Open wide your mouth...

 

The people of Israel were on a FREEDOM March.  For the last 400 years they had only known slavery. They were accustomed to suffering without hope, with eyes and hearts downcast, not looking to the ONE who would save them. 

Their journey through the wilderness would expose their "I’m tired of men telling me what to do" hearts. They were still slaves, not to the Egyptians, but to their own desires.  They had no idea of what true freedom was.    

The people demanded their needs to be met; God wanted a relationship.

They wanted to be their own boss; God wanted them to learn to trust Him.

 He invited them, "Open wide your mouths and I will fill them." Ps. 81:1 But instead of opening their mouths to Worship HIM, they poured out their unbelief and whined.  Instead of praising Him for His kindness, they lodged their complaints about their situation.   Instead trusting with Mouths Open wide, they closed their fists with defiant murmuring.

All the rest of God’s creation understands HIM, but the men and women created in His own image, those He longed to save, were walking head down, going nowhere.

He was leading them to the PROMISED LAND, but knew they needed to be set free from themselves first.  REAL freedom always has more to do with what's going on inside us, than the circumstances surrounding us. 

We need to remember their journey too, lest history repeat itself.      

The birds know and trust.  Helpless from the very beginning, God created them to look up with their mouths wide open in expectation. 

And in time, those wide-open mouths are meant to do much more than receive food, but to receive HIS words of life, because “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” Matt. 4:4