SunSep252011
Scripture: EXODUS 17:1-7
Complaint: it seems to be the MO of the Israelites. If you were here last Sunday, you may remember that, having escaped their captivity in Egypt, they were now way irritated about having to wander around a Middle Eastern desert with nothing tasty to eat. And in response to their complaining, God gave them manna—bread for their journey.
Now, in the very next chapter of Exodus, there the Israelites are again in a contrary mood, complaining this time about not having enough to drink. So God tells Moses to take the staff he carries, and to strike a rock, so that water will pour forth from it. Another gift from the Creator to a sulking, unhappy people.
Two consecutive stories about whining people trying to get God to pay attention to their needs. And two successive responses of grace by the Giver beyond all givers. As a preacher, I confess I was a little sorry to see two successive stories that seem so similar. I had said I was going to preach a series of sermons on these readings from Exodus, and now here I was facing a story that in a number of ways seemed like a duplicate of last Sunday’s. What am I supposed to do, preach the same sermon again? Maybe I should preach on another biblical text, I thought.
Now after twenty-five years of doing this, you’d think I’d know better. Of course these two episodes aren’t identical. Each has its own distinctive character. And those nuances make for an entirely different dynamic this week, with an entirely different word for us. Today’s story has its own unique twists and accents.
The major difference is this: last week we pointed out that the complaining of the people is a good thing. It’s an honest expression of where they are emotionally. And the fact that God rewards their complaining with the gift of the manna shows that even God can be swayed by the desires we express and convey.
This week, though, not so much. The complaining takes on a different tone. This time it’s just more of the same and it begins to get a little old. The essential dynamic of the stories is still the same: in both, people complain; and in both, God gives food (last week) or water (this week).
But as we look more closely, the differences begin to seem more noticeable. Mainly it has to do with this: in last week’s story, there is no editorial comment on the complaining the Israelites do. Their badgering is presented as a kind of benign persistence. In this week’s story, though, something different happens: there’s a distinct jab taken at those carping Israelites. The whole point of the story, we find as we come to its last verse, is that the site where this incident takes place is from now on going to be called “Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the Lord” (17:7). You’d think if some neat name were going to be given to this place it would have something to do with the magnificent grace that had fed the people in the wilderness. Isn’t that the central point? Why not call the place “Water Is Given” or “Streams in the Desert”? No. Instead it’s “Testing” and “Quarreling.”
Putting these two stories next to each other, it’s as if God is saying: ‘a little complaining is fine—I don’t have a problem with that. It’s an entirely appropriate reaction to the vagaries of human life. But too much complaining and I’m going to put my foot down—it’s more than anyone—including me—should have to endure.’ It’s evidently a matter of proportion: some crabbiness is fine, but there’s a limit, and then it’s time to stop.
We understand their complaining, don’t we? We know the frustration of being promised a raise, and not getting it; or of trying delicately to open the cereal bag and having it rip all the way down the side; or of training doggedly for a race, only to get injured during race week. And if we’re typical, we complain. We rail about the frustration or the inequity or the dashed hopes and dreams. If we don’t express that frustration, it’s pretty easy for it to get bottled up inside us. If we don’t release it, it stays around to haunt us. A little tirade can free us to go on, to get past whatever the issue is. That’s the psychological dimension of the need to complain.
Not only that, but in a bigger sense, some of the things we complain about are conditions that really ought to be changed—in our family, in the workplace, in the world. If one adult in the house is hitting or verbally abusing another, or a child, it’s clearly not right, and complaining is more than justified. If workers are being treated like dirt, then objection is in order. If poverty continues to run rampant because priorities are skewed, then a principled protest is not only permissible, it’s required. Where would we be racially if Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King had not expressed strenuous objection to the status quo? Where would we be in response to gay and lesbian people had not the Stonewall riots refused to acquiesce to the predominant persecution? How long would this country have continued to fight in Vietnam if antiwar protesters had not continually challenged the government’s determination to wage that war? Let’s give protest and complaint its due. It can be both psychologically healthy and ethically necessary.
But how easily we slip, don’t we, from healthy resistance to sullen whining. How readily we slide from appropriate criticism to tiresome negativity. The world is littered with people who make hay out of seeing nearly everything in a negative light, people who are always trying to exert their brand of “improvement” on a world whose goodness they can never seem to celebrate.
Given the effectiveness of the Israelites’ complaints in these stories, we dare never dismiss complaint outright. It’s a necessary part of a psychologically and ethically healthy tool box. But given the rather startling naming of the place in the wilderness as “Testing” and “Quarreling,” it’s also worth asking ourselves to what extent we might have slid into a kind of inveterate complaining. It’s worth taking a good hard look at ourselves and determining whether we fall into the “legitimate complaint” camp, or whether we instead fall into the “tiresome carping” camp, the camp that pushes and prods and criticizes more than it affirms and supports and contributes.
The stakes are large, because the stance we take toward each other is remarkably contagious. If we grumble, those around us are likely to grumble, too. And if we affirm, others are likely to do the same. We all know people who, when they walk into a room, suck all the life right out of it. And we know others who seem to bring sunshine into the room as soon as they walk in.
Sometimes we don’t even know the effect we have, so it can be sobering to discover it. Just this week, I was telling Mary that the Fuel Perks at one of our local grocery establishments were about to expire, and that it would be great if she could stop by there on the way home that day to fill up. A couple of hours later, she told me that she had already filled up—at another station—and that she hadn’t wanted to tell me because, knowing my tendency to, shall we say, perhaps over-manage the details of our budget, she thought I would be irritated. Who knew that sweet little old me came across to my own spouse as one who would “tsk-tsk” if I sensed she hadn’t done what I had planned on! Is that really the way I come across? Evidently yes. Complain enough, grumble enough, and pretty soon you’ve distanced yourself from your own family. Not a good thing!
The same thing can happen at our workplace. We may grumble about the boss, or complain about the staff, and pretty soon it takes on a life of its own. It becomes the standard way we think about the organization. And what happens without our knowing it is that we become part of the problem. Yes, Jim may have done a lousy job on an important project. And yes, Lisa may need to be held to account. What their inadequacy may call for, though, is teaching or guidance, rather than complaint or whining.
Complaint eats into an organization or family like black mold in a wet basement, and pretty soon it takes an act of Congress to get rid of it. A good friend of mine once served a church in New England, and the conference minister used to say about the church that “the whole [was] less than the sum of its parts.” And the reason was that the church was characterized by back-biting and sniping and mutual suspicion. Carping was what distinguished the church’s members, and while it may have let each of them feel self-righteous, it did nothing to build up the body of Christ (Eph. 4:12).
In a way, the whole message we’re hearing today is one big cliché: you can attract more flies with honey than with vinegar. But it’s no less true for being a cliché. I’m much more likely to do something for you if you butter me up and tell me what a valued member of the team I am, than if you habitually convey your displeasure at my failings.
Some of this is summed up in some wisdom from the human resources field. Most of us grow up thinking we should try to improve in those areas in which we show our weaknesses. And when we get into a workplace, often the mentality is to improve those faults. An HR professional I know, though, says something entirely different. Over the years, she’s learned that workplaces should play to workers’ strengths rather than their weaknesses: accent gifts rather than correct limitations.
You can keep harping on a person’s failings, but there are two inevitable results. One is that the person’s morale will plummet. You’ll undermine their self-confidence, and they’ll always be looking behind their backs to see who’s ready to make a new suggestion about what they’re doing wrong. Their joy will evaporate. The other consequence of harping on the negative is that absolutely nothing improves. In a whole host of ways, it’s nearly impossible to “make people better.”
I once heard William Willimon, a thoughtful and respected United Methodist bishop, say that the best thing you can do to improve people’s performance is—pause for effect—hire the right people. Get the right person into a position, in other words, rather than thinking you’re going to improve them once they start.
In my first parish, in one of the first performance reviews I ever received, the man who spearheaded it summed it up this way: “Hamilton has certain weaknesses, but they’re so wrapped up with his strengths that if we tried to correct his weaknesses we’d end up sacrificing his strengths.” It was a remarkably perceptive and helpful summation of my limits and gifts, and an acknowledgement that complaining about my limits was going to prove singularly fruitless.
My guess is that’s true for everyone, that our weaknesses and strengths are so intimately interlocked that any attempt to dislodge one from the other will result in such a needless contortion of the person that something fundamental will be sacrificed.
Let’s be clear: none of what we’re saying is intended to imply that there’s never any room for improvement, that the way things are is the way they’ll always be. I hope I’ve learned some things over the years, and that experience has shaped me in some helpful ways. It’s only to say that approach matters, tone matters. The stance that man took with me in my first church was one that affirmed who I was and encouraged me to grow into my strengths.
This approach can have traction in homes, workplaces, neighborhoods, and nations. Imagine what it would be like to say to the spouse or partner who frustrates us, “I know I haven’t expressed my appreciation recently, but I so love being married to you.” Or to lay off some of the complaining we do to our children, some of the carping we do about grades or neatness or manners. All of those standards are important—nothing we say this morning is an attempt to deny that. It’s only to say that when the atmosphere is charged with negative ions, the poison is enough to undo the best of intentions. It ends up being counter-productive. So how about a totally different approach? How about a hug? Or a trip to play mini-golf? Or a walk at Frohring Meadow? Or a visit to a favorite restaurant?
The same is true in workplaces. We all know that Susan does a lousy job at marketing. Or that Bill is overly obsessed with details. Or that Lee runs habitually late. Yes, in some perfect world these traits would need to be corrected. This isn’t to say that anything goes. And it isn’t to say that there aren’t improvements that can and should be made. It’s only to say that eventually incessant carping can become more of an impediment to workplace cohesion and productivity than the behavior we’re criticizing.
As we attend to this story from Exodus this morning, we’re reminded of some things that are at the core of our faith. It’s appropriate and necessary to bring our complaints to God: that’s part of a healthy relationship. But it’s crucial that we not belabor the point, that we not get stuck in a kind of toxic spin cycle. There’s clearly no hard and fast way to distinguish one approach from the other. But we always have this as our North Star: God has created each of us in unique and special ways. And we’ve been invited to share that love with others, to accept them as they are, and to be creators and encouragers and cheerleaders and partners. And when we do that, the sky’s the limit. The rivers of God’s holy waters will bathe us in grace.