(40) How oft.--Ten instances of murmuring are actually recorded in Exodus and Numbers.

Verse 40. - How oft did they provoke him in the wilderness, and grieve him in the desert! (comp. Deuteronomy 31:27; Deuteronomy 32:15-18; Acts 7:30-43, etc.). That God is "grieved" at man's sins appears, not only from this passage, but also from Genesis 6:6; Psalm 95:10; Ephesians 4:30; Hebrews 3:17.

78:40-55. Let not those that receive mercy from God, be thereby made bold to sin, for the mercies they receive will hasten its punishment; yet let not those who are under Divine rebukes for sin, be discouraged from repentance. The Holy One of Israel will do what is most for his own glory, and what is most for their good. Their forgetting former favours, led them to limit God for the future. God made his own people to go forth like sheep; and guided them in the wilderness, as a shepherd his flock, with all care and tenderness. Thus the true Joshua, even Jesus, brings his church out of the wilderness; but no earthly Canaan, no worldly advantages, should make us forget that the church is in the wilderness while in this world, and that there remaineth a far more glorious rest for the people of God.How oft did they provoke him in the wilderness,.... Where they were not only at his mercy, having nothing to help themselves with, but had many singular mercies bestowed upon them; and yet were continually committing such sins against God as provoked the eyes of his glory; ten times they tempted him, the Lord says, Numbers 14:22, therefore that dispensation is called the provocation and day of temptation; for it was a series of rebellion and sin, Psalm 95:8,

and grieve him in the desert; which signifies the same as before, and is spoken after the manner of men, Genesis 6:6 and like a tender parent grieved at the disobedience of his child, and that he is obliged to take the rod and chastise it. The prophet Isaiah says, they "vexed" or "grieved his Holy Spirit", Isaiah 63:10, the same word is there used as here; compare with it Ephesians 4:30.