Sticking to the What and not the Why?

Numbers 32¹ The Reubenites and Gadites, . . .  said, "let this land be given to your servants as our possession. Do not make us cross the Jordan." ⁶ Moses said to the Gadites and Reubenites, "Shall your countrymen go to war while you sit here? ⁷ Why do you discourage the Israelites from going over into the land the LORD has given them? ⁸ This is what your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh Barnea to look over the land. ⁹ After they went up to the Valley of Eshcol and viewed the land, they discouraged the Israelites from entering the land the LORD had given them. ¹⁰ The LORD's anger was aroused that day and he swore this oath: ¹¹ 'Because they have not followed me wholeheartedly, not one of the men twenty years old or more who came up out of Egypt will see the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob- ¹² not one except Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite and Joshua son of Nun, for they followed the LORD wholeheartedly.' ¹³ The LORD's anger burned against Israel and he made them wander in the desert forty years, until the whole generation of those who had done evil in his sight was gone. ¹⁴ "And here you are, a brood of sinners, standing in the place of your fathers and making the LORD even more angry with Israel. ¹⁵ If you turn away from following him, he will again leave all this people in the desert, and you will be the cause of their destruction."


Wow! Moses got pretty stirred up about the request of the Reubenites and Gadites! He called them some pretty strong names. "A brood of sinners" was how he described them. The only problem was that Moses was still living out the old script that came from years of spending time with people who did not want to be around him or God. He missed that a new attitude had come into the camp. He missed that the younger group were talking and acting like people who believed God and really wanted to serve him.


As I was meditating on this passage again this morning it struck me how much like me Moses was. Moses was operating on a soul habit that had been ingrained in his being by constantly dealing with people who had a bad attitude. But the reality is that he was wrong this time. He misjudged his country men’s heart motives. In fact he got it 100% wrong.


Unfortunately the passage does not say that Moses apologized. He held a hesitant stance that was still mistrustful. I see myself in this.

Many times I have found myself acting on what I believed was the why and not responding to the what.of what people do and say. How easy it is to “know” why people are doing and saying what they do and say.

If only Moses had taken the time to pray about what the men who were asking him to give them an inheritance on the other side of the Jordan. If only he had gone to God to listen to His heart before he angrily reacted to what he was sure was the why of their request. I can think of a thousand times that I wish I had done the same.

I have come to understand that God wants us to always respond to what people do and not what I think is their motivation for doing it. I have brought about a great deal of conflict that need not have happened if I had followed this principle.

It is simple change but it yields profound results. Moses might have said, “There is only one problem with your plan and that is it will leave us with fewer fighting men” He could not do that because he was already sure of their motives. John Sandford calls this a “bitter root judgment.”


A Bitter Root Judgment conditions us to see the events in our lives in a way that may not be reality. We are absolutely deceived by such judgments. The are often self fulfilling. Even when they are not we will still find a way to hold on to them. Just like Moses could not bring himself to say, “I am so sorry I misjudged you. You obviously are men of great integrity and character. Please forgive me.”


Instead he held on to suspicion even when there was no reason for it. He had a bitter root judgment that influenced his thinking about everyone. It is almost impossible to discern these bitter roots. If we start with the assumption that we all have them it helps. If we then make a commitment to God and ourselves to only deal with the “what” and take the “why” to God to either reveal it to others or reveal the lie to us we will begin to discern them.

The most destructive place I have seen these bitter roots operate is in marriage. Listen to Moses speak to these noble Israelites and imagine what it would be like to be his wife if he felt the same about her. The minute she did something that seemed like she was not fully committed to God’s plan (as he a saw it) he would be angrily calling her names and calling down God’s wrath on her. She in turn would most likely respond in kind and pretty soon you have a ruined relationship. If instead of saying why he believed she was acting in the way she was and calling her names if he would say, “I am having a hard time understanding what you are doing. Could you tell me what it is about?” Responding to the what and not the why.