Sandy bones

Sometimes Paul scares me.

This morning I read this: (1 Cor 10:1-5) "For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.  Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered over the desert."

This passage seems to be a reference to the Israelites wandering in the desert; besides the direct reference to Moses, there are allusions to the cloud (which led during the day) and passing through the (Red) sea. Spiritual food could be manna, spiritual drink could be the water from the rock. The reference to Christ puts the whole thing in a New Testament frame.

It's the last line that's scary. After 40 years of following, after 40 years of sinning and being forgiven, of learning and worshiping, most of them died in the wilderness because God was not pleased with them.

I wonder, did they know? Or did they just go along with the crowd, following along to the temple, going with them to collect manna, conforming to the group? They likely thought everything was fine; after all, they were just doing what everyone else did. You'd think if they had an idea that God was displeased, they would have changed something. After all, this was a group that had seen the fire and heard the thunder at Mt. Sinai.

That's why this is so scary. In a spiritual sense, I often think we're doing our 40 years of wandering here on earth, and then we get to enter the promised land. What if, like the Israelites, most of us will end up as the spiritual equivalent of dry bones slowly being drifted over by sand?

What if all the things I call worship and obedience aren't enough to outweigh the disproportionate amount of time I spend tending to my worldly affairs? What if the bit of my wealth I give disappoints God in light of everything He's blessed me with? What if the little scrap of scripture I put in my head each day is drowned in the ocean of worldly thoughts and images from all the media I consume?

There's nothing about me that's more special than God's chosen people. After being baptized, eating and drinking spiritual sustenance, and traipsing around this world in a crowd of God's people, I could still not please God. Then what?