CALVARY BAPTIST CHURCH
Rev. Fred
Weimert September 28, 2008
Life on the Other Side
The Hebrew
Bible reading for today
is a story from the book of Exodus.
A story which tells of
the Israelites
thirsting in the wilderness.
We
look back at this story
and say to ourselves…
“Don’t
worry
God
will fix everything.”
To
us these appear to be comforting words…
We
all know how the story ends…
God
brings water from the rock…
So
don’t worry everything’s
gonna
be ok.”
Of course if
you were an Israelite in those days…
who
had spent your entire life in
Somewhere
near the
Somewhere
where even a slave
could find water to drink…
You
might be getting kind of worried.
The only Israelite
we
can be sure, from these stories…
who
had ever been outside of
and
into this trans
This
wilderness
Sinai
or
Sin, Zin
or
of
or
whatever…
The
only person among those who wandered back then…
who
had ever been
to this God forsaken place before…
was
this Moses, fellow…
who
apparently
had fled across this wilderness…
from
which
is on
the far side of the
40
years earlier…
and
he had apparently
come
back across this wilderness
a
few years ago…
to
lead
out
of slavery…
out
of
and
to a land of promise…
It
all seemed crazy, now,
but
he performed those powerful signs…
we
thought he was a deliverer…
but
maybe he was demented.
Maybe
this was just an Egyptian plot
to
have this past Pharaoh pretender
come
back and lead
us
rebellious slaves…
out
into the wilderness…
and
just let us die there.
He would be finishing
the murdering work
of
the male children…
indeed
of all the children of
which
the midwives prevented
all those years ago.
When you are in the wilderness
with nothing to drink
thoughts
like this may well flash through your mind.
As you watch the children and the
aged
showing evermore serious
signs of dehydration
you begin to
trust no one.
Moses
came from this wilderness…
he
had to know there was no water here,
or
where the water was here.
I
wonder if all those plagues
that he said happened…
I
wonder if they really happened at all.
They
didn’t happen to us.
They
didn’t happen where we slaves lived…
We
could have been tricked
by the Egyptian rumor mill.
Exodus
17: 1-7
From
the wilderness of Sin
the
whole congregation of the Israelites
journeyed by stages,
as the LORD commanded.
They camped at Rephidim,
but there was no water for the people
to drink.
The people quarreled with Moses,
and said,
"Give us water to drink."
Moses said to them,
"Why do you quarrel with me?
Why do you test the LORD?"
But the people thirsted there for
water;
and the people complained against Moses
and said,
"Why did you bring us out of
to kill us
and our children
and livestock
with thirst?"
So
Moses cried out to the LORD,
"What
shall I do with this people?
They are almost ready to stone
me."
The
LORD said to Moses,
"Go
on ahead of the people,
and take some of the elders of
take in your hand the staff with which
you struck the
and
go.
I
will be standing there in front of you on the rock at Horeb.
Strike the rock,
and water will come out of it,
so that the people may drink."
Moses
did so,
in
the sight of the elders of
He
called the place Massah and Meribah,
because
the Israelites quarreled and tested the LORD,
saying,
"Is the LORD among us or
not?"
Here
ends the reading.
The issues
in this story
are trust and leadership…
We assume that the fire
and cloudy pillar
had lead
the
bread and the quail were there
but
where was the water.
One
of the worst things that you can do
when
you are getting dehydrated
is
eat.
The
digestion only speeds up the dehydration…
Getting
water matters most.
At times
like this it is only natural to question…
“Where is God?
and ‘”Are
these leaders, we have, really from God.
Thank God
we aren’t in the wilderness…
or are we?
Have you read the papers
lately…
Have you seen the news
on TV?
the stuff
about this financial market meltdown…
Or
are you just ignoring it,
hoping
it will all go away.
In the September 29th,
2008 issue of Time magazine
Serwer and
Sloan wrote
“If you’re having a little trouble
coping with what seems to be the complete unraveling of the world’s financial
system, you needn’t feel bad about yourself.
It’s horribly confusing, not to say terrifying, even people like us,
with a combined 65 years of writing about business, have never seen anything
like what’s going on now.” pg.
32
In
Thursday’s Sun
Mirabella
and Hopkins wrote:
“’We’re basically in a free fall,’
said David M. Fick, a managing director of Stifel Nicolaus &Co.. in
If you
don’t think we are in the wilderness
then I could read to you for the
next day or two…
just a few of the
thousands of articles
which are all saying we are in the
wilderness
and
there isn’t any water here…
Ron Smith,
not my favorite,
wrote an editorial on Wednesday
“Trusting those who got us into this mess to
get us out”
In essence he said,
“no way.”
there
is no way we should trust
those
who got us into this mess
to
get us out…
And
while Ron Smith appears to want to go back
to
the gold standard,
Which
doesn’t surprise me,
I
would agree with his basic conclusion in the article
no
one really knows how to get out of this mess…
Oh,
our leaders will try…
they
have to…
we
have no hope without them…
certainly
the talk radio people
aren’t going to get us unstuck.
but
there is no simple fool proof solution.
So we are
stuck in the wilderness
as were the children of
and like
them we have questions about the leadership…
we
are ready to stone them…
because
they appear to have caused this insoluble mess.
But Moses
had the staff
which was used to split
the sea…
and with it
he is able to strike the rock
from
which the water flowed.
This magic rod doesn’t
mean that water
had not
been,
will not
continue to be, an issue for
We
saw similar complaints and deliverance
three
chapters earlier… (Ex. 15:22ff)
when
there was only bitter water.
And
we will see the same scene
at the end of
at
Kadesh.
Just
before they entered the Promised Land.
That story is in the book of Numbers
(20).
Water had to be a constant problem
for
It remains the same
today…
In
In the wilderness there is always
need for water,
but in the wilderness God is also
present.
It is the same for us today.
In the
wilderness we find ourselves in.
We don’t have the rod of Moses to
deliver us…
and water isn’t really
our most pressing issue.
Our issue is
the sustenance we need for life.
I feel these problems may well
trouble our nation
and the world…
for many
years to come.
And even if someone is able to
deliver us
with the stroke of a
staff…
or wand.
This wilderness may be wide,
and we can’t go back…
but God is with us in
the midst of it…
and
therefore we are not to fear,
or to act as
if we are alone…
or
as if or action or inaction will matter little.
As it was in the Gospel story
(Mt. 21: 23-32)
so it is
today…
what
we do will matter.
How we
deport ourselves in the wilderness
matters
to God…
We
said we would serve God
back
when we were delivered
through the waters of baptism.
And
just as Jesus prayed in
that
this cup might pass him by…
there
are cups
we would like not
to have to drink or suffer.
But ours is to serve God
no matter what…
no
matter where
no
matter when.
We
are to seek to be Christ’s presence
in
this world…
providing
shelter
and
sustenance
in
Jesus’ name
to
neighbors in need.
As we wait
on God’s deliverance
may
we not faint or grow weary. Amen.