This singular command was given by Jehovah to Moses during the last year of Israel’s journeyings. Water was lacking and the people, as their manner was, complained against God and His servant. Prayer and supplication would have been more becoming, but Moses felt constrained to say on one occasion, “Ye have been rebellious from the day that I knew you” (Deut. 9:24). Our minds recall a similar incident in the early days of their travels (there are 39 years between the two circumstances). The people had arrived at Rephidim and there was no water for them to drink. Jehovah in His great mercy did not chastise them for waywardness before they reached Sinai and placed themselves under law. This solemn fact altered the whole position of the people’s relation to Jehovah. It was no longer pure sovereign grace, but law, which confronted them.
Jehovah said to Moses at Rephidim, “Go on before the people and take with thee of the elders of Israel and thy rod with which thou didst smite the river.” The rod and the elders speak of judicial action. Christ is in view typically here. In Exodus 16, we have Him in His lowly grace, the manna of God’s people (as in John 6); in Exodus 17, we have Him, the One smitten for our blessing, and in the water that flowed freely, we are reminded of the gift of the Holy Spirit who is likened in John 7 to rivers of living water. It was not of God that there should be any smiting of the rock now that the people were on the borders of the Promised Land. There could not possibly be a type of Christ smitten a second time.
Moses and Aaron very suitably fell down on their faces before God. His word to Moses was, “Take the rod and gather thou the assembly together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their eyes.” It was Jehovah’s will that Aaron’s budding rod should be brought out of the sacred ark, but it was merely to be shown, not used. “Speak to the rock” was what Jehovah said. The High Priest, Aaron, was present at the moment, but he was not bidden to do anything. He stood there as the High Priest for the people with the ephod on his back, the breastplate of twelve precious stones on his heart, and the shoulder pieces with the names of the twelve tribes upon them. He stood there as an excellent type of Christ, the risen One, who now appears before God as Representative of all God’s people, however faulty they may be.
In our need today, all we have to do is to mention His Name in the divine presence. We sometimes sing, “How sweet the Name of Jesus sounds in a believer’s ear.” We might also say with even more propriety, “How sweet the Name of Jesus sounds in God the Father’s ear.” The mention of His Name in a simplicity of faith is sufficient to draw forth every blessing that God has for us as a result of the work and worth of His Son.
The contrast between Exodus 17 and Numbers 20 is remarkable. At Rephidim, the elders were present and the rock was smitten by divine command; in Numbers 20, there is nothing about the elders, but the High Priest is noted and the smiting, in which Moses grievously erred, was quite out of place. God gave the water in spite of the people’s murmuring and of Moses’ failure. In Numbers 21, God sent the fiery serpents for chastisement (for the people’s evil must be judged); in Numbers 21, we are not told of any need on the part of the people, but simply that the people were “much discouraged by reason of the way.” It was simply that inbred evil manifested itself.
The consequences of Kadesh-barnea were very grievous–neither Moses nor Aaron could now be allowed to enter the land. God would not tolerate His people being addressed in anger as “ye rebels.” Moses seems to have quite forgotten God at this crisis: “Must we bring water out of the rock?” God graciously said long after, “They provoked his spirit so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips” (Ps. 106:33).
Moses and his brother were too eminent in the service of Jehovah for their fault to pass. The nearer we are to God, the more severely He deals with us for our evil. In Amos 3:2, we read, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for your iniquities.” So Moses and Aaron–with their sister before them (Num. 20:1)–must be buried on the eastern side of Jordan. We shall meet them again at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The infinite grace of God towards us all will then be fully displayed.