HARD TIMES - Israelites
When you are afraid or worried or in pain, what do you do? Do you have any strategies that help you feel better? Do you tell yourself to be brave? Do you try your best and not try not to think about failure? Do you ask for help? Or for some panadol? I know when I was in primary school I hated it and felt sick in my stomach every night going to bed and every morning getting ready but just kept going. I learnt at church to ask God for help and I did.
We all feel afraid or worried or in pain at different times of our lives. We all react differently too, when these things come upon us.
What do you think?
Imagine you are needing to move and live in a different country because your life where you are is not good.
You pack up all the things you want that you can carry and you leave. You don’t know where you are going, you just have to leave. You start walking. Then you catch a boat to a new land. Then you walk some more. You worry about food but notice millions of flowers growing around you and they are all edible. You mush them up and fry them like fritters. After a few months of eating those flowers you wish you had never left. It wasn’t so bad. At least you had things to eat other than one type of flower.
Bible Passage: Psalm 56:3-4
“When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?”
Story Time!
If you are interested in reading this story straight from the Bible, make your way through Exodus!
The Israelites:
Left Egypt hoping for a better life
Left Egypt just to die in the desert
God saved them. Led them with cloud and fire, parted the dead sea, provided manna to eat and water from stones, took them to the promised land.
The Israelites were scared. Large people with big armies lived in their promised land now. They complained, they rejected God’s authority, they doubted him.
God sent them back to the desert to wander around for 40 more years. More manna, more suffering, more doubting God.
God taught them an invaluable lesson during this time and it is a lesson repeated to every Christian and referred to in the bible more than any other event. TRUST GOD. In suffering, in life, in everything. He is powerful and in control. He is worthy of our trust in all situations.
Bible Passage: Psalm 56:3-4
“When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?”
Question Time!
Is there a time you can think of where you might doubt that God is in control?
What can you do to show that you trust God in certain situations?
