WORD OF WARNING
The final words of today’s Psalm put the fear of God into me: “Therefore in my anger I swore, 'They shall not enter my rest.'” Yikes! How many times this week I have given up in despair, forgetting who God is and failing to consider what God has done, as the psalmist fervently urges us to do (O come! O come!). Rather than bringing God words of thanks, I have turned my back to him. Rather than rejoicing in God’s strength, power, creativity and care (I am a sheep!), I have doubted God’s ability or desire to sustain me.
Stomach churning, I move on to the reading in Exodus, where I discover that I am not alone. Here the Israelites complain about not having anything to eat and actually accuse God of wanting to kill them, which seems awfully bold considering God had very recently rescued them from being slaves in Egypt. Yet here, rather than smiting them, God provides food for them, with quail in the evening and manna in the morning. Oh. Okay. Here God’s first response is to provide for his people’s needs, even in the midst of their complaints and accusations.
While eventually God does get fed up and refuses to allow the first generation of Israelites into the promised land — after Meribah and Massah, for instance, where the Israelites complain about lack of water— God’s anger is the result of many years of complaining. I have been warned!
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