And when the people complained, it displeased the Lord. And the Lord heard it, and His anger was kindled. And the fire of the Lord burnt among them, and consumed them that were in the uttermost parts of the camp. And the people cried unto Moses. And when Moses prayed unto the Lord, the fire was quenched. and he called the name of the place Taborah, because the fire of the Lord burnt among them. And the mixed multitude that was among them fell out lusting, and the children of Israel also wept again and said, who shall give us flesh to eat? Thank you, and you may be seated, pastor. All right, let's have a time of prayer and just kind of get ready here for the rest of the service here. So let's pray, and I'll close this out here in a moment. Well Father we just rejoice tonight and thank you for the yet another opportunity with the health of body and the times that we live and the way we are able to just get around and our vehicles and all of these things that you've made it possible for us to meet here tonight and be in this place. And Lord, I know that the people that are here, Thy people tonight, are eager to hear from Your Word tonight and eager to hear direction from the Holy Spirit and change that must be made in our life. things that need to be pointed out. And we're so thankful, Lord, that we can come to your word and know that, Lord, a work can be done in our heart and life. And we could just dwell on that and think on that for quite some time and just thank you that you're that concerned about us. that we grow and to be like Christ. And Father, as you attempt that, just pray again, Lord, you'd help us to just allow you to do that work in us, that we'd have a spirit of humility and just an obedient spirit about us tonight as you attempt to do in our hearts what you see as necessary for each individual life. And Father, we do want to remember those that are not with us tonight through sickness and other means or other reasons. And I do hope you'd continue to heal their bodies and bring them back to us. And we'll thank you for what you do tonight and what you're going to do yet again tomorrow and the next day and the next day. And we just thank you for your goodness. We'll ask it all in the name of Jesus. Amen. Let me stand one more time and turn to page 36. Page 36. There's a wonder of sunshine But the wonder of wonders that fill my soul is the wonder that God loves me. Oh the wonder of it all, the wonder of it all Just to think that God loves me Oh, the wonder of it all, the wonder of it all, just to think that God loves me. There's a wonder of springtime at Harvey. The sky, the stars, the sun But the wonder of wonder The three fossils Is a wonder that's only begun Oh, the wonder of it all the wonder of it all, just to think that God does make me. Oh, the wonder of it all, the wonder of it all, just to think There's a wonder of God's revelation. ♪ Where wonders and thrills flow so ♪ ♪ Is that Jesus is coming again ♪ ♪ Oh, the wonder of it all ♪ ♪ The wonder of it all ♪ ♪ Just to think that God loves me ♪ The wonder of it all. The wonder of it all. Just to think that God loves me. Maybe she did faster. It can sometimes be a wonder that a fellow human being loves us. And yet, what a greater wonder that God could love us. Boy, am I thankful for that. Amen. Okay, Numbers back in Numbers chapter 11. You're going to say, we were just here last week. I know, I know. Settle down. I got it. We're going to look at something else. Brother Hunter called and asked if I would preach this again. One of the greatest college basketball coaches, probably whoever was, was known as the Wizard of Westwood. Anybody know who that coach is? Brother Martin, I would think you might, where you lived for so long. And this coach was named John Wooden. How many know that name of the coach? Basketball, UCLA, University of California, Los Angeles. And one of the greatest college basketball coaches, I believe, that there was. He led UCLA to 10 championships in a 12-year period of his coaching. And some of the most notable people that came through UCLA that he coached was, well, Lou Alcidor, who's that? Anybody know who that is? Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, right? Bill Walton, Gil Goodrich. I mean, some great, great players that went on to the NBA came through John Wooden's program. And Wooden had many inspirational life sayings that have been preserved in prints and things like that that you can find up on people's walls and things like that. And one of them was this, champions never complain. They're too busy getting better. Champions never complain. They are too busy getting better. Here's one more. How to handle adversity, he told his team. How to handle adversity, don't whine, Don't complain, don't make excuses. Don't whine, don't complain, don't make excuses. Not bad advice, wouldn't you say? Not bad at all. It'd be good for us to think about this as well. And when I think about the poorest among us, what we have compared to those in the past, it's absolutely amazing. Think about this, the greatest, most powerful kings that would ever rule over large portions of the planet at a time. I'm thinking of Alexander the Great, I'm thinking about Suleiman, I'm thinking about Titus and some of the Roman emperors. You think of some of those in England, how they ruled and they had large swaths of area of the planet that they ruled over and when I think about these great powerful kings and all that they had and all the power that they had all the ability that they had at their fingertips they did not have a warm shower to walk into and take a shower at any given time like we do today. The poorest of poor have more today than the greatest kings ever had in the past. Think about that. Their castles didn't have central heat or air. Yep, they didn't have a way to remove all the moisture. right, when it gets too damp in the house or things like that. They had no refrigeration that they could pack with food that they just, you know, brought their little camel train from the grocery store and just unloaded it in the refrigerator. No, they didn't have that at all. Their medical system, for lack of a better word, was rather medieval. Right? I mean, when you think today, it's not the kings, but it is the plebs, it is the commoners, it's the poor folk, right? That have all of these things in their homes, yet we're probably the most unthankful generation that has ever been before. It's the most discontent, the most unsatisfied, and the most unthankful and ungrateful there has been. And we've got more than anybody has ever had in the past. I mean, how many realize, I know some of you, when we stop and think about this, there were those in the past that a simple cut on the finger or a simple wound on a part of the body could have been a death sentence. I asked my grandfather, well, my grandfather told me one time, they were cutting wood with an ax. I've told this before, but he missed the log and it went right through the side of his boot into his shoe. And I said, what'd you do? He said, well, I went to the house and packed it full of wood ash. That's what they did back then. Packed it full of wood ash, wrapped it up, stayed off it for a couple of weeks. No doctor? No. We're going to do that, right? I mean, it's unbelievable that we have what we have today. And yet what we're going to see here in our text, we've been here before, but we're going to visit this text again. We're going to look today, tonight, at the devastation of a complaining spirit. We've got so much. We have so much. Yet we still find ourselves today, easily, if we're not careful, walking around with a complaining spirit. Now chapter nine, Israel had been on this journey out of Egypt for about two years now. So they've been out of Egypt two years. The tabernacle is built by this time. The priests are prepared. The instruments of the tabernacle have been made. The sacrificial system is in place. Manna is falling every morning. Well, six mornings out of the week is falling from the sky. I wanna show you this. You talk about the care of God and it is something you could miss real easily in verse 9 speaking of the manna and it said when the dew fell upon the camp in the night the manna fell upon it. What is that word it referring to? Is it referring to the camp or is it referring to the dew? I think so, I think you're right. I think God was so concerned that the dew fell first before the manna, so the manna wouldn't have, it was like a coriander seed, right? God took such care that after the dew came, God could drop that manna down, so it didn't get dew all over it, get it all wet and mushy, and you couldn't do anything with it. No, no, listen, that's not out of the pale of reason of how concerned our God is about us. Little things like that, well, we wouldn't even think, know what I would have done? I'd have been like, well, here's your manna. you know, and then you get up in the morning, it's just a pile of pile of manna, you know, it's just a pile of mush. Right? Whoops, that didn't work. No, this is what God has done for them. This is where they are at this this they are two years into this, and God has provided for them over and over. and over again. Everything is in order so that Israel now can move forward with God and get to where God has promised them through the covenant that He made with Abraham. And in verse 1 we saw this, that right off the bat the Bible says the people complained. the people complained. Now it doesn't say in verse one what they complained about at this point, because the fact of the matter is, it doesn't even matter what you're complaining about. That's not the issue, is it? The issue is you have a complaining spirit. The issue is that it wasn't a legitimate concern. It wasn't something that was brought up like, well, you know, this might be a problem and I know it's going this way, but if it continues to go this way, this may happen. Well, that might be a legitimate concern. That wasn't what was going on here. It was just full out a complaining, a complaining spirit. And listen, a complaining spirit is a spiritual issue. It's a spiritual issue. The very fact that they were complaining was the issue, and it displeased the Lord. Look at this. It displeased the Lord, verse one, and the Lord heard it. You talk about perking up the ears. I just say that with, you know, obviously God doesn't have ears and He hears all at all times. But boy, this watch, He heard it to the point that He had to turn and do something about it immediately. Complaining is infectious. It really is. God heard it. He hears everything. Do you know He hears your complaining? Do you know He hears my complaining? What do you mean He hears it? He hears it because it displeases him. He hears it, right? As a parent, you might have heard your kids chattering in the back and they're in the other room and they're carrying on and they're playing. And all of a sudden, somebody says something, you went, oh, what was that? I mean, something grabbed your attention. You heard all of the words that were being said, but there was something they said that you said, now I've gotta go in there and do something about this, right? God heard the complaining. It displeased him. In the end of verse one, we see here that God judged the complaining. You see, the pillar of fire had been a comfort to the children of Israel these two years now, right? But now there's another fire that is coming into the camp that is a fire of the Lord that is chastisement. And so Israel here cries out to Moses, Moses prays and the fire stops and the death stops and they continue to go on but It's mind-boggling to me here in verse 4 We're gonna read after this complaining after the fire of the Lord has fallen After there are people that have died because of the complaining and the chastisement of the Lord in verse 4 It says in the mixed multitude that was among them fellow lusting and the children of Israel also wept again and said, who shall give us flesh to eat? Now, before you act totally shocked that Israel would complain again after just finishing up burying some dead who died for complaining, right? Before you get totally shocked about it, what have you or I done just 10 minutes previously? Right? What have you or I done 10 minutes after repenting? Yeah, Lord, I can't believe I've said that, can't believe it, you know, whatever, Lord, Father, I'm sorry, forgive me, this was wrong, I confess it, right? And five minutes later, Father, I'm back. Yeah, same thing, same bat time, same bat channel, same thing. And this is where, hey listen, we're all cut out of the same flesh, right? And the problem this time began with the mixed multitude. We looked at it last week. The crowd that came out of Egypt with them began to infect them on the outskirts of the camp. And the Bible says they fell a lusting. They had desires that rose above everything else in importance. No, this need for meats was greater than the need to get where God wanted them to be. This need for meat was greater to them than the need to get into the promised land and get into all of the promises that God had. Forget all the promises that God had. I just want some meat. I need a steak right now. I mean, I know God's promised all of these things. These guys would have all failed the marshmallow test, right? How many know what that is, right? You get your kid to give him a choice, right? You can have one marshmallow today or two marshmallows tomorrow. If they say two marshmallows tomorrow, you've got a success right here. They're going to go far. They can put off instant gratification and they can wait for something better, right? Yeah, Israel failed that one, right? You can have one quail today or, you know, 25 million or you can have all of the promises of God tomorrow. No, we'll take the quail. So they wept again. They complained again. They're all upset again. They're sick of the manna. They wanted meat. And they weren't content with what God had given them. Let me give you seven things that a complaining spirit does. Number one, a complaining spirit reveals the heart. It's a heart of ingratitude. It's a heart that doesn't trust. It's a heart that's in worry and fear. It is a heart that's not relying, that isn't resting in God. It reveals the heart. Number two, complaining produces false truths. Look at verse five. We remember the fish, which we did eat in Egypt freely, the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Well, yeah, I mean, they lived in one of the most fertile parts of Egypt, up around Goshen, in that Nile Valley. they remembered all of these things that they ate freely, right? Freely. You didn't do much freely. I don't know if you remember this or not, but do you remember the bricks? Remember all these bricks that you're building and having to make day after day? And when Moses, who's dragged you out into the wilderness, when he showed up, he made it worse. and they were mad at them before they ever left Egypt, right? Yeah, you didn't do a lot freely. You were called a slave. And the only reason you had leeks and onions and cucumbers and all these things, probably because they're just sitting around in abundance around there and you got some of it, right? Listen, complaining produces some false truths. We look back and we remember things and they're not always exactly accurate in our mind like we thought they are. Number three, complaining turns something good into something bad. There is nothing at all beside this manna. Well, what's wrong with that? This is a good thing, right? This is a good thing. This is a miracle that shows up six mornings a week. They get up, the dew is on the ground, the manna's on the dew, and this is a miracle that they get to see every day of the week except for the Saturday. But it turns something good into something bad. Oh, we got this manna. Manna. Yeah. Isn't it crazy what we complain about? Number four, complaining spirit produces the awful sin of comparison. We remember. We remember Egypt. Wow. Yeah. This is the same thing as looking longingly for the days before you were saved. Those were fun days. Remember those days? Boy, I was, you know, and yeah, you have forgotten a lot, haven't you? Yeah. It produces the awful scent of comparison. Number five, complaining spirit can't see the past completely or accurately. I said it before, they remembered the bricks, I mean they remembered the good things, but they forgot the slavery, they forgot the bricks, they forgot the edict to kill all of the baby boys. Boy, that was just a stunning time to live, wasn't it? Boy, that was great. Boy, we miss Egypt when we had no control over what children we got to keep. Isn't it crazy? This is what a complaining spirit does. It skews everything we look at. It blinds us. It messes up our sight. Number six, complaining mischaracterizes the present. Look at verse six. But now our soul is dried away. There is nothing at all besides this manna before our eyes. and mischaracterizes the present. Hey, what about the tabernacle? What about the pillar of fire? What about the pillar of a cloud? What about the, wait, what about being in a land free of Egyptians that used to own you, right? But no, no, no, when you begin complaining, you totally mischaracterize what's going on in the present. You miss it all, right? Verse seven, or number seven, not verse seven, don't look at verse seven. It has nothing to do with number seven. Well it might, let me look at this. Complaining looks past all of the good that has been in the past. Complaining looks beyond, it can't see all the good that was there, that has already been in the past, that has been provided by God, which you know He will do again. Well, I just don't like where I am right now. Well, you ever think God has a purpose for where you are right now? Are you going to that quickly? What did Job say? How can I accept good at the hand of the Lord, not evil also? And so by verse 10, everybody's weeping in their tabernacle or in their tents. They're weeping about their terrible, horrible condition. Here we are in freedom. It's terrible. Yeah. Here we are on the way to God's promise for us. Oh, this is awful. Yeah. We saw last week that it affected Moses greatly. Leaders aren't immune to discouragement and anger, are they? They are not. And so Moses was angry with them. God was angry with them. And at the end of verse 10, look at this. Then Moses heard the people weep throughout their families, every man at the door of his tent, and the anger of the Lord was kindled greatly. Moses also was displaced. In the next few verses, we're gonna see how the complaining affected Moses. It affected him so badly that made Moses question some of God's motives and some of the ways God was working. It had a great effect on Moses. Now notice God didn't correct Moses. I mean you might look on the surface and see some things that Moses maybe said wrong or shouldn't have responded, but God didn't correct him. He was under a load of pressure. Ok, I know what it's like to have maybe two people complaining at a time. I can't imagine a million to a million and a half people complain. Can you imagine kind of the energy of that? The weeping, we're going to die. Everybody's moping around for days. Every time you go by, you're like, hey, there you go. Praise the Lord. Millions of them. I mean, a million of them, not millions, but a million. I couldn't imagine that. I'm thankful for God's care of Moses. And God says, well, I'll kill him. It's like, no, no, don't do that. Moses has gotten so down. He's like, well, just let me die. Just get me out of here. I'm tired of this. So pretty serious deal going on, the complaining. Can I tell you this complaining affects everybody around you? Watch, it not only brings other people into the complaining and brings them to a place of sin, but it also discourages those that God has put over you to lead you to where He wants you to be. It's discouragement. And Moses felt so incomplete and incompetent that he just wanted God to kill him and find somebody else to do the job. Right? So God is like, no, we're not going to do that. But this complaining I'm going to show you what it did. It moved God. Look at verse 18. 18 And say thou unto the people, Sanctify yourselves against tomorrow, and ye shall eat flesh. For ye have wept in the ears of the LORD, saying, Who shall give us flesh to eat? For it was well with us in Egypt. Therefore the LORD will give you flesh to eat, as if Egypt was treating them better than God. That's what they're saying. Could you imagine a Christian getting up and saying, I tell you what, I just got treated much better by the world than I have been treated by God. You know, in the old life, before I was saved, I tell you, the world was much better to me. Man, I'd punch him in the mouth. No, I wouldn't. I'm much too small for that. I'd have Alan do it. I mean, could you imagine somebody saying, but this is essentially what they're saying. This is what they're saying. Egypt was treating them better than God was. And so we saw this last week. God's going to give them what they want. How many remember the numbers? 997,000 dump trucks of quail. Yep, billion, like 33 billion quail, something like that. Everybody took 10, I mean, we looked at those numbers. The grandson, he was trying to add it up himself and he was doing a whole thing and he got pretty close. They did pretty good on that one. And that's a lot of quail. That's a lot of quail. It's like in their mouth, it's coming out their teeth, coming out their nostrils like God said it was going to, right? And while they're gorging on that, God smote them. me please. Don't miss this. Sometimes God disciplines us with something we never ask for like the fire of the Lord. But listen, listen, listen. Sometimes God disciplines us with the very things we've been lusting after. Careful what you lust after. Careful what you desire that's outside of the will of God that God has said no. Because that very thing God can use to chasten and discipline us. So complaining discourages and it defeats and complaining is an infectious disease. Complaining, listen church, it is a devastating, devastating thing to become a part of. So besides the destruction of complaining, there's some things I'd like, maybe I'd like you to think about this as we finish up here in a little bit. There has never been a blessing attached to the fruit of complaining or the fruit of a complaining spirit. Jesus will never say, well done, thou good and faithful complainer. Enter in. I mean, nowhere in the Bible does it record that there is a crown for a complaining spirit. Oh, you've got the crown of a complaining spirit. Good job. It's not there, right? There's nowhere in the Bible that reveals that the complaining spirit will move God to supply your needs. You said, wait, well he brought all the quail. No, that was judgment. That was discipline. You know what the tender care of God was? The way he laid the manna on the ground for him every day. five crowns. Complainer's crown. You got the complainer's crown. Good job. So what do you do? You might say, well, What are you gonna do when things aren't, what are you supposed to do when things aren't going our way? What are we supposed to do? Just nothing? Well, I'm not saying that there aren't some things that are wrong and shouldn't be addressed at times. We're not saying we just be quiet about some things. I'm saying that when these things arise, we need to check our heart and see if we just have a complaining spirit or if it's actually something that needs to be addressed between us and God or us and somebody else or whatever the problem may be. But sometimes we just gotta be very careful that the things that come into our life that we don't like That we just don't have a complaining spirit over them, over the provisions of God, over the goodness of God, over the direction and the leadership of God. That it's not just a complaining spirit. When we're urged to complain about something, I want you to remember a few things. Because we're all urged to complain, aren't we? Okay, good. Martin knows he's a complainer. Quit complaining about your wife. When we have this urge to complain, I want you to remember, I think I've got about five things for you to remember. When you feel the urge coming on to go, why? What about, why? I don't like. Number one, God is aware. God is completely aware. It's almost like this missed God, this thing in your life. He's like, whoa, sorry about that. I didn't see that coming. Boy, that did some damage, sorry. He's absolutely aware. He misses nothing. Zero, nothing. He doesn't miss a thing, right? Number one, God is aware. Number two, God is in control. He has allowed this situation in your life. Hey, listen, when you realize there's something that's coming to your life that you want to complain about, maybe the better thing in response would be to say, God, what do you want me to learn from this event in my life? What do you want me to learn? It's on purpose. Yeah, he has a plan for it. It's not just haphazard. That's not who our God is. Well, you don't know how awful it was and how terrible it was. Well, he does. He was aware. And he allowed it. All right? And maybe we just need to ask God, what do you want us to learn? What are you trying to show us? I'm going to do that like these last two weeks on this silly project. I'm like, OK, Lord, what are you trying to show me on this one? Because I'm really not liking this. This is really not good. God knows what needs to be done. He sees the beginning from the end which goes right back to the truth that God has a purpose. He knows what needs to be done. Remember we saw last week you know sometimes God allows things in our life to reveal our heart towards Him. Sometimes God allows things in our heart, in our life, so we can see what's in our heart and the way we view the character and the goodness and the faithfulness of God. What did Israel do here? Well, they just blamed God. And they're upset and angry and mad. Mad at God's man, you know. There's one tangible thing they could go attack was Moses. Maybe, right? You ask God, why are you stretching me? Why are you refining me? What is going on? How are you doing this? What is the purpose of this? I don't get it. Before you complain, right, ask God about this. Number four. Before you complain, maybe you could remember that sometimes What needs to be done for us is to realize that we weren't left on this earth solely for our happiness. But isn't that what the world's trying to sell us? You do this and you'll be happy, and buy this and you'll be happy, and do this and you'll be happy. There's a term for this. It's called humanism. Humanism. What is humanism? Well, you could sum it up this way. The end of all being is the happiness of man. People believe that the entire purpose of why we are on the planet is for our happiness. No, that is wrong. It is unbiblical. The reason that God has left us on this earth is for His glory and that His will could be accomplished through our life in reaching the world with the gospel. Amen. That's what it is. It's not just about us being happy. It's about us having joy and contentment, which we can have that regardless of the circumstances that we are living through. This is the wonder that the world doesn't get. This is the, I mean, I was just thinking of Samson today, and here, I mean, Samson was, had all this strength and all this power, and he's doing all these things, but there was not one thing about his physical attributes that people would look at that they could see that he had this great strength, because they would ask him, well, where does this great strength come from? You know, well, I can't tell you. Well, Delilah got it out of him, right? But they couldn't tell. He just looked like a regular guy. Listen, friend, you know what the world ought to see? The world ought to see when they look at us, there's nothing special about us. There's nothing different from us to them. We're all of the same flesh. But they watch us go through things in life. They watch us go through trials. They watch us go through hard times. They watch us go through things that just would normally rattle anybody else. And they say, how on earth do you react this way? to the things that are going on in your life? Well, because it's not about me. And God has a purpose in this. And God has a reason for this. And even in this purpose, I can have great joy just as Jesus had great joy on His way to the cross. Makes no sense. They go, huh? And we say, well, come to Jesus and you'll learn. Humanism. It's not all about our happiness. Finally, number five. And this is where I want to get at with all of it and seeing what month we are in. Learn to be thankful. That really helps the problem of complaining. 100 verses 3 and 4, "'Know ye that the Lord, He is God.'" I like that. I love how simple and how powerful that is. "'Know ye that the Lord, He is God.'" Boy, I could spend another message on that right there. Let's do it. No. You're saying, no, we're good. Be thankful. It is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves. We are His people, and the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Be thankful unto Him, and bless His name. When we think of who He is, and we understand who we are not, We can come before Him with thankfulness and thanksgiving. I love this, enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise. What is gates and courts? But access to the King. Not everybody had that access. But you know what we ought to be thankful? We have access, direct access to our Heavenly Father because of the work of Jesus Christ on Calvary. Ephesians 5.20, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. You notice it says, giving thanks always for all things. Woo, that's a hard one. The Bible also says, then everything give thanks. And some may say, well, it doesn't say for everything give thanks. Well, actually right here it does. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. don't know if I can do that." Oh, you can. You can. It's called the grace of God. The enabling grace of God can cause us to thank Him for the things that the world would shake their head that we had ever thanked somebody for. Thank Him for bankruptcy? Thank Him for cancer? him for, I mean just fill in the blank of anything awful. Thank him for those things. Hey, listen we know this. We've been around long enough. There are some wonderful things that come out of some of the deepest trials in life. Listen there are some things that we learn of God that we could learn no other way. And when we go through that valley and the trial we come out the other side and say, you know what I'd go through that all over again if this was the only way to learn what I learned. Because what I learned about God was more precious than What I learned about his character, what I learned about himself was more precious than the depth of that trial. You've been there. You've been there. Be thankful. Give thanks for all things. Thankfulness reveals we have the right view of the character of God. Thankfulness reveals that you trust God, that He's given you enough. Wasn't that the problem with the Israelites here in 11? They had manna, they had food, they were full. Listen, they weren't starving when they fell. That's why the difference between what they did with the manna that morning and the quail the other day was one was lost. The quail was lost because they were full. They had just had manna. They may have had a full breakfast that morning before the manna dropped all over them. If you go back and look at it, it looks like they spent about, could have been spent up to 30 hours just collecting birds to eat. Now, I do wonder if the birds were dead or if they had to go kill them. That's another, I got to think that through. That'd have been interesting. A lot of neck cracking. That'd be kind of interesting. Thankfulness reveals that you trust God that he's given you enough. Godliness with contentment is great gain the Bible says. Paul said, I've learned whatsoever state I am therewith to be content. And you see that thankfulness in all of Paul's writings is thankfulness for who God is and what He has given and the contentment. I've known to abound and I've known to be abased. Paul says, I've learned whatsoever state I am therewith to be content. Thirdly, reveals we trust Him enough to thank Him even when we don't understand Him." Listen you can't do that without the indwelling Spirit of God. You can't do that as somebody who is not born again. That is a work of the Spirit of God in your life. Thankfulness reveals that we trust Him enough to thank Him even when we don't understand Him. Complaining. So let me challenge all of us tonight, I said us, I'm gonna challenge all of us tonight to put away murmuring and complaining. Let's be challenged tonight to live a life of thanksgiving on a day-to-day basis. You know what, if you seek, if we ever stop to try to just seek to acknowledge or see all of the things that we could be thankful for, do you know there's probably about nothing else we could do all day except walking around saying thank you for, thank you for, or thank you for this, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Friend, we could spend a long time. you for shoes. Thank you for socks. Thank you for a toothbrush. For the other people I'm glad that you know. I mean there are all sorts of things that if you really think about it we've got heat, and we have air, and we have lights, and we have walls. You know there are people meeting across the world that are thankful for a church with a roof and no walls. thankful for benches and a dirt floor and that they get to sit on a wood plank and not on the floor. And they are thanking the Lord tonight for what they have. They are thankful that the monsoons have passed and they get to go to church in a dry place and the rains aren't pouring down. I mean it just goes on, and on, and on, and on. Do you suspect there might even be a Christian somewhere walking the ghettos of New Delhi, or Delhi in India? scraping around for a little bit of breakfast out of some gutter that says, thank you, Lord. Found a little something to eat. I don't doubt it. I don't doubt it. My goodness, we have a lot, don't we? Absolutely. Let's live a life of gratitude and thankfulness. Let's put away complaining. Put away complaining and let's live a life that the world sees something so different, so different. What an awful testimony to live such a complaining life that we draw the world into our complaining spirit rather than drawing them into Christ. Boy, what a shame that would be. Our Father, we thank you tonight for your Word. We thank you for the preservation of thy Word and the inspiration of thy Word. We thank you that we have your Word in front of us, completely intact, without error. We thank that we have, so many of us have multiple copies of this. We have, we're looking at the word of God tonight. Your word here written down and we know that many before us, many of our forefathers went to their graves and went to horrible deaths and tortures because they had a copy of the word of God that they weren't allowed to have. And we thank you tonight that we have it right in front of us. Father, we could just spend time and another hour here just thanking you. for all that we have and but we thank you that everything that we do have comes down to one central thing and it comes down to the person of the lord jesus christ and we thank you for jesus we thank you for all that we have in him and father we just pray you'd help us to live lives of gratitude and put away complaining out of our life in every part. Would you do that work in us by your Holy Spirit? And we ask you for your grace to do that. And we'll thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. The invitation is open. Let's stand tonight. However the Lord has dealt in you, maybe it would be a good time just to spend a little bit of time to get away with the Lord and say thank you. Thank you. Thank you for this. Thank you for saving me. Thank you. Thank you for what you've given me. Maybe it's a time of thankfulness tonight. Maybe it's a time of just asking the Lord, asking the Lord to help you to stay away from a complaining spirit. If you've noticed it coming on, would you ask the Lord tonight, would you take that away from me right now? You know what a good way to get rid of that complaining spirit is? Just start thanking Him. Just start praising Him and thanking Him for all that He's done. you. you. Amen.