you're like her all right that'll be fine we'll look forward to that now shall we turn our Bibles please to the book of numbers numbers chapter 11 you may notice from the chart that our red line which indicates how far we have progressed on our journey from Egypt to Canaan It's extended a little further since we were here last time, and we're going to make progress this morning. So we're going to read Numbers chapter 11, beginning at verse 1. 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 flinched. And he called the name of the place Tibera, which means burning, because the fire of the Lord burnt among them. And the mixed multitude that was among them fell alusting, and the children of Israel also wept again and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat? 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. But now our soul is dried away. There is nothing at all besides this manna before our eyes. And the manna was as coriander seed, and the color they're off as the color of the dallium. And the people went about and gathered it, and ground it in mills, or beat it in a mortar, and baked it in pans, and made cakes of it. And the taste of it was with a taste of fresh oil. And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it. Now we're going to read down at verse 33. And while the flesh was yet between their teeth, ere it was chewed, the wrath of the of the Lord was kindled against the people. And the Lord smote the people with a very great plague. And he called the name of that plague, Kibrah-Hadaba, because there they buried the people that lost it. That Hebrew name there means the grave of loss. And the people journeyed from Kibrah-Hadaba until Hazirah and Abodat-Hazirah. In our study, we have been lingering at Mount Sinai, as you know. Israel was kept there for approximately one year. We have passed over very much in our studies that transpired there because we did not want to take too long to complete our journey. But in our last studies, we noticed that before there was any movement from Sinai, God revealed to the people his order. He had an order for them, whether they were in camp or on the march. Last Wednesday night, we looked at the order of the march. God had a place for each one of his people, for each family of Levi's, and for each five in Israel, around the center when they were in camp, the center of course was the tabernacle, and then on the march God had a place for each one of them, so that everything now being in order and ready to move according to the divine plan, they move on from Mount Sinai, as you see on the chart here, with a broad red line, they move on to Kibra Patava. Now we have been reading what transpired there. We did not read the entire account, but I want us just to look at a few thoughts regarding what transpired at this place, and I believe there we have some very very important lesson for us to learn. I think you could center what transpired that we want to look at around about five different words, but I think linked themselves together. First of all, we were reading in verse one of their discontent. They murmured, they complained. Now we'll come back to that. A little farther down, we read of their desire. They were desiring the things that they once had enjoyed in Egypt, and connected with that desire was their dissatisfaction with the manna, God's provision for them. Now this could only bring God's disciplining hand upon them. And so we read of his discipline that even while in grace he provided for them, by bringing in these quails in a miraculous way yet he disciplined them and the result for many was death and so we have that solemn scene there, Kibra Alaba where they're buried in a place that is called the Graves of Lot now I have pointed out to you that the book of Exodus is the book of coming out, coming out of Egypt, delivered from bonding, picturing to us, of course, that deliverance that we have from the bondage of sin and Satan to the blood and power of the cross of Christ. And so in Egypt they came out, and we followed them down to Mount Sinai. In the book of the Leviticus, which we did not take time to look at to any great extent, they were taught how they could go in and worship God. But now, in the book of Numbers, a very interesting, although neglected book, they are taught how they should go on for God. And one of the first things that they had to learn, as I said, was they had to go on according to the divine plan, in the divine order for the count. What they're going on. Now, the title in our English Bible numbers, well, it is connected with the subject of the book, yet it's not adequate at all. We must remember, of course, these names are not inspired, as the text of the Bible is. there are two numberings in the book of numbers but there's a great deal more now the Hebrew word the title in the Hebrew Bible which of course is the original of numbers is Midbar which means in the wilderness now that's exactly what it is they are in the wilderness they've been delivered they've been redeemed they've been brought out to God now they're traveling through a wilderness and there are a number of wildernesses spoken of in the book of Numbers that reminds us that when we are saved when we become Christians through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ when we come unto the blood of Christ and are sheltered by that blood from judgment we become pilgrims and strangers that is what Peter writes about in his epistle we are strangers this world is not our home now many of us as Christians settle down as though this were our home and we're going to be here forever in our heart we know that's not true but we go ahead and we act as though it were but God wants us to remember that we are strangers in this world This is not our home. We are traveling toward our heavenly home. But we are pilgrims, not strangers wandering around. But pilgrims. Remember when I first put up this chart, which I bore from another brother, my chart having, like many of my books, taken off the parts unknown. But when I bore this chart from another brother, you remember, I knew. immediately began to criticize it. I didn't like the title whatsoever, the wanderings of the children of Israel. That gives the wrong impression altogether, as I said. They did not wander from Egypt until they got to the borders of Canaan. They journeyed because they were guided by the Spirit of God, as pictured in the Bible. the pillar, the cloud. Now, God doesn't want his children wandering. It was not in the mind of God for them to wander for 40 years. We'll deal with that when we get there. God has made us children who are going somewhere. You have heard, I'm sure, about the happy colored brothers who was talking so much about heaven that he kind of got on the ground. nurse of his unsaved fellow workmen, and one of them said to him, why, you know there's no such a place as heaven? Well, he said, I'm sure he's having a good time going nowhere then. Now, every Christian can say that. We're having a good time, but we're not going nowhere. We're going to heaven. We're strangers here, and the more we live like it, the happier we'll be. But thank God we're pilgrims on our way toward our heavenly home. But in this book of numbers, and this is all I want to say about the general nature of the book, in this book of numbers, seven times, you read about these people murmuring, complaining. Now, that's rather a surprise, isn't it? Think of all that God had done for them. slaves with nothing. Ground down under the lash of the taskmasters in Egypt. There they were eating out a miserable existence. God had come in and delivered them. He'd brought them out of Egypt. He'd provided for every need. He'd stopped them at Mount Sinai and revealed themselves to them and instructed them, and now he was leading them on, and every morning they looked out at the door of their tent, they saw the manna that God had given freshly every morning on the Jews. Now think of all that, and yet here they are once again, and they're murmuring, they're meaning. What a rebuke to us. For God has done infinitely more for us than he did for Israel. The salvation that we enjoy is infinitely greater than that which Israel had in a natural way. And yet don't we find ourselves complaining? Complain about this and that and the next thing, you know? Some Christians can complain if the coffee's too hot, it's burning their tongue. It's too cold. They don't enjoy it. If the toast isn't toasted enough, they don't like it. If toasted too much, it's burnt. How silly for us to be complaining. We who are heirs of God and joined heirs of Jesus Christ, I was blessed with one of the most contented men I've ever known, my father. If the food was cold, he liked cold food. If it was hot, he liked cold hot he was able with lukewarm he just loved lukewarm too he enjoyed when the sun was shining and he was thankful when it was raining oh i'm glad of that and he was like that until his 80th year when god took him home to heaven and he left behind a testimony at the christian nursing home where he ended his day as being one of the most contented men they'd ever know that never had in me but and he just enjoyed him. And I hope his son will be half the man he was. They were complaining. Now, we're not told what they were complaining about. So you would be led to believe it was because of the journey. There's nothing else mentioned to begin with. There is later. You see, these people had been stopped at Mount Sinai for a year. morning they'd have their manna every morning god provided the water for them they hadn't had to pack up their tents and move they were simply there learning from god and seems to me they just made them kind of soft and now they have to pack up and journey through the wilderness and they start complaining about it isn't that true of us you know god in his goodness he makes things a And we get shocked. And then when there's a little bit of casting and style come along, before we know it, we're complaining. I am not going to take time, there isn't time, to go through the New Testament. But again and again we have murmuring spoken against. Very, very strong. And we're told to do all things without murmuring. things without murmuring and so here they are they're discontented and it discrees of the Lord now it might not seem very much to us we we have a certain category of sins you know and oh I wouldn't think of doing that was a good thing you wouldn't but then before we don't think very much about murmuring complaining do we but here's discrees of the Lord they apparently were not satisfied with where and how the Lord was leading them. That's the only thing that appears on the text. Now, the Lord's just pleased with that. And yet how often, if you and I are honest, I look back over 50 years, how often in my heart, I may not have set up my list, but how often in my heart I thought, now the Lord just isn't leading me the way he should. Why'd he put me here? Why'd he put me there? Why'd he lead me in this way? Why'd he lead me in that way? You see, when we do that, we're questioning his love or his wisdom. And really in our mind we're saying, now, Lord, I could have done a little bit better. If you just had consulted me, I could have told you how to do this just a little bit better than you did. Now, it almost frightens us to think of that. doesn't it but isn't that actually what we're doing when we complain against the way the Lord leads us and the Lord is displeased and his fire his anger is kindled and a fire burns and I want you to notice it's kindled and it burns and consumes them that were in the uttermost part of the camp that is those that were furthest from the tabernacle the tabernacle is the center And here are the fringe area people. Out around the fringes. They apparently were the ones who had done the complaining. Because God always suits his punishment to the transgression. They were complainers and they were consumed. Let me say this then. The safest place in the things of God is not out there in the fringe. Get into the center of things. I've always believed if I was going to do anything, I was going to do it the very best I could. When I played baseball, when I went to the plate, there's just one thought I had in mind. That's a home run. Well, we settled for a single. We're not going to settle for a single. We're going to have a home run. And when God saved me, I said, no, I want to put what I've got into the things of God just as much as I did in my business or my athletics or anything else I believe we're in danger when we become strange area Christians we can always complain about something if you get in the middle of it and get so busy you won't have time to complain and then they cry to the Lord and Moses prays and the fire is quenched but I must move on because there are a few things more I want you to notice when we come to verse 4 we have their desire for the things of Egypt and you'll notice where this begins with a mixed multitude now we ran to the mixed multitude in chapter 12 of the book of Exodus when they came out of Egypt it says a mixed multitude went with them now doesn't explain who they were these are only two references you've got to it. But undoubtedly, some of them at least were ones who were related to the Israelites by marriage. You find in the 24th chapter Leviticus, you read about a man whose mother was an Israelite and his father was an Egyptian, which tells us there was some intermarriage at least when they were down there in Egypt. Others may have been some of their neighbors, but this mixed multitude they were not Israelites. They just went along. Maybe they were impressed by the plagues that God poured out on the land of Egypt. But when the Israelites got ready to move on, a mixed multitude went along with them. They weren't Israelites at all, they were just hangers off. They were what we would call today professors. of people today that are professing religion that do not possess Christ. There are some people who are just out and out sinners. They don't claim to be on them. But there are many people in America who profess to be saved, but they've never been born again. They've never come under the blood of Christ. They've never seen themselves a lost, guilty sinner going to hell and trusted Christ. Now that's the mixed multitude you've got in Christendom today. Nine-tenths of your trouble originates with mixed multitudes. Nine-tenths of the grumbling and complaining and wanting the world and bringing the world into the church and trying to put the church into the world, it comes from the mixed multitudes. They weren't satisfied with a manna. Oh, it's all right. It's kind of a supplement. But we remember, they say, the fish, which we did eat freely in Egypt. The cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, the garlic. We remember what we had down in Egypt. Wait a minute. Is that all you remember? Don't you remember the past masters? Don't you remember the lash? Don't you remember having to make bricks without straw? The devil won't tell you about that, but he'll tell you all the things the world has to offer. But he won't tell you the price you've got to pay for. We remember the fish had tweeted eat freely. They paid dearly for it. Fish may have been plentiful in Egypt. It may have been the food of the poor people. But I tell you, this is costly fish for them. under the broiling sun, making bricks and going home. No paychecks. They'd paid plenty for their fish and all the rest. And you can be quite sure of this. Everything the devil gives you, you will pay a high price for it. Now I'm not talking out of any ivory tower. I was a slave of sin before God saved me. I'm not going to talk about that either. But I know that side of the street, and I know what you pay. You pay in your body, you pay in your mind, you pay physically, you pay in motion, as well as spiritual, for everything you get from the dead. But the devil will remind you of these things. And oh, how the devil used to remind me now, if you become a Christian, you'll have to. to give up the fish and the onions and the leeks and the garlic. And I'm sorry to say I went in strongly for the garlic, not in a physical sense, but morally I went in for the garlic, because you know the devil's got everything. What's the matter? What's wrong with cucumbers and melons? Nothing. Nothing. nothing. They're both mild. They tell us particularly that cucumbers of Egypt were mild, but they're mild, apparently harmless, and that's what the devil baits many of his hooks with. He gets people with cucumbers and melons. Things within themselves are not harmless, but they're so occupied with them, they despise the man of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then he has some leech. for others that's a little stronger and if you want something a little stronger than that if you're some onions and if you want the real strong you'll give it a garlic he got whatever your palate desires the devil has got but as they desire these things what's it making them do it's making them dissatisfied with a manna Now, the manna was God's provision, and the manna, of course, was that beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have covered that in the fact, and I think it's quite significant that the man is described again here, and is spoken of as coriander seed and the deltium. But in their desire for these things of Egypt, it's leading them to be just slanted. satisfied with the Lord Jesus Christ in figure, in type, in the manner. Now, let me make, keep this clear. I don't want you to get confused. Those of you who are unfaithed, who have never been born again, he keeps you so occupied with the diet of Egypt, of this world, that you do not accept Christ as your Savior. I hope you're clear on that. Now, let me speak to those of you who are saved. What he wants you to do is to develop an appetite for the things of this world so that you'll be dissatisfied with Christ. Now, let me say this. Christ is enough to begin with, and he's enough to end with. I've been a young fellow, and as I was in a young fellow, my main interest was in force. But God took me out of frankly every sport there was and out of the ring and satisfied him of Christ. I had no trouble giving up my career in the ring. I had no trouble giving up my career in baseball or in football or in hockey. I found Christ was all I knew. Then I went on from that period into middle age, where there comes marriage and a home. and a family and I found Christ enough for that now I'm going down the other slope and some of us said to me well it's quite anybody's near 70s you are but why would they be interested in athletics why would they be interested in all these things but now wait a minute I've been through all that Christ was enough and now as an old man Christ is enough The manner is enough to satisfy from the beginning to the end. Oh, I'd like you to see. It speaks here of it being the taste of the fresh oil. Now, we here in America, in the Western world, we don't use oil and we don't value oil the way they did and do in the Middle East. anything that was fresh oil in the Middle East. Why, that was excellent. That's what they needed, and that's what they wanted. And to me, the thought here is, not only was the manna, as you have it in Exodus 16, sweet like honey, but it was fresh, like fresh oil. They've been getting it to 16, but it was still fresh. And we who have been saved all these years, we can say the Lord Jesus Christ is still fresh. I enjoy the Lord Jesus, my Savior, every bit as much now as I did when first God sent. I think maybe a little bit more, because I know a little more about it. But here, they, the they're satisfied with the man they want flesh and to pass over the verses that we did not read God promises to Moses that he'll give them flesh more than they need even and even Moses may staggered at that why he says Lord if we kill off all the herd and all the sheep and the cattle and everything if we kill them off Well, that'll hardly be enough for the whole town. The Lord's word said, Now you leave that to me. And he brought in these migrating quails in such quantities from the Mediterranean Sea there. He brought them in at such quantities and he brought them in low down, swept in by a strong wind so that the people just had to stand up all they not see the quail flying over their heads, but they're brought in low there where they could just club them down, and they got more than they could eat. So they spread them around the camp, the dry in the thaw. God had given them what they'd asked for, and they started to enjoy it. struck. That's why I asked you to read verse 33. While the flesh was yet between their teeth, here it was to, the wrath of God was tingled against the beast. Do you remember back when God gave them the quail in Exodus 16? God says, I'll give them so much quail it'll come out their nostrils. And as I said then, all you'd have to do for a month or so to turn an Israelite green were just a quail. and he'd had it. He didn't want to hear anything about prayer. Now that's the way God worked sometimes. A wise man Solomon said, the backslider and heart shall be filled with his own ways. And I've known some Christians get away from God. They were determined they were going to have something, and God let them get it. And if they only could have got rid of it after, they'd have been so glad but sometimes God does this God gives them the way they start to chew it and before they can even swallow it the wrath of God strikes and disappears it's a solemn thing my brethren sisters to get away from God I'm talking to those of you who are true Christians who are born again it's a solemn serious thing to get away from God to get your heart set on something I've known some Christians young and older, and they've got their heart set on marrying a certain person, and they wouldn't take advice from God and their man. I tell you, they were awfully glad if they could have got rid of that person later. Awfully glad. I've known some Christians, and they've set their heart on money, and all they could think was making money and making money and making money and making money and making money. God let them make money but his judgment fell off. I've known some Christians and they have neglected the things of God for the things of themselves, their own family, their own home, their own business. That which concerned themselves came first God permitted us it reminds me I shouldn't take time but it reminds me of an Irish brother I preached with I know you can learn a lot from Irishmen because they're always doing things that nobody but an Irishman would do well he was at that time when our preachers all had stomach trouble. You know, it's one of those fads. He used to have all, I've lived with all kinds of fads. And the fad then was for a preacher to have stomach trouble. And when he sat down at a sumptuous table, you know, some sister had prepared, well, oh, I'm sorry, I can't eat that. Sorry, I can't eat that. Of all the affliction that has struck me through my life, I've never had that, for which I'm supremely thankful to God. Well, they'd stomach them. And then they had a cure. The fad then was to eat fleshman's yeast. Any old-timers remember that? You know, all the preachers always carried a little cake of fleshman's yeast. And so when they started to burp, why, they'd cover off fleshman's yeast and start chewing away at it, you know. Well, this Irishman, I was preaching with it, they had a little girl. And she thought it was candy. so she said candy daddy and so very patiently for an Irish woman he explained now this is not candy dear daddy has stomach trouble and this is yeast you have to eat yeast for his stomach trouble candy daddy candy daddy well he did what you'd expect any Irishman to do he just took what she thought was candy and put it right in her mouth well you can imagine a little talk getting a mouthful of fresh man's yeast of all the spitting and squattering their walk. But you know, I've never forgotten. Anytime I get old to urges at the throne of grace and say to my heavenly father, candy, father, I remember that you. I better let the Lord make the choice for me. It may not be candy. If the Lord says it won't do me any good, I better be satisfied and not have it. And while This was yet in their teeth, the wrath of God spoke. There's a commentary on this in Psalm 106. I believe it's verse 15. Referring to this very instance, it says, He gave them their desire. He gave them their desire, but He sent leanness into their soul. Sometimes you have to make a choice. Often you have to make a choice. Let me say to you, my dear unsaved friend, your choice is between heaven and hell. You've got to make a choice. And the choice between heaven and hell depends upon whether you receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior. You, my dear Christian friend, your choice is between earth and heaven. And you've got to make a choice, which you're going to live for. Live for earth and the things of us, or live for heaven and the things of us. Set your heart on something that's of this world. God may give it to you, but he may send leanness into your soul. lose your interest in the things of God. You'll lose your interest in prayer. You'll lose your interest in the Bible. You'll lose your interest in the gathering together of the Lord's people. And you'll lose an eternal reward at the judgment seat of Christ. May God help us not to make the mistake. What a tragedy. Israel moved on. But not all of them. Some of them were very under honest tombstones there aren't very many of those but there at Hebrew capital the tombstones of it were read the graves of those who lost them I'm afraid lying underneath many a tombstone that says a breath or a peace I'm afraid there's a body of someone whose soul has gone to hell. Make sure that Christ is your Savior. And having received him as your Savior, live for him 100% shall we