Friday, July 29, 2016
Exodus 17:5-6 And the Lord said to Moses, "Go on before the people, and take with you some of the elders of Israel. Also take in your hand your rod with which you struck the river, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb; and you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink."
WATER FROM THE ROCK
Water, food, shelter-- nearly every "survivalist" today will tell us that these are the things that a person needs to survive. We can survive perhaps three weeks without food, but only three days without water. When the Israelites wandered in the wilderness they were in need of water. No matter how many times the LORD miraculously provided that water, as soon as the Israelite tongues got a little dry they complained.
On one memorable occasion the LORD called upon Moses to strike a rock and promised to make water flow out of the same dusty dry rock. It was a miracle the Israelites didn't forget. In fact, one Jewish legend claims that the Israelites carried with them a piece of the Rock of Kadesh while they wandered and it continued to provide them with water.
The Spirit of God corrected that legend through the Apostle Paul. He pointed out that that it was Christ that provided their needs of both bread and water, not the rock itself.
They were fed with spiritual food, food provided by God (1 Corinthians 10:1-4, NKJV): "Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed through the sea, all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ."
The food and drink is called spiritual because they were supernaturally provided by God.
The Rock out of which God provided water should remind us of Christ. He is the one who provides all of our needs.
He is the only one who provides abundantly for our parched and thirsty souls-- the food and water we need to survive and to reach the safety of the Father's House, our eternal home.
