The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. So they quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test?” But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?” Then Moses cried out to the Lord, “What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 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. 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. And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”
(Exodus 17:1-7)
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It’s been said that the only two things in life that are certain are death and taxes. Both do seem inevitable. But I’m not sure that they’re the only two things in life that are certain. I have a feeling that thirst is probably also an experience that binds the human family together. Now, thirst exists in degrees. If you’re living in the desert, or in a land where fresh water is scarce, your thirst is very real and potentially life threatening. We have the good fortune to live in Canada, a country that’s rich in fresh water. When we want a drink we go to the nearest tap and we turn it on. Or we have shelf after shelf in grocery stores filled with bottled water that we can access. We take it for granted. We don’t realize how much we take it for granted until we find ourselves in a place where easy access to fresh water can’t be taken for granted. Almost ten years ago, when I traveled to China, one of the first things that struck me was the stern advice we were given to never (EVER) drink the tap water, because it would make us sick. We were told to use only bottled water, even for something as mundane as brushing our teeth, and it was even suggested that we should take baths rather than showers because there was less chance of the water getting in our mouths that way. In spite of all that advice we still found ourselves going into the bathroom in the hotel room and turning on the tap. Eventually, to play it safe, we put a sign right beside the tap to remind us not to drink the water from it. All because we’ve been raised in an environment which teaches us to take water for granted. But in spite of how easy it is for us to find fresh water, most of us have still experienced the sensation of being thirsty. How often have we heard people say “I’m dying of thirst.” We’re not, of course. But even if you’re not literally dying of thirst, just being thirsty is not a pleasant experience.
I think about the people of Israel described in our passage from Exodus. Wandering in the desert, scorched by the hot sun in the day and troubled by cold nights - and with no water to be found. This was thirst. And it was a thirst that caused people to be desperate. A people who were prone to arguing and quarreling among themselves suddenly became a united group with one common quest - to kill Moses because he had set them free but then led them into a land where it seemed that there was no other fate waiting for them than to die of thirst. Fortunately for Moses, God stepped into the picture and let him off the hook by providing water from a source where water should not have been found. The moral of the story, I suppose, is that God provides - often in mysterious and inexplicable ways, often not until all other hope seems lost - but, still, God provides.
We, living here in Canada, may not have the same problem of thirst that the people of Israel had, as rich as we are with water. But we thirst for other things, I think. We thirst for hope, we thirst for an experience with something greater than ourselves. The fastest growing religious designation today in Canada isn’t atheism - it’s the so-called “spiritual but not religious movement.” The very presence of that movement is a sign of the spiritual thirst of our society, and the tragedy is that just as Moses was unable to provide water to quench the thirst of his people, so many of our churches today seem unable to provide the spiritual thirst quencher that people are looking for. People turn on the church, they dismiss the church, they’re increasingly hostile to the church in some cases. Don’t get me wrong - we’re not persecuted. It really grates on me when I hear Christians in Canada or the United States talking about being persecuted because the Lord’s Prayer isn’t said in schools anymore. Let’s get real. There are Christians getting their heads cut off and being forced into slavery in the Middle East right now. That’s persecution. We experience minor inconveniences that are nothing in comparison. The type of hostility toward the church that I’m speaking of is reflected in the dismissal by so many “spiritual people” of the idea that the church can provide any sort of meaningful encounter with God - or at least with something greater than ourselves. That’s reflected when we see churches that are so obviously concerned more with themselves than with their neighbours; more concerned with their own survival than with sacrificing themselves for something greater; more fixated on who’s going to chair this or that committee than on who’s going to take on this or that outreach mission. These are all things I’ve heard as reasons why people give up on the church - and, I have to confess, there’s some validity to them.
It’s a dry and thirsty spiritual land that we as a church are called to engage, but it seems we’ve become a little bit like Moses in the desert - fearful of people turning against us, dreading what tomorrow might bring, feeling ourselves under siege, not able to figure out where to go or what way to turn. But, like Moses again, we also have a resource if we’ll only have the faith to access it - a resource that will tell people that we (of any denomination) are the church; that we (of any denomination) are the people of God; that we (of any denomination) have a common purpose. But we have to be willing to do that. People see us so caught up in our difference over points of doctrine or governance and they give up on us. “What good is the church?” they ask. “Those Christians can’t even agree among themselves.”
Moses got out of a tough spot by placing his trust in God. He cried out in despair and God reminded him that he was not alone; that God was with him. And God provided a source of water for the people from the most unexpected source. Can we get out of a tough spot? I believe we can. God has provided us with the source of life giving water. Jesus said, “whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” If we want to quench the spiritual thirst of the society around us, then God has given us what we need - not doctrine, not buildings, not beautiful stained glass windows - God has given us Jesus. We need to stand for Jesus, celebrating he who unites us rather than focusing on those things that divide us. Perhaps, then, knowing that all we have to offer is an encounter with Jesus, the living water can begin to flow to the spiritually dry and thirsty we encounter every day.
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