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Numbers 20:1-13; Speak To The Rock
2026.05.10 Numbers 20:1-13; Speak To The Rock ;Audio available at: http://www.ephraimbible.org/Sermons/20260510_numbers-20_1-13.mp3
Number 20 begins a movement in the book of Numbers on a different trajectory. So far in Numbers things had looked promising, the people obedient, organized, following God’s leading, and they quickly spiral into failure, disobedience, rebellion. This chapter sounds a bleak note of death and disobedience, but the following chapters move us definitively back toward the promised land.
This chapter begins with the death of Miriam, in the middle is the death sentence on Moses and Aaron for their disobedience, and ends with Aaron’s death on the mountain and his son established as high priest in his place. We are going to take just the first half of this chapter today.
Miriam’s Death
Numbers 20:1 And the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came into the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh. And Miriam died there and was buried there.
Miriam, prophetess of Israel, Moses’ older sister who watched over him as an infant in the Nile, who led the women in song at the Red Sea deliverance, who with her brother Aaron criticized Moses’ leadership and was struck with leprosy, for whom Moses interceded and she was healed, now died and was buried. Unlike the latter part of this chapter where Moses and Aaron are condemned to die for their disobedience, nothing is spoken of her sin or guilt or shame. She simply died and was buried. Because of the rebellion of the people, the Exodus generation would fall in the wilderness, and we see in this chapter that even their flawed but faithful leaders would fall outside the promised land.
The people are on the march again, this time to the wilderness of Zin, camping at Kadesh. Although the year is not specified, this is the first month. In Exodus 12 the first month was established for them as the month of the Passover, the month of deliverance from slavery, to be commemorated every year. In Exodus 40 it was the first month of the second year when the tabernacle was erected. Numbers 9 picks up the story at the same point, the first month of the second year after leaving Egypt. According to the chronology in Numbers 33, we are leaping ahead to the first month of the fortieth year after leaving Egypt, as the last of those fighting men numbered at the beginning of this book were being laid to rest in the wilderness. The wages of sin is death.
The Complaint of No Water
Numbers 20:2 Now there was no water for the congregation. And they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. 3 And the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Would that we had perished when our brothers perished before the LORD! 4 Why have you brought the assembly of the LORD into this wilderness, that we should die here, both we and our cattle? 5 And why have you made us come up out of Egypt to bring us to this evil place? It is no place for grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, and there is no water to drink.”
If you’ve been with us through Numbers, this feels all too familiar. There’s a problem, an obstacle, circumstances are less than ideal, and the people default to grumbling, complaining, even preferring death to the circumstance they were currently facing. They accuse, blame their leaders for their problems.
The current problem is no water. That’s a serious problem, but this is not the first time they have faced problems with water. On leaving Egypt, there was too much water; they were trapped between the army of Pharaoh and the Red Sea, and the Lord parted the waters of the sea so they could walk across on dry land. Those same waters became the waters of judgment which closed over their pursuing enemies. In Exodus 17, at Rephidim there was no water, and the Lord split the rock and brought water from the rock for the people to drink (we will come back to this event in a bit). In Numbers 19 God provided the ashes of a red heifer to be mixed with living water to make the water that cleansed from the impurity of death. Here in Numbers 20, the problem was again no water, and now this next generation, like their fathers, were assembling together against their leaders to issue their complaint. But their complaint goes far beyond water.
They actually say that it would have been better for them to stand with the rebels of chapter 16 and fall under the wrath of God as fire came out from the Lord and consumed them. They would rather be swallowed by the earth and go down alive to Sheol than to endure a lack of the niceties of food and drink.
They attribute the Exodus to Moses and Aaron rather than to the Lord, and they view it as an evil plot to kill them rather than divine intervention to set them free. How often we reflect back on our slavery with fondness as if it were freedom, and complain about the true freedom the Lord has purchased for us!
They fail to take any responsibility for their current circumstances; they were in the wilderness because in chapter 13 they listened to the 10 spies who doubted the Lord’s promise to give them the land, and said that the opposition was just too big for them to conquer, rather than following the two who believed the Lord’s promises and said ‘let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it’ (Nu.13:30). They complain of no grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, the very things the spies brought back to demonstrate that the land the Lord promised to give them was an exceedingly good land, flowing with milk and honey. They were now in this ‘evil’ place because of their choice to reject the land God promised to give to them. They were following in the footsteps of their fathers.
A Word Of Grace
Numbers 20:6 Then Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the entrance of the tent of meeting and fell on their faces. And the glory of the LORD appeared to them, 7 and the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 8 “Take the staff, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water. So you shall bring water out of the rock for them and give drink to the congregation and their cattle.”
This too sound familiar. Moses and Aaron take the complaint of the people to the Lord and intercede for the people. The last time these two were on their faces before YHWH the plague had already broken out and Aaron rushed into the midst of the congregation to take his stand between the dead and the living to make atonement for them, because wrath from the Lord had already gone out. (Nu.16:44-49). But this time is different. There is no condemnation from the Lord, no rebuke of their sinful attitudes, no threat of judgment on the people. The glory of the Lord appeared, but this time with a gracious word. Assemble the congregation, take the staff, speak to the rock, and it will yield its water for all to drink and be satisfied.
I wonder if Moses and Aaron were a bit bewildered as they were on their faces before the Lord. No wrath breaking out, no fire, no plague, no judgment, no atonement to be made; just a word of grace, giving the rebellious people the good they don’t deserve.
The Rebellion of Moses and Aaron
Numbers 20:9 And Moses took the staff from before the LORD, as he commanded him. 10 Then Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock, and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?” 11 And Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock with his staff twice, and water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their livestock.
Moses took the staff from before the Lord. The only staff that we know was placed in the presence of the Lord is Aaron’s staff from chapter 17 that ‘had sprouted and put forth buds and produced blossoms, and it bore ripe almonds’, which was meant to ‘make to cease from me the grumblings of the people of Israel, which they grumble against you’ (Nu.17:5,8). Although we are not told, I doubt this fruitful staff withered in the presence of the Lord. Imagine this abundantly fruitful branch, which was ‘to be kept as a sign for the rebels’, being brought out by Moses and Aaron. This would have gotten the attention of the congregation. Moses was instructed to take the staff and speak to the rock. He took the staff, but he spoke to the rebels. And what he says is startling; ‘Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?’ Moses, who in the past had pleaded before God on behalf of the rebellious people, now berates the people, giving them a verbal lashing. And even worse, he and Aaron take credit for the promised miraculous provision of water with no reference to the Lord as the provider of every good thing. Then imagine Moses taking this fruitful staff, and smashing it into the rock, scattering a flurry of leaves and buds and blossoms and almonds flying in every direction.
It seems they didn’t know how to respond to God’s grace. The Lord had revealed his character to Moses:
Exodus 33:18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.
Exodus 34:5 The LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 6 The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, 7 keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” 8 And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped.
YHWH is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. He will be gracious to whom he will be gracious, and show mercy to whom he will show mercy, all the while upholding his absolute justice. What Moses and Aaron were more familiar with was God’s just and holy wrath breaking out in judgment, and their posture of seeking to appease his wrath through incense and intercession. But here it seems they felt the people needed to be rebuked, so they rebuked them, forgetting that even they were commanded in Leviticus 19
Leviticus 19:18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.
‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord’ (Dt.32:35; Rom. 12:19). It is not for you to take vengeance when I desire to show mercy.
Consequences for Unbelief
Numbers 20:12 And the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe in me, to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.” 13 These are the waters of Meribah, where the people of Israel quarreled with the LORD, and through them he showed himself holy.
There were consequences for unbelief, even for the appointed leaders of Israel. Even good leaders can fail. They failed to take God at his word, to believe what he said and to do exactly what he said. They failed to uphold him as holy in the eyes of the people. And the Lord will defend the honor of his holiness.
Strike The Rock
There’s some backstory to this account that we need to consider. Back in Exodus 17,
Exodus 17:1 All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” 3 But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” 4 So Moses cried to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 And the LORD said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the LORD by saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Forty years earlier, Moses had been commanded by the Lord to strike the rock to bring out rivers of living water. We also need to understand what the rock represented. In Psalm 78, which reflects on these events;
Psalm 78:15 He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep. 16 He made streams come out of the rock and caused waters to flow down like rivers. …20 He struck the rock so that water gushed out and streams overflowed. … … 35 They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God their redeemer.
God was their Rock; Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10 of Israel:
1 Corinthians 10:1 For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
The Lord said ‘I will sand before you there on the rock, and you shall strike the rock.’ The Lord was saying ‘I must be stricken to bring out rivers of living water’
Isaiah 50:6 I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.
Isaiah 53:4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
The smitten Rock was Christ. But the sacrifice of Jesus was once for all.
Hebrews 9:24 For Christ has entered… into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
The Rock has been struck. Now all who are thirsty need only come to him to drink, speak to him, ask of him, our abundantly fruitful great High Priest, and he is pleased to answer, overflowing with mercy and grace for sinners.
***
Pastor Rodney Zedicher ~ Ephraim Church of the Bible ~ www.ephraimbible.org
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By Rodney Zedicher2026.05.10 Numbers 20:1-13; Speak To The Rock ;Audio available at: http://www.ephraimbible.org/Sermons/20260510_numbers-20_1-13.mp3
Number 20 begins a movement in the book of Numbers on a different trajectory. So far in Numbers things had looked promising, the people obedient, organized, following God’s leading, and they quickly spiral into failure, disobedience, rebellion. This chapter sounds a bleak note of death and disobedience, but the following chapters move us definitively back toward the promised land.
This chapter begins with the death of Miriam, in the middle is the death sentence on Moses and Aaron for their disobedience, and ends with Aaron’s death on the mountain and his son established as high priest in his place. We are going to take just the first half of this chapter today.
Miriam’s Death
Numbers 20:1 And the people of Israel, the whole congregation, came into the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh. And Miriam died there and was buried there.
Miriam, prophetess of Israel, Moses’ older sister who watched over him as an infant in the Nile, who led the women in song at the Red Sea deliverance, who with her brother Aaron criticized Moses’ leadership and was struck with leprosy, for whom Moses interceded and she was healed, now died and was buried. Unlike the latter part of this chapter where Moses and Aaron are condemned to die for their disobedience, nothing is spoken of her sin or guilt or shame. She simply died and was buried. Because of the rebellion of the people, the Exodus generation would fall in the wilderness, and we see in this chapter that even their flawed but faithful leaders would fall outside the promised land.
The people are on the march again, this time to the wilderness of Zin, camping at Kadesh. Although the year is not specified, this is the first month. In Exodus 12 the first month was established for them as the month of the Passover, the month of deliverance from slavery, to be commemorated every year. In Exodus 40 it was the first month of the second year when the tabernacle was erected. Numbers 9 picks up the story at the same point, the first month of the second year after leaving Egypt. According to the chronology in Numbers 33, we are leaping ahead to the first month of the fortieth year after leaving Egypt, as the last of those fighting men numbered at the beginning of this book were being laid to rest in the wilderness. The wages of sin is death.
The Complaint of No Water
Numbers 20:2 Now there was no water for the congregation. And they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. 3 And the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Would that we had perished when our brothers perished before the LORD! 4 Why have you brought the assembly of the LORD into this wilderness, that we should die here, both we and our cattle? 5 And why have you made us come up out of Egypt to bring us to this evil place? It is no place for grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, and there is no water to drink.”
If you’ve been with us through Numbers, this feels all too familiar. There’s a problem, an obstacle, circumstances are less than ideal, and the people default to grumbling, complaining, even preferring death to the circumstance they were currently facing. They accuse, blame their leaders for their problems.
The current problem is no water. That’s a serious problem, but this is not the first time they have faced problems with water. On leaving Egypt, there was too much water; they were trapped between the army of Pharaoh and the Red Sea, and the Lord parted the waters of the sea so they could walk across on dry land. Those same waters became the waters of judgment which closed over their pursuing enemies. In Exodus 17, at Rephidim there was no water, and the Lord split the rock and brought water from the rock for the people to drink (we will come back to this event in a bit). In Numbers 19 God provided the ashes of a red heifer to be mixed with living water to make the water that cleansed from the impurity of death. Here in Numbers 20, the problem was again no water, and now this next generation, like their fathers, were assembling together against their leaders to issue their complaint. But their complaint goes far beyond water.
They actually say that it would have been better for them to stand with the rebels of chapter 16 and fall under the wrath of God as fire came out from the Lord and consumed them. They would rather be swallowed by the earth and go down alive to Sheol than to endure a lack of the niceties of food and drink.
They attribute the Exodus to Moses and Aaron rather than to the Lord, and they view it as an evil plot to kill them rather than divine intervention to set them free. How often we reflect back on our slavery with fondness as if it were freedom, and complain about the true freedom the Lord has purchased for us!
They fail to take any responsibility for their current circumstances; they were in the wilderness because in chapter 13 they listened to the 10 spies who doubted the Lord’s promise to give them the land, and said that the opposition was just too big for them to conquer, rather than following the two who believed the Lord’s promises and said ‘let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it’ (Nu.13:30). They complain of no grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, the very things the spies brought back to demonstrate that the land the Lord promised to give them was an exceedingly good land, flowing with milk and honey. They were now in this ‘evil’ place because of their choice to reject the land God promised to give to them. They were following in the footsteps of their fathers.
A Word Of Grace
Numbers 20:6 Then Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the entrance of the tent of meeting and fell on their faces. And the glory of the LORD appeared to them, 7 and the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 8 “Take the staff, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water. So you shall bring water out of the rock for them and give drink to the congregation and their cattle.”
This too sound familiar. Moses and Aaron take the complaint of the people to the Lord and intercede for the people. The last time these two were on their faces before YHWH the plague had already broken out and Aaron rushed into the midst of the congregation to take his stand between the dead and the living to make atonement for them, because wrath from the Lord had already gone out. (Nu.16:44-49). But this time is different. There is no condemnation from the Lord, no rebuke of their sinful attitudes, no threat of judgment on the people. The glory of the Lord appeared, but this time with a gracious word. Assemble the congregation, take the staff, speak to the rock, and it will yield its water for all to drink and be satisfied.
I wonder if Moses and Aaron were a bit bewildered as they were on their faces before the Lord. No wrath breaking out, no fire, no plague, no judgment, no atonement to be made; just a word of grace, giving the rebellious people the good they don’t deserve.
The Rebellion of Moses and Aaron
Numbers 20:9 And Moses took the staff from before the LORD, as he commanded him. 10 Then Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock, and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?” 11 And Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock with his staff twice, and water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their livestock.
Moses took the staff from before the Lord. The only staff that we know was placed in the presence of the Lord is Aaron’s staff from chapter 17 that ‘had sprouted and put forth buds and produced blossoms, and it bore ripe almonds’, which was meant to ‘make to cease from me the grumblings of the people of Israel, which they grumble against you’ (Nu.17:5,8). Although we are not told, I doubt this fruitful staff withered in the presence of the Lord. Imagine this abundantly fruitful branch, which was ‘to be kept as a sign for the rebels’, being brought out by Moses and Aaron. This would have gotten the attention of the congregation. Moses was instructed to take the staff and speak to the rock. He took the staff, but he spoke to the rebels. And what he says is startling; ‘Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?’ Moses, who in the past had pleaded before God on behalf of the rebellious people, now berates the people, giving them a verbal lashing. And even worse, he and Aaron take credit for the promised miraculous provision of water with no reference to the Lord as the provider of every good thing. Then imagine Moses taking this fruitful staff, and smashing it into the rock, scattering a flurry of leaves and buds and blossoms and almonds flying in every direction.
It seems they didn’t know how to respond to God’s grace. The Lord had revealed his character to Moses:
Exodus 33:18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.
Exodus 34:5 The LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 6 The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, 7 keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” 8 And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped.
YHWH is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. He will be gracious to whom he will be gracious, and show mercy to whom he will show mercy, all the while upholding his absolute justice. What Moses and Aaron were more familiar with was God’s just and holy wrath breaking out in judgment, and their posture of seeking to appease his wrath through incense and intercession. But here it seems they felt the people needed to be rebuked, so they rebuked them, forgetting that even they were commanded in Leviticus 19
Leviticus 19:18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.
‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord’ (Dt.32:35; Rom. 12:19). It is not for you to take vengeance when I desire to show mercy.
Consequences for Unbelief
Numbers 20:12 And the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe in me, to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.” 13 These are the waters of Meribah, where the people of Israel quarreled with the LORD, and through them he showed himself holy.
There were consequences for unbelief, even for the appointed leaders of Israel. Even good leaders can fail. They failed to take God at his word, to believe what he said and to do exactly what he said. They failed to uphold him as holy in the eyes of the people. And the Lord will defend the honor of his holiness.
Strike The Rock
There’s some backstory to this account that we need to consider. Back in Exodus 17,
Exodus 17:1 All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” 3 But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” 4 So Moses cried to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 And the LORD said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the LORD by saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Forty years earlier, Moses had been commanded by the Lord to strike the rock to bring out rivers of living water. We also need to understand what the rock represented. In Psalm 78, which reflects on these events;
Psalm 78:15 He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep. 16 He made streams come out of the rock and caused waters to flow down like rivers. …20 He struck the rock so that water gushed out and streams overflowed. … … 35 They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God their redeemer.
God was their Rock; Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10 of Israel:
1 Corinthians 10:1 For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
The Lord said ‘I will sand before you there on the rock, and you shall strike the rock.’ The Lord was saying ‘I must be stricken to bring out rivers of living water’
Isaiah 50:6 I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.
Isaiah 53:4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
The smitten Rock was Christ. But the sacrifice of Jesus was once for all.
Hebrews 9:24 For Christ has entered… into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
The Rock has been struck. Now all who are thirsty need only come to him to drink, speak to him, ask of him, our abundantly fruitful great High Priest, and he is pleased to answer, overflowing with mercy and grace for sinners.
***
Pastor Rodney Zedicher ~ Ephraim Church of the Bible ~ www.ephraimbible.org