Who Are You Listening Too?

"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? And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock twice: and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them." Numbers 20: 7-12

If you have been following this blog you are probably thinking to yourself, "man, this dude loves Moses", which is good for two reasons. One, because Moses deserves props, flaws and all, for what he did in service to God. And two, because now you won't think I'm using today's blog to pick on Moses. We see in the 20th chapter of the 4th Book of the Bible (Numbers) that God gives Moses clear instructions, and Moses proceeds to do his own thing. What? you say, you didn't read that. You say God told Moses to get water from the rock and Moses got water from the rock. True, but did you notice the method God told Moses to use? God told Moses to, "speak ye unto the rock before their eyes; and it shall give forth his water," (Numbers 20:8). Now if you are observant, you are probably asking yourself, "his?". We will touch on that in a moment. But for now let's focus on what God said and what Moses did. God told Moses to speak to the rock, but instead Moses spoke to the people and struck the rock. God never told Moses to speak to the people other than to gather them together. In his defense, Moses is human just like you and me. How often have we thought we were doing the will of God, only to find out later we were using God to push our own agenda? It is easy to do. You mean well, but the enemy often uses the stresses of life to distract our attention while God is speaking. Never happened to you? Have you ever been sitting in church while the Gospel is being preached and you are thinking about the argument you had earlier that morning with your spouse? Or maybe you were thinking about that girl you like or what you were going to do after service. Moses was angry with the people, which caused him to feel self-righteous. This was uncharacteristic for Moses, but it had been 40 years of listening to the constant murmuring and complaining. He lost it, just for a moment, but that's all it takes. We all have to be ever mindful of the dangers of listening to the enemy's voice, especially when it sounds good to our itching ears. Can't you picture Satan tempting Moses: Moses you need to give these ungrateful people a piece of your mind, after all you have done for them. Did you pick up the pattern of the enemy? He wants you to put your total focus on yourself, which causes you to take your eyes off of God. Moses didn't deliver the people, God did. Moses didn't give them water, God did. Don't misunderstand, there is tremendous honor and privilege that comes with being the instrument of God, but we are only the instrument. God is the source. Now back to the rock, the Apostle Paul clears up the mystery of "his water". I Corinthians 10:1-4 reads, " Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; And did all eat the same spiritual meat; And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ." You see, if we would just ask Jesus for what we need rather than giving in to our own insecurities, we would see unending blessings. "In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters." John 7:37-38