THE CRISIS OF CONTENTMENT

Exodus 3:1 NASB95

Now Moses was pasturing the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian; and he led the flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

I.GOD CONSTANTLY CALLS US TO A DEEPER RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM. (THE MOUNTAIN OF GOD: SINAI)

A.THINGS IN AND OF THEMSELVES WILL NEVER SATISFY YOU.

Satisfy Your Soul

Bernhard Langer was one of the best golfers of his generation, twice winning the US Masters and at one time topping the world golf rankings. He said, ‘I had… won seven events in five different continents; I was number one in the world and I had a beautiful young wife. Yet there was something missing.

‘The lifestyle we all (especially us sportsmen) are leading – it is all about money and who you are and who you know and what you have and these things aren’t really the most important things. I think people who have these things, they realise that… there is still something missing in their life and I believe that is Jesus Christ.’

The spiritual emptiness that Bernhard Langer is describing is common to all humanity. One young woman said to me that she felt there was ‘a chunk missing in her soul’. You are not simply body and mind. You are a soul created for relationship with God. How then do you satisfy your soul?

Seek God day and night

Spiritual ‘food’ is just as real as physical food and it satisfies us in a way that cannot be satisfied by anything physical.

David was in the desert. He knew what physical thirst and physical hunger were like. But he also knew and experienced spiritual thirst: ‘My soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water’ (v.1). And he knew what it was like for his spiritual hunger to be satisfied: ‘My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods’ (v.5a).

His spiritual hunger and thirst are satisfied as he worships God: ‘So here I am in the place of worship, eyes open, drinking in your strength and glory’ (v.2, MSG).

B. GOD WILL DRAW YOU THROUGH THAT HUNGER.

Lord, I seek you today. Thank you that you satisfy my soul as with the richest of food and quench my spiritual thirst. Thank you that your love is better than life.

II. MOUNTAIN TOP EXPERIENCES CHALLENGE YOU.

A. TO GET TO THAT PINNACLE EXPERIENCE YOU WILL HAVE LESSONS FROM

DR. ANONYMITY.

DR. TIME. Many lessons can only be learned by experience. You can’t explain it. Have you ever said to someone, “you had to be there?”

Dr. Solitude. Some lessons only come in the quietness of loneliness. Desert

Dr. Discomfort. Real life does not offer safe zones. I wish it did. There are forces and principalities working against order and good. Sometimes, you even work against your best interests! Wow.

B.How will you respond?

i.Don’t need God’s Guidance. Story of Scientists rejecting God. Get your own dirt. Where did dirt come from? It didn’t wait around for man to make it. Yet, scientists if you take their position believe dirt made you as well? No intelligence. The very thing we walk on, they will say you were “created” by it. I am always amazed how they claim we are just dust, stirred up by the wind, shaken together by lightening and lava in a primordial soup that happened to make a person over lots and lots of time. But their VIEW is scientific and our belief in an intelligent Creator God is dumb fairy tale.

Look this is all that makes up a human being. In other words, we are all just this far away from drowning. But if its so simple, why don’t they make their own lifeforms instead of stealing DNA from God?

ii. I’m Tired of God and the difficulty of following God.

Anyone can aim low and hit the ground. It takes endurance to follow hard after God. You have to go through some gauntlets for God. You have to pay your dues so to speak. How many years did Moses have to learn before God will speak clearly to him? How long did David wait to be King? While being sought after. I had that problem in Estes Park. I was trying to avoid Seminary. I just wanted to get going and be pastor of a church. I thought I could do it. But I wanted to do it my way. Interestingly enough when I surrendered to Seminary, a church called me as pastor in the first semester. I could have bucked against God...

iii. I accept the call to courageously follow God all my life.

Jim Elliot.