You know when you’re looking at someone on the train or in a park or somewhere and they catch your eye so you look away in case they think you’re staring at them? Well, last Sunday, today and over the next few weeks we’re looking at men and women in the Bible and how they prayed. We’re peering into people’s private prayers at delicate points in their lives; moments of great vulnerability and intimacy and particularly here with Moses in Numbers 11. It feels a little intrusive really. At least they can’t look up and embarrass you as they catch you doing it.
But the reason we do this is not to pry but to learn and grow. About these very Old Testament stories, like the one we just read in Numbers, Romans 15.4 says this:
“Everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.”
This is about learning to go the distance, finding encouragement when life is against us. In Numbers 11 we’re at a crucial turning point in the history of God’s people. They have just been miraculously set free from 400 years of cruel oppression. For generations they had cried out to God to get them out of Egypt and lead them into the Promised Land. And God did that. The tyrant Pharaoh was overcome and they escaped unharmed as the mighty hand of God opened up the waters of the Red Sea. They celebrated greatly. The Lord led them through the desert with a pillar of cloud by day and a column of fire by night. He sent bread from heaven to feed them.
On the face of it, with a recent history as good as that, you’d have thought that the people would be really fired up.
The Toxic Power of Grumbling
So it’s a bit of a shock when chapter 11 starts with these words:
Now the people complained about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord, and when he heard them his anger was aroused. Then fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. When the people cried out to Moses, he prayed to the Lord and the fire died down… The rabble with them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing and said, “If only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost - also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!”
You don’t have to be Einstein do understand that things were not going well. Hardships, fire, complaints, cravings, regrets, disillusionments, comparisons, eating disorders... They were in a desert. They were obviously hungry and thirsty. They had no directions and no map. They had baggage to carry. There was nothing to do. It was too hot. It was too cold. Yes, both! In that part of the world, it’s 40˚ by day and 0˚ at night.
We English hate to complain don’t we? We hate to make a fuss. We mumble to each other that the soup is cold but when the waiter comes and says “Is everything OK?” we say “Oh yes, fine thanks.” The Italians have noticed this. They have a proverb that says, “Step on an Englishman’s toe and he’ll apologise to you.” I met a man who was half German and he told me that restaurateurs in Germany save the worst wine for the us because they know we are the only ones who won’t object! Sometimes people should complain a little.
Let me tell you a story about a man who decided to join a monastery.
The chief monk told him that it would be hard. He would have to give up all his possessions, pray all day and remain totally silent with one small exception. He was allowed to say two words every five years. Five years go by and the Pope comes to visit. “How’s it going?” he says and the man replies with the two words available to him “Bed hard.” So the Pope says, “Terribly sorry, we didn’t know. We’ll take care of it right away.”
Five more years go by and at the end of that time, the Pope comes back again. “How are you my son, is everything OK now?” So the man replies, “Food cold.” The Pope says, “So sorry, I’ll sort it out for you today.”
Five more years pass by and the Pope comes back a third time. “Hello again! Is everything all right now for you?” The man says “I quit.” So the Pope says, “Well of course you quit. I’m not surprised. You’ve been here for 15 years and all you’ve done is complain!”
But there’s a difference between a reasonable drawing attention to under par service and the unhappy overflow of an ungrateful heart. These grumblings and murmurings are recorded here not to show us we should never complain about cold soup. But to show us how fickle human nature can be. There is an alarming contrast between chapter 10 and chapter 11! How quickly people can turn from celebration to griping.
Who do these complaints come from? Verse 4 talks about “the rabble.” It seems that there was an unwilling and vocal group at the heart of the community that soured the whole atmosphere. You know the sort of negative, unhelpful person who walks into a room and the temperature drops immediately. It’s like the bloke who says “I was going to buy a copy of that book the Power of Positive Thinking and then I thought “Ah, but what good would that do?”
Who were these people, this rabble in Numbers 11? The commentaries suggest that it was most likely a small number of Egyptian former slaves, non Israelites, who found their way into the exodus as well. These were people who did not share the identity of the people of God. They jumped on the bandwagon but they never really bought into the identity of being God’s holy people and the vision of where God was leading them.
God had promised them a land flowing with milk and honey. He promised he would drive out their enemies before them. He promised them protection and blessing. It was to this people that he revealed himself as Yahweh Raphé (I am the Lord who heals you).
But the rabble only came along for the ride. They only joined in as long as everything was going well and as long as they were personally getting something out of it, but at the first sign of hardship, instead of hanging on to what God had promised, instead of facing adversity in faith, they complained and grumbled and moaned and whinged. And the result is that their negativity polluted the mood of the whole community.
The reality is this: just like the community in the desert here, in any church there are times of setback and discouragement. There are seasons when everything seems to go wrong. There are times when you have to fight in faith and pray with passion despite any evidence of God being with you.
A few weeks ago we showed a video clip of our young people’s work and we celebrated the great things God is doing amongst them. Next week there’ll be a clip about how God is blessing the Lunch Club ministry. We want to talk about what God is doing, not about what God is not doing! We love to celebrate that. But those clips don’t tell you the whole story. We could have showed you a video of the leaders and volunteers of those ministries crying out to God in frustration, praying and agonising, working late into the night preparing, being let down, dealing with crises and illness and exhaustion… That’s the other side of the same reality. It’s because the kingdom of God is both now and not yet. It’s here but it is yet to come. Sometimes we see the power of God break through and wonderful things happen. Other times we don’t. Some are healed. Others aren’t. Some come to faith. Others never do.
The basic problem here is that the rabble had ungrateful hearts. After all God had done for them they should have been overflowing with thanksgiving.
After all God has done for us in Christ so should we! 1 Thessalonians 5.18 says “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
Cultivate a grateful soul. You have been redeemed at a high price (the blood of Jesus), you are deeply esteemed by your heavenly Father, you are the apple of his eye, you have been salvaged from the gates of hell and an eternity of bitter regret by grace. You are held with affection in the mighty hand of God, nothing can tear you from his grip and nothing can separate you from his love. So learn to nurture a thankful heart. Don’t let the rabble get to you!
The Impact of Grumbling on a Leader
You talk to any leader and they’ll probably say that the hardest thing to deal with as a leader is the rabble. You get rabbles in businesses, schools, political parties, extended families, voluntary groups, hospitals, even churches … you name the organisation, and there’s a good chance that there’ll be a rabble.
They’re the ones who always say how much better things were before. A few chapters down the line, in Numbers 16, they describe Egypt, the country they had just left, as a land flowing with milk and honey. No it wasn’t! It was a land of hopeless toil and oppression and slavery with no dignity.
The rabble are the ones who spread a spirit of dissatisfaction. In v4 the whole community takes their cue from them: “If only we had meat to eat!” they all say. “We have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!” Wait a minute! This is coming from people who have had miracle bread from heaven every day. The Bible says “It was like coriander seed and looked like resin.” Exotic. “You ground it in a hand mill or crushed it in a mortar.” Convenient. “You could cook it in a pot or make it into loaves.” Versatile. “And it tasted like something made with olive oil.” Sounds delicious. People say there’s no such thing as a free lunch – yet this didn’t cost them a bean. What did they want, jam on it!?
The rabble are the ones who, whatever goes wrong, whoever is responsible, blame the leader. “My car’s broken down. Well it’s no wonder is it, with David Cameron in charge?” “My pew sheet is a bit creased. Well that would never have happened with the last vicar!” Fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. Verse 2; the people cried out to… Moses. “Hey, what’s with all this fire from heaven singing my tent? It’s not very convenient Moses, sort it out!”
Poor Moses! He had met with God at the burning bush. He had seen a vision of the Promised Land. He had been at the forefront of God’s mighty deliverance. He had talked with the Lord face to face on the mountain that shook with the awesome grandeur of God’s holiness. He was excited and motivated about what God was doing. He could see where it was all going. He had given up living in a palace for that.
Hebrews 11 says “By faith Moses… refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.” Even when he was just eating manna it doesn’t bother him that much because he had seen the future. The rabble could only see manna.
And now, because of their moaning and complaining, everybody in the whole camp - 600,000 of them - are wailing at the entrance of their tents. What does 600,000 wailing people sound like?
The ancient Romans had a tradition: whenever one of their engineers constructed an arch, as the capstone, the central stone at the top of the arch, was hoisted into place, the engineer assumed responsibility for his design and the workmanship of his builders in the most profound way possible: he stood underneath. Feel the pressure.
600,000 wailing people. Feel the pressure. The rabble and their negativity and complaining became the focal point of all the pressure Moses was under.
And this is how the rabble often affect leaders. Moses hears all that wailing and cracks under the pressure. And this is the prayer of a leader who is close to the edge. It’s not working. Maybe it’s my fault? And if you’ll allow me to share my heart with you one moment, I’m no Moses but in 20 years of pastoral ministry, I’ve been here many times. Every church leader I know has been here. It’s where you feel that God is calling you to do more than you can deliver. “I don’t know if I can do this, Lord! Maybe I’m the problem. Maybe I just haven’t got it. Maybe I should have just stayed in retail management.”
Verse 13: Hear the exasperation in Moses’ voice. See the tears rolling down his face. “Where can I get meat for all these people? They keep wailing to me, 'Give us meat to eat!' I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me.”
Every pastoral leader asks themselves from time to time the same questions. What have I got to feed these people? Can I say anything that has even a grain of wisdom and doesn’t sound hollow? As I stare at a blank computer screen uninspired for a sermon I must preach tomorrow, is there anything in this book of any interest at all today? Paul said “I die daily.” I’m no Paul, but I die at least monthly!
Then you see how vulnerable leaders can be in v11. “Why have you brought this trouble on your servant?” says Moses. “What have I done to displease you that you put the burden of all these people on me?” Notice he’s getting things distorted. He’s starting to blame God for everything.
“Did I conceive all these people? Did I give them birth? Why do you tell me to carry them in my arms, as a nurse carries an infant?”
Moses is feeling, “Maybe I should just move to an easier job that hasn’t got the hassle.” He’s saying “Why is this my problem? I don’t have to be responsible for this lot. If you so want to get them into the Promised Land, do it yourself, I can’t be bothered anymore.”
Why did all this happen? How did things get so bad so quickly that Moses actually wanted God to finish him off?
The answer is that he allowed himself to become worried about the problems instead of focused on his vision. The vision was “God is leading these people into a land flowing with milk and honey. But Moses is bogged down with the problems and ground down by the rabble. “How long will this take? How can I keep everybody happy? Where am I going to get meat from? I just don’t know how I’m going to sort that out. They want fish! How am I going to get fish in a desert? How will I ever have the time to do everything I have to do?
He needs to get to where Paul was in 2 Corinthians 3.4-5, “Such confidence we have through Christ before God. Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.”
In our vision to reach out to this parish, we’re going to encounter much opposition and many problems. Just one month into a 48 month vision and we already have encountered opposition and problems. There’ll be times when the rabble start to whisper and moan. There’ll be times when we’ll have to choose not to listen to that and decide that we’re going to overflow with thankfulness instead. There’ll be times when there’ll be too much to do, too little money and too few resources to do it. We will face ridiculous odds. But our confidence is in Christ and our competence comes from God.
Ending
So as I close, as we think about the 4 years ahead of us, how did God answer all Moses’ questions? In the way he usually does. He doesn’t answer all our questions; he questions our answers instead.
Verse 23: The Lord answered Moses, "Is the Lord's arm too short?"
Is there anything God cannot do?
Is his arm too short to save?
Is God somehow unable to honour his promises to us?
Is anything impossible for God?
Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 10th October 2010
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