“Then they believed His words; they sang His praise (Ps. 106/12).”
I have read of how Moses endured even though he did not see God. But the Israelites endure only when it seemed easy and worldly instead of residing in the eternal, invisible God. Today we know modern-day Israelites who live in the world with the world’s treasures instead of seeking after God. We have been fooled into thinking we can have both, worldly things and God. Where are we centered? In the present day, we want him more and more, yet we hang on to our things. God wants us to see him; we cannot call him small or his message.
Are we the Israelites who believed after they saw him work? They were filled with doubt when they came to the Red Sea, but lo and behold, they believed after God made a way, leading them across to safety while seeing Pharaoh and his host drown. The Israelites were leading a push-pull, up and down faith life, a life that depended on circumstances rather than the kind of faith God wants for all of us.
The world lives in the philosophy that seeing is believing. On the other hand, God asks that we believe in order to see. It is tempting to believe only when the wind is favorable. “Faith is to believe what we do not see, and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe {Saint Augustine).”