God meets our needs to prepare us for greater things. Often times we make the mistake of thinking that God meets our needs for our purposes. He certainly meets our needs because he love us, but his meeting of human needs is never the end game, rather, its the means for a greater end. We have to remember that God is not a means to our ends, but we are a means to his ends. We can’t forget that he is much more concerned about our holiness than our happiness.
We see this in the story of the desert wanderings in the book of Exodus. As Israel makes their way across the desert, the challenges get more and more difficult. One the first obstacles that the people of Israel face in coming out of Egypt is thirst. This is the fundamental human need. The people of Israel are delivered from Egyptian slavery and right away they begin complaining that they have nothing to drink. God responds immediately and turns the bitter water sweet for drinking.
Did you know that God wants to turn the bitter water in your life into sweet, nourishing and refreshing water that is good for drinking? This is the kind of God we serve.
Not long after this, they complain that they are hungry. Again, a fundamental human need. God sends mannah from heaven and meets this need.
As the story of the wilderness wandering progresses, the obstacles get more and more serious. Each need more advanced than the next—and need after need, God proves himself faithful.
He proves himself faithful to Israel in the small things so that they will trust him in the big things. He does the same things for us. He proves himself faithful in the small things so that we’ll trust him in the big things. Often times it can even seem that he’s not being faithful, but this is the time of true faithfulness—these are the times where we can trust him even when we don’t understand. When we can do this, we have arrived.
Each time God meets our needs, it’s preparing us for the next big thing. What is he preparing you for? Are you ready for a harder, more challenging trial? Something more serious than food and water?
He will be faithful.
Beyond this, we said before that meeting human needs is not the end game for God. He is not a means for human ends, rather humans are a means for God’s end. Think about it for a moment, why was God bringing Israel through the desert? Because he had a mission for them, a mission to bring blessing to the world. Ultimately, this was accomplished through Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. He needed people to represent him in the world so that they world would know him.
Drawing further on Jesus’ life, Jesus didn’t heal simply to heal, rather, he healed people in need during his earthly ministry in order to show the masses the kind of God that he served.
This means that people’s needs are God’s opportunity to shed his love and light into the world.
Let God meet your needs today, not for your sake, but for the sake of the world.
