Monday, August 29, 2011

Wandering

For the last little while I have been reading through the first five books of the Bible (insert fancy Jewish name here). A lot of people don't really like most of these books, they are full of lots rules about bacon and sacrifices. But in the midst of them are all these crazy stories.

And I started to notice a pattern. There is always a common denominator, someone whining. We want to go back to Egypt. Moses isn't a good leader. We have nothing to eat. All the stories begin with people complaining. But the similarities end there.

For the first part of the Israelites in the wilderness, every time they complain, God provides. There's no water, water from a rock. There's no food, manna and quail from the sky. God is totally helping these people out.

Then there is a change. The golden calf. Rebellion. The people sin in the most awful way so God tells the people they will wander through the wilderness for 40 years until everyone over 20 has died. And the people, they keep on complaining. But from this point on, the complaints are met with dire consequences. Leprosy, fire from the Tabernacle, snakes, the ground opens and swallows people up, from this point on rebellion and complaining is met by tremendous acts of God, such crazy things that only God could have caused them.

All these stories have gotten me to thinking. We like to wait until things go away. Let's be honest, it's human nature, if we don't have to deal with something, we stall until hopefully the situation resolves itself. But God gives us a different example to follow. Even though He could simply wait for them all to disappear, that was the plan in the wandering, God doesn't. When something needs to be addressed, God addresses it (in a way that can only be attributed to Him).

So the question I've been asking myself is, are there things I need to address? Are there situations in which I'm passively waiting and causing more trouble when I should be actively helping? Good or bad. Maybe it's a good thing, but that takes work, and we all love extra work. But if it needs to be done and done soon to save headaches, why not do it now?

T

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

how many time i do not do what i want to do but do what i dont want to do

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