Psalm 84:1-4 (5-12); Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29 

Rev. K.C. Van Atta-Casebier 

A Sermon for Foundry UMC 

9.26.21 

Let’s Pray. God, for Your wisdom and revelation and hope, we pray now. Amen. 

Splash! A little jarring at first, for both me and the water, but when the water  settles, it begins to envelop me in what feels like a hug with no added pressure. Then  an immediate, unencumbered deep breath with no resistance, no pain. It's the moment I  long for - breath accompanied by relief. After the breath comes the desire to test the  water, to see if it encourages movement or would prefer for me to stay in my place.  Predictably, it always encourages movement. It always invites me forward. And after the  movement comes the rest. And oh, does the water encourage rest. It holds steady as if  to say, “Take all the time you need, I’ve got you, and I’ll be here when you’re ready to  move again.” Eventually though, the time does run out. I have to find the nearest ladder,  and pull myself out of the pool. It’s hard, not just because of a lack of desire, but  because (and I’m sure you’ve noticed this as well), pulling yourself out of the water  requires extra strength. The water grabs onto you, almost trying to pull you back into  communion with itself. “No! Don’t go,” the water says. Inevitably, the first feeling and  connection I have with my body after swimming, is a deep and primal need. THIRST.  Now, I do need to confess that I am typically a thirsty person. I have “beverage needs”  as the Foundry Youth and I call them, and you will likely never see me without a  ridiculously large sized container of water. Swimming, though, exacerbates my thirst,  because as it turns out, spending time in the pool can actually dehydrate you. As time  goes on, I not only experience that kind of primal thirst, but also an itching desire and  thirst to be back in the water. To feel held, relieved, and encouraged to move and to  rest. Over the last few months of obligation, difficulty, and to be transparent, a dip in my  mental health, swimming has sustained me.  

To set the scene for our text, we actually have to set two scenes. In our first  scene, the Israelites are emboldened to express their hunger and thirst by this rag tag  rabble, said to be a group of Egyptians who tagged along with the Israelites out of  Egypt. They begin to express a hunger for sustenance beyond the miraculous manna  that God has provided for them. Specifically they wanted the fish, melons, cucumbers,  leeks, onion, and garlic that they were fed back in Egypt - a meal that was remembered  as free, except that it wasn’t free at all. It actually came at a great cost, the cost of their  freedom. Moses hears the people weeping at their tents. I imagine it as this guttural  expression of another very basic human need - food. Moses, overwhelmed by the  communal despair, addresses God by saying (and I’m paraphrasing), “Why am I the  one carrying this burden? Did I conceive these people? No, YOU did. I can’t carry the  weight of this need. It is too heavy. DO SOMETHING.” And as we enter the second  scene, God basically rebuts saying, “No, you do something. Go grab the seventy elders  and bring them to the tabernacle tent.” And in our second scene, Moses does just that. 

And in the tabernacle tent, God takes some of the Spirit saturated in Moses and places  it on the seventy elders, and they begin prophesying. Then word gets back to Moses  that 2 of the elders weren’t in the tabernacle, but they were prophesying anyway.  Joshua is very concerned. And Moses says, “Would that all the Lord's people were  prophets, and that the LORD would put his spirit on them!" (v. 29) This is firstly a tale of  revised memory. Perhaps we revise our history because it is too painful to confront.  Maybe we do it subconsciously. I’m going to talk briefly about pregnancy and want to  offer this word. If you feel that this might be something that could cause you pain,  please keep watch over