And Moses cried unto the LORD, saying, What shall I do unto this people? they be almost ready to stone me.
At Rephidim the thirsting people with no water to drink blamed Moses for bringing them out of Egypt to kill them with thirst, and pressed him with contention and threats until he was distressed and cried out asking what he should do with a people almost ready to stone him. God Himself had led them there by the pillar of cloud to a place He knew beforehand had no water, to test their loyalty and teach them their helplessness and dependence on Him. He answered Moses by directing him to smite the rock in Horeb with his rod before the elders, so that life-giving water flowed out for the people to drink. The verse therefore warns against meeting hardship with murmuring and unbelief that forgets past deliverance, and teaches instead to call upon the Lord in perplexity with childlike faith, trusting Him to turn emergency into opportunity and trial into blessing.
Crisis at Rephidim
Israel had journeyed from the wilderness of Sin and pitched at Rephidim by the commandment of the Lord. They were led there enshrouded in the pillar of cloud as General of the armies of heaven and by His Angel, though He knew beforehand there was no water there. Thirsting with no water to drink, the people chided Moses, contended with him, and murmured against him. They accused him of bringing them and their children and cattle up out of Egypt to kill them with thirst through hardship, asking why he contended with them. In doing so they tempted the Lord by saying Is the Lord among us or not.
Instead of humbly asking God to meet their need, they blamed Moses. They distrusted God's care and dishonored Him by unbelief, forgetting their heavenly Leader. They forgot His past deliverance with a high hand, His slaying of the firstborn, His feeding them with angels' food, and His covenanting and promising to bring them to the promised land. Their cruel murmuring and enraged threats grieved Moses and left him in distress and unsure what to do. They pressed him to the point where they were almost ready to stone him, so he cried to the Lord asking what he should do unto this people.
God answered by directing him to go before the people with the elders of Israel. He was to take the rod with which he smote the river, and to stand before the rock in Horeb and smite it in their sight so water would come out for the people to drink, which Moses did. Water flowed for their deliverance, the Lord using the rod to provide for them rather than to punish them for murmuring. The place was called Massah, meaning Temptation, and Meribah, meaning Strife, because of the chiding of Israel and because they tempted the Lord.
That provision of water from the rock showed Israel was being led and protected by divine power. The wilderness sojourn event was later commemorated by the water ceremony of the Feast of Tabernacles, the most impressive part of the feast calling forth the greatest rejoicing. At the first dawn of day the priest dipped a flagon of water from the flowing waters of the Kedron and lifted it on high before the people. He ascended the broad steps of the temple, entered the court of the priests, and poured the water out before the altar.
God's Purpose in Testing
God Himself leads His people to Rephidim and into strait, difficult places to test their faithfulness and loyalty to Him. Israel journeyed and pitched there according to the command of the Lord, who was leading them enshrouded in the pillar of cloud as General of the armies of heaven and who knew beforehand there was no water there. Though He had delivered them from Egypt with a high hand by slaying the firstborn, fed them with angels' food, and covenanted and promised to bring them to the promised land, they chided Moses for water, murmured that he had brought them and their children and cattle up to die of thirst, tempted the Lord, forgot their Leader, dishonored Him by unbelief, and vented wrath and bitterness upon Moses until he cried to the Lord asking what he should do with a people almost ready to stone him. Their emergency was God's opportunity, and those who meet their own Rephidim are to call upon the Lord for aid with the trust of a hungry, thirsty child asking its earthly father for what is needed, believing He can bring life-giving refreshment even from flinty rock independent of surroundings.
In mercy He does not always place them in the easiest places, lest in self-sufficiency they forget He is helper in time of necessity. He could have led them elsewhere, but He permits disappointment, privation, want, and grievous trial so they will realize their helplessness and dependence on Him and learn to call upon Him for help. Trial brings out inherited and cultivated tendencies to wrong, while He reveals His matchless love through miracles of grace. It reveals true steadfast principles and the gold of character and the faith cherished in His instrumentalities in contrast with selfish, ambitious sentiments, trying hearts and exposing how easily souls are deceived and misled by temptation and how little faith professed believers have in God and how much confidence in themselves.
He leads there because He sees beforehand the strait places through which they pass and knows it is for their good and for His name's glory. No amount of tribulation there can separate them from Christ, who knows all their trials and has already proved Himself their ever-present Saviour and ever-present help in trouble. In His own time He will open the flinty rock and cause cooling, life-giving streams to flow forth, turning trial into blessing as He turned the bitterness of Marah into sweetness.
The same Rephidim trial comes upon all connected with His work, His institutions, and the church. When tested people lose faith, they turn against His work and His appointed workers with doubt, murmuring, pressure, and threat even to stoning, which tests the workers. The cry of Moses under that pressure reflects the serious responsibility resting on leaders as they guide the people toward the land God had prepared for them.
Such a trial becomes a blessing when it leads to self-examination. It brings conviction by the Holy Spirit and thorough conversion of heart and mind for those unfit for leading positions, establishes faith on better principles with stronger faith, gives clearer moral judgment and correction of wrong attitudes, and produces striving for higher moral perceptions and better preparation for various lines of work. It gives clearer light for sincere, earnest, God-fearing souls to walk in and be blessed by, and sets right minds formerly biased in wrong directions so they learn lessons of lasting benefit.
Trusting God in Hardship
Everyone who takes up the cross to follow Christ comes to such a Rephidim in the narrow way, for life is not only green pastures and cooling streams. Disappointment, privation, want, and grievous trials come even there, bringing doubt and despondency, conscience-stricken reasoning that wisdom has left God, and the complaint that the Lord has failed, deals ill, and does not love, with the question Is the Lord among us or not.
The verse warns against imitating Israel by breaking into rebellion and unbelief in difficulty. Instead of waiting patiently, reviving faith, and recounting His past deliverance from Egypt, His slaying of the firstborn, His feeding them with angels' food, and His promise to bring them to the promised land, they distrusted God, dishonored Him by murmuring and complaining, and vented wrath and bitterness upon Moses as if he had brought them and their children and cattle up to kill them with thirst. By venting their wrath on Moses they forgot their heavenly Leader, forgetting that their emergency was God's opportunity. Their crisis tested their faith, and patient trust and remembrance of God's goodness would have shortened the test.
Those at their own Rephidim of rough way, want, and difficulty are instead to wait patiently, revive faith and recount His great goodness, wonderful works, and past manifestations of power and love, and exercise implicit faith in the Lord's power to guide and uphold them. They are to pray for the Holy Spirit to bring those past manifestations to mind, believe He is as willing to help now as on former occasions, and look to Him in trusting faith. They are to go forward with praise, thanksgiving, and full assurance of help, helping those worse off who seek light.
They are to learn to call upon the Lord for aid as Moses did, bringing every burden to the heavenly Father with childlike faith as a hungry, thirsty child calls its earthly father for what is needed. In perplexity they should simply turn to God in prayer and ask Him for what is needed, trusting His kindness, rather than murmuring and complaining, and that response pleases the Lord. That calling upon Him in emergency teaches helplessness and dependence on Him.
They can trust that He longs to manifest Himself in emergency and reveal abundant supplies independent of surroundings, turning emergency into opportunity to help. In His own time He will open the flinty rock and cause life-giving, refreshing, cooling streams to flow forth even from flinty rock, and turn trial into blessing as He turned the bitterness of Marah into sweetness. So He proves Himself an ever-present help in trouble, bearing burdens for His people that will only be fully known face to face with God when they see as they are seen and know as they are known, being with them always even to the end of the world.
At Rephidim the thirsting people with no water to drink blamed Moses for bringing them out of Egypt to kill them with thirst, and pressed him with contention and threats until he was distressed and cried out asking what he should do with a people almost ready to stone him. God Himself had led them there by the pillar of cloud to a place He knew beforehand had no water, to test their loyalty and teach them their helplessness and dependence on Him. He answered Moses by directing him to smite the rock in Horeb with his rod before the elders, so that life-giving water flowed out for the people to drink. The verse therefore warns against meeting hardship with murmuring and unbelief that forgets past deliverance, and teaches instead to call upon the Lord in perplexity with childlike faith, trusting Him to turn emergency into opportunity and trial into blessing.
Crisis at Rephidim
Israel had journeyed from the wilderness of Sin and pitched at Rephidim by the commandment of the Lord. They were led there enshrouded in the pillar of cloud as General of the armies of heaven and by His Angel, though He knew beforehand there was no water there. Thirsting with no water to drink, the people chided Moses, contended with him, and murmured against him. They accused him of bringing them and their children and cattle up out of Egypt to kill them with thirst through hardship, asking why he contended with them. In doing so they tempted the Lord by saying Is the Lord among us or not.
Instead of humbly asking God to meet their need, they blamed Moses. They distrusted God's care and dishonored Him by unbelief, forgetting their heavenly Leader. They forgot His past deliverance with a high hand, His slaying of the firstborn, His feeding them with angels' food, and His covenanting and promising to bring them to the promised land. Their cruel murmuring and enraged threats grieved Moses and left him in distress and unsure what to do. They pressed him to the point where they were almost ready to stone him, so he cried to the Lord asking what he should do unto this people.
God answered by directing him to go before the people with the elders of Israel. He was to take the rod with which he smote the river, and to stand before the rock in Horeb and smite it in their sight so water would come out for the people to drink, which Moses did. Water flowed for their deliverance, the Lord using the rod to provide for them rather than to punish them for murmuring. The place was called Massah, meaning Temptation, and Meribah, meaning Strife, because of the chiding of Israel and because they tempted the Lord.
That provision of water from the rock showed Israel was being led and protected by divine power. The wilderness sojourn event was later commemorated by the water ceremony of the Feast of Tabernacles, the most impressive part of the feast calling forth the greatest rejoicing. At the first dawn of day the priest dipped a flagon of water from the flowing waters of the Kedron and lifted it on high before the people. He ascended the broad steps of the temple, entered the court of the priests, and poured the water out before the altar.
God's Purpose in Testing
God Himself leads His people to Rephidim and into strait, difficult places to test their faithfulness and loyalty to Him. Israel journeyed and pitched there according to the command of the Lord, who was leading them enshrouded in the pillar of cloud as General of the armies of heaven and who knew beforehand there was no water there. Though He had delivered them from Egypt with a high hand by slaying the firstborn, fed them with angels' food, and covenanted and promised to bring them to the promised land, they chided Moses for water, murmured that he had brought them and their children and cattle up to die of thirst, tempted the Lord, forgot their Leader, dishonored Him by unbelief, and vented wrath and bitterness upon Moses until he cried to the Lord asking what he should do with a people almost ready to stone him. Their emergency was God's opportunity, and those who meet their own Rephidim are to call upon the Lord for aid with the trust of a hungry, thirsty child asking its earthly father for what is needed, believing He can bring life-giving refreshment even from flinty rock independent of surroundings.
In mercy He does not always place them in the easiest places, lest in self-sufficiency they forget He is helper in time of necessity. He could have led them elsewhere, but He permits disappointment, privation, want, and grievous trial so they will realize their helplessness and dependence on Him and learn to call upon Him for help. Trial brings out inherited and cultivated tendencies to wrong, while He reveals His matchless love through miracles of grace. It reveals true steadfast principles and the gold of character and the faith cherished in His instrumentalities in contrast with selfish, ambitious sentiments, trying hearts and exposing how easily souls are deceived and misled by temptation and how little faith professed believers have in God and how much confidence in themselves.
He leads there because He sees beforehand the strait places through which they pass and knows it is for their good and for His name's glory. No amount of tribulation there can separate them from Christ, who knows all their trials and has already proved Himself their ever-present Saviour and ever-present help in trouble. In His own time He will open the flinty rock and cause cooling, life-giving streams to flow forth, turning trial into blessing as He turned the bitterness of Marah into sweetness.
The same Rephidim trial comes upon all connected with His work, His institutions, and the church. When tested people lose faith, they turn against His work and His appointed workers with doubt, murmuring, pressure, and threat even to stoning, which tests the workers. The cry of Moses under that pressure reflects the serious responsibility resting on leaders as they guide the people toward the land God had prepared for them.
Such a trial becomes a blessing when it leads to self-examination. It brings conviction by the Holy Spirit and thorough conversion of heart and mind for those unfit for leading positions, establishes faith on better principles with stronger faith, gives clearer moral judgment and correction of wrong attitudes, and produces striving for higher moral perceptions and better preparation for various lines of work. It gives clearer light for sincere, earnest, God-fearing souls to walk in and be blessed by, and sets right minds formerly biased in wrong directions so they learn lessons of lasting benefit.
Trusting God in Hardship
Everyone who takes up the cross to follow Christ comes to such a Rephidim in the narrow way, for life is not only green pastures and cooling streams. Disappointment, privation, want, and grievous trials come even there, bringing doubt and despondency, conscience-stricken reasoning that wisdom has left God, and the complaint that the Lord has failed, deals ill, and does not love, with the question Is the Lord among us or not.
The verse warns against imitating Israel by breaking into rebellion and unbelief in difficulty. Instead of waiting patiently, reviving faith, and recounting His past deliverance from Egypt, His slaying of the firstborn, His feeding them with angels' food, and His promise to bring them to the promised land, they distrusted God, dishonored Him by murmuring and complaining, and vented wrath and bitterness upon Moses as if he had brought them and their children and cattle up to kill them with thirst. By venting their wrath on Moses they forgot their heavenly Leader, forgetting that their emergency was God's opportunity. Their crisis tested their faith, and patient trust and remembrance of God's goodness would have shortened the test.
Those at their own Rephidim of rough way, want, and difficulty are instead to wait patiently, revive faith and recount His great goodness, wonderful works, and past manifestations of power and love, and exercise implicit faith in the Lord's power to guide and uphold them. They are to pray for the Holy Spirit to bring those past manifestations to mind, believe He is as willing to help now as on former occasions, and look to Him in trusting faith. They are to go forward with praise, thanksgiving, and full assurance of help, helping those worse off who seek light.
They are to learn to call upon the Lord for aid as Moses did, bringing every burden to the heavenly Father with childlike faith as a hungry, thirsty child calls its earthly father for what is needed. In perplexity they should simply turn to God in prayer and ask Him for what is needed, trusting His kindness, rather than murmuring and complaining, and that response pleases the Lord. That calling upon Him in emergency teaches helplessness and dependence on Him.
They can trust that He longs to manifest Himself in emergency and reveal abundant supplies independent of surroundings, turning emergency into opportunity to help. In His own time He will open the flinty rock and cause life-giving, refreshing, cooling streams to flow forth even from flinty rock, and turn trial into blessing as He turned the bitterness of Marah into sweetness. So He proves Himself an ever-present help in trouble, bearing burdens for His people that will only be fully known face to face with God when they see as they are seen and know as they are known, being with them always even to the end of the world.