THE BEST TIME IS NOW (EXODUS 16:1-21)
I read a true account of a billionaire who purchased an expensive $20-million jet that transported him between Los Angeles and New York. He collected works of art by contemporary masters to hang in his homes, bought identical wardrobes for clothing on both coasts and owned two houses in Los Angeles and two in New York.
In the hope of gaining a companion the billionaire bought a parrot and taught his pet bird to speak. It was a great start. The bird was able to pick up simple words easily, and just a few words from the parrot such as “Hi!” “Good morning!” and “How are you doing?” would thrill and satisfy the owner. He enjoyed the daily task of teaching the bird new words.
One day the owner realized that the parrot was merely repeating whatever he was taught. Finally, when he was tired of the empty chatter, he shouted at the bird in his frustration and anger, “SHUT UP!” Of course, the bird gave him a dose of his own medicine. How did the bird respond? By shouting back “SHUT UP!”
Someone wisely said, “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.”
Not long after the Red Sea deliverance, Moses faced a trying time in the wilderness. The people grumbled non-stop. They were chronic grumblers. The Hebrew word for “grumble” (v 2) is the same word for staying the night, spending the night or stopping for the night (Gen 19:2, 28:11). Grumbling is a annoying lingering houseguest that is hard to rid of. The Hebrew word for grumble made its debut in the desert barely three days after the miraculous spectacle under the sea (Ex 15:22-24). The second grumbling incident now erupted in the middle of the second month (16:1-2). The words “grumbled” (16:2, 7) and “grumblings” (16:7, 8, 8, 8, 9, 12) appear eight times altogether in Exodus 16, more than any chapter in the Bible. The grumbling heightened and intensified, and this time the Israelites’ target and victim was Aaron (v 2).
Why is grumbling a present hindrance to past and future progress? How does God view His people who moan and groan at the first sign of trouble? What kind of attitude adjustment do we need?
Relax and Rejoice in the Lord
16:1 The whole Israelite community set out from Elim and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt. 2 In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. 3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.” (Ex 16:1-3)
People forget the good they receive the moment adversity arrives. Worse, they wish for death more than life or they wish they were never given life. Suicide ambushes them at the time when not all is lost.
Controversial baseball player Darryl Strawberry, whose troubles with drug addiction have overshadowed the three World Series titles he won, typifies those who deny their responsibility and despise their lives. When Strawberry was with the Dodgers, he responded the most negative way possible to his reversal of fortune, which included the IRS investigating him for tax fraud, the court punishing him for beating his wife and the Los Angeles baseball fans booing him for his poor performance on the field and his substance abuse off the field. He said to the press, “I thought, ‘What would it be like if I wasn’t around anymore?’ There wouldn’t be any problems if I wasn’t around. Then people wouldn’t have anything else to say.” (Los Angeles Times 9/22/93)
The Centers for Disease Control reported that one in three adolescents said they’ve thought about suicide and this figure is true for all income groups. Women attempted suicide three times more often than men do; however, men are more likely to commit suicide than women. Every year in the United States, more than 24,000 men succeed, compared to 6,000 women, according to the National Center for Health Statistics (Los Angeles Times 3/30/93).
Despair for life begins with a dislike for who you are and what you have, then a distribution of blame and unhappiness to others and, finally, a delusion that death ends and solves all problems.
The Israelites identified the killer in Egypt as God and not Pharaoh (16:3), confused the quality of life in Egypt under the old Pharaohs with the new Pharaoh and bemoaned their death rather than behold their options when they ran into roadblocks.
People tend to pine for the past they never had, so much so that they could never enjoy the present. Nostalgia is an enemy of the present good. Already, they had forgotten the miracle at Marah (Ex 15:22-24), where God made the bitter waters of Marah drinkable. As long as they trust in God, they were not without hope or help. Their option was to relax and rejoice in the Lord. It was far better than resenting the Lord for where they were not, who they never were and what they never had.
The Israelites were not thankful to God, truthful to themselves or thinking of Moses and Aaron. Their problems began with a seldom-used Hebrew wish “if only” (Ex 16:3, Judg 9:29). These two words result in wishful thinking, sentimental longings and disgruntled beings. They were unwanted guests and national enemies in Egypt; merely visitors, outsiders and trespassers to the locals. Thankfulness to God meant recognizing that God had freed them, saved them and guided them. God was not the killer, Pharaoh was; the Israelite babies did not die, Egyptian babies did; and not a single Israelite drowned, Egypt’s army did.
The truth of Egypt was that food was never in the abundance for Israel and the Israelites were never comrades, only slaves, there. Israel forgot about the oppression (1:11), the cruelty (1:13), the bondage (1:14) and the death (1:15) that befell them in Egypt. Their last days there were spent in groaning, wailing and crying (2:23). Their cries were loud, never quiet sobbing or sniffing, but sadly, the groaning in slavery (2:23) had turned into grumbling in freedom.
By the time Israel had vented, Moses was the victim, not them (16:3). The accusation shocked Moses: “You have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.” Moses was horrified to discover that he was chiefly responsible for leading an entire assembly - men, women and children - to their death. At this point, the Lord stepped in to put a stop to their ranting and raving, and gave them a test.
Run and Return to the Lord
6 So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the LORD who brought you out of Egypt, 7 and in the morning you will see the glory of the LORD, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should grumble against us?” 8 Moses also said, “You will know that it was the LORD when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the LORD.” (Ex 16:6-8)
Jim Smith went to church on Sunday morning. He heard the organist miss a note during the prelude, and he winced. He saw a teenager talking when everybody was supposed to be bowed in silent prayer. He felt like the usher was watching to see what he put in the offering plate and it made him boil. He caught the preacher making a slip five times in the sermon by actual count. As he slipped out through the side door during the closing hymn, he muttered to himself, “Never again, what a bunch of clods and hypocrites!”
Ron Jones went to the same church one Sunday morning. He heard the organist play an arrangement of “A Mighty Fortress” and he thrilled at the majesty of it. He heard a young girl take a moment in the service to speak her simple moving message of the difference her faith makes in her life. He was glad to see that this church was sharing in a special offering for the hungry children of Nigeria. He especially appreciated the sermon that Sunday - it answered a question that had bothered him for a long time. He thought as he walked out the doors of the church, “How can a man come here and not feel the presence of God?” (Illustrations Unlimited, James Hewett)
Smith and Jones had a different attitude and heard different things.
Israel thought that problem number one was Moses’ leadership, but they had no self-awareness of a bigger personal obstacle - their departure from God. Their failed relationship with the Lord was at the heart of their grumbling. Moses mentioned the Lord five times (vv 6, 7, thrice in 8) in three short verses, and he used a devastating head-eyes-ears-mouth or know-see-heard-grumble argument to counter the mistreatment at the hands of the Israelites: “In the evening you will ‘know’ that it was the LORD who brought you out of Egypt, and in the morning you will see the glory of the LORD, because he has ‘heard’ your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should ‘grumble’ against us?”
The Israelites needed to quickly return to the Lord. They need to repair the damaged relationship with God and take responsibility for their actions, turn aside from their pigheadedness, trust more and whine less. Their death wish and their vocal complain that God was a killer (v 3) were unjustifiable and inexcusable after all that the Lord had done for them.
The God of Israel was not an unloving, an unsympathetic and unresponsive God. He was worthy of their belief, trust and worship. Serving and following Him was never wrong. He didn’t change, but they changed.
Moses answered that the Lord who had saved Israel before will satisfy them that day and will stretch or test them tomorrow. Moses’ first words in his reply answered the Israelites’ assertion that they were better off if God had killed them in Egypt in the first place (16:3). He answered that God had always been the deliverer and not the death of Israel: “In the evening you will know that it was the LORD who ‘brought you out’ of Egypt” (v 6). The Lord had no desire to kill them in the wilderness, since it was He who saved them from Egypt. The opposite of what they said was true: God found them in Egypt and rescued and delivered them from Egypt.
The irony of Moses’ reply resonated with the Israelites who, besides asserting that they would rather die by the Lord’s hands in Egypt, contented that they sat around pots of meat and ate all the food they wanted (v 3). Now they were given all the meat they could eat in the evening and all the bread they want in the morning (v 8). They could bake, boil or cook the manna that was flown in (16:23). God did it His way to satisfy their argument, but not their desires. Later Israel would not have the stomach for it (Num 11:6). The manna was a test (Ex 16:4), just as the bitter waters of Marah were (Ex 15:25). They were to gather no more than necessary, but again many later failed the test (16:20).
Rest and Rely on the Lord
21 Each morning everyone gathered as much as he needed, and when the sun grew hot, it melted away. 22 On the sixth day, they gathered twice as much--two omers for each person--and the leaders of the community came and reported this to Moses. 23 He said to them, “This is what the LORD commanded: ‘Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the LORD. So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning.’“ 24 So they saved it until morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink or get maggots in it. 25 “Eat it today,” Moses said, “because today is a Sabbath to the LORD. You will not find any of it on the ground today. 26 Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any.” (Ex 16:21-26)
In the eleventh century, King Henry III of Bavaria grew tired of court life and the pressures of being a monarch. He made application to Prior Richard at a local monastery, asking to be accepted as a contemplative and spend the rest of his life in the monastery.
“Your Majesty,” said the Prior Richard, “do you understand that the pledge here is one of obedience? That will be hard because you have been a king.” “I understand,” said Henry. “The rest of my life I will be obedient to you, as Christ leads you.” “Then I will tell you what to do,” said Prior Richard. “Go back to your throne and serve faithfully in the place where God has put you.”
When King Henry died, a statement was written: “The king learned to rule by being obedient.” (Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching 155, ed. By Craig Brian Larson Baker 1993)
Daily necessities, though not bare necessities, were given the Israelites so that they would learn to depend on the Lord, and not on the food. Food was never in short supply until Joshua entered the land (Josh 5:12). Besides food, clothing and sandals, too, were never wanting (Deut 29:5). God wanted them to have confidence in Him based on their past experience of Him, that He would be there for them today and tomorrow, just as He was there for them in the past.
The old English word for “rely” comes from the word, rally; so to rely on the Lord means having the confidence that He will rally to you, coming to the right place at the right time with the right help.
Dependence on the Lord is not blind faith; it comes with instructions, rules and guidelines. For maximum or optimum enjoyment and gladness, they had to follow orders. Moses told Israel what to enjoy, what to evade and what to expect. Moses told the Israelites how to enjoy their food: knowing when to collect, what to do with it and how much was needed. It meant gathering food in proportion to the storage of the stomach and the number of people in the family (16:15).
Israel also found out that dependence on the Lord was a day by day experience: “No one is to keep any of it until morning” (16:19). Moses’ instructions were to use food today and not to save for tomorrow, to share with others not to keep from others, to eat fresh food and not to waste leftovers.
The Lord also warned them what to expect for defying orders. Forbidden food did not taste sweeter; it did not last or satisfy (16:20). They also incurred Moses’ displeasure (16:20). Infringing on the Sabbath day’s rest when they were allowed to collect double the night before (16:27) was an exercise in futility.
Conclusion: In the New Testament, Paul warns believers not to grumble as the Israelites did (1 Cor 10:10); instead, we are to trust that God is faithful and He will not let us be tempted beyond what we can bear, but will also provide a way out when we are tempted. God’s grace is sufficient for His people. His power is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor 12:9). He doesn’t withhold anything that is good from his children who ask of Him (Matt 7:7). Do you count your blessings? Are you testing His goodness? Have you appropriated every spiritual blessing that is available in in Christ? (Eph 1:3)
Victor Yap
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