Keep Your Eyes on What GOD Has Done
What have you been desiring or craving? What have your thoughts been fixed on? What do you find yourself complaining about?
In Numbers 11, the Israelites are in the wilderness (on their way to the promise land) after God had just delivered them from slavery in Egypt. Yet, they still complained. They had a strong craving for meat and were reminiscent of how things used to be for them in Egypt (Numbers 11:4-6). They quickly had forgotten the slavery that God had delivered them from; they had taken their eyes off what God had done for them.
Psalm 106:13-14 states that: “They quickly forgot His works; They did not wait for His counsel, but craved intensely in the wilderness, and tempted God in the desert.”
How often we are like the Israelites. Quick to forget all that the Lord has done for us and delivered us from; Quick to complain and desire after that which used to keep us in bondage.
Dr. Constable puts it as such “How often does Christ, the bread of life, not suffice a heart not in communion with God! The heart seeks elsewhere for its nourishment; it wants something else; it remembers what the flesh used to enjoy in the world and forgets the bondage in which it was held.”
James 1:12-15 says:
“Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. No one is to say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it has run its course, brings forth death.”
We see from James that we are carried away and enticed by our own lust or, in other words, our own desires. The Israelites were craving what they had in Egypt, instead of focusing on the good gift of deliverance that the Lord had just given to them.
Desires that Ensnare
In Numbers 11:18-20, God tells Moses that He is going to answer His people’s prayer and will provide them with meat, but that it will end up becoming loathsome to them (Numbers 11:18-20). Psalm 106:15 continues on to say, “so He gave them their request, but sent a wasting disease among them.” What the Israelites thought would satisfy them ended up making them sick.
It is not that desiring the meat was wrong in itself; it is that the Israelites forgot what the Lord had done for them and instead of trusting the Lord in the wilderness and thanking Him for His deliverance, they fell into complaint. In the same way, our desires are not necessarily wrong (we can desire things that are not sinful), yet often we allow our desires to consume us in such a way that we become willing to sin to get what we want.
When what we desire and crave becomes an idol, in such that we put it above God and are now looking to it to satisfy us, it ends us ensnaring us.
We end up thinking that we have to have what we are desiring to be satisfied. Yet when we finally receive what we were wanting, we end up finding out that it does not deliver like we thought it would. It might satisfy us for a moment, but eventually we find ourselves either completely consumed by our desire or back in the same place of feeling unsatisfied, desiring something else. This is because anything apart from Jesus will never satisfy us or quench our thirst.
Jeremiah 2:13 says:
“For My people have committed two evils:
They have abandoned Me,
The fountain of living waters,
To carve out for themselves cisterns,
Broken cisterns
That do not hold water.”
Everything apart from Christ is like a broken cistern that hold’s no water. Instead, the water just continues to seep out of the cracks and the cistern never fills up. This is what it is like to chase after and live for our desires, even good desires. If we make our desires the center of our lives, it will leave us unsatisfied and unfulfilled. The Lord made us for Himself and we are only ever truly satisfied when we are finding our delight in Him alone.
The Source of True Satisfaction
When you feel like you are walking in the wilderness, a change of circumstances is not what will finally make life great or what will satisfy you. Jesus Christ is the only true source of satisfaction in the wilderness season’s and in abundant seasons. He is with us in every season and in His presence is the fullness of joy (Psalm 16:11). There is nothing sweeter than the love of Christ.
“For Christ also suffered for sins once for all time, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit.” - 1 Peter 3:18
“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” - Romans 5:8
“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin in our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” - 2 Corinthians 5:21
To Live
Bring your desires to the feet of Jesus, lay them down at His feet and entrust them to Him. Ask Him to help you see that He is the greatest treasure and that He alone satisfies.
Read Numbers 11 & Psalm 106
To Listen
*this article was originally posted on Kindred Soul Counseling