Bill Johnson - Complaining Seems Reasonable, but It Leads to Unbelief
The command to not fear is the most frequently repeated command in the Bible. Why? Because it leads to unbelief. Complaining is the language of unbelief. Complaining only comes from a heart that has a lordship issue. I want you to go with me to chapter 15, and we’ll jump down to verse 22. How many of you have your Bibles? Let me see them. All right, Eric, I like it, I like it. And by the way, all of our online family, I love you guys so much. I miss seeing you in different places around the world where you come up and say hi. So, I miss you.
All right, verse 22. Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea; they went out into the Wilderness of Shur. They went three days into the Wilderness and found no water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter; therefore, they called the name Mara, and the people complained against Moses. Here’s the thing about complaining: complaining is always reasonable—almost always. There’s a good reason for it. All you have to do is remove the promises and presence of God from the equation to legitimize your complaining. See, fear is also a strange thing because fear will always attract whatever information is needed to legitimize its existence, and complaining functions out of that spirit of fear. They were in need of water; is that a sin? No. Okay, and the people complained against Moses; that’s logical.
Chapter 16, verse 2: The whole congregation of the children of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. Verse 3 is rather humorous to me. The children of Israel said to them, «Oh, that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt when we sat by the pots of meat and ate bread to the full! For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.» Thank you. Then the Lord said to Moses, «Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you, and the people shall go out and gather a certain quota every day that I may test them.» What’s going on here? God has just tested them with lack, and now they’re going to be tested with abundance. If you don’t trust God with lack, you’ll never trust Him with abundance. Here, in this moment, they are complaining against Moses, saying, «Oh, that we would have died in Egypt when the pots were full of meat and we had all the bread we could eat.»
I don’t know what happened to their memory because days earlier they were complaining about their conditions. But what complaining does is distort your view of reality. It distorts your perspective; perspective is lost in complaining. Because we move in the momentum of unbelief, we enter a way that cancels out the God-given ability to simply trust God, just to trust Him, no matter what. Complaining cancels out the awareness of reality. It actually clouds the vision of the experiences of our lives, the situations in our lives. In this case, they are saying it would have been better for us to die when we were in the lap of luxury. Yeah, they were slaves.
Listen carefully: it’s a breakdown of the character of the heart to choose the safety of slavery over the responsibility of freedom. What’s happening in this generation right now is not the first time it has happened. It occurred to Israel right here when they preferred the safety of slavery over the responsibility of freedom. All right, that one overwhelmed me; let’s just keep moving here. Verse 7 says, «And in the morning you will see the glory of the Lord, for He hears your complaints against the Lord.»
Interestingly, seeing the glory is usually thought of as a reward, but it’s not in this case; it’s the opportunity to recalibrate values. I don’t know if that makes sense to you; let me try to say it this way: beholding Him gives me the opportunity to readjust all my values. What I’m thinking, what are my priorities, the focus of my life? The glory recalibrates everything. Without that, I live randomly, carelessly, as to whatever I think is best. So He says, «I’ve heard their complaints; I’m going to show them my glory.» Why? Because in that experience, they will have the opportunity to reset the values of their hearts.
Chapter 17, verse 2: Therefore, Moses—excuse me, the people contended with Moses, saying, «Give us water that we may drink.» Moses responded to them, «Why do you contend with me? Why do you tempt the Lord?» All right, let’s just say we’re part of the two million people who are following this guy named Moses. We’ve been walking for days, and we have no water. Thank you. The desire for water is right. The complaint against Moses is not—biblically, it’s called tempting God. What is it to tempt God? It’s to appeal to Him to do evil. Now, He can’t, but it’s still the wrong posture for a person to take. In Psalm 78, which offers an overview of this whole situation, it says, «You tempt the Lord by limiting the Holy One of Israel.»
You tempt the Lord by putting a cap on His capability and the profound impact of His Covenant with you. You tempt Him by limiting. Now, first of all, He doesn’t expect me to fully imagine all He is capable of; I don’t have the mental capacity for that. He’s not looking for that; He’s looking for the baby steps—the steps in the right direction that just remove the limit of what God is capable and willing to do in my lifetime. What we see of Him, what He shows us about His nature, is supposed to be the thing we hold onto in difficulty.
I’m not saying that right; the absolute anchor of our soul is what He has shown us about His nature and His Covenant. If I let go of that to embrace fear, an accusation, resentment, or any of those negative things, I’m letting go of the most solid thing in my life. Why? You and I were designed for one primary purpose. This may sound strange to you, but one primary purpose—and that is to worship. Worship is the recognition of worth. In other words, God unveils His nature and presence to a people; the only logical response is worship. He’s not looking for a good worship service; I mean, those are wonderful, but that’s not the point.
In John 4, it says the Father looks for worshipers, those who will worship in spirit and truth. It doesn’t say He’s looking for worship; He’s not an egotist in need of our affirmation. He doesn’t need us to boost His ego; He’s looking for worship. Why? Because He is a God of love, and the God of love always wants the best for us. Since you become like whatever you worship, He can want nothing better for us than for us to worship Him, because in that transforming presence, we are transformed.
All right, let’s come to the end of this; it says, «So he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah because of the contention of the children of Israel and because they tempted the Lord, saying, 'Is the Lord among us or not? '» They tempted the Lord, saying, «Is the Lord among us?» Okay, review the context here: pillar of fire at night, a cloud by day, and they’re asking the question, «Is the Lord among us?» That’s what complaining does: it distorts your view of what’s already established in your life. It’s like—I don’t know how many of you have ever had a dislocated joint. I used to have this knee that occasionally went out of joint from football in high school, and I remember one time—in fact, in Weaverville, Chris was around when I got up out of a chair. My lower leg became dislocated, but it’s still connected; it’s still alive. There’s a measure of movement—very limited movement, but a measure is still me and still mine. However, I couldn’t stand on it for all the money in the world; I couldn’t stand on it because it was actually out of joint.
What happens with complaining is it dislocates you from your design. It dislocates you; you’re alive, but the goal has changed from the Promised Land to survival.