The Travails of Traveling
The Story of the Old Testament: Numbers • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Prayer
Traveling Woes
Last weekend I made the trip to with a couple of our friends from Christ Presbyterian Church, John Minihan, their pastor, and Monty Fulton, who heads up their Outreach Team. We made our way to Richmond for our East Central Presbytery meeting - it’s a six hour drive so we had a long time to talk in the car. Monty and I started talking about family road trips - the ones our parents took us on when we were kids.
Both of us were fortunate enough to have parents who took us to places all over the country as we were growing up. And that of course meant lots of time, hours, packed in the car with sibling. In my family, there were six of us kids - we filled every seat of that station wagon, Mom and Dad in the front, three in the middle and three in back row. The back of the station wagon was loaded with luggage and bags of food. My Mom put in a lot of work putting food together to eat lunches at rest stops as we made our way.
You make that many trips and spend that many hours in the car, things are going to happen. When I get together with my family we’ll start recounting stories - of when my youngest brother got sick in the car. Who, of course wants to sit in that seat even after the clean up? Of course it was the sibling who laughed when it happened.
My parents had to endure a lot - traveling can be challenging. Six kids crammed in together are going to get into fights. Or just get really noisy. I think the crowning moment was when we causing a ruckus in the back after a day of skiing in Red River, New Mexico, making our way back to the cabin we rented every year, and my parents finally had enough. The three of us, myself included, who had been involved in the ruckus, had to get out of the car and walk the rest of the way up the road to the cabin. Old school parenting. We trudged along, singing, “I’m 500 miles away from home.” That is, until some friends that we knew from Dallas, who were also skiing that week in Red River, came up the road - they were bringing pizza to our place to have dinner together. Guess who got a ride up to the cabin!
If you’ve done any traveling, you’ve got stories - lots of great ones, but also stories when things did not go as planned. Kids getting sick. Car breaking down. Flight delays and missed connections. The travails of traveling.
As I mentioned last week, the book of Numbers is a traveling book. The name Numbers comes from the military census we covered last week, but the traditional Hebrew name means “in the wilderness,” as the story covers the Israelites as they make their way from Mount Sinai area towards the promised land.
For their first year coming out of slavery in Egypt, they’ve been camped here in the desert of Sinai. It’s here that they received the covenant from God, the Ten Commandments, this agreement that would bind them to God, to be his people, his holy nation, and he would be their God. They received the instructions for the tabernacle, which they built and dedicated. Regulations for the priesthood, for Aaron and his sons to become the priests that would serve as intermediaries. We looked at many of the instructions God gave them - the ceremonial laws, the moral laws, the commandments for the feasts and festivals.
Now, they are about to head out, and as we saw last week, they took a count of all the men aged twenty and older, able to serve in the army (there’s going to be fighting ahead) and the instructions for their formation, both where they were to camp and how they would travel - always with the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant, God’s presence among them, at the very center.
So, finally, they set out: Numbers 10:11-13, On the twentieth day of the second month of the second year, the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle of the covenant law. 12 Then the Israelites set out from the Desert of Sinai and traveled from place to place until the cloud came to rest in the Desert of Paran. 13 They set out, this first time, at the Lord’s command through Moses.
You may have noticed that it’s now a year later than we saw last week: they are in the twentieth day of the second month of the second year since leaving Egypt. After over two years here in the desert, they are finally on the move, finally making their way toward the land God has long promised to give them, the land of the Canaanites (the time frame is a good indicator that God is in no hurry to get them there).
The army is counted, the formation established, God is in their midst, it’s time to go!The cloud lifts up, God’s presence leading them. They follow along making their way from the Desert of Sinai towards the Desert of Paran.
We get this description from Numbers 10:33-36 - So they set out from the mountain of the Lord and traveled for three days. The ark of the covenant of the Lord went before them during those three days to find them a place to rest. 34 The cloud of the Lord was over them by day when they set out from the camp. 35 Whenever the ark set out, Moses said, “Rise up, Lord! May your enemies be scattered; may your foes flee before you.” 36 Whenever it came to rest, he said, “Return, Lord, to the countless thousands of Israel.”
Then it begins, the travails of traveling. And with these difficulties, the complaining. We get three stories, one right after the other, of griping and complaining by the Israelites.
The first one is very brief, so I’ll share it in its entirety, Numbers 11:1-3, Now the people complained about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord, and when he heard them his anger was aroused. Then fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. 2 When the people cried out to Moses, he prayed to the Lord and the fire died down. 3 So that place was called Taberah, because fire from the Lord had burned among them.
As you might imagine, taking thousands of people across the desert - a lifestyle they’re not really used to, they are not nomads, they’d been settled in Egypt for a long time. It’s hot, dirty, they’re thirsty. This would have been hard. What do they do? They complain! They let their dissatisfaction with their current conditions be known. They are not fans of how God is leading them on this journey.
God hears their complaints, and “his anger was aroused.” He sends fire to destroy those complaining - and as we’ve seen, and will continue to see, the people cry out to Moses, he prays on their behalf, and the fire dies down.
Now the second story of complaints is much more specific, it’s all about the food. Now, you and I, I’m sure we can’t relate to this - of course we would never complain about the food being provided for us - but they did. Apparently, they were getting tired of manna. If you remember from way back in Exodus 16, manna was the bread-like substance God was providing for them every day while they are in the desert.
They are getting nostalgic for all the variety of food they were enjoying while enslaved in Egypt, Numbers 11:4-6, The rabble with them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing and said, “If only we had meat to eat! 5 We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. 6 But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!”
As before, the Lord gets angry, in fact, God is described as being exceedingly angry. He’s not the only one - Moses, too, is angry and upset and shares his woes with the Lord. Moses essentially asks God why God has placed the burden of all these people on him - this rabble who is constantly complaining.
He asks God, “Did I conceive all these people? Did I give them birth? Why do you tell me to carry them in my arms, as a nurse carries an infant, to the land you promised on oath to their ancestors?” In other words, they’re not my kids? Why do I have to put up with these complaining brats? (It was hard enough for our parents to put up with us on those trips!)
Moses has no way to provide them with the meat that they want. At the end, he literally tells God to put him to death - “If this is how you are going to treat me, please go ahead and kill me - if I have found favor in your eyes - and do not let me face my own ruin.”
Love God’s respond here - first, he lightens Moses’ burden. He instructs Moses to bring him seventy of Israel’s elders, those who stand out as leaders, and God pours out his Spirit on them. The same power that he had blessed Moses with, God takes some of the power of the Spirit and share it with the elders.
And then, to the Israelites - you want meat?! I’ll give you meat, more meat than you can stand. You’ll get so much meat it’ll be coming out of your nostrils and you loathe it. Kinda like the parent who catches their kid smoking and then makes them smoke the whole pack - you want to smoke cigarettes, I’ll give you cigarettes! You’ll notice that God will often give us the very thing we ask for, as foolish as our desire may be (we’ll see that next week when we cover Numbers 13 & 14).
God sends a strong wind and drives quail in from the sea. It’s so much quail it covers the ground, in some places, three feet deep. There is quail all around, as far as the eye can see. So the people gather it, a lot of it. But then this, Numbers 11:33 - But while the meat was still between their teeth and before it could be consumed, the anger of the Lord burned against the people, and he struck them with a severe plague.
Last complaint - this time, trouble among the leadership. Aaron and Miriam start stirring up trouble against Moses, criticizing him because he has a Cushite wife. But really, and this is so typical of us, they’re badmouthing Moses for something totally unrelated to what they really have a problem with - the real issue here is that they are jealous of Moses.
Numbers 12:2, “Has the Lord spoken only through Moses?” they asked. “Hasn’t he also spoken through us?” And the Lord heard this. God doesn’t just listen - he reacts, immediately. He calls Moses, Aaron and Miriam to meet with him at the tent of meeting (like summons to the principal’s office - we’re going to have a little talk).
God first affirms his relationship with Moses, how faithful he is, how he speaks to him face to face - because God trusts Moses so much. Then God punishes them - well, really, Miriam (not sure why Aaron escapes punishment), God turns Miriam’s skin leprous. Aaron cried out to Moses for forgiveness, and per the usual arrangement, Moses graciously cries out to God to heal Miriam. Which God does.
I want to invite us to reflect a little bit on their travels here - or, rather, the difficulties they endured. No doubt these travels were hard - making your way across the dry, dusty desert with thousands of other people. Eating the same food, day after day after day. Seriously, this would have been hard. But the problem in these stories isn’t about their hardships, but how they respond to them - all their complaining.
But here’s why it was so problematic for them to be complaining about this - and why God becomes so angry when they do. Because their complaint reveals a rejection of him. It’s a rejection of his goodness, and all that he’s done for them to get them to this point. It’s a rejection of his plan, of the great thing he is inviting them into - and process by which he is shaping and forming them. Their complaints reveal a lack of trust in God.
See this explicitly in their longing (again) to return to Egypt and to enjoy all the foods they had there. Their thinking is that life was better there rather than what God has for them - and the hardships they are having to endure in order to get there.
Remember, everything happening is a part of God’s plan for there, to shape and form them to be his people, his holy nation, nation that will be a blessing to all other nations.
He is intentionally testing them. This isn’t accidentally difficult, God has a purpose here. This is, as Ruth Haley Barton describes it, a crucible - a place or set of circumstances where people or things are subjected to forces that test them and often make them change.
And this is exactly what they are resisting, rejecting - these hardships of traveling through the desert, how long it’s taking. Humbly having to receive what God provides for them every day, being absolutely dependent on him - the manna, same food over and over again.
In Aaron and Miriam’s case, the role he has asked them to serve - which is not the same role he’s given to Moses.
Question is, how do we respond to the hardships God allows into our lives? Can we begin to see God in the hardships, in the crucible? Whole purpose of the journey is to make it with God, his presence right there in their midst. Under his guidance and protection, according to his plan - for his purposes. That what becomes key here is a willingness to surrender to God in the midst of whatever difficult, whatever crucible we’re experiencing - and to seek after him.
The Israelites are not unique in this - we see similar resistance in the Gospels from the disciples. Jesus asks his disciples who they think he is. They respond beautifully: You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God. God in their very midst, in their presence.
Jesus affirms their response, then goes on to teach that the Son of Man must suffer at the hands of the religious leaders - and not just suffer, but be put to death. Peter resists it! No, this will never happen to you! He is resisting God’s way, the way of the cross - not just for Jesus, but for himself.
By the way, did you notice that the very word, crucible, has as its root, the crux, the cross? A crucible is the cross we must bear. The hardship we must endure - the question is how we will endure it?
In our recent Spiritual Formation Group gathering, we were talking about God’s sense of time. And how God seems very content to let his people endure hardship for long periods of time - at times, really long periods of time. No hurry at all.
Those become times we can resist God, seeking another (easier) path, doing it our way. In this way we reject God and what he wants to do in us in those crucible periods. Or we can surrender to his way - and seek him in the midst of it.
Perfect example of this is Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, inviting his disciples to stay awake and pray with him as he faces his impending arrest, trial and crucifixion. This is, quite literally, Jesus’ crucible moment, his moment of great hardship. Except there’s no complaining going on. No rebellious “I want to go back to Nazareth, it was better back there.” No jealous sniping.
What does Jesus do? He goes to pray. He seeks after the Father. Not just for a few minutes, but for hours in prayer - so long the disciples he’s asked to stay watch with him and pray fall asleep not once, not twice, but three times. But Jesus knows he needs to go to the very one who has set this hardship before him, who’s laid out this journey.
Not only does Jesus seek after the Father, but he surrenders to him. It is no easy surrender. It is a brutally honest and hard fought surrender. Jesus pleads with the Father, if there’s any way, take this cup from me. But make no mistake, surrender he does. But not my will, but yours be done.
Surrendering and seeking. Seeking and surrendering - this is path the Israelites rejected. All their complaining and grumbling were a rejection of God, resisting what he had for them, the hardships he was calling them not just to endure, but to seek and to surrender to him in the midst of.
Spiritual Discipline
I want to invite you to think for a few moments about the hardships in your own life. The reality is, you’ve either just come out of one, are in the midst of one - or you’re going to move into one. There’s no escaping hardships. God allows crucibles into our lives. Sometimes God out and out brings them into our lives, as part of our journey, to shape and form us.
What would it look like to seek God with an attitude of surrender in the midst of it? To come before God asking, “where are you, Lord, in this?”
Listen, like Jesus, there’s room here to be honest with God. I don’t like this, Lord. I don’t understand it. This is hard. I’m in pain, here. Notice that those are not complaints, those are soul-bearing prayers to God.
Here’s where the Discipline of Silence can be very helpful. To simply sit before God, in silence. Because silence, at its heart, is an act of seeking God, setting ourselves before him, and an act of surrender, ourselves laid out before him.
To be attentive to God to point where you can begin to hear his voice, where you can be open to receive the comfort and peace of his presence. Where you can begin to discern what God may be doing in you through this hardship.
I started off this message with lighthearted stories of the difficulties of traveling. But there’s nothing easy or lighthearted about some of the crucibles we endure in life. As we’ll see, God is going to get his people to the Promised Land. He certainly glorified Jesus, and his willing sacrifice on the cross. Will we entrust ourselves fully to God as he takes us through the travails of our own journeys?