March 8--What Do You Really Need?

Our felt needs can be indulged, and in doing so, we find ourselves on a continual hamster wheel of more, more, more.  Or we can let felt needs take us to their source--which is our deepest need--and find real satisfaction there that lasts.  These passages help:  Numbers 11-12, Mark 14:1-21, Psalm 52, Proverbs 10:31-32.

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Eve reads her Bible journal aloud on this episode.

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Transcript

Numbers 11-12

Mark 14:1-21

Psalm 52, Prayer, Proverbs 10:31-32

SPEAKER_00 0:00

March 8. What do you really need? I won't be reading the scripture references. For those, please check the written post. I remember a lot of peanut butter and jelly and yogurt in college, but I also remember not minding the food failures served up in the cafeteria as much as my friends did, since mealtime for me growing up was stressful. At least in college, no one made me eat two bites of food I didn't like or threw orange juice in anybody's face or left the table disgraced. These issues and others played out at our table made mealtime feel dangerous, like crossing a minefield. I never knew when something or someone would go off. But in college the mood was lighter and brighter. Soccer players slurped down bowls of jello in one gulp. Someone would invariably yank a tablecloth to see if it could be taken without taking everyone's plates with it. We had tablecloths for goodness sake. A work study person always played the piano. We laughed. This atmosphere more than made up for the crummy food in my book. Enjoying what you're eating is a little thing compared to solving world peace or passing your English lit exam, but sometimes it's the little things that get under your skin first and most and worst. When your atmosphere is the desert and your meals are the exact same thing three times a day, complaints about the food supply take center stage. This is where the people are in today's reading who learn what it is they really need. The Old Testament chapters are Numbers eleven to twelve. They are tired of traveling and camping out, tired of listening to Moses, tired of how hard their lives are in the wilderness, and they complain about it like a lot. God disciplines them by letting fire break out around the perimeter of their camp, but Moses prays and the fire abates. Then the rabble among them, the misfits, stir up everybody to complain about the mainly manna menu. They remember the food they had in Egypt of fish, vegetables and fruit, garlic and onions, and it was all free, at least that's how they remember it. Their slave food menu sounds more like the all you can eat buffet line at a resort, rather than as it more likely was, doled out at a soup kitchen. Somehow they've forgotten that their free food in Egypt was paid for by the straps across their backs and meeting their quota of mud bricks. It's surprising to hear them remember slave life so fondly rather than to remember how God has rescued them so heroically. It's an astonishing amnesia of the facts. They've forgotten what he's done to free them and load them with all the loot they can carry. They've forgotten his covenant promise as well as his perks for obedience, not to mention the gift of their brand new tabernacle. They've also had Moses to lead them, an angel to guide them, and God's very own presence in the pillar of cloud and fire above them. All they can see in this moment is the same old, same old manna and they're miserable. What they crave is meat. It's a big slap in the face of the God who's given them every single thing they need, every step of the way. And when you factor in that it's only day three since they left Mount Sinai and that already they're all whining in front of their tents, well, something's got to give. And something does. Moses loses it next. He asks why he has the burden of carrying people to the land God's been promising for years, and why does he have to nurse them along the way? And where is he going to find meat for so many? It's too hard for him, and with deep feeling he asks God to end his life, quote, If this is how you're going to treat me, put me to death right now if I've found favor in your eyes, and do not let me face my own ruin, end quote. Moses falls right into the same sort of emotional exaggeration of the facts that the Israelites have fallen into. They remember an all you can eat free buffet bar at the Hard Rock Cafe in Cairo, while Moses imagines that God expects him to care for these crybabies as if he's given birth to them, wiping noses and breastfeeding them all the way to Canaan. I've had days like this. In the middle of a particularly stressful parenting moment, I once ran to the outside shed to have a minute to holler myself up a headache. So I'm all ears to hear what God as parent does and doesn't do next. God doesn't argue with Moses about what he expects or about Moses' perceptions. He doesn't try to set Moses straight. He doesn't smite him with fire the way he flamed up at the edges of the camp when the people whined. God isn't angry with Moses. Twice the Bible says that God was angry with the people for complaining, saying, quote, we were better off in Egypt, end quote. But nothing is written about God being angry with Moses for complaining. God gives Moses the relief he needs. He says for Moses to bring together seventy men known as leaders, he'll give them some of the spirit that's on Moses, so they're able to help with Moses' burden, quote, so that you will not have to carry it alone, end quote. And God does all this, regardless of the way Moses accuses God rather than asks for his help. I wonder why Moses gets away with what sounds like complaining while the people get flames around their camp for trash talking the accommodations. What gives? Maybe this. Moses complains directly to God in prayer. He quote, asked the Lord, end quote, why all this misery was his to deal with. That's what prayer is, taking our troubles to God, even if the trouble we're having is because of our own self-pity. Messy as he was, Moses pours out his unedited, unfiltered frustrations to the only one who can help him. But the people, quote, complained in the hearing of the Lord, end quote, which implies that they talked about God to one another. This is gossip, maybe even slander, not prayer. They spread around their bad feelings and bad attitudes, and it works like a contagion, so much so that by the time Moses hears about it, every family is wailing. Even so God gives them what they want, but it's not the lesson of grace that Moses receives. Theirs is a lesson of judgment of what happens when they reject him. He'll give them meat for a whole month, quote, until it comes out of your nostrils and you loathe it because you have rejected the Lord who is among you, end quote. They've experienced God with them, and they've decided he's not enough. Leeks and onions and meat, these are what they need. Saying they were better off in slavery was like giving God a middle finger. He doesn't take those sentiments lightly. But if meat is what they really want, why would they hate having it in abundance for a whole month? Because meat isn't what they really want, and God knows it. He'll give them what they think they want, and so much of it that they'll finally learn that meat isn't what they want at all. It was the craving of the moment, not the real cry of their hearts. The real problem is that they've quote rejected the Lord who is among you, end quote. Cravings distract us from our heart's cry, and they're never satisfied. As soon as we get the thing we think we have to have, we're already looking for something else. If a craving could be sated, we wouldn't keep running to the next thing, but we do. It's only by following our cravings to their source, the cry of our deepest self for God with us that we have any rest. When God tells Moses about all the meat he's promised, Moses loses it again, considering the fact that there are roughly six hundred thousand men, plus women and children, he just can't believe God enough for meat for so many for a whole month. Don't you know the magnitude of the meal train you're signing up for? Moses asks. Even if we slaughtered all our livestock and emptied the sea, would it be enough for all of these? My paraphrase Once again what God doesn't say are any words that condemn. Instead he asks his road weary warrior if he thinks, quote, the Lord's arm is too short, end quote. And further, Moses will see whether or not what God says will come true. God's understatement and self control here is masterful because he could have pointed out all the times he's provided in more dire circumstances. He could have pointed out that he's kept his word one hundred percent. He could have pointed out that this is his trip with his people, not Moses's, but he doesn't. He just tells Moses to get where he can see, and the meat literally flies in on wings. Unfailingly humble, patient, and kind, God always gives us what we most need. Sometimes it's help and a word of encouragement, and sometimes it's a kick to our backside with hard consequences for our mistakes, but it's never condemnation and shame. Each of us gets what God designs for us and what we get looks vastly different, but his purpose for us is always the same to lead us out of ourselves and into more of Himself where our deepest longings are met in God with us. God is always about giving what you really need. The New Testament passage is Mark 14, 1 to 21. Jesus elicits strong feelings from five groups of people in this passage. One, the religious professionals who were looking for a reason to arrest and kill Jesus. They see what his teaching is doing to their credibility and authority with the people, not to mention their good old boy power lunching lifestyles at the temple. These people hate Jesus. two, the unnamed woman who comes into Simon's home where Jesus is eating, breaks open a jar of expensive perfume, and pours it on his head. Jesus says she's done a beautiful thing by preparing his body for burial, and it would always be remembered. This woman adores Jesus. three. The other guests at Simon's who are indignant with her waste of money. In their minds social justice is primary, so selling the perfume and giving the money to the poor would have been more righteous in their minds than pouring it over the Son of God's head. These men don't understand who Jesus is. four. Judas, who's had it. Throwing away a hefty sail puts him over the edge. He goes to the chief priests who promised to pay him well for telling them where and when they can arrest Jesus without a crowd around to stop them. This man loves money more than Jesus. five. The disciples who eat the Passover meal with Jesus next and are sad to hear that one of them will betray Jesus. The truth is they all desert him when he's arrested except for Peter, and Peter denies he knows him three times. These men don't know how much they need Jesus. Jesus still makes people uncomfortable, challenges their priorities, sends them scrambling for cover. Only the woman sees him for who he is. We won't recognize Jesus if we think we're good enough without him. We won't value him unless we get a good look at our need of him, and when we do, we'll either run from him or pour ourselves all over him. You get to make your own choice about needing Jesus. From Psalm fifty two David praises God's brought down the big bully who bragged about his badness, he trusted in his money and power to harm others, and now he's six feet under. But David trusts God's love, he puts his hope in who God is, he thrives and flourishes and gives God the praise. Which legacy will you leave? What do you really need? Prayer. God, I've had all these responses to Jesus at one time or another, but I want a consistent more with you. Fix my eyes, teach me how to pour myself out for you. In Jesus' name, so be it. From Proverbs ten, thirty-one to thirty-two. Wisdom makes itself known in what you say, so does perversity. Passages in numbers, mark, psalms, and proverbs are selected for today in the yearly Bible. This is Eve de Bartleaban Roebuck.