He showed me that the root of the
Israelites’ rebellion lay in their distorted perspective of Him. Because that generation of Israelites was
raised under the extremely harsh, unrelenting, oppressive rule of an evil
Pharaoh, they had a very distorted perspective of authority which they
intrinsically transferred to ALL authority figures, including God. He began showing me all the ways that He
worked passionately and persistently to demonstrate to the Israelites that He
is a “good Daddy,” but that nothing He ever did was enough for them to surrender
to Him completely and consistently. Exodus
6:6-9 clearly explains this and leaves no room for doubt about this truth: “[Therefore,
say to the children of Israel: ‘I am the Lord.
I will free you from your oppression and will rescue you from your
slavery in Egypt. I will redeem you with
a powerful arm and great acts of judgment.
I will claim you as My own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your
God who has freed you from your oppression in Egypt. I will bring you into the land I swore to
give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I
will give it to you as your very own possession. I am the Lord!’] So Moses told the people of Israel what
the Lord had said, but they refused to listen any more. They had become too discouraged by the
brutality of their slavery.” Because
they grew up with oppression, they could not allow themselves to hope and
believe that God was going to free them from slavery and give them a land of
milk and honey as their new dwelling place.
Their experience as harshly-treated slaves caused them to completely discount
God’s goodness because they could not trust God. They only trusted themselves. He also showed me that they robbed themselves
of so much because they were never able to embrace His goodness, His
righteousness, and His deep love for them.
I began seeking Him and asking Him
to show me how to believe with all
my heart that He is a good Daddy. I felt
led to examine the early chapters of Exodus again to understand what the
Israelites could have done differently that would have allowed them to finally
rest in Him and fully trust Him in every
situation instead of incessantly grumbling and complaining. He showed me one of the reasons that
He performed a series of mighty, astonishing miracles in rapid succession in
the early chapters of Exodus: He was
working very hard to prove His loyalty, omnipotence, goodness, and love to the
Israelites. In His goodness and
compassion, He understood their reluctance to trust Him as well as the reason
for their reluctance. So, PART of His
divine purpose in hardening Pharaoh’s heart was NOT ONLY to show the EGYPTIANS
that He is almighty—it was ALSO to demonstrate His omnipotence and love to the
ISRAELITES as well. After researching
online, it seems that the ten plagues happened in a five- or six-month
period. That’s a LOT of awesome works in
a short period of time. The plagues were
God’s way of teaching the Israelites that He is completely trustworthy—nothing
is too hard for Him, and He will do whatever it takes to take care of them.
Their problem was that they never
allowed themselves to bask in His awesome, rapid-succession miracles, not even
during the ten plagues, not even when they witnessed God systematically destroy
the Egyptians and exclude them from
the plagues (starting with plague four).
They took all of those awesome miracles for granted. God showed me that the FIRST thing I need to
do in order to fully trust Him and change my mindset is to bask in every
miracle that He does for me and my loved ones, to meditate on those miracles and allow myself to understand
that He performs those miracles PARTLY because He loves me and He enjoys blessing me. God also showed me that another stumbling
block for the Israelites was that they very quickly forgot all of His
miracles—every time they encountered a problem in the wilderness, they should
have immediately begun praying to God and trusted that if He could free them
from slavery, He could do anything. They
should have CONTINUALLY REMINDED THEMSELVES of what He had done for them in the
past in order to encourage them in their current struggles. However, they did not. I need to remember to look back on all that
God has done for me and allow that to be an encouragement for my present and my
future.
A sad and serious consequence of
their refusal to see Him as a trustworthy God was that they robbed themselves
of so many blessings. That entire first
generation was cursed because of their unbelief: all males twenty years and older (except
Joshua and Caleb) would die in the wilderness during the forty years. So they got to experience the freedom from
slavery, but they never got to live in the land that was “flowing with milk and
honey.” Those Israelites were never able
to enjoy the amazing future that God planned for them because they were stuck
in their past. They still had a slavery
mentality. They were never comfortable
with the concept of freedom—as odd as it sounds, they were comfortable with
slavery, and they refused to embrace the incredibly scary concept of
freedom—because freedom carries great responsibility and they felt completely
unprepared for that. Time after time, with
every problem they encountered, that generation expressed their desire to
return to slavery in Egypt as opposed to allowing God to teach them how to face
the responsibilities of freedom. They
preferred the oppression of slavery over God’s abundant blessings. They were so stuck in their past that they
could not embrace the bright future that God was trying so desperately to give
them.
God was the same good, trustworthy,
loving God through each phase of their life.
He was no less a good God when they were living with their oppression in
Egypt as He was when He helped them conquer the Promised Land. His goodness was just harder to feel and
embrace during their season of cruel slavery.
It was like the sun hiding behind the clouds—they couldn’t see it, but
that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there. It is
like that with us, too. When we are
going through a trial, God’s goodness doesn’t change—only our ability to
perceive it changes. Even at that, God
gave the Israelites numerous opportunities to embrace His goodness during their
fiery trials—the ten plagues, the crossing of the Red Sea, the destruction of
Pharaoh’s army right in front of their eyes, the provision of manna, quail and
water, their ability to conquer the kings of Og and Bashan, and the list goes
on. It is very sad that they were never
able to enjoy the fullness of God’s goodness.
I am scared that I’m going to
remain stuck here—that I’m never going to allow myself to internalize the
concept that God is a “good Daddy,” that He genuinely loves me deeply, that He
enjoys blessing me, and that He will always have my back. Like the Israelites, it is so clear to me
that if I don’t get past this, I, too, will miss out on so many blessings and
so much joy. The entire time that they
spent in the wilderness, the Israelites SHOULD have been constantly marveling
at God’s astonishing provision and miracles for them. He demonstrated His ability to overcome any
obstacle they faced, and He demonstrated time and again that He had their
backs. The same applies to me. I need to learn to trust Him, no matter what
… simply because He has proven to me over and over that He’s a good Daddy. I honestly don’t need to be scared or worried
about anything because He has proven that He is completely trustworthy. All the trials that I have to face, as
daunting and scary and overwhelming as they are, and as unequipped as I feel to
face them, God will hold my hand through them, and each trial will help me
become more of who He created me to be.
If I say that I want all that God has for me, I
must be willing to do whatever it takes to position myself to receive
His blessings.
Some Scriptures which help me to trust God--they're all popular Scriptures, but I thought I'd include them anyway.
For I know the thoughts that I think toward
you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a
future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I
will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when
you search for Me with all your heart.
–Jeremiah 29:11-13
And
it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to Him
must believe that God exists and that He rewards those who sincerely seek Him. –Heb. 11:6
He
who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He
not with Him also freely give us all things? --Romans 8:32
Now
to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think,
according to the power that works in us, --Ephesians 3:20
“You
are good, and do good.” --Psalm
119:68
Truly
God is good to Israel, to such as are pure in heart. –Psalm 73:1
Oh,
give thanks to the Lord, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever.
–I Chron. 16:34
For
the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good
thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly. –Psalm 84:11
“The
Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!” The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
to the soul who seeks Him. It is good
that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. –Lam. 3:24-26
A song about trusting in God:
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