An Attitude of Gratitude

  In Numbers 21 we find the Lord sending fiery serpents into the Israelite camp to punish them for their sins. The Israelite people were committing the sins of murmuring and tempting the Lord their God.

I Corinthians 10:9-10 – “Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents. Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.”

  Israel was murmuring and tempting their God because they did not realize the blessings of that were already upon them and they felt they deserved more. They were not grateful to the God who had delivered them and who was protecting them in the wilderness.

  It has been said, “The foundation of gratitude is the expectation of nothing.” When you expect more than you deserve that is when you will be ungrateful for what has already been given to you.

  The Israelites were going to find out the hard way, through the fiery serpent punishment, that God had been supplying protection and provision for them all along, and they were just ungrateful for what He was supplying. Deuteronomy 8:15 tells us that these serpents were widespread through all the wilderness that Israel was wandering in, and yet God was protecting Israel from them until their sin against Him.

  How many times do we complain about what the Lord has not given to us not realizing the disasters He has kept us from? How many times do we want more than we have when everything that we have is enough and all provided for by the Lord?

  True gratitude is when you thank the Lord for what He has already done and look on it as enough.

I Timothy 6:6 – “But godliness with contentment is great gain.”