Who's On First?
Commentary
I heard a story once of a custodian who worked at a certain university. Among his responsibilities, he emptied the wastebaskets in the administration building where the president of the university had his office. The school underwent a change in presidents during this custodian’s time there, and he found that his experience of his job changed. “I didn’t mind emptying Dr. Wilson’s garbage,” he remarked, referring to the former president.
Dr. Wilson, you see, was a most gracious man. He was as solicitous of the custodian as he was of the multimillion-dollar donor. His successor, however, was cut from a different cloth. He busily passed by much of the staff without more than a nod most days. And the man who emptied his wastebasket found that it was harder to do with joy than it had been for the previous president.
It was an interesting and insightful remark by the custodian. After all, the actual job was the same as it had always been. The problem was not that the second president made a bigger mess or had smellier trash. No, it was about the style and the character of the men involved. And the custodian confessed that it was easier to do his job for the more humble and winsome man than it was for his successor.
In some arenas of life, the cynical wisdom when it comes to getting ahead says “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” I’m sure that is an accurate assessment in some settings. Perhaps when it comes to being happy in your work, meanwhile, the adage might be slightly different. Perhaps we might say instead: “It’s not what you do, it’s for whom you do it.”
This, of course, is the Christian’s key. And it goes far beyond mere employment. For us as followers of Christ, this is our joy and our peace, our purpose and our satisfaction -- not what we do, but for whom we do it. If it is Christ’s wastebaskets that I get to empty, you see, then I am a fortunate man and happy to do it.
Exodus 16:2-15
Whenever God is in the picture, there is always the capacity for the routine to turn miraculous, for the ordinary to become extraordinary. The scriptures are full of stories that bear witness to that truth. So are our own lives and testimonies.
In the case of our Old Testament reading, see the remarkable transition from the beginning to the end.
The beginning is about as ordinary as it gets: hunger. This is a daily affair. It is built into the universal human experience. One wouldn’t expect so humdrum a starting place to turn into something so monumental.
In addition to the universal quality of this very ordinary starting place, there is also something very familiar about it in the immediate context of the exodus story. “The whole congregation of the Israelites complained,” the writer reports. Well, there’s nothing new about that. Even a person very well-versed in scripture would be hard-pressed to identify the chapter and verse of that line, for it occurs so often in the story. Again and again, the people complain. And more than just a bad attitude, their chronic complaining indicates an underlying faithlessness on the part of the people.
We also see in the early verses of this episode an element that may be personally familiar to us. Observe the content of the people’s complaint, for it lacks all sense of perspective. They cried out that they wished they had died back in Egypt. And their memory of Egypt is summarized as “we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill.” Do either of those matters square with reality?
First, of course, they didn’t want to die back in Egypt. After Moses and Aaron’s first encounter with Pharaoh, you recall, the edict came down to make bricks without straw. And in the wake of that difficulty, the Israelites complained to Moses: “You have made us obnoxious to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us” (Exodus 5:21 NIV).
Meanwhile, their recollection about sitting around eating all that they wanted sounds unlikely. They were slaves in Egypt, after all, not passengers on a cruise. And when Moses appeared on the scene to deliver them, there’s no indication in the story that the people were saying, “No, thanks. We like it just fine here!”
Nevertheless, oftentimes when we are desperate we lose our ability to see clearly. They were hungry, discouraged, and overwhelmed. And in that clouded condition, slavery looked better than freedom, death looked better than life.
Well, the Lord provided for their need there in the wilderness. Within 24 hours, it seems, he miraculously furnished two staples for the hungry multitude: meat and bread. And the bread, of course, was the famous desert diet that came to be known as “manna” -- a name born out of their question “What is it?”
The introduction of that manna, then, marks the end of the episode. And what do we know about that manna? It was the original “daily bread,” for God sustained them with it throughout their generation of wilderness wanderings. It became a symbol of both God’s providence and the people’s obedience, inasmuch as it could not be kept overnight except in preparation for the sabbath, when there would be no manna to gather. It embodied God’s faithfulness, as the manna continued regularly until the people transitioned to eating the produce of the Promised Land (Joshua 5:11-12). And ultimately that manna foreshadowed “the real bread from heaven” (see John 6:31-35, 48-58).
We see, then, how the routine turns miraculous under the hand of God. We see how the ordinary becomes extraordinary. The commonplace stuff of life -- hunger and growling, needing and fussing -- becomes the context for God’s power, kindness, faithfulness, and salvation.
Philippians 1:21-30
Hamlet’s famous “to be or not to be” speech was born out of despair. In his letter to the Philippians, Paul is pondering a similar sort of “whether ’tis better” dilemma; yet for him it is not a tortured decision. Rather, it seems that he is torn between two good options. Indeed, as he expresses each it becomes clear to us that these are two beautiful options.
And these two beautiful options may be ours as well.
On the one hand, there is the beauty of remaining in this world, in this life. It is “more necessary” for the Philippians (and, no doubt, for so many other believers across the Mediterranean world). That choice is marked by participating in their “progress and joy in faith.” This, you see, is the lovely option of working for the Lord and accomplishing his work in the lives of his people. It is clearly the privilege that you and I enjoy as ministers of the gospel. And more broadly, it is the rewarding option available to anyone who is willing to be used by God.
On the other hand, there is the beauty of “departing.” Paul regards it as “far better,” for to die is “gain,” it is to “be with Christ.” This is a beauty that goes unrecognized by most of us most of the time. We so instinctively cling to this life and this world, you see. We do all that we can to avoid death, failing to see what awaits us on the other side. That’s not to say that the Christian should have a death wish. Quite the contrary: it is a life wish! We should be characterized by the perspective that anticipates with joy the fullness of our destination. How silly it is to linger at the rest stop when the end of the journey is so perfect and so good!
And so we observe that the apostle is faced with two excellent options. What a nice problem to have! And the same enviable problem is available to anyone and everyone. The recipe is simple, and Paul reveals it at the outset. “For to me,” he writes, “living is Christ”; or, as the old King James Version rendered it, “For to me to live is Christ.”
If, for me, life is devoted to something else -- family, career, possessions, pleasures, causes, or you name it -- then I will not enjoy Paul’s happy dilemma. But when life is all about Christ, then life in the flesh is suddenly endowed with an ultimate meaning and purpose. And at the same time, death offers to us the greatest fulfillment, for it unites us with the one who is our first love and reason for being.
Matthew 20:1-16
Life is not fair. God is not fair. Both of those statements are true, yet the truths are quite different.
We make a mistake when we equate God with life. It’s not a conscious or deliberate thing, but it’s a very common one. When life is good, it is easy for us to affirm that God is good. When life is bad, however, we find ourselves questioning the goodness of God. It is as though God is the chef in the kitchen of a restaurant, and so we credit or blame him for the quality of the meal we are served.
But let us be purposeful about separating the issues. The goodness of God is not identical with the goodness of life. I am reminded in this regard of the psalmist’s profound affirmation that God’s love is better than life (Psalm 63:3). And likewise, the fairness of life is a different question from the fairness of God. Both are unfair, but in different ways.
We need not invest any time in trying to prove that life is unfair. Keep your eyes open for ten minutes and you will likely see proof enough. And we are often grieved by the ways in which life is unfair, whether to us or to others.
The parable that Jesus tells in our gospel lection, meanwhile, illustrates beautifully the truth of God’s unfairness. It is the unfairness that the main character in the story calls generosity. It is the unfairness that you and I know as grace.
The story has many nuances and details worth preaching or teaching. The bottom line, however, is Jesus’ surprise ending. At the end of a work day, a landowner who has employed a great many workers in his vineyard over the course of the day pays them all the same wage. It is the day’s wage agreed upon by those hired at the very beginning. Fair enough. But he pays that same amount even to those who were hired as the day’s work was winding down.
Tellingly, the workers hired first were not unhappy with their pay until they saw their juniors receiving the same amount. This is the ugliness of envy, of course. Left on my own, I may be content. But when the green eye looks around and sees what others have, what others get, what others enjoy, suddenly I am no longer content with what I have. The position of those first workers is arguable, to be sure, but not defensible.
We may see ourselves in those first workers. We may also recognize in them Jonah or the prodigal son’s older brother. They too were famously unhappy with the unfairness of God.
The generous master, of course, is the character that reveals God to us. He is not unfair in the traditional sense of the term. That is, he never cheats anyone, never gives someone less than he or she deserves. Ah, but the Lord is renowned for giving people more than they have earned, giving them better than they deserve. He was not unfair in his treatment of the first workers hired. He was profligately unfair, however, in his treatment of the last workers hired.
See the long line of workers. And see how many, many of them -- of us -- are among those who receive from the Master better than we deserve, so much more than we have earned. Life is unfair, to be sure. But God is unfair too, and we call his unfairness grace.
Application
This week’s selected passages furnish us with an assortment of variously happy and unhappy people. The hungry children of Israel are unhappy, and they let their complaints be known. The workers hired first in Jesus’ parable, likewise, are an unhappy group, and they too voice their complaint. Standing in contrast to all those folks, however, is the apostle Paul.
To say that Paul was happy is to do an injustice to what Paul was. The letter from which our New Testament lection is taken is sometimes nicknamed “the joyful epistle.” This in spite of the fact that Paul was in prison when he wrote it.
The children of Israel were in an unhappy circumstance. So was Paul. But while they were marked by complaining, he was filled with rejoicing.
The servants hired first felt that they had been treated unjustly. As the landowner pointed out, they had not. The apostle Paul, meanwhile, had almost certainly been treated unjustly. While we don’t know the circumstance of his imprisonment at the time he wrote to the Philippians, we may be quite sure that he was no criminal. Yet while the workers were feeling cheated, Paul was feeling joyful.
We make a great mistake, albeit a natural and common one, when we rely on our circumstances for our happiness, our contentment, our sense of satisfaction. There will always be something wrong, after all. There will always be something that isn’t quite right, not quite to our liking, not fair or pleasing to us. And so we will find ourselves perpetually in the camp of the Israelites or the grumbling workers.
I would rather align myself with Paul. But how? “For to me,” he revealed, “living is Christ.” It was not what he did -- or more broadly, what he experienced -- that was finally the issue for him. It was for whom he did it.
Alternative Application
Exodus 16:2-15. “The Complaint Department” The customer service desk, the suggestion box, the support line, the “tell us what you think” survey -- these are all standard practices used by businesses and other organizations to deal with the needs of their customers. Many times, of course, the needy customer is a complaining customer. He or she is frustrated or dissatisfied with the product or service, and so the business has to provide some proper way of channeling and processing those complaints. A happy customer, after all, is your best advertisement. But an unhappy customer -- especially in the day of online reviews -- can be devastating to a business.
And so a million times a day two old adages are affirmed and reinforced: “The customer is always right” and “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” The unhappy customer registers his or her complaint, and if the customer service department is functioning properly that customer walks away satisfied.
A common error of the unhappy customer, of course, is taking the complaint to the wrong person or place. The server in the restaurant, for example, has to field a lot of complaints that really belong to the cook or the manager. The salesperson may get an earful about problems that belong to the manufacturer. (We as preachers, too, may have to hear more than our share of misplaced complaints. It was the choir, the organist, the youth minister, or the bishop that made this parishioner unhappy, but you and I hear about it and are forced to answer for it.)
That same phenomenon may be in play with our Old Testament story. The Israelites had complaints, but they were misplaced. It’s a small enough detail in the text that we may gloss over it, but relationally it is a huge detail. “The whole congregation of the Israelites,” the narrator reports, “complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.”
This is a classic case of the server paying the price for what did or did not happen back in the kitchen. What, after all, had been the role of Moses and Aaron in all of this? Had they initiated the process? Was it their idea, their plan? Were they mapping out the itinerary? Were they making the rules?
Time and again throughout the story the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, and they complained to Moses and Aaron. But the people were going to the wrong place in terms of both cause and effect. It was God who had been the cause of their exodus, their journey, and their provisions. And the effect of complaining against God compared with complaining to God is a night-and-day difference.
The pages of the Bible are full of people who complain to God. Moses himself does it. So does Job, the psalmist, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Jonah, and more. And remarkably, there is no penalty for such candor. It’s when the people of God take their complaints elsewhere -- which the children of Israel do as a matter of course -- that the hammer comes down.
That seems counterintuitive to us. After all, wouldn’t you and I rather not hear than hear people’s complaints? Why should we fare better with God when we complain to him instead of not?
In the context of a relationship, a complaint is a beautiful thing. The content of what is being said may be unpleasant enough, but the meaning of what is unsaid is marvelous. For the complaints we bring to God carry with them these unspoken messages. First, that he is there. Second, that he cares enough to listen. Third, that he loves us so much that our circumstances and our feelings matter to him. And fourth, that he is powerful enough to do something about it all.
In any relationship, candor is a compliment. And the candor of a complaint offered in prayer carries with it significant affirmations about God. The children of Israel needed to find the right complaint department.
Dr. Wilson, you see, was a most gracious man. He was as solicitous of the custodian as he was of the multimillion-dollar donor. His successor, however, was cut from a different cloth. He busily passed by much of the staff without more than a nod most days. And the man who emptied his wastebasket found that it was harder to do with joy than it had been for the previous president.
It was an interesting and insightful remark by the custodian. After all, the actual job was the same as it had always been. The problem was not that the second president made a bigger mess or had smellier trash. No, it was about the style and the character of the men involved. And the custodian confessed that it was easier to do his job for the more humble and winsome man than it was for his successor.
In some arenas of life, the cynical wisdom when it comes to getting ahead says “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” I’m sure that is an accurate assessment in some settings. Perhaps when it comes to being happy in your work, meanwhile, the adage might be slightly different. Perhaps we might say instead: “It’s not what you do, it’s for whom you do it.”
This, of course, is the Christian’s key. And it goes far beyond mere employment. For us as followers of Christ, this is our joy and our peace, our purpose and our satisfaction -- not what we do, but for whom we do it. If it is Christ’s wastebaskets that I get to empty, you see, then I am a fortunate man and happy to do it.
Exodus 16:2-15
Whenever God is in the picture, there is always the capacity for the routine to turn miraculous, for the ordinary to become extraordinary. The scriptures are full of stories that bear witness to that truth. So are our own lives and testimonies.
In the case of our Old Testament reading, see the remarkable transition from the beginning to the end.
The beginning is about as ordinary as it gets: hunger. This is a daily affair. It is built into the universal human experience. One wouldn’t expect so humdrum a starting place to turn into something so monumental.
In addition to the universal quality of this very ordinary starting place, there is also something very familiar about it in the immediate context of the exodus story. “The whole congregation of the Israelites complained,” the writer reports. Well, there’s nothing new about that. Even a person very well-versed in scripture would be hard-pressed to identify the chapter and verse of that line, for it occurs so often in the story. Again and again, the people complain. And more than just a bad attitude, their chronic complaining indicates an underlying faithlessness on the part of the people.
We also see in the early verses of this episode an element that may be personally familiar to us. Observe the content of the people’s complaint, for it lacks all sense of perspective. They cried out that they wished they had died back in Egypt. And their memory of Egypt is summarized as “we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill.” Do either of those matters square with reality?
First, of course, they didn’t want to die back in Egypt. After Moses and Aaron’s first encounter with Pharaoh, you recall, the edict came down to make bricks without straw. And in the wake of that difficulty, the Israelites complained to Moses: “You have made us obnoxious to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us” (Exodus 5:21 NIV).
Meanwhile, their recollection about sitting around eating all that they wanted sounds unlikely. They were slaves in Egypt, after all, not passengers on a cruise. And when Moses appeared on the scene to deliver them, there’s no indication in the story that the people were saying, “No, thanks. We like it just fine here!”
Nevertheless, oftentimes when we are desperate we lose our ability to see clearly. They were hungry, discouraged, and overwhelmed. And in that clouded condition, slavery looked better than freedom, death looked better than life.
Well, the Lord provided for their need there in the wilderness. Within 24 hours, it seems, he miraculously furnished two staples for the hungry multitude: meat and bread. And the bread, of course, was the famous desert diet that came to be known as “manna” -- a name born out of their question “What is it?”
The introduction of that manna, then, marks the end of the episode. And what do we know about that manna? It was the original “daily bread,” for God sustained them with it throughout their generation of wilderness wanderings. It became a symbol of both God’s providence and the people’s obedience, inasmuch as it could not be kept overnight except in preparation for the sabbath, when there would be no manna to gather. It embodied God’s faithfulness, as the manna continued regularly until the people transitioned to eating the produce of the Promised Land (Joshua 5:11-12). And ultimately that manna foreshadowed “the real bread from heaven” (see John 6:31-35, 48-58).
We see, then, how the routine turns miraculous under the hand of God. We see how the ordinary becomes extraordinary. The commonplace stuff of life -- hunger and growling, needing and fussing -- becomes the context for God’s power, kindness, faithfulness, and salvation.
Philippians 1:21-30
Hamlet’s famous “to be or not to be” speech was born out of despair. In his letter to the Philippians, Paul is pondering a similar sort of “whether ’tis better” dilemma; yet for him it is not a tortured decision. Rather, it seems that he is torn between two good options. Indeed, as he expresses each it becomes clear to us that these are two beautiful options.
And these two beautiful options may be ours as well.
On the one hand, there is the beauty of remaining in this world, in this life. It is “more necessary” for the Philippians (and, no doubt, for so many other believers across the Mediterranean world). That choice is marked by participating in their “progress and joy in faith.” This, you see, is the lovely option of working for the Lord and accomplishing his work in the lives of his people. It is clearly the privilege that you and I enjoy as ministers of the gospel. And more broadly, it is the rewarding option available to anyone who is willing to be used by God.
On the other hand, there is the beauty of “departing.” Paul regards it as “far better,” for to die is “gain,” it is to “be with Christ.” This is a beauty that goes unrecognized by most of us most of the time. We so instinctively cling to this life and this world, you see. We do all that we can to avoid death, failing to see what awaits us on the other side. That’s not to say that the Christian should have a death wish. Quite the contrary: it is a life wish! We should be characterized by the perspective that anticipates with joy the fullness of our destination. How silly it is to linger at the rest stop when the end of the journey is so perfect and so good!
And so we observe that the apostle is faced with two excellent options. What a nice problem to have! And the same enviable problem is available to anyone and everyone. The recipe is simple, and Paul reveals it at the outset. “For to me,” he writes, “living is Christ”; or, as the old King James Version rendered it, “For to me to live is Christ.”
If, for me, life is devoted to something else -- family, career, possessions, pleasures, causes, or you name it -- then I will not enjoy Paul’s happy dilemma. But when life is all about Christ, then life in the flesh is suddenly endowed with an ultimate meaning and purpose. And at the same time, death offers to us the greatest fulfillment, for it unites us with the one who is our first love and reason for being.
Matthew 20:1-16
Life is not fair. God is not fair. Both of those statements are true, yet the truths are quite different.
We make a mistake when we equate God with life. It’s not a conscious or deliberate thing, but it’s a very common one. When life is good, it is easy for us to affirm that God is good. When life is bad, however, we find ourselves questioning the goodness of God. It is as though God is the chef in the kitchen of a restaurant, and so we credit or blame him for the quality of the meal we are served.
But let us be purposeful about separating the issues. The goodness of God is not identical with the goodness of life. I am reminded in this regard of the psalmist’s profound affirmation that God’s love is better than life (Psalm 63:3). And likewise, the fairness of life is a different question from the fairness of God. Both are unfair, but in different ways.
We need not invest any time in trying to prove that life is unfair. Keep your eyes open for ten minutes and you will likely see proof enough. And we are often grieved by the ways in which life is unfair, whether to us or to others.
The parable that Jesus tells in our gospel lection, meanwhile, illustrates beautifully the truth of God’s unfairness. It is the unfairness that the main character in the story calls generosity. It is the unfairness that you and I know as grace.
The story has many nuances and details worth preaching or teaching. The bottom line, however, is Jesus’ surprise ending. At the end of a work day, a landowner who has employed a great many workers in his vineyard over the course of the day pays them all the same wage. It is the day’s wage agreed upon by those hired at the very beginning. Fair enough. But he pays that same amount even to those who were hired as the day’s work was winding down.
Tellingly, the workers hired first were not unhappy with their pay until they saw their juniors receiving the same amount. This is the ugliness of envy, of course. Left on my own, I may be content. But when the green eye looks around and sees what others have, what others get, what others enjoy, suddenly I am no longer content with what I have. The position of those first workers is arguable, to be sure, but not defensible.
We may see ourselves in those first workers. We may also recognize in them Jonah or the prodigal son’s older brother. They too were famously unhappy with the unfairness of God.
The generous master, of course, is the character that reveals God to us. He is not unfair in the traditional sense of the term. That is, he never cheats anyone, never gives someone less than he or she deserves. Ah, but the Lord is renowned for giving people more than they have earned, giving them better than they deserve. He was not unfair in his treatment of the first workers hired. He was profligately unfair, however, in his treatment of the last workers hired.
See the long line of workers. And see how many, many of them -- of us -- are among those who receive from the Master better than we deserve, so much more than we have earned. Life is unfair, to be sure. But God is unfair too, and we call his unfairness grace.
Application
This week’s selected passages furnish us with an assortment of variously happy and unhappy people. The hungry children of Israel are unhappy, and they let their complaints be known. The workers hired first in Jesus’ parable, likewise, are an unhappy group, and they too voice their complaint. Standing in contrast to all those folks, however, is the apostle Paul.
To say that Paul was happy is to do an injustice to what Paul was. The letter from which our New Testament lection is taken is sometimes nicknamed “the joyful epistle.” This in spite of the fact that Paul was in prison when he wrote it.
The children of Israel were in an unhappy circumstance. So was Paul. But while they were marked by complaining, he was filled with rejoicing.
The servants hired first felt that they had been treated unjustly. As the landowner pointed out, they had not. The apostle Paul, meanwhile, had almost certainly been treated unjustly. While we don’t know the circumstance of his imprisonment at the time he wrote to the Philippians, we may be quite sure that he was no criminal. Yet while the workers were feeling cheated, Paul was feeling joyful.
We make a great mistake, albeit a natural and common one, when we rely on our circumstances for our happiness, our contentment, our sense of satisfaction. There will always be something wrong, after all. There will always be something that isn’t quite right, not quite to our liking, not fair or pleasing to us. And so we will find ourselves perpetually in the camp of the Israelites or the grumbling workers.
I would rather align myself with Paul. But how? “For to me,” he revealed, “living is Christ.” It was not what he did -- or more broadly, what he experienced -- that was finally the issue for him. It was for whom he did it.
Alternative Application
Exodus 16:2-15. “The Complaint Department” The customer service desk, the suggestion box, the support line, the “tell us what you think” survey -- these are all standard practices used by businesses and other organizations to deal with the needs of their customers. Many times, of course, the needy customer is a complaining customer. He or she is frustrated or dissatisfied with the product or service, and so the business has to provide some proper way of channeling and processing those complaints. A happy customer, after all, is your best advertisement. But an unhappy customer -- especially in the day of online reviews -- can be devastating to a business.
And so a million times a day two old adages are affirmed and reinforced: “The customer is always right” and “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” The unhappy customer registers his or her complaint, and if the customer service department is functioning properly that customer walks away satisfied.
A common error of the unhappy customer, of course, is taking the complaint to the wrong person or place. The server in the restaurant, for example, has to field a lot of complaints that really belong to the cook or the manager. The salesperson may get an earful about problems that belong to the manufacturer. (We as preachers, too, may have to hear more than our share of misplaced complaints. It was the choir, the organist, the youth minister, or the bishop that made this parishioner unhappy, but you and I hear about it and are forced to answer for it.)
That same phenomenon may be in play with our Old Testament story. The Israelites had complaints, but they were misplaced. It’s a small enough detail in the text that we may gloss over it, but relationally it is a huge detail. “The whole congregation of the Israelites,” the narrator reports, “complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.”
This is a classic case of the server paying the price for what did or did not happen back in the kitchen. What, after all, had been the role of Moses and Aaron in all of this? Had they initiated the process? Was it their idea, their plan? Were they mapping out the itinerary? Were they making the rules?
Time and again throughout the story the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, and they complained to Moses and Aaron. But the people were going to the wrong place in terms of both cause and effect. It was God who had been the cause of their exodus, their journey, and their provisions. And the effect of complaining against God compared with complaining to God is a night-and-day difference.
The pages of the Bible are full of people who complain to God. Moses himself does it. So does Job, the psalmist, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Jonah, and more. And remarkably, there is no penalty for such candor. It’s when the people of God take their complaints elsewhere -- which the children of Israel do as a matter of course -- that the hammer comes down.
That seems counterintuitive to us. After all, wouldn’t you and I rather not hear than hear people’s complaints? Why should we fare better with God when we complain to him instead of not?
In the context of a relationship, a complaint is a beautiful thing. The content of what is being said may be unpleasant enough, but the meaning of what is unsaid is marvelous. For the complaints we bring to God carry with them these unspoken messages. First, that he is there. Second, that he cares enough to listen. Third, that he loves us so much that our circumstances and our feelings matter to him. And fourth, that he is powerful enough to do something about it all.
In any relationship, candor is a compliment. And the candor of a complaint offered in prayer carries with it significant affirmations about God. The children of Israel needed to find the right complaint department.
