Title of the message, The Smitten Rock. The Smitten Rock. The Old Testament is so rich, so full of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a joy just to sit down and
read through the Old Testament and see Christ in all these types
and all these pictures that God gave to Israel, which was a type
themselves of the church. And here we have another type
given, and that's not just a rock but a smitten rock. And it's
not just a smitten rock, but it's a rock that followed them.
It was their rock. It was their rock. It wasn't
just any old rock out there. This was their rock. A rock that
followed them. I'll read you a scripture in
a minute, and I know you've read it many times before. That rock
was Christ. Which tells us Christ was with
them. That rock was Christ. So let's look at this. Let me
read the first seven verses and then we'll make a few comments
here. Chapter 17. And all the congregation of the
children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of sin after
their journeys according to the commandment of the Lord. That's
what this life is. This life is a journey. The sooner we learn that, the
better. This is not home. This is not the final resting
place. This is not it. It is a journey.
Just as the children of Israel, being a type of the church, journeyed
through the wilderness for all those years, we journeyed through
this life. I'll tell you what. This world, this lost world is
like a wilderness, a desert, a desert where no water is. And they pitched in Riffidim
and there was no water for the people to drink, over a million
some people, and there was no water there for them to drink.
And you know, they had their cattle and you know, they had
all, there's a host now. There was a real host there and
there was nothing for them to drink. Wherefore the people did chide
with Moses, argued with Moses, angry again
with Moses, the Lord's servant, the Lord's pastor over them.
How many times, I'm going to read this here in a second, but
how many times did they chide with Moses? How many times did
they chide with Moses over water and drink? I mean, water and
food. Don't we ever get past that? You think we ever get past
our bellies? Wherefore, the people did chide
with Moses and said, give us water that we may drink. And Moses said to them, what
are you chiding with me for? What are you arguing with me
for? Who am I? They said, who am I? Our Lord said to the Israelites,
or to the Pharisees over the Gospel, Moses gave you not that
bread. And Moses recognizes it here
and he makes it known to them. Who am I? You're chiding with
me to give you water? I can't give you water. I'm a
million some people. If you're going to have water,
God's going to have to provide it. This is bigger than me. This
whole thing is bigger than us, way bigger than us. And they
chided with Moses and said, give us water that we may drink. And
Moses said unto them, why chide you with me? Wherefore do you
tempt the Lord? And the people thirsted there for water. And
the people murmured against Moses and said, wherefore? And how
many times, as I said, did they say this? Wherefore is this that
thou hast brought us up out of Egypt to kill us? and our children
and our cattle with thirst. And Moses cried unto the Lord,
saying, What shall I do unto this people? They'd be almost
ready to stone me." I have a good pastor here. I'm
telling you, you're a blessing. You're a blessing to your pastor. Moses is constantly saying, They're
going to kill me. They're going to stone me. This
people, they're going to stone me. And the Lord said unto Moses,
Go on before the people, and take with thee of the elders
of Israel, and thy rod wherewith thou smotest the river, that
rod of judgment. You notice when they came to
the waters of Meribah, there was a tree there, and that tree
was put into the water and made the water sweet. Not that rod
that Moses was using all the time. Because that rod that he
used, he used as judgment against Egypt. It was a rod of judgment.
And he said here, now, you take that rod wherewith thou smotest
the river, and take in thine hand, and you go, and behold,
I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb. I'll
stand on that rock, and here's what you do. Thou shalt smite
the rock. He didn't peck the rock. He didn't
reach over and just peck it. He took that rod, and I mean
he took a swing at it. He took a hard swing at that
rock. And there shall come out of it that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight
of the elders of Israel, and he called the name of the place
Massah and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of
Israel, because they tempted the Lord, saying, among us or
not." What did you have for breakfast? Manna. They said, is the Lord among
us or not? Well, what did you have for breakfast? You had the
manna that God gave from heaven, that bread from heaven. They
had it every morning. Even here with the murmuring,
they still had manna. God's faithful. God's faithful. We murmur, He still blesses us
in Christ. He still blesses His children
in Christ. Look at this world. There is nothing more ungrateful
than this world. There's nothing to be more ungrateful
than this world. And yet, the sun shines every
day. God sends rain every day. He
causes the crops to grow every day. to an unthankful world. Well, here we have a picture
of the smitten rock. We're given another picture,
another type of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's not only a rock,
but he's a smitten rock. And now that rock, out of that
smitten rock comes what? Water. Christ is not only a rock,
He's a smitten rock, but He's not only a smitten rock, He's
the water of life. He's everything you and I need. Everything we
need, God has provided for us in His Son. He's given us bread
from heaven, and if you'll notice, this is not accidental. The bread
from heaven was given before the rock was smitten. Christ
incarnate must come. And then he must be smitten.
And we have a beautiful picture of that here. Now the people
here are thirsty again. And again, they complain against
the Lord. Not just Moses. Their complaint
is against the Lord. Moses told them in this last
chapter, your murmuring is not against me. It's against the
Lord. That's who it's against. And now they go and they camp
in Riphidim. There's no water there for this
multitude. This is a multitude. And here
again, God proves them, and He proves this, that they still
don't believe Him. They still don't believe Him.
This is why they could not enter the Promised Land, is because
of their unbelief. They'd go out every morning,
and they would gather their manna. and they would take it home,
and they would eat it, and they didn't believe God. Look over
in Hebrews chapter four. Hebrews chapter four. It says here, let us therefore
fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest,
any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was
the good news the gospel preached as well as unto them." You see,
it was preached to them that they were going to be delivered
from bondage and they were going into the land of Canaan. They had the
gospel preached to them like we do. They had it preached in
types and pictures, and God gave it to them. It said, "...for unto us was
the gospel preached as well as unto them, but the word preached
did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that
heard it." They didn't believe God. did not believe God. But we which have believed do
enter into rest, that is, into Christ. We rest in Christ. As
he said, as I have sworn in my wrath that they shall enter into
my rest, although the works were finished from the foundation
of the world. We speak in a certain place of the seventh day on this
wise, and God did rest the seventh day from all his works. And in
this place again, if they shall enter into my rest, seeing therefore
it remains that some must enter therein, they to whom it was
first preached entered not in because of unbelief." The majority of this group did not enter into the promised
land, that original group. The ones that were born in the
wilderness, 20 years old and under, went into the promised
land, except for Joshua and Caleb. The rest of them did not believe
God. They missed Christ. They missed the message. They
did not believe the good news. On every turn, when they had
a little hardship, they murmured and complained against God. It says in verse 2, the people chided
with Moses. As I said, in reality, they were
chiding against God. Is He not the one guiding them?
Are they not said to be His people? Did He not make them a nation?
Are not all things of God? You know, we can't pick and choose
what's of God and what's not of God. Scripture says all things are
of God. Now, all means all. That's all
inclusive. It means all. All things are
of God. All trials are of God. Trouble
does not spring from the ground. God has ordained our afflictions.
God brought them to this place. It says back in verse 1, and
all the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the
wilderness of sin after their journeys according to the commandment
of the Lord. He brought them to this place. He's going to give another picture,
another message, another miracle. It's going to speak of His Son.
It's going to speak of the water of life, who is the Lord Jesus
Christ. But what do they do? They get to this place. Now, this is the people that
came across the Red Sea on dry ground. This is the people who
came to Maribah and the water was made sweet and they drank
of it. This is the people who went out
and made manna. This is the people whom the Lord gave quail to every
day. I mean, they had manna and they
had these quail. Every day. Yet they didn't believe. They
murmured against God like spoiled children. So they murmured, they complained,
they complained, and they complained. And they kept charging God with
killing them. They said, you're going to charge
Moses, but really God. You bring us into this desert
To kill us, and you know what? Finally he did. You complain
about it long enough, you get it. Charge him long enough with
it, and you just might end up with it. Because he did kill
most of them there in the desert. If that's the way you want to
deal with him, then you better... He may just deal with you that
way. He may do it. It seemed that the two greatest
problems Israel had What are we going to eat? What are we
going to drink? They even complained about the
light bread. They called it light bread. They started complaining
about that. They complained about not having
something to drink. The only reason they didn't complain
about their clothes, what they're going to wear, was because their
clothes and shoes didn't wax old for 40 years. That's the
only reason they didn't complain about that. But the most glaring
sin in all this was their tendency, and we have the same tendency.
We have the same tendency because we were made from the same dirt. And that's to doubt God, to doubt
His tender care of us. How deceitful is the human heart. It will trust a weak, frail,
mortal before it will trust the omnipotent God. If you're His,
well, you don't have to worry about it. I bet you'll live just
as well as anybody else. I bet you'll die. You'll die
better than those who don't have it. You believe Him, you have
a good end. Cast all your cares upon Him. where he careth for you. He careth for you. Now, verse four through six, we will see a special rock. This
is a special rock. Now, it looked like, I'm sure
it looked like all of the rocks. I mean, it probably looked like
other rocks in the area. You know, Christ, there was no
beauty about Him that we should desire Him, says in Isaiah 53.
But here is a special rock, and that rock is special because
that rock was Christ. Christ. Look over in 1 Corinthians
chapter 10. Moreover, brethren, I would not
that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under
the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and were all baptized
unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and did all eat the
same spiritual meat and did all drink the same spiritual drink,
for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them. And that rock was Christ. That rock was Christ. That rock was the Lord Jesus
Christ that followed them and that watered them. God told Moses, when the people murmured and
complained, he could have let them just die of thirst. But
instead, he had mercy. You see, where sin abounded,
grace does much more abound. It does much more abound. And
God said to Moses, you take that rod, that's the rod that He put
in the Jordan and turned it to blood. That's the rod that brought
the plagues on Egypt. That's the rod that drowned the
Egyptian army in that Red Sea. He said, you take that rod and
you smite this rock that I'm standing on. In smiting that
rock, you're smiting God. You said, I can't do that. Is
that not what God did? Did not God smite God? That's
why Martin Luther was like, oh, God forsaking God. Is that not what Martin Luther
cried out? Who can comprehend such a thing? God, my God, my
God, why hast thou forsaken me? God forsaking God, God smiting
God. That's what happened. That's
the picture is given here, the rod of God's justice. fell on
His Son, who is God. God the Father, God the Son,
God the Holy Spirit. And the rod of His justice fell
on His Son. Awake, O sword, against my fellow. And He smote him. Christ died under the wrath of
Almighty God. smitten with the sins of his
people. And what do you think is going
to come out of that rock? What came out of his side when that
soldier took that spear and plunged it in his side? Blood and water. Blood and water. And he said,
Moses, you take that rod and you smite this rock. Don't tap
it. Bite it. Strike it. Strike a blow to it. That's what
God did to His Son. Blow after blow after blow of
divine justice. No mercy. Not even a hint of
mercy. He took His wrath out on Him
without any interruption. That's what he did. That we might
go free. That we might have what? The
water of life. And it came out of a rock. Can you imagine what that must
have looked like? A multitude of people. A multitude of people. Well over a million some people. And he smites this rock. And
I'm sure it's not just a little rest, this is a rock. Steady,
strong, not a dirt clod. You and I were made of dirt clod.
We were made from the dust of the ground. Christ wasn't. Here's
a steady, steady, strong, towering rock. And out of it comes this pure,
they didn't have to distill it after it came out, I mean, this
is a pure, I'm sure when they drank this water, it was like
the wine when our Lord turned the water into wine. And that
governor said, man, this is the best wine I've ever had. This
is the best. Well, everything about Christ
is the best. Everything he does is the best. And when that water
came out, why, it make our bottled water taste like dirt. Pure crystal. Clean water. Water. These people were dying of thirst. They were dying. Have you ever
really, really been thirsty? I mean where your tongue kind
of pretty much sticks to your mouth. And then you get a taste
of cold water. Nothing like it. Nothing like
it. And here is a dying people, and
they ought to die. Murmuring against God after all
that He's done for them, delivered them from bondage. He brings
them into this situation to prove to them who He is, to show them,
to reveal to them who He is, and to preach to them a gospel
message. They get it in this rock. And this water, this water
flows from this rock. And it waters this whole crowd,
this whole multitude is watered by this one rock. And it didn't go dry. It did
not go dry. And their thirst was quenched.
And that rock that was smitten, that the water came out of, was
for a particular people. It wasn't for anybody else in
that land. That was a desert. They were in a desert, but that
wasn't for anybody else but them. That rock was smitten for Israel. Christ was smitten for a multitude
of sinners given to Him by the Father. And He says to them, Are you
thirsty? Are you thirsty? Not everyone's
thirsty. Really, not everyone's thirsty. But everyone that's thirsty,
he says, come and drink of the water of life freely. And everyone
that's thirsty comes. But God has to make us thirsty.
God has to bring us to the place of a desert where there's no
water. But the water's flowing from
that rock. That's the only water there is in the desert. And the
thirsty people drink. Thirsty people drink. This is
how you know A person's alive. Here's good evidence somebody's
alive. People who are alive get thirsty
and they drink. They get hungry and they eat.
It's the same way spiritually. Thirsty people drink, hungry
people eat. People who don't need to be here,
people who just, it's just, I mean, it's just a once in a great,
once in a while, you know, just once in a while thing, Would you drink water once in
a while? You drink it every day. Do you eat once in a while? No,
you eat every day. That's the same way it is with
the child of God. You must drink and feed on Christ
daily. It's a daily thing. If you can go without it, you
don't need Him. Dead people don't need water.
Dead people don't need food. But the living do. And those who are made alive
in Christ, they need Him. They need the bread of life and
they need the water of life. They need Him. He is that rock. In spite of their sinfulness,
here's the mercy of God, in spite of their sinfulness, in spite
of their murmuring, in spite of their complaining, He fed
them and He watered them. in spite of it. I stand here today preaching
the gospel in spite of myself. You're here today to hear the
gospel, to worship God in spite of our sinfulness. God's given
us a desire to be here. He's given us an appetite for
the gospel. We have an appetite for the gospel. And even though we often murmur
and complain, was it too hot today? Was it? You ought to have been shocked.
I'm telling you, we'd all say, oh man, it's ridiculously hot.
No, it was the right temperature. It was not one degree higher
than God purposed it to be. Is that our God or not? It's
not one degree hotter, one degree colder. He determines the temperature
of every day. That's our God. Let's thank God for that rock.
There's a rock in a weary land. We're saying that. We're just
saying it. There's a rock in a weary land,
and out of it flows the water of life. The rock is real, the
water is real, and the life is real. Come and drink of it. Are
you thirsty? It's for thirsty people. Water
is for thirsty people. If you're not thirsty, you won't
want it. You know, when they talk about free will, man's will is never to have Christ. You will not come to me that
you might have life. If we do will to have Him, It's
because He said, Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy
power. He makes us willing. He gives us a desire. He makes
us thirsty. He makes us hungry. He makes
us these things because He gives us life. And when you have life, you have
these things. You have these motions of life. Anyone thirsty? He says, come
and drink. It's for the thirsty people.
You know, good news is for people in trouble, isn't it? Good news
is for those in trouble. Pardon is for those in jail,
those who've broken the law. Look over in Revelations 21. Look in verse 6. And he said unto me, it is done, I am Alpha and Omega,
the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is
athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. You thirsty? I am. I know some
of you are. Look over Revelation chapter
22. This is what made me think of that water coming out of that
rock. It was so crystal clear, pure to drink. And he showed
me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding
out of the throne of God and where? Where else did it come
out of? Out of the throne of God and
of the Lamb. It's coming out of Him who sits
on the throne. Look in verse 17. And the Spirit and the Bride
say, Come, that is the Holy Spirit. And let him that heareth say,
Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take
the water of life Freely. Freely. If you're thirsty, drink. That's what it says. Come. I
could get on the radio and say, listen to me. If you're thirsty,
come and drink. If you're rich or poor, what
race you're of, what class you're of, if you're thirsty, come. There's water to drink. There's
life to be had out of the crucified one. But not all are thirsty. Not
all are thirsty. I doubt that all the other people
that lived in that land, they'd already dug their wells. They
lived there a long time. They knew where all those natural
springs were, but we're not drinking of a natural spring. This thirst is not a natural
thirst, and it's a thirst that only he can quench. That woman
at the well said, he said, whoever drinks of this water will thirst
again, but whoever drinks of the water I shall give him never
thirst again. She said, well, evermore, give me this water. He's the
water. He's the water. He's the bread.
He's the sacrifice. He's the priest. He's all in
all. He's all in all. There was no water coming from that rock until it
was smitten. Now, later on, we'll see where
Moses spoke to it, and that was the problem, because that rock's
only going to be smitten one time. Only one time. It's not going to be smitten.
Christ crucified one time, but he must be crucified one time.
He must be crucified one time. His blood must be shed one time
for the redemption of our sins, our souls, and put away our sins.
One time. It's not going to happen again.
It's not going to happen. Let me close by reading Isaiah 55. Let me read this first three
verses. O everyone that thirsteth, stop! O everyone that thirsteth,
come ye to the waters. He that hath no money, come ye,
buy and eat. Yea, come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price. Why do you spend money for that
which is not bread, and you labor for that which satisfies not?
Hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and
let your soul delight itself in fatness. Incline your ear,
and come unto me, here, and your soul shall
live. And I will make an everlasting
covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David. Whatever nation, whatever tongue,
whatever language. He said, if you're thirsty, come. The rock has been smitten and
the water is flowing, so come and drink.