Pursuing God with Dave and Gene

An eleven-day trip turned into forty years. And one of the biggest reasons why is that Israel couldn't stop complaining. God was providing manna every morning, leading them with a pillar of fire, and they were romanticizing life as slaves in Egypt. That's what whining does. It rewrites history, edits out the suffering, and makes the place God delivered you from sound better than the place He's taking you. And it's contagious. It spreads through families, workplaces, and churches the same way it spread through Israel's camp. Here's the thing: whining is the exact opposite of worship. You can't do both at the same time. So what are you currently complaining about that God has actually already been faithful in?

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

There was a perfectly good road from Egypt to Canaan. A direct route. A few weeks of walking, and Israel could have been home. But God took them south, deep into the desert, for an entire year. Not because He was lost, but because He was more concerned with who they were becoming than how fast they arrived. That pattern shows up everywhere in Scripture. Abraham, Joseph, Moses, and David. The roundabout way isn't the exception in God's story. It's practically the rule. So if you're living in the space between where you started and where you want to be, the question worth asking isn't, "When do I get out of here?" But the real question to ask is, "What is God doing in me here?"

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Most of us know we haven't kept all ten. And that's actually the point. The Ten Commandments were designed to show us who we really are and how desperately we need grace. Think about how you use a mirror in the morning.  The mirror just shows you the truth. The commandments hold up a reflection, not a ladder to climb. And when you look honestly, they don't lead to condemnation. They lead you straight to Jesus, the one who fulfilled what we cannot and offers forgiveness freely to anyone who asks. 

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

The Hebrew word for glory literally means weight or heaviness. It is God's full reality pressing into the world, and it is what filled the tabernacle so completely that even Moses couldn't enter. When was the last time you were genuinely struck by who God is, not what He's done for you, but just who He is? 

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Even after the golden calf, even after the rebellion, God's response wasn't to pull back. It was to draw closer. He gave Moses detailed instructions for building the tabernacle, a portable sanctuary right in the middle of the Israelites' camp, because He wanted to dwell among His people, not just visit from a distance. Every piece of furniture, every curtain, every offering pointed to the same thing: a holy God who desires relationship. But the tabernacle was always a shadow of something greater. When Jesus came, John tells us He literally "tabernacled" among us. And when He died, the curtain separating people from God's presence was torn open from top to bottom. You don't need a priest to go in for you once a year anymore. Through Jesus, you can approach God with confidence anytime. And through His Spirit, God doesn't just dwell among you. He lives in you. So here's the question worth carrying into your day: are you actually living like that's true?

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

It only took forty days. Forty days since the mountain shook, since they heard God's voice, since they trembled at His presence and begged Moses to speak for them because they were too afraid. And now they're melting down their gold and building something they can see, touch, and control. The golden calf wasn't just an act of rebellion. It was what happens when impatience wins. When we can't trust God's timing, we start filling the gap with something else. Money, success, relationships, comfort, habits. We don't always bow down to idols made of gold, but we all have something that quietly takes God's place when the waiting gets hard. So here's the question worth sitting with today: what have you been building while you wait?

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

God didn't climb Mount Sinai to make life harder; He went there to move in. When He gave the Ten Commandments amid thunder, lightning, and smoke, it wasn't a power play. It was a covenant. The first four commandments shape how we relate to God; the next six shape how we treat each other. And when Israel responded with one voice, "Everything the Lord has said, we will do," it was a moment of total surrender to a God who simply wanted to live among His people. But that raises a question worth sitting with today: Are there rooms in your life with the door still locked? God's commands aren't guardrails meant to cage you — they're the care of a Father protecting what matters most.

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

After delivering His people from slavery, parting the Red Sea, and providing daily bread in the wilderness, God gathered Israel at Mount Sinai and gave them the Ten Commandments, not as a burden, but as a blessing. These commands weren’t meant to restrict freedom but to protect it, like guardrails on a dangerous road. They reveal what life looks like when love for God and love for others shape every choice. The law was never a ladder to earn God’s approval; it’s a mirror that shows our need for grace and a guide that helps us flourish. So the real question is, how do we see God’s commandments? As control… or as care from a Father who wants to protect what matters most?

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Fresh off the miracle at the Red Sea, the Israelites quickly traded celebration for complaining when the wilderness exposed their hunger, thirst, and fear. Yet again and again, God responded not with anger, but with provision, turning bitter water sweet, raining down manna from heaven, sending quail at dusk, and bringing water from a rock. Through every need, He was teaching them a deeper lesson: trust Me one day at a time. The wilderness wasn’t just about survival; it was about dependence. And the same invitation stands today. Where are you tempted to grumble instead of trust? What if the very area you complain about most is the place God is inviting you to rely on Him daily?

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is a weekday podcast designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Just days after their miraculous escape from Egypt, the Israelites found themselves trapped with Pharaoh’s army closing in behind them and the Red Sea blocking their path ahead. Fear replaced celebration, and freedom suddenly felt fragile. But in that impossible moment, God revealed once again who He is: the One who fights for His people and makes a way where there is no way. As the waters parted and they walked through on dry ground, God didn’t offer a partial rescue; He delivered them completely. This dramatic scene reminds us that when we feel surrounded and stuck, the same God still works in ways we cannot see. 

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is a weekday podcast designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.

Pursuing God with Gene Appel is designed to help you pursue God, build community, and unleash compassion. Grounded in Scripture and shaped by Eastside’s conviction that God’s grace is for everyone, each episode invites you to discover God’s presence and activity in your life.