What Were They Thinking?

Praise the Lord!

Oh, give thanks to the LORD,

for He is good!

For His mercy endures forever.

Psalm 106:1, NKJV

Okay, so God's people were enslaved and being slaughtered in Egypt under the hard and heavy hand of Pharaoh and his task masters. They cried out to the Lord in their captivity, and He heard their cry. He found Moses over in Midian looking after his father-in-law's sheep, and He says to Moses, "Go deliver My people, and I will be with you." So then Moses goes back to Egypt, where his face is plastered on every post office wall as public enemy number one, does a whole bunch of awesome stuff with a stick and the power of God, and Pharaoh emancipates the Hebrew slaves and sends them packing on down to the Red Sea shore. Then he changes his mind, chases them with chariots and horses, and ends up drowning in the Red Sea when God parted the waters for Moses to pass over on dry ground but brought the waves crashing down again on the heads of the Egyptians. God feeds the Israelites when they are hungry, waters them when they are thirsty, shields them from the heat of the desert day and the cold of the desert night, gives them victory after miraculous victory over their enemies. And how do they thank him?

They did not appreciate the powerful goodness of God.

They rebelled against Him and His chosen representative.

They quickly forgot all that He had done for them.

They lusted for the things they did not have, and complained about the things they did have.

They griped about the generous provision of God and put Him to the test.

They envied God's appointed leaders.

They took an oath to serve God alone, and at the first opportunity made themselves a worthless god from the gold of their earrings.

They despised the pleasant land God had promised them and refused to enter it out of fear.

They did not listen to His word, nor did they believe it.

They ran after other gods.

They drove Moses to the point of insanity and crazed disobedience.

They did not fulfill the demands of God to destroy His enemies, bur rather intermarried and intermingled and became corrupt.

They served the idols of their enemies, and sacrificed their own children in abominable flames.

They defiled themselves and the land God had given them.

And in spite of all that, in spite of the punishment and discipline and correction He had to inflict on them, God did not reject or disown His Chosen People. He did not forget them or the covenant He had made with them. He did not cast them off or destroy them completely. Instead, He heard their afflicted cries, their grief, their sorrow, their repentance. They may have indeed been crying because they got caught, certainly because they were being punished, but God heard them anyway. And He showed up time and time and time again just to save them and demonstrate to them that, though they were a sorry lot, He was still a good God!

Thank You, God, that You are always better to me than sometimes I am to You.