Examples For Us

Posted on by korgrocker

“Nor should we put Christ to the test, as some of them did and then died from snakebites. And don’t grumble as some of them did, and then were destroyed by the angel of death. These things happened to them as examples for us. They were written down to warn us who live at the end of the age.”
1 Corinthians 10:9-11 NLT

Paul listed some additional events that occurred during the journey through the wilderness, a journey that should have taken the Israelites no more than a few weeks at most, but ultimately lasted forty years. It was a journey full of miracles, but also one marked by punishments that God inflicted on an idolatrous, complaining, and grumbling people. Yesterday, we considered the sexual immorality and idol worship. In today’s verses, Paul highlights two more episodes, the first of which can be found in Numbers 21. “Then the people of Israel set out from Mount Hor, taking the road to the Red Sea to go around the land of Edom. But the people grew impatient with the long journey, and they began to speak against God and Moses. “Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die here in the wilderness?” they complained. “There is nothing to eat here and nothing to drink. And we hate this horrible manna!” So the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people, and many were bitten and died” (Numbers 21:4-6). This time, the sin of the people was one of ingratitude, rebellion, and grumbling. The Lord’s punishment was a plague of poisonous snakes and “many were bitten and died”. Well, it indeed focused their minds, and we read what happened next in the following verses, “Then the people came to Moses and cried out, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take away the snakes.” So Moses prayed for the people. Then the Lord told him, “Make a replica of a poisonous snake and attach it to a pole. All who are bitten will live if they simply look at it!” So Moses made a bronze snake and attached it to a pole. Then anyone who was bitten by a snake could look at the bronze snake and be healed!” 

The snake episode was a “type” of what was to come, with Jesus being raised up on the cross at Calvary, and anyone who looked upon Him with a believing heart would be saved, but from a different kind of death. Jesus Himself referred to the Numbers 21 event when He said to Nicodemus, “And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life” (John 3:14-15). 

The second reference from 1 Corinthians 10:10 pertained to another instance when the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron. A man called Korah had initiated a rebellion against Moses. He was a Levite, but it appeared that he possibly desired to be a priest, and we can read the account in Numbers 16. The Lord dealt with rebellion with a terminal solution. The earth opened up, and the three rebellious families and all their belongings disappeared into a big hole, which closed over them after they had gone. But the rest of the Israelites were very upset by this. Numbers 16:41, “But the very next morning the whole community of Israel began muttering again against Moses and Aaron, saying, “You have killed the Lord’s people!”” The Lord was going to destroy them all, and he sent a plague that Moses only narrowly averted. Paul believed that the Lord sent an angel of death amongst the people, but the outcome was the same. 

Both these examples quoted by Paul in our headline verses today were “written down to warn” all who were grumblers in the Corinthian church, and, by implication, they apply to believers today. We don’t know for sure how the Corinthians reacted to Paul’s message, but we do know how we pilgrims should respond. When we wake up in the morning, do we grumble about anything? We could list many things, but none of them are worthy of a child of God. I once said to a man whom I met early one sunny summer morning, “Nice morning today”, to which he replied, “They’re all nice if you wake up”. Instead of grumbling about the injustices of life, we would do better to thank God for the new day granted to us and get up with a sense of anticipation about what God has in store for the day ahead.

Dear Heavenly Father. None of us knows the day or hour when we will leave this life, but while we are here and alive, we will thank You and praise You for all You have done for us. Please lead us in all that You want us to do today, we pray. In Jesus’ name. Amen

The Grumbling Crowds

Posted on by korgrocker

“But after his brothers left for the festival, Jesus also went, though secretly, staying out of public view. The Jewish leaders tried to find him at the festival and kept asking if anyone had seen him. There was a lot of grumbling about him among the crowds. Some argued, “He’s a good man,” but others said, “He’s nothing but a fraud who deceives the people.” But no one had the courage to speak favourably about him in public, for they were afraid of getting in trouble with the Jewish leaders.”
John 7:10-13 NLT

If nothing else, Jesus had managed to get the crowds at the Feast of Tabernacles talking about Him. Some said he was a good Man. Others said He was a fraud. But there was a lot of grumbling going on. And to cap it all, the Jewish leaders saw Jesus as a threat to their authority and the comfortable life they had as the de facto government of Israel. Were they heading up a totalitarian state, much as we find in places like Iran, with religious leaders dictating rights and wrongs, supported by a force of “heavies” to make sure the people stayed in line? Possibly, but with Jesus on the scene, unpredictable, claiming to be the Son of God, teaching a different message to the people and supported by miraculous signs, they felt they had no option other than to close Him down, by whatever method was possible and expedient. So there were those in the crowds who supported Jesus, happy to accept Him for who he was, but they probably kept their heads down for fear of “getting into trouble with the Jewish leaders”. 

So the opposing factions present in the crowds created a febrile atmosphere of argument and grumbling. Such a situation happens today, not in physical crowds but in cyberspace, with social media becoming the battleground for opposing points of view. In our democratic systems of government, there is little the leaders can do to shut down the grumblers, although they try, with legislation in place to suppress the worst excesses, but with “free speech” being maintained, for now. In Jesus’ day the crowds were located in and around Jerusalem, but today, the “crowd” is global in its extent. 

But the Bible is clear – grumbling is a sin and can show unbelief towards God. The Apostle James wrote, “What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure” (James 4:1-3). These verses from James aptly describe the “culture wars” so prevalent in today’s societies. One group of adherents to a particular ideology take an aggressive stand against another equally aggressive group, each trying to close down the other. So they quarrel and fight, incessantly grumbling, confused and ignorant – Godless people with wrong motives. It never happens amongst Christians, does it? Hmmm…

Paul wrote in Philippians 2:14-15, “Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticise you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people”. Jesus came with a mission and ministry to seek and save the lost. In the process of this, He counter-culturally challenged the status quo and wherever he went he left a trail of grumblers, particularly amongst the Jewish hierarchy. But the world has never been the same since His first coming. God’s plan for mankind’s salvation was successful and ever since Jesus walked the paths in the Middle East countless people have repented of their sins and believed in Him. And we pilgrims are demonstrations of the fruits of Jesus’ ministry. What a Saviour!

Dear Father God. Thank You for Your plan of salvation and showing us the way to eternal life with You. Our gratitude will last forever. Amen.

The Two Witnesses (3)

Posted on by korgrocker

“But after three and a half days, God breathed life into them, and they stood up! Terror struck all who were staring at them. Then a loud voice from heaven called to the two prophets, “Come up here!” And they rose to heaven in a cloud as their enemies watched. At the same time there was a terrible earthquake that destroyed a tenth of the city. Seven thousand people died in that earthquake, and everyone else was terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second terror is past, but look, the third terror is coming quickly.” 
Revelation 11:11-14 NLT

Can you imagine the scene? Two dead bodies lying in Main Street, Jerusalem. The world’s media would have been represented, video cameras rolling, interviews with the locals continuing. There would have been some conjecture about what should now be done with the corpses. But God had a plan. He solved the worldly problem by resurrecting the two witnesses, and they stood up. Can you imagine the ensuing chaos? The account talks about terror gripping the observers. It was the stuff of nightmares. No plot in a zombie film could match what would happen that day.

Then a loud voice from Heaven addressed the two resurrected prophets. Three, easy to understand, words. “Come up here!”. Said with a loud Heavenly voice that everyone could hear. But the terror the people felt was compounded because the prophets were surrounded by a cloud and ascended to Heaven before their very eyes. There was no dispute. This was no optical or magical illusion. This was happening in broad daylight. And while they were staring at this scene before them, the whole place shook with an earthquake so fierce, so terrible, that a tenth of the city was destroyed, and seven thousand people with it. 

The next piece of John’s narrative is interesting. The remaining terrified people “gave glory to the God of heaven”. To give glory to someone, perhaps for a significant sporting event, means that their achievement has been acknowledged. As I write this, the English Women’s Football Team is glorying in their win over Germany in the Women’s World Cup. But to give glory to God is much more than that. The phrase “give glory to God” was an old Jewish oath, inviting the person giving it to tell the truth before God. We see this is John 9:24 after Jesus healed the blind man, “A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. ‘Give glory to God by telling the truth,’ they said. ‘We know this man is a sinner.’” But that wasn’t what was happening here. People on earth had just witnessed two prophets give uncomfortable messages about the future for a period of three and half years. Then, to their initial relief, the devil killed them in an act of war. The people thought their troubles were now over. No more rivers turning to blood, or lengthy periods of drought. No more fire pouring from the prophets’ mouths, burning up any who opposed them. Two corpses lying in the street. But the next events – resurrection, ascension, earthquakes and destruction – finally convinced them that God was behind all this and they had no option other than give Him the glory for what had happened. But did they finally repent and turn from their wicked ways?

Do we pilgrims give God the glory for all He has done for us? Sadly, we have a tendency to take our many blessings too much for granted. Do we thank Him enough for the food on our tables, the air we breath, or our health? Do we take for granted our salvation through Jesus’s sacrifice for us. But when things are not quite what we would like, do we, like Paul, always have a thankful attitude, regardless of the circumstances in which we find ourselves? Or do we grumble? In 1 Thessalonians 5:18, Paul wrote, “Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.” He also wrote in Philippians 4:12-13, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength.” In everything we are about today, we mustn’t forget to give God the glory for all the great things He has done. And, like Habakkuk, if things don’t go our ways, and we fall upon hard times, we are full of joyful praise, glorying God anyway. We read in Habakkuk 3:17-18, “Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vines; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren; even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty, yet I will rejoice in the Lord ! I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!“

Dear Father God. Please forgive us for forgetting to thank and praise You enough. And please forgive us for those times when we grumble and complain. You have truly done great things in our lives and we give You all the glory today. Amen.