The words, “Just you wait and see,”were belted out in 1942 by Vera Lynn in the chorus of her song, “The white Cliffs of Dover,” during England’s “darkest hour” of humiliating defeats in battle, cities being bombed to bits, severe rationing of food, morale at its lowest, and Churchill’s leadership being seriously questioned. The situation was dire, and no relief in sight. But up pops Vera promising, “There’ll be love and laughter, and peace ever after, tomorrow when the world is free.”
But if someone had dared say in 1942, “Nice sentiment, Vera, but you’re promising love and laughter when we’re being brutally hit from all sides by a formidable enemy intent on destroying us, and with very convincing signs he’s winning. Do you really think in our present state, then – even if we transformed every factory we’ve got into weapons production – it would be enough to set the whole world free?”
It sounds a bit grumpy, but that was also Moses’ approach to Yahweh after his promise to provide meat for a month to “600,000 men on foot” in the middle of a desert, Numbers 11:18-21. To which Moses replies in verse 22, “But if we slaughtered our entire flocks and herds, and hooked every fish in the sea, do you really think that would be enough meat to get all these people fed?” Like Vera, wasn’t it just wishful thinking on Yahweh’s part, rather than facing reality?
But ironically, Yahweh’s answer was exactly the same as Vera’s. To the whole idea of a world being set free, Vera would have said, “Well, just you wait and see.” But that’s what Yahweh said to Moses in verse 23, first of all asking Moses, “Is the Lord’s arm too short?” In other words, “Do you really think I’m incapable or doing this?” And then Yahweh’s second volley, “You will now see whether or not what I say will come true for you.” In other words, “Just you wait and see. I’ll show you what’s what, Moses; watch and learn.”
So Yahweh ‘did a Vera’ in answer to Moses’ darkest hour – but, unlike Vera, Yahweh had the power to back it up, and in dramatic fashion too. He blew quail by the boatload into the camp to a depth of three feet “as far as a day’s walk in any direction” (31). It took two days and a night for the Israelites to gather up all the quail (32).
So Yahweh was true to his word, but why, before the instigators of the complaint got to even taste the quail, did he kill them off with a plague (33-34)? There’s a clue in verse 20, to get the point across that “Rejecting him has consequences”….(next blog)
