Tuesday, March 1, 2022

              Each day we likely have opportunities to trust God in some way.  We may not always recognize these opportunities.  Sometimes God may be hidden or hard to see.  But there He is.  He is inviting us to trust Him.  And in Bible times, people were often presented with opportunities to trust God and His purposes.  We can think of one such time in the story of Israel in the wilderness just before they entered the Promised Land.  We read what God said to Moses in Numbers 20:8, “You and Aaron must take the staff and assemble the entire community. As the people watch, speak to the rock over there, and it will pour out its water. You will provide enough water from the rock to satisfy the whole community and their livestock."  The instructions seemed clear enough.  God told Moses to speak to a rock while the rest of Israel watched and listened.  God would send forth water from the rock to refresh the people and meet their needs.  Indeed, God said the whole community and all the livestock would be satisfied.  But Moses disobeyed God.  He did not follow through on what God told him to do.  
              We could say that in a crucial moment Moses failed the trust test.  He gave in to his own frustration, his temper, his desire to be seen as powerful by Israel, etc.  There could be a long list of reasons why Moses struck the rock rather than obediently speaking to it.    
Consider what happened next.  “So, Moses took the staff from the Lord’s presence, just as He commanded him. Moses 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?”  Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank.  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” (Numbers 20:9-12).  Moses struck the rock, twice, with his staff.  And the Lord called Moses on his lack of trust.  This lack of trust was costly.  Moses was denied the chance to lead Israel into the new land.
            A failure to trust God can be costly.  It was in Bible times.  And it is today.  We can trust God completely.  That message rings clearly across the pages of Scripture.  We can trust Him with our health, our finances, our families, our marriages, our friendships, our jobs and even our search for a job.  God knows both His children and their future in perfect, total detail.  Nothing has escaped His love or vision.  How would you trust God today?  Would you trust Him with a problem that has seized your mind and dominated your thoughts?  Would you trust God to provide for you by giving a tithe, or 10% of your income, to Him each week?  Would you trust God enough to invite a friend to church or to share your faith with someone you love who is not a Christian?
            Numbers 20:13 says the people quarreled with the Lord.  And sometimes we can be quarrelsome and contentious—with God and with others.  Even believers can behave that way.  Perhaps it would be good for God’s people to be seen and known as folks who trust the Lord rather than quarreling about what we lack or what has not happened.  Moses and the people of Israel had witnessed God’s mighty power and miracles in bringing freedom from slavery and an exodus from Egypt.  Yet, here they were not trusting God to provide water by Moses doing nothing more than speaking to the rock.  Trusting God in simple ways can help us to trust Him in greater ways.  Trusting God with small things can help us to trust the larger things to Him as well.  Trusting God with today can help us trust Him with tomorrow.  Have a great Tuesday!