I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 11-13.

My first reaction to reading the story of the quail was to think, “How often have I been guilty of what the Children of Israel did here?”  It also seemed to me that it is hard to avoid.  When times are hard and life consists of the same thing over and over again, it is just human nature to desire something different.  However, then I realized that the desire for something different was not their sin.  Their sin was in complaining about what God had provided.  They complained because they did not have the luxuries which they had experienced and desired to go back to the terrible situation which they had begged God to rescue them from.  They did not beg God for some variety.  They complained that He had rescued them from a terrible situation because their new life did not include the luxuries of that previous life.  So, their sin here was not the desire for more variety than God was providing them.  It was not even the fact that they were ungrateful for the way in which God had provided for them (although that is also a sin which we should avoid).  No, their sin was complaining that God had not provided them with variety and wishing to be back in the situation from which He had rescued them.  Asking God, even pleading with Him, to relieve the tedium of your life is not a sin, but complaining about the ways in which He has provided for you is.