Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 19-21.

There is a lot I could write about in today’s passage, but I want to think about Moses’ striking the rock.  When the Israelites arrived in the Desert of Zin, there was no water for them there.  Which immediately led the people to once again to protest against Moses’ and Aaron’s leadership.  Moses and Aaron immediately do the right thing and appeal to God.  God tells Moses to speak to the rock in front of all Israel and it will begin providing them with water.  Now, the previous time a situation like this had arisen, God had instructed Moses to strike the rock to get water from it.  So, this time Moses once again strikes the rock, but that was not what God had told him to do.  God had told Moses to just speak to the rock.   The first problem with what Moses did is that he acted like he brought forth water by striking the rock, when it was God who brought forth the water.  By striking the rock, Moses acted as if it was the act of striking the rock which caused it to bring forth water, making his action similar to witchcraft.  God does not perform miracles because we follow the correct ritual.  The second problem with what Moses did was that he did not have enough faith to believe that God would bring forth water from the rock if he only spoke to it.  Both of these are problems common to the human condition.  We all struggle with thinking that if we can just find the correct ritual God will have to do what we want.  And we all struggle with having enough faith to do as God instructs and trusting Him to take care of the rest.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.