We Have Lost Our Appetite

Numbers 11:4-6 says, "If only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost – also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!”

Don't miss that small little phrase that begins the third sentence of this passage..."We have lost our appetite". Why? "We never see anything but this manna!"

Having traveled through the wilderness for many, many days, the people of Israel fall prey to a common problem...selective memory. They begin to remember their days in Egypt. They remembered having meat to eat, free fried fish, and all the salad and fruit you could want. They remembered never having to worry about the variety of their meals.

But they forgot two very important things. First of all, they really didn't get "the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost...." It really came at a great cost...their freedom. They forgot their bondage. They forgot the hours of making bricks and laboring to build the massive Egyptian structures. They forgot the beatings and the executions. All they can remember is the food.

Like Israel, we tend to remember only the pleasant things, the good things. That why we fondly reminince about the good old days. Don't get me wrong. There were some good things in those days. But there was plenty that wasn't so good either. It is just our nature to remember the good over the bad. 

Secondly, they forgot that the very thing they are complaining about now, manna, was a free gift from God that, at one time, they were very grateful to receive it. It wasn't that manna was bad. It was just they had grown use to it. They received it everyday. If it were taken away, they would surely miss it, they were taking it for granted now, rather than seeing its blessing.

Isn't that how we treat God's grace. We all know that we would miss it if it wasn't there, don't we? We all know that we are dependent on it to survive spiritually. But because it is so freely given, because by its very definition, grace is, well, grace, we sometimes take it for granted that it is there.

The danger? As Israel demonstrates, when we take something freely given for granted, we tend to lose our appetite for it. When we have experienced a blessing for so long, we tend to feel like we're missing out on something else. "We never see anything but..." 

Isn't it true that what followed that but, "this manna", was more than enough. Isn't it true that manna in freedom, even in a wilderness, is better than meat in slavery?

But do we really believe that? Do we ever find that we have "lost our appetite" for God? Do we ever secretly wonder if there is something better that what we are always seeing?

As for me, manna in the desert beats meat in slavery anytime!

Murmur or Lament?

No sooner had the Israelites left slavery and bondage of Egypt, they began to complain. They complained about the lack of water. They complained about a lack of food. Then they complained about the lack of variety of food. Numbers 11:4-6 says, "If only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost – also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!” They complained about Moses and to Moses. They complained about the God they barely knew. In the Land Between, the Israelites became champion complainers.

Tomorrow, we are going to focus on the phrase "We have lost our appetite". Today, I want to drill down on the difference between murmuring and lamenting. The first puts us on dangerous footing with God; the second actually brings us face to face to God.

In the Land Between, the Israelites whined and complained to one another about how God had let them down. They gave in to discouragement. They did not complain to God. They complained about God.  And there is a big difference. The Bible calls murmuring. Murmuring is complaining about a situation to someone other than the person to whom you are murmuring. The New Testament word for this is gossip. And God rebukes the Israelites for their murmuring.

And the reality is, murmuring does no good! Usually the person we are murmuring to cannot do anything to change the situation. Our murmuring is usually just an attempt to divide and cause people to take our side!

By contrast, there is another form of complaint in the Bible that God seems to affirm. It is called a lament. If murmuring is complaining about God, lament is faith-filled complaining to God.
 Murmuring is gossiping about God; lament is a prayer of desperation to God. Murmuring is a hopeless cry of despair. Lament is a despairing prayer of hope.

There is a wonderful example of a godly lament in Numbers 11:11-15. The Israelites were complaining about manna. And then we are told that God was angry about the Israelites murmuring. Moses was at the end of his rope also. Moses asked the Lord, “Why have you brought this trouble on your servant? What have I done to displease you that you put the burden of all these people on me? 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? Where can I get meat for all these people? They keep wailing to me, ‘Give us meat to eat!’ I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me. 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.”

Sounds like Moses is complaining as well, doesn't it? The difference? In their murmuring the Israelites are complaining about God. In his lament Moses is praying to God. There is a huge distinction. Moses isn’t rejecting God. In bringing his questions and complaints, Moses has turned towards God, not away from him.

The Land Between

For more than two hundred years the people of Israel had lived in the fertile Nile delta of Egypt, led there by Jacob when seeking to survive a terrible worldwide famine. The Israelites hadn’t just survived, in many ways they had thrived with their numbers increasing exponentially, so much so that the Egyptians were fearful of the potential power they had. The Egyptian Pharaoh’s forced them into awful slavery, making bricks for Pharaoh’s many building projects. Eventually the Israelites cried out and their cry was heard by the God they barely knew or remembered.

Through a burning bush God called a man called Moses to lead his people out of slavery. God made this promise in Exodus 3:8: "(I will) bring them up out of that land and into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey."

And so begins one of the most amazing stories in the whole bible – the story of the Exodus, where God liberates a group of illiterate slaves from the bondage of the superpower of the ancient world. Miracle after miracle frees and then sustains them. Ten plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, manna from heaven and water from a rock. God leads Israel OUT OF Egypt and INTO the Promised Land. But between the “out of” and “in to” is the Land Between. It is in the Land Between that perhaps the most important part of the story is found. Certainly it is the place where the biggest part of the story occurs.

It is in the Land Between where we need the greatest amount of faith. I once saw a diagram similar to the one below in a book by Chuck Swindoll. I think it perfectly illustrates the land between.

We don't need a lot of faith before the trial begins (obviously it hasn't started yet). And we don't need a lot of faith for the trial ends (it's over). We need faith during the trial; while we are in the wilderness; while we are in the Land Between.


For Israel the Land Between was a physical location. It was the Sinai Peninsula. It was then and is now a desolate place of limited vegetation and even less fresh water. It was a wilderness. It is a desert. And it would be their home for forty years.

As the Israelites journey OUT FROM the lush fertile home of their past IN TO the lush fertile home of their future, they pass through the wilderness, a desert, the Land Between.

But the Land Between was also more than a physical location. It was also the place of uncertainty, of testing, and of desperation. It was the place where faith was discovered and lost.Through forty years of wilderness wanderings the Israelites discovered that the Land Between is the place where faith can thrive, but also the place where faith can dry up and die.

A “Land Between” times can be be very disruptive. We can find ourselves in the land between suddenly, without any warning. We come into work one day and our boss says, “I’m so sorry, but we have to downsize.” We come home one day and our partner shocks us with the words, “I’m sorry, but I don’t love you anymore. I'm leaving” We sit in the doctor’s office and he says to us, “I’m afraid I have bad news.”

The Land Between is the place where everything that is normal is interrupted. In the Land Between we experience acute uncertainty and disruption; where life is not as it once was and where the future is in question. It is a hard place, a dry place a desert place. The Land Between, that space where we feel lost or lonely or deeply hurt, can also be fertile ground for our spiritual transformation and for God’s grace to be revealed in magnificent ways.

For Israel, the Land Between became a place of complaint, provision, discipline and growth. This week,  we are going to focus in on the first characteristic, complaint. Next week, we will look at the other three.

The Father's Heart

Luke 15:17-20 tells us: “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’ So he got up and went to his father. “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”

Now be honest. Wouldn’t you expect verse 20  say, “His father saw him and was filled with what?” If you didn’t know the story, you would expect him to say “anger”, wouldn’t you? Verse 21 continues: “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’”

You see, the Prodigal is making the same mistake that the older brother is making. He thinks his behavior is what makes him acceptable to the Father. He things his performance can make him a part of the Father’s house again. But here’s one of the great truths of the parable. You can know more earn the Father’s grace than you can throw yourself a surprise party. They both come from the Father.

Verses 22-23 continue, “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick!...” Wait a minute...not quick. Don't you think we would have a few questions? I think so. We would want to know if he had really changed, wouldn’t you? We would want to know if he was back for good. W might be tempted to suggest that our friend wait a few weeks. It would feel too early for a party, don’t you think? It would be if you were focused on the boy’s past behavior. But that is not the father's heart.

The Father says, “Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.” And that brings us to the Father’s desire.

The Feast of the Father

Pastor Craig Barnes tells a very personal story. He says, “[My father] left us when I was sixteen, and once he left, he never stopped running. Every time we tried to find him, he would only leave and disappear again. He died alone in a raggedy trailer park somewhere in the middle of Florida. A neighboring pastor, who did not know him, spent two days trying to find his family even though he did not know our names. My dad missed all of the important events in his sons' lives: graduations, weddings, birth of children, our two ordinations, and both of our Ph.D. ceremonies. He missed all of it. I prayed and prayed that he would return to us. I used to yearn for the day that he would show up in a congregation where I was preaching. My longing was for him to come through the line at the end of worship, take my hand and say, 'Good job, son' But he never came."

The story we have been studying for the past five weeks is a story, not about a father who didn’t come, but a God who ran to His prodigal son.

This story is the result of a group of people gathering around to listen to Jesus. Luke tells us in Luke 15:1-2: “Now the tax collectors and 'sinners' were all gathering around to hear him. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, 'This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.'"

The tax gatherers and the sinners loved to gather around and listen to Jesus. Andy Stanley wrote, in his book, The Grace of God, the ones who were nothing like Jesus, liked Jesus. Then in verse two, we are told that the Pharisees and teachers of the law gathered around again began to murmur among themselves. People who were nothing like Jesus, liked Jesus. And Jesus liked people who were nothing like him. So out of their murmuring, Jesus tells these stories that reveal the heart of God.

The third of these stories begins with a father and two sons. Jesus understood birth order long before modern child psychology began to talk about it. The older brother is a behaver. He did everything right. He tried to find fulfillment in life by obeying all the rules. The younger brother is a misbehaver. He wants to find fulfillment by sowing his wild oats, by searching for everything fun and living life to its fullest.

But the reality of this story told by Jesus, is that the story isn’t really about a rebellious younger son, or a self-righteous older son. It is really a story about the Father. The rebellion of the younger son, resulting in it’s ultimate degradation of the pigpen didn’t shock the Pharisees and teachers. Sin always has a gotcha. And the religious people of Jesus’ day understood this. They were shocked that the prodigal ended up in the pigpen. The self-righteous behavior of the older brother, didn’t really shock the tax gatherers and sinners. For decades they have felt the condemnation and judgment of angry, bitter, religious people. You know some of them, don’t you? The tax collectors and sinners weren’t surprised that the older brother acted like this.

But the actions of the Father shocked both groups. This week, we are going to drill-down on the actions of the Father and see what Jesus is telling us about our Heavenly Father.