Sometimes the new life God is leading you to won’t seem as great as the one He has redeemed you from. Remember the whining of those redeemed from Egypt?
We remember the fish which we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic. —Numbers 11:5
We remember the pleasures—leeks, onions, fish, etc.—all sensory, and no spirituality. It is never the lack of spiritual connection with God we miss. It is always the pleasure. All things being equal, we prefer leeks to manna. What we had seems better than what we have.
Never mind that we cried out to God to deliver us from bondage. Forget that we had no land of our own. We just want a better supper, like Esau, who for a single meal would abandon the blessing of a birthright (Gen. 25:29-34; Heb. 12:16). Like David, who for a one-night stand with a voluptuous woman would endure the life-long, agonizing sword that never departed from his family.
We remember the pleasures of a life apart from Christ, but we forget the painful bondage from which we cried to God for deliverance. We crave the best of two incompatible worlds.
When God removes something delightful from your life—something you had in abundance years ago—a number of emotional triggers kick in. Anger. Injustice. Pleasure is priority. Temptation to cross over. Coveting. But gratitude?
Uh, no.
Satan is the best marketer in the sin business. He can stretch a thin skin of beauty over a heap of dung and convince you to climb it. The devil renders the pleasures of sin as but a down payment—not a sacrifice on his part—for your ruin. He knows he gets back double for his investment. He loses nothing; you lose it all.
Only after you enter sin’s doorway will you see that that the facade that looked so enticing is actually propped up by a few two-by-fours. One strong wind will collapse the whole thing down on top of you.
But even when our longing isn’t for sin—when we grumble for only the good things God withholds—the same point applies: grumbling and complaining about God's provision amounts to rebellion against God. Has the Lord not promised to care for our needs? And if, for some reason, He chooses to wait to do so, might He have a reason?
Any kind of grumbling stems from a failure to see the true value in God’s will. To insist on instant gratification minimizes and overlooks that which is of infinite worth.
Our challenge today? Pursue that which is infinite over that which is instant.
Image courtesy of BiblePlaces.com.
2 comments:
This touches on the fact that one of the central pieces of our fallen nature is the fall of our desire. Before the serpent talked to Eve, all that was desired was also all that was moral. Moral good and aesthetic good were one and the same. When she saw that the forbidden fruit was DESIRABLE, she took and ate. It is this division that Satan seeks, and likewise under grace it is the unity of desire and godliness that God seeks to restore. One of the chief gifts of justification is the death of the part of us that wants to go back to gratification from the forbidden. More here if interested: Two Kinds of Good
Thanks Wayne!
That's a helpful reminder, Jim, about the importance of renewing our minds. Thank you.
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