And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Take the rod, and gather thou the assembly together, thou, and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their eyes; and it shall give forth his water, and thou shalt bring forth to them water out of the rock: so thou shalt give the congregation and their beasts drink. And Moses took the rod from before the LORD, as he commanded him. And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said unto them, Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock? | ||
| Numbers 20:7–10 | ||
| Without question, Moses was one of the greatest men in history. He had an awesome responsibility. He led three million people out of slavery on a journey toward the land of their destiny. He also had a glorious opportunity, for he heard from the Lord directly (Numbers 12:8). Moses was a uniquely blessed and godly man, but he was still a man. And here we see the humanity of Moses in what would be his greatest sin. If you were to ask Moses’ contemporaries what his great sin was, some would point to his murder of the Egyptian in Exodus 2. Others might point to his failure to tend his own children in Exodus 4. Others might point to his marriage to the Ethiopian woman in Numbers 12. But none of those things disqualified Moses in the way this sin does. The people were thirsty. They were murmuring. They wanted water to drink. In response, God told Moses to take the rod that had blossomed and budded three chapters earlier and to speak to the rock. Moses took the rod but then looked at the people and called them rebels. In the Greek Septuagint, the word translated “rebels” is moros, from which we get the word “moron.” “You morons, must we fetch you water?” Moses cried as he struck the rock twice (see verse 11). And although God provided water, He said, “Because of this, Moses, you will not be allowed into the Promised Land.” Moses had been leading this congregation for decades. He had put up with the murmuring, the complaining, the sin of three million people. How, then, can it be that God would disqualify him when he’s so close to the finish line? What was the sin Moses committed that marred his record? The sin was obviously related to anger. We know this not only from the context, but from the Psalms . . . They angered him also at the waters of strife, so that it went ill with Moses for their sakes: because they provoked his spirit, so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips. - Psalm 106:32–33 As I read the Bible, I understand that the point of a man’s greatest strength is more often than not the point of his greatest failure. Known for his meekness, which the Greeks defined as “strength under control,” Moses failed when he lost control and lost his temper. Peter was a man known for his courage, as one who walked on water in the midst of a storm and who chopped off Malchus’ ear. But where did he fail? He failed when he became a coward before a servant girl (Matthew 26:69). Job was a man who was abundantly patient, and yet he was rebuked by the Lord for a lack of patience (Job 40). David was a man after God’s heart, a lover of God, and yet he fell because he lusted after a woman (2 Samuel 11). Unlike the others around him, Noah was a righteous man, yet he failed when he got drunk in his tent (Genesis 9:21). The same is true of us. Where we think we are strongest will be the point of our greatest vulnerability. If you think your marriage is so strong that you will never be in danger, be careful. If you think you have so much integrity that you would never cheat on your taxes, wait a minute. If you think you’re so honest that you would never tell a lie, beware. Where I’m weak, I’m aware of my vulnerability. I know I’ve got to pray about it. I know I’ve got to keep my guard up. But when I think I’m together, I fail to pray and I don’t watch as carefully as I ought to. I rely on my own strength, not realizing that my own strength is limited. Pastor Jon Courson | ||
