Random thoughts from a man who only knows in part until the Perfect comes

So how long does it take those nice, warm feelings you get after a good worship service to wear off?  Or perhaps it wasn’t a worship service; perhaps God did a genuine work in your family, your work, or your church that just screamed His glory.  How long did it take for the joy of that experience to fade?  How long before your mind shifted from His glory to your felt needs?  How long did it take for your mind to slip from a focus on heaven’s glories to a focus on earth’s vanities?

I must admit, for me it happens quickly.  It’s hard, so long as I live in this body of death, to keep my heart and mind focused on God like it should be.  I am reminded of that this morning as I read in Exodus.  In Exodus 15 there is a glorious song that the people of Israel sang after God delivered them out of Egypt.  If you remember, they had just crossed the sea safely, yet the hapless Egyptians who tried to pursue them found their demise in that very same sea as God allowed the waters to close over them, killing them and delivering Israel once for all.  The victory over Pharaoh’s men at the sea was the final glorious touch on an amazing series of miracles that delivered Israel from the chains of Egyptian slavery.

The heartfelt worship they offered the Lord in response was awesome.  Moses leads the people in a song (Exodus 15:1-21) that, as I read it this morning, brought me to tears of joy.  It’s a beautiful proclamation of God’s power and glory.  I felt compelled to find Caedmon’s Call’s song Warrior and listen to it this morning as I read the Song of Moses.  It was a wonderful worship time, especially as I focused in on verse 13 – “You have led in your steadfast love the people whom you have redeemed,” and verse 16b – “…till your people, O Lord, pass by, till the people pass by whom you have purchased,” and I couldn’t help but repeat out loud verse 18 – “The Lord will reign forever and ever.”

Then…I came to verse 22 and beyond.  The people went THREE DAYS…and then began to grumble.  They began to grumble for water.  For the Israelites it only took three days for the glorious joy of God’s deliverance and the heartfelt impulses of worship to grow faint in view of the pressing physical needs before them -  pressing needs that they desperately wanted met.   As I read those verses I was indignant.  I wondered how these foolish Israelites could act that way!  I was indignant, that is, until I realize how much I am like the Israelites.  This has been a tough week for me on many fronts and I have allowed the challenges that have been before me to get my eyes of Christ and His sufficiency and instead let them anxiously wander to my own felt needs.   I have allowed my own “thirst” for God to fix things in my life to lead me into moments of grumbling that forget the many ways He has worked in the past.  I would have been there in the middle of the crowd grumbling against Moses because I was thirsty.

Did God not care about their thirst?  Does He not care about mine?  Yes He did and does, but He was allowing them to thirst so that he could test them.  He says so in Exodus 15:25. They failed the first test, and they would continue to fail the tests that He would continually bring their way.  Instead of finding their hope in Him, trusting Who He is, and believing that He will continue to provide for and deliver them, they turn on God and grumbled.   God is testing me.  He cares for me in ways that are infinitely more abundant than I can imagine, and He has done for me more than I He did for the Israelites; for in my case He didn’t just split the sea and bring me out of physical slavery, He split the divide between man and God and brought me out of a greater and more sinister bondage than the Israelites had experienced under Pharaoh – the bondage of sin.  He saved me through the precious blood of His Son, so that through Christ I too can be a son, a child of the King.  And He is a loving Father and He is testing me, strengthening me, disciplining me to be a better son.    If I will keep my mind on His deliverance and His glorious nature then I will endure this season and prayerfully not fall into the grumbling that my flesh loves to take part in.

O how easy it is to forget that the same God who seemingly took me to the throne of worship this past Sunday is the One who allows me to pass through thirsty patches of life come Wednesday.  O how I don’t want to be like the Israelites, and I beg for God to make me a person who sets his mind on things that are above, not on things that are on earth (Colossians 3:2).