WHAT ANGERED GOD

Throughout the Bible, there are scriptures and stories of the lovingkindness, long-suffering, mercy, grace, and favor of God toward humanity. There are also scriptures and stories that reveal that God does get angry, particularly with us, His creation, when we reject His commandments, fail to recognize His provisions and grumble about His care for us. One of the most significant examples of people angering God is Israel, as seen in their wilderness journey.

After being in Egypt for four hundred thirty years, God was ready to deliver Israel from their enslavement. God knew that Pharoah would not willingly release the Israelites, so He sent ten plagues on the Egyptians. These plagues displayed to the Egyptians that Israel had a great God working on their behave and reintroduced to Israel the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

After the last plague, Pharoah let Israel go, and they left Egypt and went into the wilderness as directed by God. It was during their wilderness journey that the Israelites showed God they did not trust Him. Their wilderness journey, which should have ended a little beyond the two years, lasted forty years, and Numbers 14:20-23 revealed how this transpired. Additionally, in these verses, God voices his displeasure with Israel and how He was going to penalize them for their actions.  

Israel’s lustful appetite, lack of discipline, and trust in the “I AM” resulted in everyone over the age of twenty dying in the wilderness. It was God’s plan that the tribe of Israel return to the Promise Land; sadly, that did not happen, for many needlessly died along the way. What does this say to us? God is patient with us; however, continued negative actions toward Him will eventually anger him, and it will result in us suffering the consequence of our deeds. Blog message for today, “Don’t make God angry.”