38 years had passed. 38 years of wandering around in the wilderness. Most of the original grumbling generation of Israelites had died. They came to camp at Kadesh and there Miriam died. Miriam was Moses’s sister. She was there when Pharoah’s daughter found the baby Moses in the bullrushes and took him into Pharoah’s household. At the age of 126 years Miriam died and was buried in the desert. Miriam didn’t make it into the Promised Land. But for Moses and Aaron and the surviving Israelites, the end was in sight. Bit the people are still complaining about the food. There’s no corn, no figs, no grapes, no pomegranates. At least they had moved on from their obsession with cucumbers, but what could they expect to find in the desert. So they were complaining. But there was a more pressing and serious problem. There was no water. They were facing the possibility of dying of thirst. But, praise God, he would continue to meet all their needs. So we read here in Numbers chapter 20 of
A Great Miracle – water from the rock!
Numbers 20 6 Moses and Aaron went from the assembly to the entrance to the tent of meeting and
fell face down, and the glory of the LORD appeared to them. 7 The LORD said to Moses. 8 ‘Take the staff, and you and your brother Aaron gather the assembly together. Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water. You will bring water out of the rock for the community so that they and their livestock can drink.’ …
11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank.
God worked a miracle and the immediate need of the people was met. He provided them with more than enough cool refreshing water to drink. The miracle of abundant flowing water is interpreted time and time again in the Bible symbolically and spiritually.
Flowing waters are a sign of God’s blessing
Isaiah 41 17 ‘The poor and needy search for water, but there is none;
their tongues are parched with thirst.
But I the LORD will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.
18 I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys.
I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs.

Isaiah 43 18 ‘Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.
19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
20 The wild animals honour me, the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland,
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
21 the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my praise.

The apostle Paul interprets the rock which sustained the Israelites as Christ himself.
10 For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. 2 They were all baptised into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. 3 They all ate the same spiritual food 4 and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.

Jesus even promised the gift of the Holy Spirit pictures as the blessings of streams of living water in the lives of believers.
John 7 37 On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’ 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
Rivers of living water. God wants to pour these blessings into our lives, and through us to all the people of North Springfield. We are surrounded by a spiritual desert. So many folk around us are desperately thirsty for God’s love and forgiveness, if only they recognised it. God is waiting for us to bring living water out of rocks right here. But there are important lessons to learn from this story of Moses, so that we will be ready for God to work his miracles and bring his blessing to others through us. Because this is a story not only of great miracles, but also of
A Great Tragedy – “you shall not enter the land”.
11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank.
12 But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, ‘Because you did not trust in me enough to honour me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.’
Moses had failed God many times in many ways during his life. But here is the worst time of all, at least in terms of the consequences of his failure. “You will not bring this community into the land I give them.”
Did you spot what Moses did wrong? Did you see what Moses did which made God so angry and brought such a devastating punishment? There were three elements to Moses’s failure – one disobedient action and one rash word which revealed underneath two sinful attitudes.
One disobedient action
This is what God commanded.
8 ‘Take the staff, and you and your brother Aaron gather the assembly together. Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water. You will bring water out of the rock for the community so that they and their livestock can drink.’
That was what God had commanded. But this is what Moses actually did.
11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank.
At first sight you might think that Moses had just done what God had commanded, but look closely. God said, “speak to the rock.” Instead Moses “struck the rock twice with his staff.” By his grace, God still worked a wonderful miracle. But Moses had not obeyed God and he would have to face the consequences of that.
Moses fell into the trap of self-reliance. Moses was complacent. Familiarity breeds contempt. God had already brought water from a rock on a number of previous occasions. The first came just after the Israelites had escaped from Egypt through the Red Sea, even before God had given them the 10 Commandments.
Exodus 17 5 The LORD answered Moses, ‘Go out in front of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.’ So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel.
Because he had struck the rock with his staff on that first occasion, Moses thought he knew what he had to do to produce water from a rock. So he didn’t listen to what God actually said.
Here is a reminder for all of us as we seek to serve and honour God. We should listen to what he tells us to do, and never think we already know. Moses relied on his previous experience instead of relying on God. God may have blessed particular events or particular activities in the past. But if we depend on doing things the way we have always done them, that may not be what God wants us to do this time and if that is the case then we will be wasting our time. We need to listen to what God tells us, to make certain that we are relying on his grace and his strength.
Jesus taught his disciples,
John 15 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5 ‘I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

Every time we are serving God we need to rely on his strength, not on our own experience. We can’t do anything by ourselves! We need to listen very carefully to what God says – through prayer and through Scripture and through prophecy, words of knowledge and wisdom.
And we need to obey exactly what God tells us to do. Even minor disobedience can have major consequences.
Numbers 20 24 ‘Aaron will be gathered to his people. He will not enter the land I give the Israelites, because both of you rebelled against my command at the waters of Meribah.
We must be very careful to do exactly what God tells us to do, no more and no less. That is the only way we can be sure that we are depending on God’s strength and not on our own human efforts. Striking the rock was one act of disobedience. But then we can also see just
One rash word
Did you spot what made God so angry in what Moses said to the people in verse 10?
10 He and Aaron gathered the assembly together in front of the rock and Moses said to them, ‘Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?’
Must we bring you water? Must WE bring you water? Psalm 106 refers back to this story and says this.
Psalm 106 32 By the waters of Meribah they angered the LORD,
and trouble came to Moses because of them;
33 for they rebelled against the Spirit of God, and rash words came from Moses’ lips.

It was Moses’s rash, impulsive, thoughtless words which kept him out of the promised land. “Must WE bring you water?” If we” meant Moses and Aaron, that would be presumptuous – as if they were the ones working the miracle. If “we” meant Moses and God that was even worse – Moses putting himself alongside God and taking credit for the miracle. Either way, in that one word, “we”, Moses was claiming some of the glory for himself instead of giving all the glory to God. Numbers 12:3 tells us
Numbers 12 3 Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.
But perhaps there was some underlying attitude of pride here when Moses presumes to take the credit for what God was going to do. The apostle Paul told the Corinthians that these stories from the Old Testament come as warnings for us.
1 Corinthians 10 11 These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. 12 So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! 13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
We must beware of the temptation to take the credit for what God does – trying to keep some of the glory for ourselves. Perhaps even by just one word out of place. When we serve God it must be in his strength alone but also for his glory alone! We are only ever unworthy servants. Remember the parable Jesus told,
Luke 17 7 ‘Suppose one of you has a servant ploughing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, “Come along now and sit down to eat”? 8 Won’t he rather say, “Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink”? 9 Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? 10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, “We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.” ’
We are only ever unworthy servants. But it is so tempting to try and keep some of the glory for ourselves. And in this world dominated by entertainment and celebrity it is truly sad to see this happen in some churches and by some Christian leaders and speakers. For God’s glory alone.
After a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, the audience kept on applauding the celebrated conductor Arturo Toscanini. Not only the audience but even the orchestra gave him a prolonged standing ovation. But Toscanini, filled with emotion, turned to his musicians and whispered, “I am nothing, you are nothing.” Then, in adoring tones, Toscanini said, “But Beethoven is everything!”
We must always give God the glory, and resist the temptation to take any credit for ourselves. He must become greater – I must become less. We must give all the glory to God. “Not I – but Jesus.” Like John the Baptist said, “He must become geater, I must become less. He must increase! I must decrease!”
One disobedient action and one rash word, and in verse 12 these revealed underneath
Two sinful attitudes
We have thought about Moses’s attitude of pride. But verse 12 reveals other problems which Moses wrestled with.
12 But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, ‘Because you did not trust in me enough to honour me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.’

“You did not trust in me enough to honour me as holy.” God explained this sin Moses later just before he died in Numbers 27.
Numbers 27 13 After you have seen it, you too will be gathered to your people, as your brother Aaron was. 14 for when the community rebelled at the waters in the Desert of Zin, both of you disobeyed my command to honour me as holy before their eyes.’ (These were the waters of Meribah Kadesh, in the Desert of Zin.)
God explained that Moses had shown a lack of faith. When Moses used that word “we” he gave the completely wrong impression that God actually needed his help to work the miracle of bringing water out of the rock. That betrayed a lack of faith. 80 years earlier, Moses had made the same mistake when God was calling him to help set his people free from the Egyptians. Moses had murdered an Egyptian who was mistreating a Hebrew – but God never needs that kind of help. Moses thought God needed him to strike the rock with his staff – but God didn’t need that kind of help either. Of course God does not need our help to accomplish anything he chooses to do. God doesn’t need our help. He chooses to work through us, but he doesn’t need us.
And then Moses had also failed to acknowledge God’s holiness.

GOOD NEWS BIBLE But the LORD reprimanded Moses and Aaron. He said, “Because you did not have enough faith to acknowledge my holy power before the people of Israel, you will not lead them into the land that I promised to give them.”

God is holy, God is Almighty, God is Sovereign. God is Lord of All. And Moses had failed to give God the glory. He had made God out to be less than He is.
Contemporary English Version “Because you refused to believe in my power, these people did not respect me. And so, you will not be the ones to lead them into the land I have promised.”
Moses failed God because of underlying attitudes of pride and disbelief and thinking that God actually needed his help. If we ever make those mistakes we get in the way of God working through us, as Moses did on that day. We will look at one more story of the Israelites wandering in the wilderness next week. But here is the sad end of the story of Moses.
Deuteronomy 32 48 On that same day the LORD told Moses, 49 ‘Go up into the Abarim Range to Mount Nebo in Moab, opposite Jericho, and view Canaan, the land I am giving the Israelites as their own possession. 50 There on the mountain that you have climbed you will die and be gathered to your people, just as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his people. 51 This is because both of you broke faith with me in the presence of the Israelites at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the Desert of Zin and because you did not uphold my holiness among the Israelites. 52 Therefore, you will see the land only from a distance; you will not enter the land I am giving to the people of Israel.’
One disobedient action. One rash word. Two sinful attitudes. May we learn to avoid the tragic mistakes Moses made!