Summer sun twinkled through the leaves of the tree lined
road. It was early, but the temperature
had already reached a balmy 87 degrees and by mid-afternoon would hit 98
degrees. I idly thought that maybe I
would take my family on a weekend trip to the surface of the sun for a bit of a
reprieve from the heat.
Sure, the surface of the sun is hot, but at least it’s a
dry heat…
I remember last winter, when the polar vortex moved through,
the complaints about the weather that I heard every day reached an extremely
high level. Maybe instead of a heat
index, we really need a weather dissatisfaction index.
“…and in other news, the weather dissatisfaction index (WDI)
is expected to reach an all time high on Tuesday at 99.99!”
Growing up I heard and read the stories about the complaining Israelites traveling
through the Sinai Peninsula. God had
done miraculous things on their behalf – freed them from slavery, taken them
through the Red Sea, and given them water from a rock. They still complained constantly.
God had sent the people food that they gathered every morning. They called it manna and initially, they liked it. It didn’t
taste too bad, was fortified with every vitamin and mineral you could think of,
and no one went hungry. There was only
one problem. It only came in one flavor –
manna flavor.
At one point the people came to Moses distraught, “Oh that
we had meat to eat! We remember the fish
we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the
onions, and the garlic. But now our
strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.”
(Numbers 11:4-6)
They should have had hearts full of gratitude, but instead
they moaned about musty manna. They had tired of the sustenance that God had provided and now, they simply wanted something else.
I wonder how much better we would do. We, who have supermarkets full of good (if
expensive) food and homes with air conditioning. We, who have running water and even ice
makers still have the ability to complain about things we cannot change, like
the weather.
At the end of the day, complaining seldom changes
anything. It doesn’t even make us feel
better about the thing under scrutiny.
It only drags our focus from our blessings to the imperfections of life.
Even if the weather dissatisfaction index hits 100 percent,
we can still feel grateful. If someone can be satisfied with just rhythm and music, surely we can be thankful the God is good and we are blessed. Who could ask for anything more?
