Israel's thirst, and they're
involved in quite a dilemma. Here's approximately two million
people who are out in the desert, and they have no water for themselves. They have no water for their
cattle or their flocks. They're truly in a difficult
situation. And our God manifests his mighty
power and mercy to them by giving them water from a rock. And he uses an unusual instrument
in order to draw forth this water from a most unlikely source,
from a rock. And the rock, God said, I'll
stand on the rock. And the rock was to be smitten
with the rod of Moses. And this is the rod, not a blessing,
but the rod of wrath. Because it specifically says
that he's to hit the rock, to smite the rock, with the rod
that he took and smote the river. And that's when the Nile River
became as blood. So this is a weapon, as it were,
of wrath and fury and justice that is going to hit this rock. And the water is going to come
gushing out, and I'm sure the children of Israel dug places
in the sand for the water to puddle up or to kind of pond
up so their cattle could drink and they had more than sufficient
water for their families. And this river, this river, it
would follow them all the way through the wilderness. But this
is indeed, as you know, more than just a historical episode
in the history of the miracles that God did to sustain the Israelites. There's a deeper picture, a more
important lesson to be learned from this. And we know this directly
from God's revelation in 1 Corinthians 10, and I invite you to turn
to that portion of Scripture with me. 1 Corinthians 10. And I'll read the first four
verses to you. 1 Corinthians 10. And, you know,
if you want to know what the Old Testament means, you look
at it in the light of the New Testament. Somebody said the
Old Testament is in the New Testament revealed while the New Testament
is in the Old Testament concealed. So there's a gospel lesson there
in Exodus chapter 17 that is concealed. It is concealed from
the natural man. It has to be revealed by the
Spirit of God and it is revealed to the children of God here in
1 Corinthians chapter 10. Look at verse 1. that you should be ignorant how
that all our fathers were under the cloud, the pillar of cloud
by day, and all passed through the sea. That is, they followed
Moses. They followed Moses into the
Red Sea, the depths of the Red Sea, literally on dry ground. And they were all baptized under
Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They followed Moses. And of course, there's a picture
here of us following our Lord Jesus in the waters of baptism. He went down into the waters
of baptism as the Israelites followed Moses, who went on a
dry path through the Red Sea, and they followed Him. Even so,
we follow our Lord Jesus Christ into the waters of baptism, confessing
Him who is our Lord and our Savior, that One who led the way for
us. and we follow his example. Notice
in the third verse, and they did all eat the same spiritual
meat. That is, they all ate that bread
that was spiritually or miraculously given. Now we know this is the
same food that Joshua and Caleb ate, And all of the rest of the
children of Israel ate, including Moses. But only those two men,
Joshua and Caleb, who were over 20 years of age when they left
Egypt, only those two men went into the land of promise, having
eaten this bread that God gave them. The rest of them died in unmarked
graves in unbelief. It is utterly amazing, and if
you want to see how undone and lost the natural man is. The Israelites, all except for
a few, people who were given one gospel lesson after another, they went through the wilderness
in unbelief, And most of them were buried in unmarked graves,
and they could not enter in because of unbelief. And you can read
that in the end of Hebrews chapter 3. In verse 4 it says, And they
all did drink the same spiritual drink, the drink that was given
them by the power of God Himself. And they drank that. For they
drank of that spiritual rock that followed them." And here
we're told specifically. You don't have to be a master
of understanding mysterious things in the Old Testament to read
this and to some degree grasp it. And that rock was Christ. There's no doubt about it. The
Spirit of God led the Apostle to write these words lest anyone
should be in question as to what is being pictured over here in
Exodus chapter 17. That rock was Christ. That rod that smote the rock
was the justice of God. And when the justice of God smote
our Lord Jesus Christ, who is himself the Rock of Ages, the
everlasting water of salvation came gushing out of that rock, and we drank of the water of
life. And that thirst that God created
within us for the spiritual waters of salvation is thereby fully,
fully met and supplied by our Lord Jesus Christ. And so as
we go back here to Exodus chapter 17, we're coming to Israel's final
stage of their journey to Mount Sinai. This is the next to last
stop on the way to the mountain. Oasis of Rephidim, it turns out
to be yet another example of Israel's faithlessness and God's
faithfulness, right? Here we see Israel's faithlessness. It's nothing new. And here we see God's faithfulness
and this is nothing new. And in your life as a believer,
haven't you observed in your own self, in your own heart now,
not talking about looking at others, but in your own heart,
haven't you had many episodes of faithlessness? We all have. And God help us, we will continue
to have those episodes. But God does not reward us according
to our faithlessness. He rewards us according to His
faithfulness. That's why Paul in 2 Timothy
2 says, if we believe not, yet He abided faithful. And He will always be faithful
to His covenant promise. This turns out to be another
example of Israel's murmuring and God's mercies, of Israel's
belly aching and God's compassion. We've begun to see a pattern
already develop in the things that we've studied thus far and
in what we see this evening. We've looked at the bitter waters
of Merah, we've heard their murmuring. We've observed them when they
had no bread, they murmured, and we've observed the faithfulness
of God. Tonight we see the lack of water
at Rephidim. Rephidim, the very word means
this is a place of resting. But they found out there really
was no rest there. Because there's no rest in the
wilderness for the people of God by nature. The only rest that a child of
God can have in this world is for the water of life to flow
to us. And we sit down by the water
of life and we drink in, we drink in the waters of salvation. With
joy we draw water from the wells of salvation, Isaiah says. And
our thirst is quenched. Our Lord said to the woman at
the well, you drink of the water that I'll give you, you'll never
thirst again. And I'm sure that all of us have
drank of the water of life. We've drank of Jesus Christ and
him crucified, buried, and risen again. And we shall continue
to do so. May our response to hardships
be altogether different from the response of the Israelites
to their hardships. They murmured and contended with
God. In each of these, what I would
call pre-Sinai wilderness stories, the things that happened to Israel
on the way to Mount Sinai, in these things we see five elements.
Number one, they're on their journey. They have begun a journey
as a nation that will not end until they get to the land of
promise. So they begin a journey. And the second thing is, the
second element is, they run into another test. They have another
great need. Third thing is, once again, they
murmur. And the fourth thing is, there's
intercession on the part of Moses for them. They have an intercessor. And he prays for them. And the fifth thing is, once
again there is deliverance by the almighty miracle of our Lord. Now the things that befell Israel
in the wilderness on the way to Sinai reflect the harsh realities
of life in the wilderness. When the Israelites left Egypt,
maybe they thought that following that pillar of cloud and enjoying
the pillar of fire at night, maybe they thought it was going
to be an easy journey. But we know from these events
that happened to them, living a life of following the Lord
was not easy for them. And it's not easy for us. Because there are a lot of enemies
out there that we have to tangle with, but the biggest enemy we
have is self. to follow the Lord by faith,
with full confidence in Him, in Him who met our every spiritual
need through the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ, that One
who has met our every eternal need, for we have everlasting
life in the Son of God, He will meet our physical needs as we
commence and continue our journey to the land of promise. But it's
not going to be an easy journey. Have you found it to be easy?
There are difficulties along the way. There's our own sinfulness. There
are the wiles of Satan. They're the temptations. They're
the allurements of the world. And there's the weakness, the
weakness of our bodies that causes us pain, aches, disease, illnesses. There are a lot of things with
which we have to contend. It isn't an easy journey. I have
not found it to be an easy journey. But it is a blissful journey
because it is a journey in which you do not really walk yourself. You are being carried. You're one of the Lord's sheep.
He sought and found you. This One who was the Good Shepherd
and laid down His life for you, the Shepherd who sought you.
He found you through the preaching of the Gospel. He picked you
up and He put you on His shoulders. He's carrying you all the way
home. It should be for us a wonderful journey. A marvelous journey. A journey of great enjoyment. And I pray that we will enjoy
the journey even more as we realize it's our Lord who bears us upon
his shoulders. But like Israel, we have to face
the cruelties of nature. And like Israel, from time to
time, we have to meet up with the cruelties of other men and
women. Now Israel's needs were real.
And I want to stress that because it's kind of easy for us to be,
you familiar with the expression an armchair quarterback? You
know, you're watching a football game, let's say at home. And then they show a replay and
this guy going down the sideline, he's wide open. What in the world? How come he didn't throw the
ball to him? Well, maybe he didn't see him.
Maybe he doesn't have the view that you have. It's easy to critique the response
of Israel to the troubles that God sent them. But I don't want to downplay
the reality of those troubles. I've never been in a position
where I didn't have anything to eat. Have you ever been there? Maybe you have, I don't know.
But I may not have had everything in the refrigerator I wish was
in there. May not have been any fried chicken
in there that I could go back and eat off of. But there's always
something in the fridge to munch on. And I've never really been
without an opportunity to drink water. Nancy and I, yesterday evening,
we went up to Moorhead to meet Austin and his girlfriend. Suzanne
and David went. Angeline and Ethan went. All
drove separately because we can't get along, I guess. But Nancy and I, I said, do we
have a bottle of water in this car? Man, I forgot water. And I said, I've got such a headache,
and I wanted to, and it's hurting even more now that I hit my head.
But I said, I wish I had water to take a couple of time off.
But I wasn't. desperately in need of water.
But they were. And it's easy for us to say,
you people, what in the world is wrong with y'all? The Lord has brought you out
of Egyptian bondage. He did it miraculously. When
you could do nothing, your extremity was God's opportunity to glorify
Himself. And it's easy for us to be an
armchair quarterback or to critique them and say, you people should
have believed the Lord. I'm certainly not saying that
their trials weren't that bad after all. They were horrible. And we would do Israel a disservice
We would be unjust if we spoke of them as if they weren't facing
anything of great significance. I just kind of believed that
if we'd been in their same shoes, that'd have been us bellyaching,
too. The things they faced were real
and had consequences. And I want to say this, I know
your trials are real. I would never downplay the troubles
that some of the people of God have. There are people in this congregation,
some who are here, some who are not here, and I certainly have
no knowledge of all the things that are going on in your life,
but I would never, never downplay the troubles and trials and sorrows
and griefs of your life. And it's easy for me to say,
when I'm not going through something, to say to you, just trust our
God. But that is what we should do,
right? But that's not to say that I think that your trials
are light, although the scriptures say they are light afflictions. But they're real. And when God
calls upon us to endure those trials, may we be strengthened
with might in the inner man. to know and to do what Peter
told us to do, casting all your care upon Him. Why? For He careth for you. Easy to say, right? Easy to quote that verse of Scripture.
Doing it, that's another thing, isn't it? You see, the things that Israel
faced, in this case, thirst, the things that they faced were
real, but their response was wrong. And their reaction was sinful. Over and over, it's very clear
in these passages that though God does not bring judgment upon
them, He is certainly displeased with their faithlessness and
their response of disobedience. Note verse 1. And all the congregation of the
children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of sin, which
means thorns, after their journeys, according to the commandment
of the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim, a resting place. And they anticipated
a place called Rephidim to be a real resting place. Hey, we're
coming up on another oasis. But it wasn't an oasis. There
wasn't any water. Israel up to this point had experienced
many difficulties, and yet the Lord brought them through. At
the Red Sea, they saw the armies of Pharaoh closing in on them.
At the bitter waters of Merah, they tasted the awfulness of
that water. In the wilderness of sin, they
felt the hunger. And here at Rephidim, they're
overcome with thirst. But here's what we have to keep
in mind. The children of Israel were in
the pathway of divine leading. They didn't just get here by
accident. The pillar of Plut led them. Here they go out in the wilderness. And that pillar of cloud by day
and fire by night, that was the presence of God. Let's be reminded,
they had the presence of God with them all the time. As do you. As I do. He said, I'll never leave you.
I'll never forsake you. Here's an entire nation moving
around in the wilderness, and we might be tempted to ask, did
God leave them in the pathway of trouble on purpose? Everything
He does is on purpose. Were these people here by their
choice or by God's choice? Where you are in life, are you
there by your choice or God's choice? You see, here's the key words
in verse 1, according to the commandment of the Lord. He commanded them to go this
way. Did you know that there were
other routes from Egypt to the land of Canaan? They were called
trade routes. And all along the trade routes
there was water, markets, food, fruit, vegetables, plenty of
water. You stop and get those things.
And isn't it interesting, however, the Lord did not lead them by
a trade route. He leads them through the desert.
There's no grocery store out there. There's no oasis out there. There
are no people running a store. where they can stop and buy whatever
supplies that they needed? Could God have led them in a
different route, an easier route? Why, sure. No question about
that. He is, after all, leading them. And they're following. Just like
Israel followed Moses through the path of the Red Sea, they're
following. There's that cloud. And Moses
said, here's the way we're going. The cloud goes this way, and
Moses goes that way, and everybody else goes that way. It's just
kind of like a crooked snake going through the sand. Here they go. Two million people. He leads them through the wilderness
journey that they might learn to depend upon Him. They're in this condition not
by bad luck, not by poor choice, but by divine providence. God led them this way just like
He's leading you. He's leading you to the surgery
place Friday. He led your wife to have a broken
bone in her foot. The hymn writer said, he leadeth
me. Oh, blessed thought. It's a blessed
thought that he's leading me, though I may not prefer the route
in which he's leading me. But we should rejoice because
it's his way. And maybe sometimes we might
be tempted to reason this way, I don't know why this had to
happen to me. Why did God do this to me? Well,
the answer to all of this is to be found in what God did to
His beloved Son. The cross of Christ is the answer.
because suffering, even your suffering, seen through the prism
of the cross of Christ, is to be considered as a part
of God's will for you. And just as surely as our Lord,
our Savior, our Substitute, God's sacrifice, as surely as He was
led through the trials that He faced in His life, so you are. And as surely as He was led to
the cross of Calvary there to bear your sins in His own body
on the tree and bring in for you everlasting righteousness,
your path has been to the cross of Christ where you found God
gives you all things through Christ Jesus the Lord. And our
attitude should be, let come what may. I'm moving Christ. And all is well. Well, the people chided with
Moses. They found fault with him. He
said, why do you find fault with me? Why do you blame me? I'll tell you, Moses, why they
blame you. Because they're really angry
with God. But they can't get at God, so
they get at God's servant. That's the way it is. And they thirsted and they said
in verse 3, Did you bring us up out of Egypt to kill us? That's
an awful thing to say, isn't it? Did you bring us up out of Egypt
to watch our children die of thirst? That's what they said
to Moses. And all of our cattle, don't
you care about us? Boy, he cared more than they
had any idea. But notice verse 4. Moses cried
unto the Lord. When they wouldn't pray, he prayed
for them. When they wouldn't cry out to
God themselves, He cried out to God for them. When He asked God to do something
for the people when they wouldn't ask, He's a picture of our great
intercessor, the Lord Jesus Christ. When we wouldn't pray, Father,
forgive us of our sins, He did. Father, forgive them. They don't
know what they're doing. He prayed for us when He hung
on the cross. And He prays for us now. He's risen again to make intercession
for us. And when we won't pray for ourselves,
God forgive us. When we won't pray for ourselves,
He prays for us. And when we won't cry out to
God in the midst of trouble, when our minds are so distorted
and the flesh raises up its ugly head and seems to buck the will
of God that's going on in our life, He prays, Thy will be done,
Father. That's the kind of Savior we
have. He will not forsake us even though we too often forsake him. Well, the Lord said to Moses,
go on before the people. Verse five, and take with thee
the elders of Israel. What the Lord is saying is, Moses,
you need some witnesses as to what's going to happen here. and take your rod, wherewith
thou smotest the river. Take it in your hand, and go.
Behold! Now that's a word. Perk up now. Pay attention. Behold! God says, I will stand before
thee upon the rock in Horeb. And remember, this is the Lord
Jesus Christ speaking to Moses. This is the Son of God because
God will not speak to nor be spoken to by any son or daughter
of Adam except through the Mediator, Christ the Lord. And He tells
Moses, behold, be amazed. Pay attention, Moses. I'm going
to stand before you there upon the rock in Horeb. And you hit that rock. You smite
that rock. And there shall come water out
of it that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight
of the elders of Israel. It was a very public event. It
wasn't like Moses went up there all by himself and smoked the
rock and the water came gushing out and then Moses goes back
down and says, hey, I hit the rock and here's the result. Well,
we don't believe you. But the elders came down and
they said, that really happened. And our Lord Jesus, when He was
smitten with the rod of God's justice, It was not a private
event, like Paul told the king there in the book of Acts. These
things weren't done in a corner under cover of darkness, though
God forsaking God was, but yet the crucifixion of our Lord was
a very public event. And we've read about His substitutionary
sacrifice over and over again, and we know and we rejoice in
the fact that due to the rod of God's justice smiting the
rock, Christ Jesus, the solid rock, the water of everlasting life
and salvation flows out to us. Drink in abundance, because it'll
never run dry. And so we read in verse 7, He
called the name of the place Massah and Meribah because of
the chiding of the children of Israel and because they tempted
the Lord. How did they tempt the Lord?
In essence they were saying, we'll follow you if you'll meet
our needs. Well, you know what? They didn't do a very good job
of following Him. But He did meet their needs.
And He met the needs of a bunch of unbelieving people. Don't
you think He will meet your needs, you who believe Him? If He'd
do this for hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people who did
not believe Him, did not rest in Him, did nothing, to secure
their salvation from Him by coming to Him in their need if He did
it for them. What will He do for us? Surely
He will give us freely all things that we need through Christ Jesus
our Lord. He is Himself the solid rock
who was smitten For us. Say, wouldn't that be a good
song to end with? 272.