Several years ago I read somewhere that a woman in Colorado actually complained to the government that the extra hour of sunlight (because of daylight savings time) was burning up her lawn. Well, certainly we would see that sort of complaining as ridiculous. But did you know that God sees your complaining and my complaining as being ridiculous? And not just ridiculous, but what comes as a shock to a lot of people, I think God sees it as sin. I’ve been convicted this week in my study of God’s word about this common practice, so common we don’t think much of it: grumbling, complaining, whining, griping, bellyaching, expressing dissatisfaction with our circumstances or our responsibilities, or that we don’t have what somebody else has. I think God takes that more seriously than we usually do.
If you have a Bible I invite you to turn with me first to the Old Testament. We’re going to do a little reading about…
Some grumblers a long time ago.
Let’s look first at Exodus 14. This is after God has brought the nation of Israel out of slavery, out of Egypt, with a series of ten mighty plagues. He’s freed them from their slavery, but then He hardens Pharaoh’s heart so that he changes his mind. And then over the horizon, the Israelites see Pharaoh’s army coming. Exodus 14:10, “As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the Lord. 11 Then they said to Moses, “Is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you dealt with us in this way, bringing us out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.” So they’re grumbling. They’re dissatisfied with how things are going. They’re charging Moses and in effect also charging God with doing them wrong. But you know, this nation was just starting to learn about the true and living God, about His unfathomable power, His never-failing faithfulness, His infinite wisdom, His perfect goodness. They were just getting to know Him. So God is very patient with their grumbling here and just does for them what He had planned, to bring glory to His name in the earth. He parts the sea for them, and when they’re all across, He brings the waters crashing down on Pharaoh and his army.
Well, they travel three days in this dry wilderness and they run out of water in their water skins and they’re thirsty. They finally spot some water, but when they try to drink it they find it’s bitter and undrinkable. So 15:24, “So the people grumbled at Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?” But God’s still real patient with them here and He points out to Moses a tree by the waters and tells him to throw it into the water and suddenly the water becomes sweet and drinkable.
They continue on and they’re getting hungry. 16:2, “The whole congregation of the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. 3 The sons of Israel said to them, “Would that we had died by the Lord’s hand in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat, when we ate bread to the full; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” But God’s still patient with them. And He flies in for them a bunch of quail for dinner, and then in the morning, surrounding the camp, there was all that “manna,” which means “What is it?” in Hebrew. But this time Moses and Aaron tell the people in verses 7-8, “You know, God hears your grumblings. When you grumble in your tents and you think only your family hears you, God hears you. And He really doesn’t like it. You’re grumbling against Him.”
They journey on and they’re thirsty again. 17:2, “Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, ‘Give us water that we may drink.’ And Moses said to them, ‘Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?’ But the people thirsted there for water; and they grumbled against Moses and said, ‘Why, now, have you brought us up from Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?’” But God is still patient with them and gives them water from a rock, not because they grumbled, but just because they need it. Moses tells them, “You’re testing the LORD when you grumble. You’re testing His patience. It’s time to stop all this whining and complaining. It’s time to realize that the LORD your God is good and all powerful and in total control and He knows what He’s doing and He’s faithful to His promises; He’s going to take care of you and bring you to the promised land. It’s time to realize that and be grateful for what God has done and is doing and will do for us. It’s time to stop all this grumbling and trust God. It’s testing His patience.”
Do they listen? Let’s go to Numbers 11. About a year later, as God continued to be very good to them, Numbers 11:1 says, “Now the people became like those who complain of adversity in the hearing of the Lord; and when the Lord heard it, His anger was kindled, and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. 2 The people therefore cried out to Moses, and Moses prayed to the Lord and the fire died out. 3 So the name of that place was called Taberah [which means in Hebrew “burning”], because the fire of the Lord burned among them.” So by this time, God is fed up with their grumbling and He begins to discipline them for it.
Do they learn? Nope, Numbers 11:4, “The rabble [the non-Israelites] who were among them had greedy desires; and also the sons of Israel wept again and said, ‘Who will give us meat to eat? 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, but now our appetite is gone. There is nothing at all to look at except this manna.‘” Which the text explains was actually pretty good stuff. The text says it tasted like cakes baked with oil. And in Exodus 16 it says it tasted like wafers made with honey (Exodus 16:31). I think of those funnel cakes they sell at the county fair. Are there better things than those things? But they’re ungrateful and dissatisfied with their provisions, and they throw a fit about it. Verse 10 says, “Now Moses heard the people weeping throughout their families, each man at the doorway of his tent [Because they don’t get all the same food they used to eat back in Egypt. Do we ever do that? Do we ever have a meltdown because of what we don’t have, rather than thanking and praising the Lord for what we do have, how He’s brought us out of slavery, and the future He’s leading us to?]; and the anger of the LORD was kindled greatly, and Moses was displeased.” And all their whining, crying, and grumbling makes life so miserable for Moses that they even drag Moses down to complain as well. In verses 11-15 Moses grumbles, “Lord, I shouldn’t have to put up with these people. They’re not my children. I didn’t conceive them. I didn’t ask for this job. Just please kill me now and put me out of my misery if this is how things are going to go.” Well, God has patience still for Moses and He makes things easier for him by sending His Spirit on to seventy other men of the nation to equip them to share the burden of leadership with Moses. But God is running out of patience with these people. Look at verse 18, “Moses, say to the people, ‘Consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, and you shall eat meat; for you have wept in the ears of the LORD, saying, “Oh that someone would give us meat to eat! For we were well-off in Egypt.” Therefore the LORD will give you meat and you shall eat. You shall eat, not one day, nor two days, nor five days, nor ten days, nor twenty days, but a whole month, until it comes out of your nostrils and becomes loathsome to you; because you have rejected the LORD who is among you and have wept before Him, saying, “Why did we ever leave Egypt?”‘ In other words, “You want meat, I’ll give you meat, until it makes you sick, you bunch of whiners.” Now look at verse 31, “Now there went forth a wind from the Lord and it brought quail from the sea, and let them fall beside the camp, about a day’s journey on this side and a day’s journey on the other side, all around the camp and about two cubits deep [3 feet deep] on the surface of the ground. 32 The people spent all day and all night and all the next day, and gathered the quail (he who gathered least gathered ten homers) [that’s like 580 gallons of quail] and they spread them out for themselves all around the camp.” I think what happens here, is God gives them enough quail to last them a whole month, and for a whole month they’re going to eat quail instead of manna. And so they gather a whole bunch and spread out the meat to dry in the sun, to make it like jerky so it will last them a month. And they’re going to get so sick of it, but it’s all they’re going to have for 30 days. And verse 33 says, “While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the LORD was kindled against the people, and the LORD struck the people with a very severe plague. So the name of that place was called Kibroth-hattaavah [which means “graves of greediness” or “graves of craving”], because there they buried the people who had been greedy.”
In chapter 12, Moses’ siblings Miriam and Aaron come and grumble at Moses over the fact that he gets to be the leader and he gets all the attention, and they think they’re just as deserving of the top spot as he is. And the lame argument they make is that Moses married a Cushite woman. “What decent sensible man of leadership quality would marry a Cushite woman?” And God says, “You three, come here! Tabernacle, right now!” And the cloud of God’s presence comes down at the entrance of the tabernacle and He calls Miriam and Aaron closer and has a stern talk with them and when He finished, the cloud of His presence withdrew, Miriam was left white as snow with leprosy. Moses begged God for her healing. God said, “Alright, but she’ll be this way for a week.”
Chapter 14 is when the 12 men that had been sent to spy out the land of Canaan returned after 40 days and gave a report. And they said, “It really is a good land that flows with milk and honey. Look at the size of these grapes and figs and pomegranates we brought back. But the people of the land are also huge and strong and their cities are large and fortified.” And the 10 of the 12 spies said, “We can’t take this land. We’re too small. They’re too big. We can’t do it.” So 14:1, “Then all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried, and the people wept that night. All the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron; and the whole congregation said to them, ‘Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why is the LORD bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become plunder; would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?’ So they said to another, “Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt.” And God says, “Moses, I’ve had it with these people. I’m going to wipe them out. And then I will make you into a nation greater than they and bring your descendants into the Promised Land and give it to them.” And Moses prays, “But Lord, if you wipe out this people, the other nations will think little of you. They will think that you got them this far but then were unable to bring them into the land and defeat the Canaanites and their gods and just slaughtered your people in the wilderness. So please Lord forgive them and let them take the land so Your power may be known and Your name great in the earth.” And incredibly God lets Moses change His mind. The prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. But look at what God says about these people, verses 22-23, “Surely all the men who have seen My glory and My signs which I performed in Egypt and in the wilderness, yet have put Me to the test these ten times [and you know most of those times were by their grumbling] and have not listened to My voice, shall by no means see the land which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who spurned Me see it.” And down at verse 26, “The LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, “How long shall I bear with this evil congregation who are grumbling against Me? I have heard the complaints of the sons of Israel, which they are making against Me. Say to them, ‘ As I live,’ says the LORD, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will surely do to you; your corpses will fall in this wilderness, even all your numbered men, according to your complete number from twenty years old and upward, who have grumbled against Me. Surely you shall not come into the land in which I swore to settle you, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun. Your children, however, whom you said would become a prey — I will bring them in, and they will know the land which you have rejected. But as for you, your corpses will fall in this wilderness.”
It’s amazing that after all the trouble they’d gotten themselves into by grumbling, there were still more occasions of grumbling further on in the Numbers’ account of their history (Numbers 16; 20:2-5). Let’s skip over a couple and just look at one more. Numbers 21:4, “Then they set out from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the people became impatient because of the journey. The people spoke against God and Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this miserable food.” And you’re thinking, “Are you kidding me? Again? Really? It seems like they just did that and it didn’t turn out well.” But the last couple occasions of grumbling actually took place close to 40 years later after all the grumbling they did in the first couple years when they came out of Egypt (see Numbers 20:28; 33:38). It’s easy if we’re not careful to forget lessons we learned many years ago. God disciplined them again on this occasion. It says, “The LORD sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.”
Now, does this really have anything to do with you and me? That was the Old Testament. And that was weird stuff that happened a long time ago. Does it really have any relevance to us at all?
The New Testament says it has tremendous relevance for you and me.
We’re going to look at 4 passages in the NT.
I Corinthians 10:1-11
I Corinthians 10:1, written to Christians 1500 years later, “For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea; 3 and all ate the same spiritual food; 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ.” He’s saying the Israelites were like us. They were baptized into Moses in that Red Sea, like we are baptized into Christ. And they regularly, in a sense, partook of the Lord’s Supper. They ate and drank the same spiritual food and drink provided by Christ. They were like us. We are like them, he is saying. But look what happened to them. Verse 5, “Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness.” Verse 6, “Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they craved.” He points out a number of the failings of those Israelites, reasons they didn’t make it that were especially relevant for his readers in Corinth. But a couple of them that Paul mentions are occasions we just read about where they were grumbling about their accommodations out in the wilderness. Verse 9, “Nor let us try the Lord, as some of them did [that was by their grumbling], and were destroyed by the serpents. Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.” Notice they were written for our instruction. They were written to teach us that we must not grumble about how God is dealing with us before He brings us to our promised land, we must trust the Lord.
Jude 16
The little one chapter book of Jude deals with certain false teachers who were teaching that you can be immoral and live however you desire and the grace of God will still cover you, you’ll still be alright. They viewed the grace of God as license to sin. They missed that God has a condition of repentance and faithfulness if He’s going to cover your sins with His grace. And much of this little letter is showing that these teachers have put themselves outside the grace of God and they’ll be condemned along with all who follow them. At verse 16 Jude points out another characteristic of these teachers that further confirms God is not pleased with them and they’re on their way to destruction. Verse 16 says, “These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own desires…” They’re like that Exodus generation of Israelites who were grumblers, who found fault with Moses and found fault with God because of their lusts for meat and melons and garlic and the food they used to have and for just ease and luxury. Notice the participle, “following their own desires.” I think that’s why we grumble. It’s not because we’re following God, you don’t grumble because God wants you to or because it would be so encouraging to the people around you, and brightens up the atmosphere and makes a positive difference. You grumble because you are following your own desires and not the will of God.
Philippians 2: 14-15
To get some context: Paul is telling us to do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard others as more significant than ourselves, not just look out for our own interest, but the interest of others. He tells us to have the humble unselfish mind that Christ had, who left heaven, took the form of a man, went to death, even death on a cross, to bring glory to God and serve us. So he’s telling us to be like Christ and in verse 14 he says, “Do all things without grumbling or disputing.” Sometimes following Christ can be inconvenient and sometimes you’re not appreciated and sometimes following the Lord does not pay off as quickly as you’d hoped. But he says do all this without grumbling, just lay down your life, give and serve, be like Christ and don’t grumble. And in Philippians, Paul is a great example of that. He’s in prison and it’s possible he might be executed. But when you read Philippians, he’s not at all complaining, he’s talking about all this joy he has over what God is doing, how God’s using him and the future we have.
Then after verse 14 where he says to do all things without grumbling, he says in verse 15, “…that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world…” Most people are selfish, I’m still trying to kill off the old selfish self, and most people grumble and complain about things… but if we give and serve and lay down our lives, endure whatever comes our ways and don’t complain about it… we shine as lights in the world. So the next time things aren’t going your way, I think we should ask the question, “Am I going to whine or am I going to shine?” Paul says whining is not shining.
One last passage…
Ephesians 5:18
“Do not get drunk with whine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit…” One of the things I’ve learned over the past year about the Holy Spirit, is often in the scriptures, you have this language of amounts or measures or portions of the Spirit a person can receive, some more, some less. One of these stories we read in Numbers, where Moses was sick of the people and asking God to just kill him, God made it easier on Moses, He said I’m going to take some of the Spirit that is on you and put it on seventy other people so they can bear some of the burden of leadership with you. And remember Elisha got a double portion of the Spirit that Elijah had. So there’s these portions you can have. These Christians Paul is writing to have the Holy Spirit, just as all Christians do, and yet Paul says “be filled with the Holy Spirit.” There’s more, you can experience more of God’s Spirit. Well, how do you do that? In the Greek text, it’s a little clearer. The main command is “be filled with the Spirit,” and then you have this series of what is called participles to explain how you do that. How do you bring in God’s Spirit, how do you experience more of Him? It is the very opposite of grumbling and complaining, it’s worship and thanksgiving. Verses 19-21, he says, “addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Grumbling and complaining grieves the Spirit, repels His Spirit. But when we sing to one another, we praise Him, we give thanks, and we’re humble toward one another, we get along, we’re not bickering, we submit to one another; when we have humble peaceful relationships and we’re worshipping and praising God, that invites more of the Spirit, we can experience more of His power, more of His help and goodness.
I don’t know about you, but I needed this lesson. I respond to the invitation this morning because I know I’ve complained about things and I have no right to complain. The Lord died for me, the death I should have died, and yet here I am alive and I’m going to live forever because of what he did. He’s forgiven me my sins, He’s shaping my character, giving me purpose. I have so much to be thankful for, all that complaining ought to be replaced with praise and thanks.
– James Williams