Exodus 17

We need water to live. To lose a reliable supply of clean water is to be desperate. The people of Israel regularly felt their need for water as the Lord moved them through the wilderness.

The tension of desperation is not an ally in man's fight for self-control. A leader and the congregation or nation that he leads can easily fall into sin at such a time. Here at the beginning of the Lord's account of Israel's wandering through the wilderness, God draws our attention more to His faithfulness than to the sin of the congregation or its leader. Other passages tell us more about sin. For now it is more important for us to see that Israel survived on this journey to The Promised Land by the Lord's miraculous provision of water from the Rock.

The gift of bread from heaven was a sign of Immanuel, who is our spiritual sustenance and the Word that strengthens our hearts in faith. The life-giving water in the desert is a sign of the Immanuel Spirit, a Spirit that proceeds forth to us from the Rock of Christ according to the mercy of God.

The story of the sin of God's people is mentioned here. We are reminded that people more easily grumble and quarrel than turn to God with humble and faithful petition. They readily blame the Lord's representatives for all their sorrows and troubles. They also may easily develop a false narrative of the events that have brought them to the present stress. This was what Israel did. They blamed Moses for their desperate situation, and they imagined that their lives as slaves in Egypt were not that bad after all. Moses turned to the Lord, and he told God that the people of Israel were ready to stone him.

In this telling of the story, God did not answer Moses concerning the sins of His people. He declared the word of His provision through His servant, telling Him what to do that the people would be able to live. The Lord told Moses to pass on before the people with the elders to the Rock of Horeb. God connected Himself with that Rock in the past (See Exodus 3), and He would do so again in the giving of the Law (See Deuteronomy 5:2). Here the Lord said these important words to Moses: “I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb.” God would be there, with Moses, on that rock. Moses was instructed to strike the rock. He was promised that the water of life would come out of that rock so that the people could drink.

What a provision for the congregation of Israel! Imagine the eagerness of a thirsty people in great need of what that rock poured forth for them. See them rushing toward the rock seeking water for themselves and for their little ones lest they die.

In the New Testament, in 1 Corinthians 10:4, the Apostle Paul says unequivocally that the Rock was Christ. He suffered for our sake, and He has given to us the living water of the Holy Spirit. Now the church is so closely associated with Him that out of us flow streams of living water. The church is connected to the Rock.

A place of testing and quarreling became a reminder of the Lord's free provision for His people. The people quarreled. They tested the Lord with their cries of unbelief. They said, “Is the Lord among us or not?” But God, who is rich in mercy, provided life for desperate people.

The wilderness was not only a place where Israel needed great supplies of food and drink from the Lord. They would also need God's hand to protect them from enemies who came out against them. At the end of this chapter we read that the Amalekites fought with Israel and the Lord saved His people.

The way to victory came through the outstretched hands of Moses, the mediator. This visible intercessory prayer told a story that the congregation could see and consider. Moses was a man with limited strength. He ascended to the top of the hill with Aaron and Hur. When Moses' hands were lifted to the Lord, Israel prevailed against Amalek. But when Moses' strength failed, his hands would drop from the posture of entreaty before the Most High God, and Amalek would prevail.

Aaron and Hur had to support the hands of Moses. Moses was too weak to offer continual intercession for the Lord's people. We have a Mediator on high who ever lives to intercede for us. His strength never fails. We lift up one another's hands as a priesthood of believers, but more than anything that we can do for others, our Messiah is our strength.

Meanwhile, on the field of battle, Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the sword. This was a moment to be remembered. The Lord God, who has the power to give life and to take it away, who raises up nations and peoples for their brief season on this earth and who can bring them down, had made Himself the protective banner over Israel. But He would be a destroyer of Amalek “from generation to generation.”

Victory had come from the throne of God, but somehow the hand of a man had been placed “upon the throne of the Lord.” The everlasting arms of our Messiah plead for us in every time of need. He is our Rock and our Redeemer at the right hand of the Father. He gives us water from on high. He will rescue us from trouble that we cannot bear.