Falling short of Gods blessings.

In Exodus God takes the children of Israel out of Egypt, showing them amazing miracles. God promises them a land flowing with milk and honey- modern day translation: I am going to take you to the most amazing gorgeous place where you will have everything you could ever want. On the way to this cool place Israel complains and loses their faith in God. They eventually give into idols and worship other gods. Modern day translation: God gives us promises, it takes longer than we want, so we say, “fine I will do my own thing.” We stop reading our bibles and going to church and start getting sucked into the world of materialism, entertainment and sin.

In Numbers God has given Israel favor and they have conquered many great nations. Today this would be God allowing us to move up in our jobs, move closer towards our dream house, becoming rich, at the same time as having our families grow.
All this background takes us to Exodus 32.

In verses 1-2 Reuben and Gad, two tribes of Israel, want to settle in a land just short of the promise land. It is like being promised an ocean front beach house but realizing that 7th street is looking pretty good and you feel comfortable there.

In verses 3-5 Reuben and Gad ask if they can stop at this place because they have a lot of livestock (cars, boats, and toys) and the land would be good for all of their stuff.

In verses 6-7 Moses asks them why they are being stupid and giving up short of what God promised.

In verses 8-15 Moses tells them why they should not quit short of what God promised them. Moses gives examples of people who had stopped short of what God promised and how God cursed these people.

In verse 16-19 Reuben and Gad do not listen to Moses’ warnings, they continue to convince him that they have fully thought this through, weighed the pros and cons, and have decided to accept less than what God has promised. Even worse they promise to help all of the other tribes make it to the Promised Land. This would be like saying we will pay for our portion of the gorgeous beach house, we will even help you build it and negotiate all of the contracts and then instead of staying we would rather go to 7th street. Crazy right??

This always blew me away, they had seen all of the miracles that God did bringing them out of Egypt and yet they stopped short of the gift that God promised them. I know we can feel this same way. Israel thought they were going to receive the promise land soon after God brought them out of Egypt. Instead, the eleven day journey turned into 40years. I would have been asking why God had not fulfilled everything that He said He was going to.

The Lord has been teaching me that we can come to Him with everything. This means our fears and disappointments. If only Reuben and Gad would have said, “God we know you are faithful you proved that to us when you showed us all of the miracles in Egypt. God we know you provide, you proved that to us when you sent manna down from heaven. God we know you are perfect and holy, you proved that to us when you purified our people and built the temple. God we know that you are taking us to a land flowing with milk and honey, but why is it taking so long? We are afraid you have forgotten about us.”

If Israel would have come to God, not with a complaining spirit, not with a spirit lacking faith, but with a humble and broken spirit, God would have comforted them and brought them peace. God would have spoke to them and showed them why it has taken so long and still given them the Promised Land.

God can handle the fact that we don’t know what He is doing, as long as we trust the Lord He will replace our spirit of worry with a spirit of peace. We may not always get a detailed list of why God is doing certain things in our lives but He does promise His peace.

27Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. 28"You heard me say, 'I am going away and I am coming back to you.' If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. (John 14: 27-28)

xoxo
Ash B