Contemptible people among them had a strong craving for other food. The Israelites cried again and said, “Who will feed us meat? We remember the free fish we ate in Egypt, along with the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. But now our appetite is gone; there’s nothing to look at but this manna!”
- Numbers 11:4-6
The incident described in the verse above happened around two years after The Israelites left Egypt. Two years and they forgot the whip on their back, the labor that made them cry out to God in despair and misery. They forgot the restrictions on their life, which included having to kill their baby boys. They forgot that they were owned, managed and controlled by a slave master who hated them. If they didn't forget completely, they did forget how bad it was.
Instead they remembered the fish and fresh vegetables. They were being fed by God, miracles from heaven that tasted of honey appeared for them every day, but they grew tired of manna, the miracle that kept them healthy, that proved to them on a daily basis that they were loved and cared for by the God who set them free from their captivity. They wanted meat. They wanted the pleasures that they remembered.
As a child I used to despise them for this. I thought the Bible proved the Israelites were the stupidest people on the planet. They only took two years to reach that point because they were cut off by the Red Sea. Had they not gone through that miracle they would have turned back to their chains almost immediately. What idiots? Right?
Yeah, I don't think that so much anymore. Or rather I do think they were idiots, but no more so than most of us. I believe it's human nature. The Bible says it is. As a dog returns to his own vomit, So a fool repeats his folly. (Proverbs 26:11) I used to think that this Proverb meant that some dogs were that disgusting and some people were that foolish. Then I thought, OK, pretty much every dog will eat his puke and most, if not all, fools return to their folly, go back to their sin and shame like it's tasty and fun, put the chains back on themselves....but most people aren't fools.
Now I think the proportion of people who return to their folly, who go back and repeat the sins that shamed them, hurt them, damaged their lives and made them look like fools is the same as the proportion of dogs that will eat their own puke. Yeah, I know. It's gross. And I haven't seen a dog that won't do it yet. Most dogs will eat another dogs mess if the dog that got sick doesn't eat it all quickly enough. And every single one of us, in my experience and observation, is as disgusting and stupid as a dog.
Oh some people escape getting to look like fools because their chains are more socially acceptable, the sin they can't control and keep going back to is anger and pride that helps them succeed in business and get rich while they sacrifice their family on the altar of selfishness, rage and money. Some lie and cheat and get promoted instead of sent to prison. Some of these slaves manage to wear their chains so well that we admire them, want to be like them, fight for their scraps and try to exchange our chains for theirs, which at best usually just means added chains since we can't ever stop wearing the ones we already have for long. Yeah, we're the stupid dogs trying to bully the sick pup out of the way to lick up his sickness.
Others of us aren't so easily hidden. No one is admiring our beautiful chain. Our foolishness is easier to spot as foolishness. The self destruction of people pleasing. The slow motion suicide of alcohol and drugs. The diabetic who refuses to discipline his self and eats his way into an early grave and robs his grandchildren of their hero years before it should have been. I could go on. The truth is that the ones that look foolish are the ones we don't do, the ones that lead to more obvious pain and misery and destruction more quickly, and the ones that bring shame from society if found out. Those we call foolish. But if the misery doesn't appear as bad from the outside and doesn't really catch up to you until you're alone at night or reaching the golden years, if it hasn't brought shame because the world admires it or you haven't gotten caught yet, if the chains and cage are gilded and padded with cushiony comfort we tend to treat the fool as though he were wise.
The truth is that we all return to our sin and shame. No matter how rough it gets, without the power and grace of God we can't help but go back to our folly. We're all fools who either quickly or slowly forget the pain of the whip and remember only the pleasure. We're all idiots who can't seem to grasp that the most comfortable cage is still a cage, that bondage is bondage and that slavery to sin brings death, even if it is a socially accepted and admired set of sins. We are all, the ones who look wise and disciplined in their immaculate lives and the gutter crawling junkie willing to do almost anything to poison himself again who are easy to spot as fools, hopeless captives without Christ. It is God alone who is good and wise and able keep us free.
I have promised not to do things and done them within hours. I have sworn that my freedom meant more to me than anything and then violated my parole and risked returning to prison in less than a month to taste the drink and feel the drug just one more time. I have expressed my desire to be nothing but loving to my wife and treat her as the treasure I believe her to be all day with no exceptions....and then gotten out of bed and fallen short of that perfection I aim for every day and fail at every single day. I have seen the need to control and release my anger and then grabbed it and wrapped myself in it like it's my favorite warm coat. I have..... and who hasn't? Who can claim innocence in this and cast a stone?
Your puke may be different than mine, but I bet it tastes the same. God looks at us running back to our sin with the same look we have on our face when our dog returns to their sickness. No. Don't do that. That's disgusting! It's not going to make your stomach feel better. I will clean it up for you. I have food that won't make you sick. Please, don't do that. It's nasty. And all the while we're.....
We can't stop it.We can't control ourselves. Even the micromanaging self disciplined master of self is a slave to self and has their own areas of sin and slavery....and some of them will OCD self discipline themselves into a cushioned cell as restrictive as any prison cell us undisciplined hedonists made for ourselves. There is no freedom on our own. But there is freedom. There is a solution to the problem. We don't have to keep getting sick. And if we do, we don't have to lick it up. The grace of God is freely given that we might be made free, and stay free. God can make us look wise and powerful as we refuse to go back to Egypt. Grace can help us remember that the pleasures were hollow and empty and fleeting and that the pain and misery and despair were much more real. We don't have to be idiots who can't keep from longing for the land of slavery like it is actually the Promised Land. We can enjoy and appreciate the daily care and blessings of God and take His gifts of grace with us as we walk free from the sin, shame and folly of the past. We don't ever have to go back.
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