Bury the Craving

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Nate Devlin. August 23, 2026. Numbers 11:31-35.

Summary

Most fairs are merry places, but not this one. In Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian and Faithful must pass through Vanity Fair, where every foolish trifle in the world is for sale and the rabble jeers at them to buy, buy, buy. “We buy only the truth,” they answer. It is an allegory, and Christian stands for all of us. Vanity Fair is real too: the place of temptation, of craving, of addiction, of strong and crooked desires. Its biblical name is Kibroth-hattaavah, the wilderness of Numbers 11.

The big idea: something always dies in the wilderness of desire, but it does not have to be you. In Bunyan’s story, Vanity Fair is where Faithful goes to die; often it is faithfulness that dies there. The wilderness is where God sends slavery to die. Israel’s rabble had a strong craving, and their enslavement to it had to die. We must go there too, because God is working to put temptation, crooked desire, and addiction to death in us.

God took the people out of Egypt, but Egypt was not yet out of the people. The rabble had a strong craving, and the people wept for the fish and melons and garlic of Egypt, with nothing but manna to look at (Numbers 11:4-6). I am withering away, eating from God’s hand. That is the psychology of craving. So God gave them meat until it came out of their nostrils, and verse 20 tells us why: “Because you have rejected the LORD who is among you.” Something had to die for resurrection to be possible. God put the craving to death, and those who held on to it died with it. God wants to bury your craving in Kibroth-hattaavah. He must bury our lusts, our temptations, our cravings, and our addictions, because he wants us to live. He is killing it, so do not hold on to it, or you will die with it.

Craving entered the world in the Garden through the serpent, a sign of desire out of control, all belly between head and tail, and we listened to it. Desire itself is not wrong; the problem is desire broken loose from the authority of God. Delight yourself in the LORD (Psalm 37:4); seek first the kingdom (Matthew 6:33); we ask and do not receive because we ask to spend it on our passions (James 4:3); put to death what is earthly in you (Colossians 3:5); walk by the Spirit (Galatians 5:16). The tenth commandment, “You shall not covet” (Exodus 20:17), describes the craving, and the Westminster Larger Catechism defines covetousness as discontentment with our own estate, envying the good of others, and inordinate affections. The psychology of craving also includes grumbling: we complain, we have a pity party, and then we try to soothe ourselves, to medicate ourselves, by satisfying our desires. I do not like how things are going, so I am going to indulge. This is a hard season, so I am going to crack open this drink and enjoy a little bit of whatever.

The church fathers, in the writings gathered in The Philokalia, developed what we might call an anatomy of craving. Temptation is either a trial sent by God to aid our progress or a suggestion from the devil. It begins with provocation, an image-free stirring in the heart, when we sense that sin is near. Provocation is not sin, the fathers said, but every stage after it is an increase of sin, so provocation is the place to kill temptation. Provocation leads to disturbance, when the mind entertains the sin; disturbance to communion, when we begin to enjoy turning it over; communion to assent, when we go downstairs at midnight for the pecan pie: we are doing this. Then comes prepossession, what the church fathers called addiction. They did not use the word addiction, but it is the same idea: the involuntary presence of former sins in the memory, the repeated acts of sin that predispose us to yield to particular temptations. It is the well-worn road, the smoothness that lets us glide right into that temptation. We always retain free choice, but the force of habit makes it more and more difficult to resist. We are addicted. Finally there is passion, the unnatural appetite and love of a thing, when we unite with our sin and it defines us: this is what I am.

So when you sense provocation, move. Get up. Cry out to God: I can feel it crouching at the door; I need your help. Call a friend. And if you fail? Get up, confess your sin, and move forward. “Though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again” (Proverbs 24:16). Scripture is not pristine history; it is filled with murderers and adulterers and addicts, a record of God redeeming craving people and killing strong cravings, so let them go. “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful” (1 Corinthians 10:13), and with the temptation he provides a way of escape. John Owen’s The Mortification of Sin can be summed up in one line: “Be killing sin or it will be killing you.” Christ is killing the craving in us because he does not want it to kill us. So look to Christ, trust in Christ, rely on Christ, and you shall live.

Key texts: Numbers 11:31-35; Numbers 11:4-6, 10, 20; Psalm 37:4; Matthew 6:33; James 4:3; Colossians 3:5; Galatians 5:16; Exodus 20:17; Proverbs 24:16; 1 Corinthians 10:13

For reflection

• Where is your Kibroth-hattaavah, the place where a strong craving has made you ungrateful for what God has already given?
• Of the stages the church fathers describe (provocation, disturbance, communion, assent, prepossession, passion), where do you usually notice a temptation, and what would it take to catch it at provocation?
• When you fail, what keeps you from getting up, confessing, and moving forward, as Proverbs 24:16 describes?