Part I
The attitude of complaining
Numbers 11 & 14
Hossein Mardashty
Today we’re going to look at the most important stories in all of Scriptures. It is the story of the children of Israel who refuse to go into the Promised Land. It is so important that every single book, every author, every writer of the bible refers to this story in one way or the other. |Even Jesus speaks of it and that is how important it is.
Those of you who read your bibles should be familiar with the parable of fig tree. In this parable Jesus said that he wants to see fruits in our lives. That’s why God has planted us on this planet. That’s why we are on the face of the Earth. God wants to see fruit comes out of our life. The bible talks about the fruits of the Spirit which are; love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, faithfulness, kindness and self-control. God wants to see that kind of fruit coming out your life and my life. It is God’s intention ever since he’d created man to bless us. He wants you to be a blessing to others. He wants to bless you so that you could bless other people.
God always wanted to do that. In fact Jesus said; I have come (why did you come Jesus?) I have come that you may have life and that you may have it more abundantly.
Let me ask you this question as we start this new series this afternoon.
Is that a kind of life you’re living?
Are you living a kind of life that is fruitful? Do you see the fruits of the Spirit and this abundant life that Jesus has promised happening in your life? Or is your life more kind of like wilderness, kind of like a desert; it’s kind of dry and daily and routine and nothing really fruitful is coming on and it’s just whole hung on the same3 thing day in and day out and you would say if any body were to ask you; are you living an abundant life? And if were honest you would have to say; No!
And yet God wants you to. God wants you to be fruitful; he wants you to be blessed; he wants you to have a wonderful life; God wants you to be a blessing; he has done anything in his power to make that happened.
And so my question is to you and to me; if my life is as abundant as Jesus is talking about then why not? Why am I not living this abundant life?
And maybe your answer is found in this Old Testament story. It could be that your attitude, the way you think, the pattern of thinking that is formed in your life ever since you were a little child to where you are to day is a pattern of thinking that God hates. And so for the next ten Saturdays we are going to talk about two things; we are going to make a foundation for every thing we are going to say during next ten Saturdays today. It’s all based on this one story.
We are going to talk about five attitudes, five pattern of thinking, five ways of thinking in your life style that God absolutely hates and he wants you to get rid of them. But if you ever get rid of anything in your life, if you get rid of a habit you have got to replace it with something else. So we are going to do that; five things that God hates and five things that God loves.
The first thing we are going to talk about today is complaining.
God absolutely hates complaining. He hates it and that bring us to our story. I want to tell a part of it and then we’re going to read it.
You know that the children of the Israel went down to Egypt after Joseph led them down there and there they became slaves of the Egyptians for four hundred years. They were the Egyptians’ labor force. They helped build all the great pyramids, and all the great palaces that are still standing down there in Egypt today. They were down there as slave labor for four hundred years until God said that’s enough it’s time for you to leave that place and going to the land that I’d promised your forefather Abraham to give you. The bible always uses this description of it; a land flowing with milk and honey.
So about two million of them got up and Moses led them out of Egypt, across the red sea, out into the Sinai desert where for one year they camped out at the base of Mount Sinai. During that time God fed them with Manna from Heaven, he gave them water out of rocks and he gave the Ten Commandments until finally God said; OK, now I am ready to bring you into the Promised Land. It was a trip that took them 18 months to get from Egypt up to the border of this land that God says the land flowing with milk and honey. A land that God said I am going to give it to you. Now that they got up to that border, they got scared and they thought wait a minute, we don’t know who is in this place and we need to find out. So Moses appointed 12 spies to go into the land and see if it truly was this land milk and honey that God had promised.
So these 12 spies went in and they came back and here is their report; they said yes indeed. This really is the land of milk and honey; it is a great land; it’s a wonderful land; it’s a fertile land and ten of them said it’s wonderful except, but, however, wait; there are giants in the land. They got armies there; they got guys so big that we will never take that place. We need to back off and think about that.
But two of spies came back with this report; yes it’s a land filled with milk and honey, there are good things there, it’s every thing God said it was; yes there are giants in there but God is with us let’s go and take it. God had promised it to us so let’s go and get it.
Now listen to the reaction of the people. This is our story.
Numbers 14:1-4
Did people follow the ten’s report or the two report?
I hope you heard that. The word that the Scripture uses is that the people grumbled. This word is called untomontopia that it’s a literally device where the word sounds like what was happening. And all of the people started grumbling means they did …
You brought us out to this place; we had so good back there in Egypt. Really?! You were slaves making bricks for some one else’s house or tomb and at the most miserable salary; for food to eat and a place to sleep.
How does God think about grumbling like this? Let’s see God’s reaction.
Numbers 14:26-30
This is incredible. This is amazing. In fact it is so amazing that every single writer in the bible refers to this story in way or the other. It was the news around the town. God said; I am so sick of hearing you complaining that every body that is 20 years old and older, you’re going to die in this wilderness. You may ask yourself that is that what God thinks about complaining? That’s what the bible says.
Now remember that they were almost two million people and just imagine the numbers of 20 years old and older. And every single one of them died out there in that wilderness.
You may say that’s kind of wild; isn’t it? Why God would be so upset about complaining? We all like to complain after all. How many of you like to complain? It is like we are wired to complain. You don’t believe it? What’s the first thing you do when you get around the circle of your friends? Oh man, this brother Hossein is so bad, it is so wrong, this is wrong, that is wrong, this is not good, that’s not good, I wish I had this, I wish I did not have that, I don’t like this but I like that. It’s just like we invite people to our place to have some one to complain about the thing we don’t like to. We all like to complain. You like to complain and I like to complain. We all love to complain. Why is that? Why is that we are such negative people all the time?
Because it is easier to complain than it is to say something positive. Because if I say something positive about a thing I’m going to have to do something about it. Our problem most of the times is that we don’t want to do anything and what we want is to complain.
With in mind I want to tell you what an attitude is because God can’t stand this attitude of complaining.
Definition of an attitude:
- An attitude is simply a thinking pattern. A way that you have thought about things that has been that was for a long period of time. Attitude is something that forms over a long period of time.
- An attitude is something you pick up. You pick up attitude from people around you. If your mother or father were grumblers, guess what you learn at your dinner table? Or your friends for instance; if they are not serious about the word of God or God himself, then you get that attitude and as the result come to church thinking that it’s right to make jokes about God and his word and his servant at the same time. We learn this pattern of thinking all the way ever since we’d been little children. We learn how to do it.
But there comes a time in our lives that God gives us a choice. And now we can choose our attitudes. We are mature now, we’d learned how to grumble from our parents or friends or siblings but we don’t have to continue grumbling about that. We can choose to change and God gives us the choice.
Do you know that your attitudes are the ones that you choose?
If you are a negative person
If you are always a grumbler
If you never say anything positive about anything
It’s because you have chosen to be that way.
You may say; I don’t believe that brother. I believe that my mother and father and friends and siblings and the society have made me that way and I don’t have any choice in it. That’s wrong. You have every single choice in the world.
Now if that’s true then when the children of Israel start to adopt this pattern of thinking. How they start to become grumblers?
They started grumbling way back there in their slavery days when they were making bricks and constructed all those pyramids and buildings for the Egyptians. They started grumbling back then. Imagine what was the subject of their conversation at that time; I hate this slavery, we live in this miserable hut and I am building a palace for those ungrateful Egyptians … And then they got out in the wilderness seeing God bring them to the red sea, he was giving them food to eat, he was giving them water and all of the sudden they began to look around and say we don’t like this desert out here, we hate it. I want you to listen about their complaining.
This is found in Numbers 11:1-3
Complaining by the Israelites wasn’t a new thing, it was an old thing. In fact they were so good at it that when they finally got towards the Promised Land they began to complain again. God was so fed up with it. He’d listened to so often that sent down the fire and consumed some part of the camp out side.
This tells us some important things.
The people complained. They chose to complain. Are you a negative person? Do you know why you are a negative person? Do you know why you complain all the time? Because you choose to. Let me tell you a story to illustrate my point in here;
[The first woman to ever win three Olympic gold medals was a woman by the name of Wilma Rudolf. She did it in 1960 in Rome. She was one the fastest women ever ran. She grew up in Tennessee. She was the 20th of 22 children. Imagine her mother, she probably the most tired up woman. She was born premature. In that time they didn’t have all the sophisticated medical equipment we have today to keep her alive but for some reason she lived. But she was a weak and small child. She was so weak that when she was 4 years old, got double pneumonia and scarlet fever at the same time. That made her immune system even weaker so she contracted polio and left leg was paralyzed. So they put her in a brace. She had to walk around in that brace until she was 13 years old. When she was 13, she decided to run track. She was told that she couldn’t because her legs were paralyzed. She took off the brace and said that she would run. For three years she competed in every possible race at her high school and you know where she placed? She was dead last in every race for three years. Till finally she began to make up her mind and she chose, I’m going to work hard, and I am never going to loose again. She chose a positive attitude; she said I don’t care if my leg was massed up I don’t care if I was the weakest person in my family; I am going to run and I am going to be the best I can and when she made that choice when she chose a positive attitude to work hard you know what happened? No body could beat her. She won three Olympic gold medals in Rome in 1960. With the fastest time any woman ever runs inn the history of the Olympics.]
You choose the way that you think. You choose the pattern of your thinking. And when you complain it brings the wrath and anger of God on you.
You may say that’s crazy. So let’s read it again. Numbers 11:1-4
Here is something you need to know when you open your mouth and start complaining;
God is listening.
God is listening to everything you say. God’s listening to the things on your hearts. He is listening to you and complaining is a sin. In God’s eyes it’s a worst thing in the world. It’s an attitude number one that God hates.
Why we say that complaining is a sin;
- It damages me. It damages who I am. When I complain and I am negative all the time and all of the sudden become a complainer you know what happens? No body wants to be around me. No body wants to be my friend any more. Do you know people whom every time you see them everything is wrong in their lives. All they say is negative and depressing. What would you do when they come to your door? Do you like to be around the people who are negative all the time? Of course not. It hurts you.
- It hurts the people around you. Do you know what complaining does? It becomes contagious. Have you ever realized that? I have realized that I start complaining only when I am around negative person. Complaining is contagious and so you start hurting every body.
- It ultimately says this; God you can’t take care of me. And this is the worst thing about the complaining and the reason why it’s a big sin that God hates. Everything is bad in my life and that’s your fault. If you were a better God, if you were a bigger God, if you’d love me better, if you did what I wanted you to do, then all of this bad stuff in my life wouldn’t be happening. And all of these problems wouldn’t be happening and when we get right down too far you are not a good God. God hates this attitude.
All of you parents know what I am talking about. Just imagine with me now, you come home one afternoon and your children are in the back room talking and grumbling. You open the door and listen to what they are talking about and all you hear is grumbling and complaining. Here is what they are saying; our father is so mean to us, he won’t let us stay and watch television all night long, what’s wrong with him? He is so mean to me he doesn’t let me go to bed with doing my homework; our mother is so mean that doesn’t let us eat as many as we want; Can you believe our parents are like that? They don’t love us, they hate us, they don’t give us what we need and what we want. If you are a parent and you hear something like that what would be your reaction? Maybe for the first two minutes you regret that your kids don’t like you and then your reaction would be; those snotty, ungrateful kids. I can’t believe that they don’t have any gratitude for what I did for them. They are not thankful for anything. I brought out of Iran to have better opportunity to live and education and freedom that they could never have in Iran. And immediately your anger would come to surface. Do you think that the heart of our heavenly Father any different?
It was not in Israelites’ case. God said I am tired of these ungrateful people and for that reason not one of them will set foot on Promised Land.
You may say that’s long time ago. God wouldn’t do that today, would he? He wouldn’t put me in the wilderness, would he? I am living here in Belgium and it rain all the time, there is not going to be any kind of desert in here. Yes he does. If you keep up with the attitude of complaining, God is going to put you in wilderness; he will isolate you the way that you’ll have no friends any more; where nothing goes right in your life and everything in your life is like a dry desert land even if you live in the place where it rains 13 months a year.
If you don’t believe me ask yourself; how am I doing now? Do you have any real and truthful joy in your life? Do you have any peace in your life? Is there any patience, goodness or gentleness or kindness in your life? Are you living the abundant life that Jesus talks about? If not maybe it’s because of your mouth. Maybe it’s because of complaining in your hearts and God says; ok if you want to keep complaining against me, you don’t like things I am doing in your life then you just are going to sit over here and I am going to put you in the wilderness for a while.
Are you wondering why there is no joyfulness and fruitfulness in your life? Maybe that’s the reason. Maybe you are a complainer. [Oh God I don’t like this, I don’t get any positive in my life, Jesus you have forgotten me, what’s going on in here, why can’t I get a job, why we can’t get out of this center, why the people in the church are so selfish or why they are not as I want them to be, I hate this food I eat, I hate this place I live, I don’t like my attires, friends, …] and God says out to the wilderness you go!
God hates complaining.
I want to show you the last thing and then you are dismissed to and complain about what you heard or act upon it.
This is a very important point; don’t miss this. This found in chapter 11, verse 1
Numbers 11:1
What they were complaining about? They were complaining about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord. If I have to complain about anything that’s it. The things that are hard in my life; the things that are difficult; when everything is going smooth, I don’t complain about that, I want to complain about the hard things.
And yet God says don’t complain about the hardships in your life because that’s the very thing I am going to use to do one thing; I am going to use the hardship in your life to keep your heart close to my heart.
You see when everything is going right in your life, when you have no adversity, when there is no hardship, when everything is going smooth and everything is going great, then you know what I do or what you do probably? I say I am pretty good guy. I am kind of wonderful. Man look at all those good things I have done and all those great things that happens in my life … oh, I am such a wonderful guy.
But when the bad things come into my life, when there is a hardship going on, where do I go first? Immediately I go; oh God help me out. I need you, I can’t do this by myself, I don’t want to do it by myself, please help me Lords and God has sent hardship into the life of every one in this room, hasn’t he? Haven’t you had hardships? Doesn’t God send you adversity? Doesn’t he allow little things in your life to happen? Why? That you would come to him. And you would stay close to him and that you remember who he is and who you are not.
He is God; I am not. He is sovereign; I am not.
All those hardship keep us coming back and back to the heart of God.
For next ten weeks we are going to look at all these different attitudes that God hates. Because I want the best for us in this year and as long as we gather here as Iranian fellowship. I want God’s blessing on your lives and on this ministry. I want God to bless you. I want God’s best for you and for me.
So we better find the things that keep me away from God’s blessings and one of them is complaining attitude.
Let me ask you three questions;
- Are you a complainer? If God would have followed you around and put a tape recorder, recording everything you said during last week, what would he hear? Negative things or positive thing? What kind of person are you? Are you a complainer? We don’t like to admit that we are complainers; when we do it try to cover by such excuse as I am making an instructive comment. Are you a complainer?
- If you are a complainer, has God got you in the wilderness right now? Is there any joy in your life? Do you find any peace and patience? Is there anything like that in your life? Are you experiencing the fruit of the Spirit that God want you to have? Are living this abundant life that Jesus talks about? If you are in the wilderness, maybe that’s the reason.
- Are you willing to repent? Repentance means that are you willing to change your mind? First thing you’ve got to do to be able to get away from being a complainer is to admit that you are a complainer. I am a complainer God! I am complaining all the time. This is good first step. Now we can move on from there. I am a complainer and you’ve got me in the wilderness but I want to get out. How do I move? You must change your mind; repent! That makes the Cross of Calvary so important. The reason Jesus died was for sins like complaining. He opens the door for you to be able to change your heart and mind and thinking pattern. So you could think like Jesus, that’s why that is so important.
Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe, sin had let a crimson stain but he washed white snow.
Are you a complainer? Has God got into the wilderness? Change your mind and heart and come to Jesus and let him wash you white snow to change your thinking.
Let’s pray;
I thank you Lord for the example of Israelites. Things are coming out of my mouth that I am ashamed of but I know you love me, I know that you want the best in my life and that you want me to be blessing. I come to the cross of Jesus today and every drop of blood that he shed n that cross. Every wound that he experienced, every pain and agony that he felt; I ask you to take that a cleans me, make me clean and whole, and today I want you to change my heart and change my mind and take all these negative complaining things out of me. And I will give the glory and honor and praise because I know it’s not me, I like complaining too much but it’s all you. Lord Jesus you paid it all.
Men and women in this room in the wilderness … who are in the wilderness and got negative spirits and every time they look around something is wrong, something is not right, or just not good enough … Holy Spirit would you convict us of sin, would you bring us to Jesus so that can be right and I ask that in Jesus’ name. Amen!
