“Then the whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night. 2. All the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, and the whole community told them, if only we had died in the land of Egypt, or if only we had died in this wilderness! 3. Why is the Lord bringing us into this land to die by the sword? Our wives and little children will become plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt? 4. So they said to one another, ‘Let’s appoint a leader and go back to Egypt.’” HCSB
This is a sad commentary on the history of God’s people. Just a short time before this, the Israelites marched out of Egypt with their heads held high. Four hundred years of captivity had ended. God had miraculously delivered them from Egypt. He had miraculously gotten them through the Red Sea. He had given them manna to eat every morning and provided quail along the way. What did God have to do to show them that He meant business? Now they want to erase all of this, backtrack and go back to captivity in Egypt. Why? As the Israelites got closer to the “promised land,” Moses sent out twelve spies to spy out the land that they were to conquer. The report of the spies was that it was as good a land as God had said it was. The problem was that the people were big folks, and the Israelite spies, except for Joshua and Caleb, said that they seemed like “grasshoppers” in their sight. Wow! They have gone from the victorious people of God with their heads held high to “grasshoppers.” Of course, you know that they never returned to Egypt but the fact that the thought was there and a plan presented proved a lack of faith on their part. This made me wonder about how many times have I come to a bad place in my life and in my heart devised a plan to “go back to Egypt”? Just as God’s plan for Israel was to forge ahead and not go back to Egypt, so it is with us. . If God wants me in Palestine, He doesn’t intend for me to go back to Egypt. Thus far I have been nice, because I have referred to my own lack of faith. What about you? How many times have you made plans to “go back to Egypt?” Somehow we think that when God makes a promise to us, it will be fulfilled without a great deal of responsibility on our part. It just doesn’t work that way. God has “the promised land” in our future, but there will be struggles and fights along the way to get there. If the struggle seems bigger than God, then we will want to back up and not carry out in our lives what God wants. Where are you sitting now in reference to God’s plan for your life as against what you want for your life? If you are like a lot of people, you will not really worry about what God wants and go on your merry way. You don’t have to worry about going back to Egypt, because you have never left your "Egypt.". But if you really care, you need to plan to face the struggles and fight the fights that are ahead of you to do and to be what God wants you to be. These struggles and fights need to be carried out with faith. And, unlike the Israelites here, we need to realize that though we seem like “grasshoppers” our God is considerably bigger than a grasshopper and is capable of helping us through whatever we need to go through. What happened as a result of this plan to “go back to Egypt”? The Israelites were made to wander through the desert for the next forty years until the generation that left Egypt died out. They wasted forty years because of a lack of faith. How much time have we wasted in our lives because of our own lack of faith? Be sure that I am not fussing at you, I’m saying to you what I say to myself: “Get up off of it. Trust God. Get in the struggle and stop wasting time.” Stop making plans to “go back to Egypt” and get on with what God wants for your life. You can be sure that the Lord does want something for your life and it is worth the struggle to find it. Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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