Read Exodus 17:1-7 and Colossians 3:12-17 here.
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Nostalgia
isn’t what it used to be…[1]
Nostalgia
is a yearning for the past. Reliving happy memories can be fun and even helpful,
but it can also get in our way. In our
reading from Exodus 17 today, the Hebrews seem to have some misplaced
nostalgia.
The
nation of Israel is out in the desert with no water. Not surprising. Deserts aren’t known for having an abundance
of water. Lack of water has made the
people grouchy, so they quarrel with Moses about it. “Why
did you bring us out here in the desert where there is no water?” In
essence they’re saying, “We were better
off back in Egypt.”
What’s
wrong with complaining about needing water?
Were
they really better off back in Egypt?
Let’s
talk first about how they got here. Over
the past few weeks, we learned that they were living in Egypt serving Pharaoh
as slaves. The people cried out in
anguish, and God heard their cries. God
sent Moses to negotiate with Pharaoh to let the people go. Pharaoh was a tough customer, but after ten
plagues, finally Pharaoh lets them go and they leave…but then Pharaoh changes
his mind and sends his army after them.
The Hebrews end up trapped between the army and the Red Sea, so God
parts the water and the Hebrews cross on dry land. And there was great rejoicing. (Yay!)
But
that’s not the end of the story. As they’re making their way across the desert,
the first stop is at an oasis, a
place where everyone can fill up their water jugs….except that it turns out
there’s something wrong with the water.
It’s bitter. The complaining
begins. “Now what are we supposed to drink?” So Moses asks God for help, and God shows him how
to make the water drinkable. That first stop gives us a glimpse of what becomes
an ongoing issue for this group….complaining.[2] God has miraculously brought them out of
Egypt and out of slavery, and at the first sign of trouble they seem to have
forgotten God. Their complaining gets in the way of being able to see that God is
right there with them.
Soon
they are complaining again. “We need food.” So God brings them manna. I love the name “manna.” It literally means, “What is it?” Whatever it is, it’s there waiting for them
when they get up every morning for the next 40 years, the entire time they are
wandering in the desert. It’s their
daily bread, and a daily reminder that
God is there with them, guiding
them and providing for them.
And
everything is lovely and they have a wonderful journey across the desert to the
Promised Land…except they don’t. They
get to Rephidim and again there is
no water. So the people complain. This time, they get so riled up they’re even
ready to stone Moses, as if it’s his
fault that there is no water there.
And
their complaint includes another now familiar refrain, “We were better off in
Egypt.”
·
They
said this when they thought they were going to be killed by the Egyptian army
next to the Red Sea and God parted the water.
·
They
said this when they were hungry and God sent them manna and quail.
And
here they are saying it again.
We had it better when we were slaves
in Egypt.
When
they were in Egypt they knew what to expect.
There was water and food. They
had homes. But they also had
back-breaking labor. And when they
complained about how hard the work was, Pharaoh took away the straw he’d been
providing for making the bricks and told them they now had to gather straw as
well.
We had it better when we were in
Egypt.
We
probably all have favorite verses in the Bible, but what is your least
favorite?
What
is the worst verse in the Bible? I’ll
tell you what it is for me:
Do
everything without complaining and arguing. – Philippians 2:14
Is
that even possible?
When
I first discovered this verse, I was shocked.
Does God really mean this?
Are
we really supposed to be able to do this?
We
lived in California then, and I was working at a laboratory as an executive
assistant. I hated my job, and I
complained about it all the time. The
people were annoying. The hour-long
drive to work through heavy traffic was excruciating. The work was stressful and boring at the same
time. I’m sure I could find more
complaints to remember, if I kept working at it, because I had a lot of
complaints. I don’t think I ever had
much good to say about it.
So
you can imagine how much that verse from Philippians got under my skin.
After
we had moved away and I had left that job behind, and we were living in South
Carolina where I was going to school full time, my perspective changed. I started to see the good things about that
job that I couldn’t see in the midst of my complaining. At that job I made the most money I’d ever
made…maybe than I will ever make. I had health
insurance, life insurance, a 401k, a health savings plan, and a host of other
benefits. I didn’t appreciate any of
that until I was a full-time student with none of it, and I began to learn the
importance of taking the time to look at our circumstances more carefully and
find the things for which we can be thankful.
There
were plenty of things for which I could have been thankful, but I was too
focused on seeing all the things I didn’t like, instead.
We
had it better when….
It’s been said that “Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson. You find the present tense and the past perfect.”[3]
The
Hebrews are longing for the safety and security of Egypt, forgetting about the
bad stuff, seeing only the good stuff.[4]
I
got into this same mindset about California.
I’d grown up there. I had lots of
great memories there. I dreamed about
going back there. I wrote stories for
some of my classes at Clemson, and they were always set in California…not where
we lived, not where I worked, but at the places where I had childhood
memories. The pictures in my mind as I
wrote looked like old movies with Los Angeles’ most famous landmarks in the
background. The more I dreamed about it,
the more I was saying to myself, “We had it better when we lived in
California…”
We
went back there twice last year, and we made it a point to go to all the old
places, and see as many old friends as we could. And we got stuck in traffic. We sat on the
freeway going 5 mph or less. And we got lost because all the cookie-cutter neighborhoods
look the same. And we started to
remember all the reasons we had wanted to leave in the first place.
And
we realized that even if we did move back there, it wouldn’t be the same
anyway, because it’s not the same as it used to be, but more importantly,
because we’re not the same people we used to be.
Ancient
philosopher Heraclitus said, “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not
the same river and he's not the same man.”
Or, as the writer Thomas Wolfe said, “You
can’t go home again.”
The good thing about looking back is
that it helps us see how we’ve grown, and helps us understand that we aren’t
the same people we used to be. When I
look back at my younger self, I see how negative and judgmental I could
be. I see how much I’ve changed. I also see how many hard things I made it
through, and how God helped me all along the way.
The bad thing about looking back is
that it can get in the way of what’s happening now. We can’t go back, no matter how badly we want
to. Looking back we can see how God was
there, but God is also here now in the present and God is doing things we can
be thankful for NOW, and if we’re stuck on looking back we miss that. It would be a bad idea to drive down the
road only looking backward. How far
would you get before you run into something? Or run off the road?
God calls us to be thankful people. It’s why we’re spending six weeks
talking about gratitude, and why our theme verse is 1 Thessalonians 5:18, “Be
thankful in all circumstances for this is God’s will for us who are in Jesus
Christ.”
Being thankful might sound passé or
trite. Honestly, I was concerned that
people would dismiss this series before we even started because it sounds too
simple to just be thankful. But then I
started doing the research, and I didn’t have to go very far to find some
really good reasons for us to work on being thankful.
1. You are what you think. It turns out that our brains are constantly
changing and adapting to what we’re asking them to do. When we think, the synapses send impulses
across the gaps to each other. When we
get into a pattern of thinking, those synapses move closer together to make it
easier the next time. Our brain rewires
itself. So if we’re complaining, it’ll
be a little easier to complain the next time.
Or if we’re practicing being thankful, then that’s the new wiring that
goes in, and being thankful starts to become easier.[5] The more we complain, the more likely we are
to complain, and the more we are thankful, the more likely we are to be
thankful. So we need to practice being
thankful to become better at it.
2. It’s not just about our own brains,
though. Our way of thinking is
contagious. If we are complaining
out loud, those who hear us are then more likely to complain as well. But if we are thankful, they are more likely
to be thankful.[6]
We
can do our own experiments to see this in action. Watch what happens as you go through your day
and see how one person can change the direction of the conversation by saying
something positive or negative.
One
thing we learn from reading Exodus and watching what happens with Israel on
their journey through the desert is that it’s
easy to forget. They go from
praising God and giving thanks for a miracle to complaints and anger, as if God
weren’t even there, as if God had never done anything to help them. And it became a habit to complain.
There
was a woman once who was an incurable grumbler. She complained about
everything. One day her pastor thought
he had found something about which she could make no complaint. That year, the woman’s crop of potatoes was
the best in the entire area.
“For
once, you must be pleased,” he said to her with a big smile. “Everyone’s saying
how wonderful your potatoes are this year.”
But instead, the woman scowled at him and said, “They’re pretty good,
but now I’ve got no bad ones to feed the pigs!”
It
takes practice and conscious effort to get out of the habit of complaining, and
remember to thank God for what he has done in the past, and for what he is
doing now. It’s why we keep on having
the Lord’s Supper, and saying the
words Jesus told us, “Do this in remembrance of me.” To remember what God has done for us and give
thanks.
It’s
why we’re going to have opportunities for discussion
about this on Sunday afternoons starting today
at 2pm, so we can work on this together, and encourage one another and see
how we’re doing.
And
it’s why I have a gift for you. A notebook.
A great way to practice being thankful is to write down what we’re thankful
for. Write something down every
day. It’s pocket-size so you can take it
with you and write things down as you see them. Say thanks to God right then for
each of these things, and work on rewiring our brains to be more thankful.
I
mentioned earlier that the theme verse for this series is 1 Thess 5:18, “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this
is God’s will for you who are in Christ Jesus.”
Whenever we are putting our faith in Jesus, we are IN Christ
Jesus. The verses that Diane read for us
from Colossians 3 are one of the many pictures in the New Testament of what
that looks like. It tells us we put on a
new persona, like putting on a coat, as we allow the Holy Spirit to help us to
wear compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.
We’ve talked a lot about how Israel was complaining
in the desert, and I mentioned that verse from Philippians that says we are
supposed to do everything without grumbling or complaining. That’s a challenge
to us all to work on that. But it’s not a challenge to us to point out
other people’s problems with complaining.
Instead Colossians tells us, “Bear
with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each
other.” This is about working on our
own attitudes, not about pointing out other people’s problems. We don’t know their situation.
Twice in this passage from Colossians, Paul tells
us to be thankful. “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts,
to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.” (3:15)
Be thankful for all the ways God has brought us
to this day.
Be thankful for today.
And keep on looking for all the ways that God is
at work in our world today, so we can say thanks.
And
whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him. (Col. 3:17)
[4]
There are benefits to nostalgia https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-nostalgia-is-good-for-you/
[6] Ibid
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