From the wilderness of Sin the whole congregation of the Israelites journeyed by stages, as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. The people quarrelled with Moses, and said, "Give us water to drink." Moses said to them, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?" But the people thirsted there for water; and the people complained against Moses and said, "Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?" So Moses cried out to the Lord, "What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me." The Lord said to Moses, "Go on ahead of the people, and take some of the elders of Israel with you; take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will be standing there in front of you on the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it, so that the people may drink." Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. He called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarrelled and tested the Lord, saying, "Is the Lord among us or not?"
If you’ve been following the lectionary, you’ll know that they have just left Egypt where they had been enslaved for generations. Through Moses, God intervened to bring liberation to the people, with a series of miracles and supernatural events culminating in the parting of the Red Sea. The Egyptians gave up at that point when their army was consumed by the sea. The Israelites were free and were making their way to the land which had been promised to their ancestors all the way back to Abraham.
But there was an in-between time; a time after they had secured their release from Egypt before they reached the land. Of course, this in-between time was lengthened but that’s tale from another reading for another day. But when we find the Israelites in today’s reading they still had the memory of being servants in Egypt and were looking forward to claiming their land. Yet to come was the giving of the law on Mount Sinai and their disobedience that lengthened their wilderness experience to forty years.
So this ragtag band of former slaves is in the midst of the wilderness. There are many types of wilderness of course, but the one that the Israelites found themselves in was a hot, dry, arid place. It seems quite reasonable and natural that they would be complaining about a lack of water. Water is vital stuff. It gives life and, without it, life can ebb away. And they were in a place in which there was a decided lack of water.
Just prior to this reading, the Israelites had complained about a lack of food which was taken care of by the giving of manna or bread from heaven. So there is a track record of God’s care here. God hears the problems that are being faced and does something about them.
Moses, on the other hand, is less caring, it seems. He hears grumbling among the people and frets and worries because of it. Perhaps he is afraid of his leadership position being threatened. Perhaps he doesn’t understand the caring that God can provide and worries about approaching God with this latest, freshest complaint of the people. In any case, Moses comes off as a bit petulant and fretful.
God, as we know, provides. The people are thirsty so God provides water, and from a rather unexpected source: a rock. Moses, using the same staff with which he struck the Nile and turned it to blood and the same staff that he held up to part the Red Sea, hit the rock with his staff and voila, water for all. The same staff that had earlier taken away life-giving water in the Nile, now provides it for the Israelites in the midst of the wilderness.
Chalice could be said to be in its own wilderness experience at the moment. We don’t know what the future holds; there’s a lot of uncertainty and we are wandering, wondering if we’ll find some sort of promised land or we’ll die from thirst in the midst of the wilderness. It’s not a particularly pleasant place to be, certainly.
But here we are. Thirsty, hot, and wondering if we’ve been abandoned. Wasn’t life better back in Egypt, even if we were slaves? At least there was some security, some sense of well-being, whatever the price. God, where is our water that will refresh us and provide us with the energy to go on?
The wilderness is a place of God’s caring. God cares about God’s people and shows it most in the wilderness. God provides manna from above and water from a rock. Unexpected but still exactly what was needed at that time.
The Hebrew people had to change who they were through their wilderness experience though. Their identities as servants of the Egyptian people had to change. Though they might not have known who they were becoming, they had to change there in the wilderness. It was inevitable.
The change couldn’t have happened though without God’s care; without water from a rock. They likely would have died of thirst in the wilderness without the divine care that got them through. But God took care of that part of their needs and they survived and were able to go on to receive the law that was to become the bedrock of their faith.
God is with us, right here, right now, in our wilderness experience. If we are thirsty, God will provide, I believe. We may not expect what is to come and we don’t know how we’ll end up in our identity. But God’s care for us will be available to us in the wilderness.
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