1787 Complain and Remain

BIG Life Devotional | Daily Devotional for Women

What have you been complaining about this year? Really … what situation, what person, what problem has you complaining?

Complaining means you are making it very clear what you’re not happy about. You give energy and words to the things you don’t like. Your complaining spirit ultimately reveals a lack of trust in God. Really, if you know God is working in this, why are you complaining about it? If you know God is bigger than this and has made a way through it, your complaints are nothing but a negative distraction from the positive power of God.

Today, at the end of this year of life, God has made it very clear: If you continue to complain, you will remain.

Oh, God has so much more for you beyond this. He has promises to fulfill and a destiny he’s aligning. He has every intended ounce of harm against you and your family being turned around and used for good. He has messages coming from the messes and testimonies rising up from the test. HOWEVER, you will dismiss yourself from everything divinely aligned for you on the other side of this if you continue to complain about it.

Girl, you will get yourself stuck right here with your complaining.

2025 can be a year of absolute breakthrough for you, but you cannot breakthrough what you complain through. Your breakthrough requires you to BREAK THROUGH the habit of giving your energy and words to the things you don’t like. Your breakthrough depends on you BREAKING THROUGH this lack of trust that comes out of you as a complaining spirit.

Girl, do you really believe God is in this with you?
Do you really believe his promises of good plans for the future apply to you?
Do you really believe nothing will be impossible with him?

Yes? Then drop your complaining!

Everybody goes through a wilderness season. You know, the wilderness, where everything is just plain ol’ hard. Where you can’t see anything beyond where you currently are. The wilderness is where you don’t want to be. You are not alone in your wilderness.

If I could only study one story in the Bible for every life lesson I need, I would study the Israelites leaving Egypt, heading towards their promised land of overflowing blessings, but getting stuck in the wilderness on the way.

Exodus 14 we read of the Israelites leaving Egypt after 400 years of slavery there, and God protects them from their enemies by miraculously making an escape through the Red Sea for them. The sea literally parts and stands on it’s ends for them to cross on dry land. Then the moment all 600,000 men, plus women and children, crossed, then the walls of water came crashing down on the Egyptians who were chasing them.

Exodus 15, the Israelites begin to complain. They complain the water tastes bad and the Lord cleaned the water for them. Then he lead them to an oasis that had 12 springs and 70 palm trees where they could camp by the water.

Exodus 16, the Israelites begin to complain about food. They literally moaned wanting to go back to where they were slaves. So, God graciously rains down food on them. Manna covered the ground each morning, and quail flooded their camp each evening.

Exodus 17, at their new camp in the wilderness there were no springs, so again the Israelites begin to complain. So, God demonstrates his power in provision once again by causing water to gush from a rock.

Later in Exodus 17, they face battles in the wilderness, and every battle they are equipped and given victory.

But they have been delayed. The journey through the wilderness has taken much longer than necessary. They were traveling from Egypt, where they escaped captivity, through the wilderness to their promised land of Canaan. The distance was 250 miles. This was an 11 day journey. A hard journey, yes, no doubt. But not a forever journey. There was an end. In fact, there was a promise.

Exodus 6: 6-8, “I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.”

But here in the wilderness, the Israelites stopped clinging to the promise and instead complained. And their complaining got them STUCK!

Now, we’re no longer in the book of Exodus, we’re in the next book, the book of Numbers. Why? Because it’s taking a LONG TIME! Think of the changing of books like the changing of the year. They didn’t get where they were supposed to in the first book, so now we’re in the second book. I don’t know … maybe you didn’t get where you were supposed to in 2024, so now we’re going into 2025 stuck in the same dang wilderness without the changes you desired.

Why? Could it be a complaining spirit?

Numbers 13, the Israelites are finally on the verge of entering this promised land of God called Canaan. Everything they wanted was there. Food, water, beauty, blessings. But right at the edge, they stopped. They stopped because their complaining spirit had created a crippling fear within them. They didn’t receive their promise, they stopped short.

And so the entire book of Numbers passes, then the book of Deuteronomy until finally we get to the book of Joshua. FORTY YEARS HAVE PASSED. 40 years of living in a wilderness. Why? Because they chose to complain, so God made them remain.

Finally in Joshua 1, God gives marching orders to the Israelites and says, “In 3 days you will cross the Jordan River and take possession of the promised land.” And this time, there was no complaining! This time, their reply was, “We will do whatever you command us, and we will go wherever you send us.”

After 40 years of wandering in a wilderness, it only took 3 days to cross the Jordan River and stand in their promised land.

My sister, there is a promise over your life. God has a divine destiny for you. This is NOT all there is. But your complaining will keep you stuck in a place far short of your potential.

Right now, on this day, before we step into another new year, God wants us to take accountability for the things we say. Our complaining tongue has blocked far more blessings than the enemy has.

This wilderness you’re in is temporary. God has a plan through this. However, you have the ability to make this temporary wilderness your permanent misery. That’s the power of your attitude. That’s the power of your tongue. That’s the power of your habits.

So, some things need to be dropped in this wilderness before you cross your Jordan and step into God’s promises. Will you make the commitment now to allow this chapter of complaining to end so you can move on to your future promises?

Will you allow the Holy Spirit to examine your attitude and reveal all that isn’t serving you and isn’t honoring God?

Will you check your habits to see their trajectory? Every thing you do creates a trajectory for your future. It’s either good or bad. It’s either in God’s will or it’s not. What’s the trajectory of your daily habits? What needs to change here as you leave 2024 and step into 2025?

The wilderness is a place of transition. You’ve left where you were and you’re moving towards what God has promised you next. The wilderness reveals what cannot continue on with you. What cannot continue here is complaining.

Plain and simple, God is asking his girls to commit to Philippians 2:14, “Do everything without complaining.”

The Message translation says it like this, “Do everything readily and cheerfully – no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God.”

If you want to show people a glimpse of good living and the living God, then you absolutely CANNOT BE COMPLAINING!

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