Numbers Chapter 11
Do You Trust Or Do You Complain?
This chapter says that the people of Israel complained about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord and when God heard them his anger was aroused. The Hebrew word for aroused is CHARAH, which means “to burn with anger.”
God was hot mad! He responded by allowing fire to come down and burn some of the outskirts of the camp. The fire didn’t destroy anyone but the people knew God was not happy at all. I’m sure they were filled with fear. Who wouldn’t be afraid if they saw fire come down from heaven? God’s anger was justified because God is against any form of disobedience. He loves us. He wants to take care of us. But he wants us to trust him. Do we? Do We complain about our hardships? Do we act as if we aren’t supposed to have hardships? A lot of Christians think that way and so when it happens, they become angry with God. They pray for it to be removed IMMEDIATELY versus saying, thank you God for this hardship because I know it will help me become more like Jesus, it will help me mature in my faith.
In John 16:33, Jesus says to take heart because we will have troubles and hardships in this world, but we can have peace knowing we can be overcomers. James 1 says we are to persevere through the troubles and not complain. In fact it says to consider it all joy knowing that we will be conformed more and more into the image of Christ.
The challenge is to be joyful during hardships versus being complainers. Being Joyful is a way of telling God you trust him.
