May it please Almighty God to
bless us together this morning as we meditate in His Word. Let
us turn to the Book of Numbers, chapter 20, and we'll read verse
8. The Book of Numbers, chapter
20, and reading verse 8. Take the rod and gather thou
the assembly together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak
ye unto the rock before their eyes, and it shall give forth
his water. And thou shalt bring forth to
them water out of the rock. So thou shalt give the congregation
and their beasts drink. We've read in this 20th chapter
of this account when the Lord graciously heard the desires
of the children of Israel and granted them water at this place
of Meribah. And I expect we all remember,
or at least most of us remember, that there was another occasion
for the children of Israel when they needed water. And that was
soon after they came out of Egypt. There was no water. And again,
that was called Meribah. And that was some 38 years previously
when Moses had struck the rock and the water had gushed out
in a most wonderful way. And now 30 years have passed
and they're in a very different part of their travelling to Canaan. We're told they were in the wilderness
of Zin. Most of the wildernesses they
travelled through were pretty wild and not very pleasant to
actually live in, but there it was, the Lord had brought them
that way, and we shouldn't forget that it was really because they
disobeyed the word of God when the Lord had told them to go
up and possess the land at Kadesh Barnea, again, probably about
37 years ago. And they had refused because
10 of the spies that had gone up brought an evil report and
said, we can't actually gain the victory. And therefore God
brought his judgment upon them and they wandered in the wilderness
for 40 years. You may remember the spies had
gone up to seek the land for 40 days. and therefore they were to wander
in the wilderness for a year for every day that the spies
had been looking and searching out the country. So it was a
very sad position. And now, after all these years,
not long, of course, before they were actually going to enter
into Canaan, there wasn't any water. And again they complained. They complained. How often they complained, didn't
they? As you and I read the history of the children of Israel, we
find again and again they complained. And yet they brought everything
upon themselves. And we should be very careful
not to complain in our lives. because we don't deserve really
anything good, any blessing. And yet there we are complaining
about this and complaining about that. And as we read together
in this 20th chapter, the people chode that spoke wrong and chided
really with Moses and spake saying, would God that we had died when
our brethren died before the Lord? And why have you brought
up the congregation of the Lord into the wilderness, that we
and our cattle should die there? And wherefore have we made us
to come up out of Egypt, to bring us in unto this evil place? It
is no place of seed, or figs, or vines, or pomegranates, neither
is there any water to drink." Now, what were they doing? They
were just complaining to Moses and to Aaron. What should they
have been doing? Well, they should have been praying
to God, shouldn't they? That's what they should have
been doing. But no, they were complaining to Moses and Aaron. And we might recognize this is
a very simple position, but a very simple thing that we should not
complain in our lives about things. We should commit our way unto
the Lord. The Lord knows what the condition
is that we are brought into. And he knows the reason for it. And we don't always know the
reason for it. But one thing should be evident.
And if we do come into these situations, we should seek unto
the Lord. We should pray unto our God.
And that's who we should pour our heart unto. Not come like
these people did and to chode with Moses. poor man than he
was. He was only a sinful man like
they were, and yet they came to him. Well, the result was,
of course, that Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the
assembly unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation,
and they fell upon their faces, and the glory of the Lord appeared
unto them. Well, it's a good thing, isn't
it? At least Moses and Aaron knew what to do. They went before
the Lord and fell on their faces before Him, and the Lord spake
unto Moses. And so we come to this eighth
verse, and Moses was told what to do. He was told to take the
rod, and that was the rod, of course, which had been wonderfully
used in the past when they came out of, well, when they were
in Egypt before Pharaoh. And then when they came to the
Red Sea, And then when he had to smite the rock at Meribah
at Amrefordim, all those years previously, this is the same
rod. And now he's told to take the
rod. And gather thou the assembly
together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the
rock before their eyes, and it shall give forth its water. and
thou shalt bring forth them water out of the rock so thou shalt
give the congregation and their beasts drink well that was a
very clear instruction wasn't it to Moses and yet we see that
Moses did not obey the instruction and we have this very solemn
example really for us today. Because God had given him an
instruction to take the rod but not to use the rod. The rod was
just there perhaps as a symbol to remind the Israelites of the
power that God had exerted on their behalf when the rod had
been used before. But now Moses was not to use
the rod. Instead, he was simply to speak
to the rock. It was very clear, wasn't it?
And yet, you see, we're told Moses took the rod from before
the Lord as he commanded him, and they gathered the congregation
together before the rock. And then you see Moses spoke
and said, here now you rebels. There was no need to say that.
Must we fetch you water out of the rock? It wasn't him, an Aaron,
that was going to fetch water out of the rock. You see how
he used a wrong statement. Gave the impression that the
power was with him. Well, of course, there was no
power with him at all. The power only existed and belongs
to Almighty God. So he came here and used this,
we can almost say, in anger. Hear, nay ye rebels. It wasn't
for him to say that. God had spoken to the Israelites
and called them rebels previously. And now we're told Moses lifted
up his hand, and with his rod, he smote the rock twice. Not
once, but twice. And the water came out abundantly,
and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. And you may
perhaps have thought, well, there we are, I've done this, and the
Israelites may have thought, yes, here's the water. But the
solemn reality was, he had disobeyed God. And there was a very sad
punishment, really, that was to come upon Moses and upon Aaron. And we should realize that you
and I today are not to disobey God's word. We're not to think
perhaps that we know better, or perhaps we're just misguided. And we may think, oh, well, this
must be the way. Clearly Moses had to rob before.
He knew what had happened before, and therefore it seems as though
he'd passed over. What God had actually said to
him actually instructed him to speak to the rock, it seems that
didn't occur to him. And therefore, he smoked the
rock. And what was he doing? He was
being disobedient to God. And we might think it was a small
thing. We can sometimes think that what
we've done wrongly was a small thing. But you see, God takes
notice and he knows all that we're doing and whether we are
following closely what God has instructed us to do and indeed,
in his case, to say, to speak. And so Moses was in this position
and he'd hit the rock And now the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron,
and he says this, because ye believed me not to sanctify me
in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not
bring this congregation into the land which I have given them. Why don't we just ponder that
for a moment? Go back in Moses' life. to that
time when he was in the backside of the desert. God was instructed
him for 40 years to prepare him to lead Israel out of Egypt.
And so God had accomplished all that. And now 38 years had passed. Moses has seen God's hand very
wonderfully going before them, appearing for them. And now God
had again spoken to Moses. And Moses now had disobeyed the
word of God. And the result was, because we're
told, you believed me not. The sin of unbelief. is a very
serious sin. And we should not think it is
something trifling. If God has told us and directed
us in the way that we should go, we are to believe that to
be the right way. We're not to do that which just
appears to us, perhaps, to be more needful, perhaps, and to
be more appropriate. It wasn't so. It wasn't so. And so the Lord deals with Moses
and Aaron, both children of God, both wonderfully favoured of
God. And yet, you see, there was this time when God dealt
with them in this way. because they believed me not,
to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel. Therefore
ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given
them.' Well it was a very solemn judgment, wasn't it, in the case
of Moses and Aaron. And as we read on in this 20th
chapter, of course, it was very soon that Aaron was to die. He was taken up to Mount Hor
with Aaron and Eleazar, his son, and he was told to strip Aaron
of his garments and put them upon Eleazar, his son. And Aaron
shall be gathered unto his people, and shall die there. And Moses did not believe this
disobedience to the word of God, to the wrong assumption that
had been made. That was an awful consequence. See, God is a very just God. God is a very holy God. And God
will be obeyed. And God knows what he will do
and how he will bring his work to pass. Israel needed water. God knew how it would come to
pass. He knew how it could come to pass. And so in our little lives, there
may be many things that we may perhaps think of and perhaps
desire and perhaps plan, and yet it may not be in accordance
with God's will. We're following what we think
would be all right, what we think would be successful. And indeed,
in his case, it was successful. Water did come out, but he wasn't
exonerated And that was the great thing, wasn't it? That was the
important consideration. And it is today. We have God's
word, and it's a great blessing to have God's word. And it describes
to us everything that you and I need for our natural life and for
our spiritual life. It gives us good counsel. It speaks to our heart. It directs
us with regards to our spiritual life. It gives us also direction
often with regard to our natural life. But of course the most
important thing is that the gracious God will direct us with regard
to our spiritual life. The worst thing that we can find
is that God grants our requests, as he
did in the word of God, and we're told he sent leanness into their
souls. What a disaster. What a terrible
situation. We don't want to just have our
requests granted. Because those requests may not
be in accordance with God's will. We may think they are right,
we may think they're needful, but they may not be God's will.
And therefore, he may grant the request, but how tragic if the
request results in spiritual leanness. Yes, it's not spiritual
health, it's not spiritual strength. The Lord departs. The Lord leaves
us to ourselves. It's a very serious thought,
isn't it? How sad it is if God removes
his Spirit from us. And yet, naturally, all might
seem smooth. And yet, you see, there's a lack
of blessing. There's a lack of favor. There's
a lack of union. There's a lack of walking with
the Lord. I often think of that word and
it often comes into my soul. Really, He granted their request
and sent Linus into their soul and also there is a way that
seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways
of death. And as you may know, that's repeated twice in different
chapters in the book of Proverbs. It's not to be ignored. It's
not to be passed over. There is a way that seemeth right
unto a man. Yes, we can look at it and we
can think, well, this is the right way. Yeah, this is the
way that must be right. Everything leads to it. There
is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the ends thereof are
the ways of death. We don't want to die spiritually,
do we? Just because we followed a false
way. Well, there are many examples.
In the Word of God, when a false way was Followed. You think of
Israel themselves. When they disobeyed God and didn't
go up and possess the land. And then you see when they thought
they would. Oh, we made a mistake. We will go up now. No, not now. God's time has passed. And they suffered that heavy
defeat. God was not with them. It's a
terrible thought, isn't it? When God is not with us. And
yet they thought. They thought about it. They thought, well, perhaps we
were wrong. Yes, we will now rectify our mistake. Oh, no.
The time has passed. Time has passed. You disobeyed. The Word of God. You followed
your own way. And therefore the Lord was not with
them. Moses knew that. He told them.
They again disobeyed the Word of God. The Word of God is really very
searching to us in all our lives. All our lives. Sometimes we may
complain about barrenness and perhaps about hardness and perhaps
about rebellion. Well, we are encouraged to examine
ourselves. We're not told to look around
at other people. We're told to examine ourselves. and that's a blessing isn't it
and what a mercy when God comes and instructs us just in that
way to examine ourselves to see whether we are doing the
will of our God doesn't mean to say the way is going to be
easy but the comfort is that the Lord
is with us. If God be for us, who can be
against us? It's evident throughout the Word
of God in the many examples of God's favour and blessing, but
it wasn't always a smooth way. Indeed, it very often was not
a smooth way. We only have to think of the
life of David. He faced opposition. But on many occasions, he was
able to come to God and ask God for guidance. He asked God, shall
we pursue? The Lord said, pursue. Another time, shall we pursue? The Lord said, no. Just because we seek God's guidance,
we shouldn't think that the Lord always gives an affirmative.
Sometimes it's the opposite way. And we are to stay, we are to
sit still. And then, of course, we can. Well,
there are many cases in the Old Testament, you can think of them
and search them out. There are many cases in the New Testament.
We can think of the apostles, can't we? In their direction. We can think of Philip, the eunuch,
can't we? He was told to go down into the desert. Really, Philip? You want to go there, in the
desert? Nothing there. He obeyed God. Of course, he
was to be wonderfully blessed to that eunuch. Just one person. But wasn't it worth it? Wasn't
it worth obeying the word of Almighty God? And what was he
privileged to do? Preached unto him Jesus. Oh my
friends, surely it's a wonderful thing, if we are privileged then,
in our little lives, to be involved in such a course as that. To
be brought to one another, to preach unto them, Jesus. And what a blessing that was.
The man's eyes were open, weren't they? He rejoiced. What a good effect it had. We might think, well, Philip,
you could have said, well, I'm not doing that. I'm not going
down to that place of desert. I'm not going to obey God's word. But he did. Paul and Silas commanded
to go into Macedonia. It wasn't what he expected. The Spirit had stopped him going
to other places. But now he was told to go into
Macedonia. Off he went, came to Philippi,
ministry wonderfully blessed, and then taken captive and imprisoned. And yet, even now, blessed to
that Philippian jailer and his household. God's ways are higher
than our ways. And again, what was that situation?
What was the great development? The same as Philip. He preached
unto the Philippian jailer, Jesus. Yes, what a wonderful thing it
is. What a blessing that is, to be able to tell of the Savior,
to tell of his glorious work, to tell what he has done. in
obeying the word of our God. Or my friends, it may not be
that which is pleasing to our flesh. It usually is not. It
usually is not. But if God is with us, if God
be for us, who can be against us? That's the blessing, isn't
it? That's the favour. God was with
Moses. But yet Moses disobeyed God.
It's hard to believe, isn't it? After, we may say, well, there
were many, many years in Moses' life, really from that time when
he was young and the Lord had been with him, all that time
in the backside of the desert, all those 38 years in the wilderness,
God had been with him. And now, left to himself, left
to himself, he comes to a wrong conclusion.
He makes a wrong decision. Solemn, isn't it? And we don't
want to be left to ourselves to make a wrong decision. A disastrous
condition. And again, if you look at it
on the face of it, you may say, well, it didn't matter. Water
came out of the rock, that was the need, and God granted it. That wasn't the position. The
situation was that Moses had not believed God and Moses had
disobeyed God. And the result was that he was
forbidden to enter in to the land of Canaan. We might say His life's work was frustrated. In all those years, doing God's
will, and now, he effectively turned against
God. And therefore the end was frustrated. And he pleaded with God, He pleaded
with God in Deuteronomy, that book of course that Moses wrote
not long before he was passed out of time into eternity. He wrote in the third chapter,
we're told he pleads with his God and he says, I pray thee,
let me go over. and see the good land that is
beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain and Lebanon. But the Lord was
wroth with me for your sakes and would not hear me. And the
Lord said unto me, let it suffice thee, speak no more unto me of
this matter. So you might think, well, surely
if Moses came and truly repented of his error and sought the Lord,
that he would have mercy and allow him to know the Lord is
just in his dealings. And we shouldn't forget that.
The Lord is a sovereign God, but he's just in his dealings. And so Moses has to acknowledge
it. And he writes these things. And
it's a record for our guidance and instruction today, written
for the children of Israel. Think of it, those five books
of Moses. A fifth of the Word of God, basically,
Moses was to write. And you might say, well, now
Moses, this is not good news about you. It's best to kind
of just kind of glide over it. Don't kind of mention it really.
Well, Moses was a servant of God. And Moses had to write what
God instructed him to write. A bit like the life of David
in the things that David wrote. David didn't write all the good
things about his life. He also wrote the bad things.
He was honest in the things of God, and so was Moses here, honest
in the things of God. And it's good for us today to
be honest in the things of God. And so the Lord was wroth with
me for your sakes. Makes us tremble, doesn't it,
to think that God could be wroth for us. for other people's sakes. Most of us might have thought,
well, I've done this well, I've done that for Israel's sake. Didn't matter. So we might think
we're doing this for other people's sake. Doesn't matter. Is it God's
will? Is it God's purpose? The Lord
was wroth with me for your sakes and would not hear me. The Lord
said unto me, Let it suffice thee, speak no more unto me of
this matter. It's a very solemn thing, isn't
it, to realise the Lord has a gracious will. And we should always realise
that God's will is to be the best will. What a mercy when God gives us
grace to humbly submit ourselves under the mighty hand of God,
as we're told. Submit yourselves under the mighty
hand of God, whatever our views might be, wherever our thoughts
might be. Have a good day, my dear. Is
it God's will? We are to submit ourselves under
the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt us in due time. And what does he say? Casting
all our care upon him, for he cares for us. That should be
a very comforting word, shouldn't it? Because we can go in God's
strength in that way. submitting ourselves unto our
kind and gracious God, believing that what he's doing for us is
for our good and for his honour and glory. How often we fail. God knows the end from the beginning. We don't. We don't. We just see the state now and
that's how we judge things. God knows the end. He knows his
purpose and how essential it is for us today to bow down before
our God. And what is that really? It's
very simply this. just like the blessed Saviour
himself. Nevertheless, not my will, but
thine be done. And remember what the Saviour
said, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. He knew
what it would involve. He knew the agony that he would
be caught upon to pass through, if it be possible. Nevertheless. What a good thing
in our lives, if there's a nevertheless. Nevertheless. Oh, if it could
be, Lord, I will. Let this happen. Nevertheless. Not my will, but thine be done. The Lord's will, of course, was
to be fulfilled. It was a gracious and wonderful
work, wasn't it? But the Saviour was to carry
out. Without it in every detail, our
salvation today would not be secure. But it is
secure. because of the willingness of
the Saviour to do the will of His Father, whatever the cost,
whatever the cost. Very humbling, isn't it? And
we know the glory of Saviour. It was fulfilled. Water came
out of the rock. But it had been done in the wrong
way. And God's judgment was upon Moses
and Aaron. Well, may we recognize the importance. Of hearing God's word. And doing God's word. And submitting ourselves to God's
Word, to his will. Take the rod. That's what he
was told to do. Take the rod. There's a picture. There's a direction that shows
my power. But don't do anything with it.
And gather down the assembly together, thou and Aaron, thy
brother, and speak ye, speak ye unto the rock before their
eyes, and it shall give forth his water, and thou shalt bring
forth to them water out of the rock, so thou shalt give the
congregation and their beasts drink. And the Lord spake unto
Moses and Aaron, because he believed me not, to sanctify me, in the
eyes of the children of Israel. Therefore ye shall not bring
this congregation into the land which I have given thee. Amen.