"Moses Stories For Our Times: Facing Challenges"
Dr. James L.
Mayfield September 29, 2002
Text: Exodus 16-17:7 (in worship read 16:2-3, 11-15) Here is another Moses story. Listen, not merely to the story I am telling, but listen beyond my words; listen for the special Word in this story that God is speaking to you personally and to your situation. God had rescued the Israelites from Pharaoh's army and brought them safely to the other side of the Red Sea. There, the Israelites camped at Elim, an oasis where there were springs of water and palm trees that produced dates to eat. After all they had been through, it was a most welcomed oasis in more ways than one. But then, the time came to move on. This is the way life is. We cannot remain at the comfortable oasis and also move on toward the promised land. Even if we have given up on there being a promised land, it is impossible to remain at the comfortable oasis. This is the way life is. Life moves-on and life moves us on. In this life, there is no place of permanent rest and peace. To be alive is to keep moving from one challenge to another until we die. This is true whether we are moving the direction God intends us to go or merely wandering some other direction we have chosen for ourselves. The time came for the Israelites to leave their comfortable oasis and continue their journey toward their special rendezvous with God at Mt. Sinai. The overall travel plan was first for them to go to Mt. Sinai and confirm their relationship with God and then after that, they were to move on to the land God had promised their ancestors. However, this travel plan would lead them into and through the wilderness. There are several stories in the Bible about wilderness experiences that are related to people or persons becoming the persons God intends them to be. Moses was in the wilderness when God drafted him to lead the Israelites. David had his time in the wilderness before he was king. Jesus spent 40 days and nights in the wilderness before he began his ministry. There is a sense in which after Paul's conversion he had two or three years of a kind of wilderness experience. Augustine, Martin Luther, John Wesley and many of us have gone through some sort of wilderness experience on our faith journey. Whatever else the wilderness may represent, it is a place or time in life where one is forced to face and deal with fundamental realities. The wilderness is a time or place in life where all the stuff we thought was important is somehow stripped away, and we must deal with the basics. Our wilderness experiences are times of testing, situations, circumstances, places in life that causes us to reevaluate priorities and to discover or rediscover what is really important. The Israelites, were led into the wilderness. The wilderness places in our lives are very different from the oasis times in our lives. For one thing, in the wilderness nourishment for living becomes an issue. At the oasis, we do not even think about what we really need because there is so much there for the taking. But in the wilderness experience, we become aware of basic needs and what is really important. So it was for the Israelites. They became aware they were hungry. To be sure we are talking about basic food for their stomachs. But for those with ears to hear, the issue was and is about more, much more, than stomach food. Remember the temptations that confronted Jesus in his wilderness experience? They had to do with three types of human hunger, -- hunger for food, hunger for recognition, hunger for power. And how Jesus dealt with his hunger in the wilderness, shaped the way he lived the rest of his life. And how we deal with our wilderness experiences shapes the way we live the rest of our lives. The Israelites had empty stomachs. I can imagine their stomachs growling, their children being cranky and crying. They were out of food, and Moses was leading them deeper and deeper into the wilderness. Without sustenance they could not go on. Without some food they and their children would die. Little wonder they began to complain. Discomfort has a way of making us forget about the promises of God. And so, the Israelites did what I often do when the going is difficult and I cannot see how I will to obtain the resources I need to make it through. They grumbled and complained. They forgot all that God had done for them, and they forgot God was leading them to the land of milk and honey God had promised. Focused on their hunger, they ignored or forgot about God and attacked Moses and Aaron saying: "At least back in Egypt we had plenty to eat. Do you remember the wonderful strews we had? We could have died of old age in slavery. Instead, you have brought us into this wilderness to starve us to death." Focused on their immediate hunger, what God had done for them in the past seemed irrelevant. Their release from bondage, their being rescued from Pharaoh's army were yesterday's news. Today's problem was they were hungry in the wilderness, and the Red Sea blocked their way back to their familiar misery in Egypt. I can just hear them saying: "Why did we allow ourselves to get in this mess? Slavery wasn't so bad." The Bible tells us God heard their grumbling. Well, of course, God heard; God always hears. But rather than be frustrated because of their lack of faith, and their lack of commitment, God dealt with them the way they were. Which, of course, is what God always does. God deals with us as we are, where we are. God continued to carry out his plan to fulfill the promises God had made their ancestors: Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And just as God had delivered them from bondage and rescued them from Pharaoh's army, once again, God provided what was needed. God provided meat and bread - quail and manna. God told Moses that each morning bread from heaven would rain down upon the Israelites. All the people had to do was go out, gather it and eat it. And sure enough, that happened. Each morning when the Israelites awoke, there was a fine flaky substance that looked like frost on the ground. The people called it manna. The instructions from God were that they were to gather about 2 quarts for each person; that would be more than enough for the day. And it was. The writer of the Book of Exodus tells us each person was fed all he or she could eat. They were fed until they wanted no more. But they were to gather only one day's supply. If they did not believe God's promise about providing enough manna for each day and because of their doubt tried to horde extra manna for themselves, before the next morning their excess would stink and be full of worms. God was teaching the Israelites that each day God would provide what they needed for that day. It is the same lesson Jesus was teaching us when he taught us to pray: "Give us this day our daily bread." This is the way life is to be lived -- especially when life has led us into some sort of wilderness. God provides what we need for each day, one day at a time, and the more we fret and struggle to horde more for ourselves, unwilling to trust God with our tomorrow, the more our efforts become a stinking, worm infested mess. Only on the day before the Sabbath was it safe to gather a two day supply. This was so that on the Sabbath, the people would be able to do what the Sabbath required -- namely, to rest and to be refreshed by pausing to remember who they were and what God had done. God had not only rescued the people from bondage, God also provided what the people needed to make it through the wilderness -- manna in the morning, quail in the evening. In another story, on another occasion, when the Israelites thought they would die of thirst, God provided the water they needed. God had not freed the Israelites just to bring them into the wilderness to die. God had a plan, a purpose. Those grumbling and faithless ex-slaves, following Moses through the wilderness were the ones through whom God would somehow, someway, someday work to reclaim the creation that had gone astray. God was not about to allow the Israelites to be destroyed in the wilderness. The purpose of their wilderness experience was not to destroy them. The purpose of the wilderness was to transform them from being victimized slaves of Pharaoh into tough, disciplined, faithful servants of God. In order for this transformation to happen, God provided the Israelites what they needed -- one day at a time. And this is the way it is for us also. Our wilderness experiences need not destroy us. God provides what we need, not merely to enable us to survived but also too transform us so that we can become disciplined, faithful servants of God. In our wilderness experiences, God provides what we need -- one day at a time. Pastoral Prayer: Guide us, O thou great Jehovah, pilgrims through this barren land. We are weak, but thou art mighty; hold us with thy powerful hand. Bread of heaven, bread of heaven, feed us till we want no more; feed us till we want no more. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Let us thank God for the gifts and blessings we have received. We have come here with a variety of concerns and problems. Let us ask God for guidance and help. God, you are beyond our ability to comprehend. Thank you for becoming incarnate in Jesus and revealing that you are like an ideal parent whose justice is awesome and whose mercy is amazing. Because of what we have learned through Christ, we are aware that you know each of us in depth and detail. You know each of us better than we know ourselves. Not only do you clearly see all our sin, you also see the amazing potential and possibility within us. You not only see who we are, warts and all, you also see the persons, that by your grace, we can become. God, help us accept your forgiveness. Help us let go of all that prevents us from being the persons you intend us to be. Enable each of us to commit ourselves to the disciplined living that will enable us to fulfill the potential you see in us. And what we pray for ourselves, we pray for others. May all your children live as you intend so that your will is fulfilled on this planet and all nations and all persons are able to live together in peace and without fear. Redeem and reclaim, this, your creation, so that all of us will live as Jesus was teaching us to live when he taught us to pray: "Our Father ... ."
|