“The Lord said to Moses, “Take the staff…speak to the rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water…then Moses struck the rock twice with his staff…But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust in Me enough to honor Me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.” Selected excerpts from Numbers 20: 7-12
This story takes place in the last year of wandering for the Israelites. Forty or so years earlier God had brought water out of a rock (Ex. 17). This is the second time God commanded Moses to take his staff to a rock. This is the same staff that God caused to bud as proof of who He had chosen to lead the Israelites (Num. 17). This is also the same staff that is “to be kept as a sign to the rebellious.” Its purpose was to “put an end to their grumbling against” God so that the Israelites wouldn’t die.
At first glance it seems a bit harsh that God would ban Moses and Aaron from entering the Promised Land. In fact, tucked away in this second story of the gushing rock is the phrase “So Moses took the staff from the Lord’s presence, just as He commanded him.” But, this was only partial obedience and partial obedience is disobedience. Moses relied on his traditionalism when he thought he was standing on tradition established by God* (see below). Another way to say it is that he was practicing religion of God when he needed to trust his relationship with God.
I’m not sure if Moses and Aaron panicked. They probably did to some extent. I would have. They were coming to the end of their bizarre odyssey. The end was in sight, the Promised Land was just over the horizon. But, the whining, petty, ingrate Israelites were about to blow the whole deal…again. They needed to be put in their place or another sentence of forty years would be handed down.
All Moses and Aaron had to do was point to the budding staff and say, “hush up, now!” That staff was given by God for specifically this type of situation. I don’t know if they forgot about it or if they didn’t believe it would work or what…but, they didn’t use the tool God had given them. I could write about what happens when leaders don’t use the tools God give them, but that’s not where I’m going. I could also spend several paragraphs writing about what happens when leaders work out of their frustration. But, what I want to explore is how we, as leaders, try to recreate what only God can create.
The first gushing rock was a great success to be sure. The Isrealites were faced with overwhelming odds: starvation, dehydration, an impending battle. God specifically told Moses to strike the rock and, voila, it gushed water. This was immediately followed by a great victory of the Amalekites. Why wouldn’t Moses think the same formula would work again? So, he woops up on the rock. In fact, he hits it a second time. Maybe it was out of anger that Moses took his wind up and went, “wap-wap” in quick succession. But, I suspect it went more like this…
Back when God spoke to Moses at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting all Moses heard was, “Take the staff…to the rock.” In his heart Moses most likely said, “OK, God, I remember what we did last time. I’ve got it from here.”
Whoa…wait just a minute. “What we did last time? There was no we there, Lone Ranger.” Back in “Gushing Rock I” God said, “I will stand there before you by the rock.” God was already at the rock…He had already primed it…He had already done the work. Moses could have tripped and fell with the staff hitting the rock and it would have gushed water.
Now at “Gushing Rock: The Sequel” I suspect Moses stormed over to the rock and took a hefty whack driven by his frustration with the Isrealites. He probably heaved his chest, raised his arms in triumph and waited for his moment of glory for recreating the wonderful climax of Gushing Rock I.
Nothing happens…cue crickets chirping in the silence of the dessert.
Not even a bubble of water seeped to the surface of the rock. But, maybe Moses’ frustration with God was starting to bubble. “I did exactly what we did last time! Why don’t you have my back, Mr. Burning Bush Great I Am!!! I’ll show you all!” There may have even been a torrent of “bowling words” as Mr. I’m Slow of Tongue spit on his hands and, just like Mighty Casey at the Bat, took his back swing and whooped up on the rock a second time. It was probably out of pity for the poor rock “that never did nothin’ to nobody” that God brought forth water.
Before we look down our noses at the pitiful sight of Moses getting the tongue lashing he deserves from God (Num. 20:12) we need to take a look in the mirror. As leaders how many times have we witnessed God do something great in our ministry? It might have been a spiritual breakthrough. For me, as a worship leader, it most often takes the form of a great moment in a worship service; one of those moments when you can feel the Spirit of God sweep over the room like a hurricane and the pastor comes to the pulpit to go straight to the invitation/alter call/decision moment without a sermon. People rush the altar. Repentance breaks through; revival breaks out. It was probably even during one of those otherwise mundane moments in the service when only God can split open the rock and let His spirit gush all over the people. We relish the moment giving Him the glory for doing something only He could have done.
Until the next time we think we’re in a similar situation. Then we get all full of ourselves and try to formulate it. “What was it I said to create that moment, what song did we sing that spoke to people, what did we do to convict people like that, what was it about us that encouraged so many?” we search frantically for the formula. Then we get frustrated with ourselves, the people and God when the formula doesn’t work. For goodness, sake! What are we thinking? We’re trying to do what only God can do. We’re trying to be God! For reasons we can never understand, because our thoughts are selfish and, therefore, are not God’s thoughts, He created that moment for that time for His purpose and His glory. It’s not our business, right or even privilege to recreate it. But, God is doing a new thing…not old things.
It’s what I call “glory hijacking.” And we all try it. We need to stop. We’re not God and He’s not just a great big us. Our job is simply to stand next to The Rock and let Him be God. We need to learn to obey; do what He says…nothing more, nothing less.
Then watch the water gush. It’ll be like drinking water from a fire hydrant…um, more like Niagra Falls.
*”Traditionalisms are the dead faith of the living. Traditions are the living faith of the dead.” The first half of this quote is attributed to Jaroslav Pelikan in his book “The Melody of Theology”. However, only the first have can be attributed directly to him. The second half remains attributed to my favorite quotist, anonymous.
“From now on the Israelites must not go near the Tent of Meeting, or the will bear the consequences of their sin and will die.” Numbers 18:22
The Tent of Meeting was kind of like Starbucks for God and Moses. It’s where they met to discuss, chat, chew (burn) the fat, etc. Okay, I’m bordering on sacrilege. The point is that the Tent of Meeting is where God was manifest for the Israelites. Moses was allowed in to the Tent to be with God, the Levites were allowed within proximity of the Tent. Everyone else? Stay away!
Why? Because God’s presence reveals sin. God’s holiness publicizes those things that were hidden in shame. The glory of God shines a spotlight on just how dirty and nasty human deeds really are. Proximity to God let’s out the secret that we’ve all tried to deny; that is, we’re really dead.
We might act like we’re alive. We party and celebrate, act joyful, commiserate with friends. We fill our lives with things that fool us into feeling like we’re alive, even vibrant. Our check book registers and credit card statements are filled with purchases of wide screen TVs, cruises to the Med, dinners at the finest restaurants. But, they’re all just illusions of life. We all know it but are too prideful to admit…we’re dead. In spite of all the things we do to feign life we’re really empty, nasty, dirty carcasses.
Rather than being alive, we’re actually just puppets; lifeless marionettes manipulated by an unseen and ruthless puppeteer. Or maybe like poor Bernie in one of my favorite movies “Weekend at Bernie’s” (the first one, not the sequel). Like Bernie, we’re just used to perpetuate the illusion of life. Who is the puppeteer? Who’s pulling the string and manipulating through the charade of life? Satan, Lucifer, the father of all lies.
“Wait a minute, Joe,” you might say. Go ahead say it. “There are at least two problems with saying we’re dead. First, what if we just don’t go near God? Or second, isn’t that a rather vindictive god you’re describing?”
The cool part is both are perfectly valid questions and both have been answered with the same name. For the first point, God is here and we can’t get away from Him. And I don’t mean just metaphysically. God coming to earth to be with humans is what separates Christianity from all other religions. All other religions base “salvation” on us bringing ourselves to life; on us working our way to heaven. But, in Jesus, God came to us. And, because God came to us in the person of Jesus then His presence in the world revealed the dirty little secret that it was filled with death.
Second, God knows that we’re dead. He knows what we we’re deceived out of or may have discovered about ourselves but wouldn’t acknowledge. We can’t make ourselves better, we can’t evolve, we don’t improve…duh, we’re dead. Dead doesn’t get better. And, that breaks God’s heart. He created us to be alive. He created us as life. So He came in the person of Jesus.
There’s a common misunderstanding amongst us humans. It seems to cross the boundary between denominations, the divide between Christian and non-Christian, nationalities, philosophies, etc. That is, many people, I would argue, the majority of people believe Jesus’ mission in life was to make sick people better. Mentally sick people, morally sick people, physically sick people; the mis-belief is that He came to heal us. Or maybe to forgive us; to gloss over our sin. While it is true that He came to do all of those things, they were just to reveal who He is and as a means to an end.
No, Jesus came to bring dead people back to life. In the person who reveals that we are dead is also the breath that brings us back to life. In one fell swoop God did one of the most compassionate and kind things in all of history. He exposed our condition and broke the lie of Satan. No, broke isn’t strong enough. Vaporized, obliterated…I don’t think there is a strong enough word, but you get the idea. That is, we’re dead and we need of Savior. In that same fell swoop, He did the most kind and compassionate thing in all of history and that is that He gave us a way to life. And, He did it through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Now, take a look at the check register and credit card statement. Re-examine the party schedule and social calendar. What does our life in Jesus look like? It’s not the view of an old rotting carcass anymore is it? The smell is sweeter, the colors brighter, the music more harmonic, the dancing more vibrant. Isn’t it good to be alive?
That’s why worship!
“At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt…”, “…Pharoah summoned Moses and Aaron and said, ‘Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested.’” Exodus 12:29 & 31
Ten plagues it took for Pharaoh to change his mind: blood, frogs, gnats, flies, dead livestock, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, death of the firstborn.
A few days ago I wrote that the reason Moses asked for the people of Israel to be let go was to go in the desert to worship (“Worship in the Desert“). Repeatedly God told Moses to make that request of Pharaoh. Repeatedly God let Moses in on the fact that He would harden Pharaoh’s heart and that the request would be denied. But, Moses dutifully confronted Pharaoh knowing full well that it was a fool’s errand.
For those of you that follow my blog you know that I have a category of posts about scripture passages that are confusing to me or, frankly, I just “don’t get.” It doesn’t mean that I don’t accept them as the inerrant word of God, but I just don’t understand why God put them there…yet.
This is one of them. I have a hard time figuring out why God would purposely harden someone’s heart. I can consider it in my head, but my heart doesn’t quite wrap all the way around it. I understand, intellectually, that God used all of the plagues and the deliverance of the Hebrews from them for His glory, but my heart feels there must have been a better way. Obviously, there wasn’t a better way because if there was God would have done it that way. But, something nags at me that there must be more. I want just a glimpse of God’s thinking. I echo the words of Einstein, “I want to know God’s thoughts, the rest are mere details.”
And then, there it is. Einstein…physics…a piece of the puzzle. Particularly, the law of conservation of energy. It states that energy may neither be created nor destroyed. It simply becomes a different form of energy: kinetic may become potential or heat become light, but energy cannot be created from nothing or annihilated to nothing.
God wanted the Hebrews to be free. While some biblical scholars don’t believe they were slaves in the traditional sense of being owned by individual slave owners, the Hebrew words used to describe them and their forced labor certainly implies a sub-human status in Egyptian society. Based on the Egyptians’ treatment of the Hebrews it’s not difficult to imagine them being regarded as possessions or tools as oppossed to living, breathing beings.
In short, the Egyptians regarded God’s chosen people equally useful either alive as forced-laborers or dead as fertilizer for their crops. Let’s go with the latter, for now.
If we regard the captive Hebrews as lifeless possessions exploited at the whim of the Egyptians, then freedom for them to worship in the desert meant “life” to them. In fact, in Exodus 6:6 God says, “…I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm…” Redeemed here is “ga^al” which could be translated as ”to redeem individuals from death.”
Are you still with me? Life is free…life is passionate…life is energy. Life without freedom…life without passion…life without energy is, at the risk of being obvious, dead. According to the law of conservation of energy if the Hebrews were to be set free from captivity, to come “alive”, then someone had to die. In this case, it was the firstborn of the Egyptians; in particular the firstborn of the King or Pharaoh that had to die.
Now, I know that this doesn’t answer my initial question of why the first nine plagues were necessary, but it does help with why the last one was. In order for someone to be free to live (spiritually), someone must die (spiritually).
If we jump into Mr. Peabody’s Wayback Machine and speed from the Old Testament to the New Testament we find the same law of physics applies. Only now it’s God’s Son, the Firstborn of The King, that died so that others could be free to live. And, Jesus’ passionate love for us was so full of ”infinite energy” that His death was more than enough in exchange for the life of every man, woman and child in the world! But, He had to die so that we could live. And, we get to die to ourselves so that He can live through us. Jesus didn’t come to make people better, He came to bring dead people to life (please see earlier ”Worship in the Desert“ regarding “have to” and “get to”) .
And, “Jesus-life” is freedom. Before He brings us to life we’re just dead, possessions being exploited by some slavemaster: lust, drugs, porn, money, power, status, control…whatever it is it keeps us dead, it keeps us captive so that we can’t “go to the desert to worship the Lord.” Someone had to die so that I could live. Jesus was that someone. He died so that I could be free to worship.
That’s “why worship.” Worship isn’t to set me free; it’s because I am free. “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” Free to worship!