Chico Alliance Church
Pastor David Welch
"Sweetening Bitter Water” Exodus 15:22-27
REVIEW
The story of God's relationship with Israel graphically illustrates the reality of God's relationship with us. Therefore a study of their experience can bring deeper insight concerning our relationship with God. Numerous parallels may be drawn all along the way.
The fact that God chose them on the basis of something in Him and not something in them...
the fact that God made an everlasting covenant through blood sacrifice...
the loving cultivation of faith at every turn...
the reaffirmation of His loyal love generation after generation...
it was that love that allowed them to suffer the ravages of life in a fallen world in order that they might realize the riches of life through faith in the God who lovingly chose them.
From the time of Abraham, the father of Israel, up to Joseph this developing people of God experienced delayed answers to prayer, severe family dysfunction, broken relationships, wayward family members, sibling rivalry and jealousy, threatened financial ruin and famine, the emotional trauma of losing a son to a wild animal, and just before the time of Moses, 400 years of excruciating bondage and slave labor under a tyrannical regime. In the midst of all this trauma, they also experienced God’s continual blessing and guidance as He prepared them to claim the promise He made Abraham; a promise of land, multiplication and blessing. For the most part, a vital personal connection with God was limited to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. Each of these experienced a significant encounter with God. Then, beginning with Moses, God drew a whole nation to experience the wonder of faith in him and the resulting salvation. That is the story we have been following recorded by Moses in the book of Exodus.
It is important to remember, their journey is our journey. The lessons they learned are lessons we must learn as we develop our relationship with God. The life experiences they encountered, we will also encounter as we struggle to understand the spiritual and material, the known in the unknown, the eternal and the temporal.
I. God Provided Deliverance from Egypt 1-15
The first lesson to learn in the very early stages of one’s spiritual pilgrimage is that we serve a God who delivers from the captivity of the enemy and keeps His promises.
• We must learn just how horrible servitude to the enemy can be. (Bounty to bondage)
• We learn that God can use any one who is willing to trust Him; in spite of past failures or present insecurities. (Preparation of the deliverer)
• We must learn that God is more powerful than the combined power of the enemy who seeks to control us. (Plagues)
Greater is He that is in you (and over you) than he that is in the world (seeking to control you).
• We must learn that only through blood sacrifice can we be saved from judgment. (Passover)
• We must learn that God allows difficult situations along our journey to demonstrate His glory and direct our growth. (Red Sea)
• The must resist reacting to difficult situations as if God were mad at us.
He is not mad at us; He is lovingly molding us in order that we might inherit the promise.
• We must break the downward spiral created by unbelief.
Unbelief in the person and promise of God enables panic.
Panic cultivates pity.
Pity generates passivity.
Passivity fosters perverted thinking.
Perverted thinking intensifies unbelief which repeats the cycle downward again.
Only genuine trust, faith, belief can break the cycle at any stage. Israel will spend their whole journey trying to learn what it really means to trust in God in spite of the difficulties along the way. Some will never get it and will die wandering in the wilderness without ever realizing God's promised to rest.
• We must learn that God is able and anxious not only to deliver us from the opposition but to disable the opposition and also enable us to address whatever obstacles stand in the way of our progress toward the promised rest.
Last week we joined the Israelites on the banks of the Red Sea celebrating the eradication of the imposing opposition and the miraculous neutralization of the impossible obstacle. We now enter the section of Exodus recounting God’s preparation to develop their faith. The last part of chapter 15 on through chapter 18 will recount how God prepared for the development of their trust. I'm sure there are numerous events that happened along the way that were not recorded by Moses. God directed Moses to record these particular events found in Exodus for a reason. It is our job to discover how those particular events relate to our walk with God and the development of our faith. We cannot to develop faith in a vacuum apart from life. We cannot learn to trust God until there is indication that forces us to trust God and realize his work in our life or resist God and try to make life work on our own.
I. God Provided Deliverance from Egypt 1-15
II. God prepared for the Development of trust 15-18
A. Bitter water (no joy) made sweet by the “tree” (The Cross) 15:22-27
1. The people encountered Bitter water 15:22-23
Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur; and they went three days in the wilderness and found no water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter; therefore it was named Marah.
Moses directed them to “break camp”. Life is made up of wonderful experiences and woeful experiences. We have a tendency to stay too long at the wonderful and skip too quickly from the woeful. Our purpose in this life must not be comfort but character. We must not pursue entertainment but seek enlightenment. If we live for comfort we will stagnate. It is amazing just how much time and resources we spend trying to rebuild Eden here.
We cannot elongate ecstasy. All good will come to an end. Stirring praise must give way to steady perseverance. God leads us from times of refreshment to times of renewing; from a wonderland to a wilderness. Only in the wilderness do we develop faith. The wilderness exposes our self-centered nature and unbelieving heart. We will only grow as we confront our focus on ourselves. The children of Israel were three days out and most likely, the provisions of water that they brought with them had been completely consumed. There was no water in sight.
It was hot. They were thirsty and most likely cranky. Thirst is a most powerful drive. Thirst is the body's reaction to the absence of what it needs to sustain physical life. The spirit of every Christian requires certain things to sustain spiritual life. When those things are absent, a thirst surfaces in the spirit and cries out in the soul. Too often, we try to quench that thirst not with the things the soul desperately needs to sustain spiritual life but with things that cannot sustain spiritual life and actually damage the soul.
We assume that our intense thirst is due to lack of comfort.
We think that if only things were better I would feel better. Life would be better.
If all my relationships just worked...
if my health were great...
if life were the way I think it should be...
if there were no tragedies to endure...
if there were no mysteries to unravel...
then I wouldn't feel thirsty.
I am thirsty because life is so bitter.
We are not only missing what is necessary for spiritual life, but what looks like it should satisfy turns out to be bitter water. We don't have to look very far to find an application to this passage.
Life is bitter. It sounds very cynical but in reality turns out to be highly biblical. We must never forget that we live in a fallen world racked by century after century of ungodly choices reaping painful consequences. The rebellious choices of he father continue down family lines with increasing intensity. No one has to convince us that life certainly disseminates its share of bitter experiences. The only time that life worked was Eden before the fall. Since the fall, God has been unfolding His plan to restore life to its pre-fall state; to reboot the whole system infected by the deadly virus of sin. Our problem is that we spend so much energy trying to restore Eden on our terms we miss all the opportunities to know God along the way. We either expect God to prevent bitter water or purify it on demand. We forget that it is the bitter experiences of life, the tragedies that trample our hearts, and the events that shatter our dreams that can drive us to realize that nothing can quench that aching thirst except God.
Maturity comes through misery.
Tribulation teaches trust.
Problems promote perseverance which leads to renewed hope and realize love.
Once again, the Israelites chose to ignore the promise of God. He did not miraculously deliver them from the Egyptians to let them die of thirst in the wilderness. They are in route to inherit the promise. Three days after their glorious celebration of God's power and promise their song of celebration turns to a dirge of complaint. While they should have exercised confident trust in the God who had so miraculously provided thus far in their journey, they responded with unbelieving grumbling and self-focus which became a pattern which ultimately resulted in their disqualification to enter God's rest.
2. The people expressed Bitter hearts 15:24
So the people grumbled at Moses, saying, "What shall we drink?"
The heart that focuses only on the present and loses sight of the ultimate person and promise of God cannot glory but grumbles in tribulation. God was about to teach them a very significant principle. Without a consistent focus on the person and promise of God, the bitter experiences of life become even bitterer and eventually breed a bitter heart. Facing bitter water can either make us bitter or better. We will either choose the obedience that blesses or the obstinacy that embitters.
3. Moses interceded 25a
Then he cried out to the LORD,
4. God intervened 25b
There He made for them a statute and regulation, and there He tested them, and the LORD showed him a tree; and he threw it into the waters, and the waters became sweet.
5. God instructed them 26
And He said, "If you will give earnest heed to the voice of the LORD your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I, the LORD, am your healer."
They had learned that God was their ruler. They had learned that God was a covenant keeping God. They had learned that God was a warrior. Now God taught them that he was their healer.
Healer of a bitter life.
Healer of a bitter heart.
APPLICATION
When we choose to submit to the authority of God in our life we will find healing. When we choose to glory in tribulation rather gripe and grumble we will neutralize all ground for bitterness. Bitterness is the result of unfulfilled expectations. We expect people to act in a certain way and when they don't we can either forgive or become bitter. We have certain expectations of God and when he doesn’t come through we can surrender to His agenda or develop bitterness against Him and continue to follow our own agenda. Jacob spent his life conniving and scheming and trying to make life work. He encountered bitter pool after bitter pool and was no closer to the promise than before. It was not until his encounter with God that crippled him for the rest of his life did he surrender to God’s agenda.
Such a life caused him to tell Pharaoh,"The years of my sojourning are one hundred and thirty; few and unpleasant (bitter) have been the years of my life, nor have they attained the years that my fathers lived during the days of their sojourning." Gen 47:9
What can sweeten the bitter water we all encounter throughout life’s journey?
What can heal the bitter heart and uproot the poisonous root that defiles many?
Jesus intercedes continually so that God will cause us to see the “tree” that sweets bitter water.
Only the cross of Christ can enable us to endure the bitter waters of life. Only the cross can heal the bitter heart. As illogical as it would be to try to purify bitter water with bitter wood, the bitter cross became God’s means to sweeten life.
At the foot of the cross we die to our own agenda. At the foot of the cross we surrender to God’s plan for our life. At the cross we embrace the suffering that will continually purge selfishness and drive us to find our life in God alone. At the cross we relinquish all our expectations for comfort, health, glory and consider all thins as garbage compared to the surpassing value of knowing Christ; the fellowship of His sufferings and the power of His resurrection. In death we find life.
Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself (his own agenda), and take up his cross(suffering and discomfort) and follow Me (obedience, surrender).
"For whoever wishes to save his life (or try to make life work) will lose it; but whoever loses his life (relinquishes control)for My sake will find it.
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? Matthew 16:24-27
When we embrace the cross we find life.
But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Galatians 6:14
The cross of Christ is basis for both spiritual and physical healing.
First prophesied by Isaiah.
But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. Isaiah 53:5
Applied by Matthew regarding both physical healing and deliverance from demonic influence.
When evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed; and He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were ill. This was to fulfill what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet: "HE HIMSELF TOOK OUR INFIRMITIES AND CARRIED AWAY OUR DISEASES." Matthew 8:16-17
Applied by Peter regarding spiritual healing.
and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed. For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls. 1 Peter 2:24-25
Until we surrender our will at the foot of the cross life will be bitter. Until we bring our agenda, our dreams, our comfort, our children, our circumstances, our plans, our future, our very life to the foot of the cross and give God EVERTHING, our heart will eventually become bitter against both God and people. We will resent God for making life so bitter. We will resent people for making us uncomfortable and not satisfying our excruciating thirst.
• The surrendered heart rejoices at tribulation because it chooses to envision the glorious product rather than resent the gritty process.
• The surrendered heart will not blame or complain or argue with God because the all-knowing all-powerful God is at work.
• The surrendered heart forgives the offenses of others knowing how much God has forgiven us and my worth or well-being is not dependant on anyone but Christ.
A complaining tongue exposes a bitter self-focused heart. Even though they murmured against Moses, it was actually God they resented for not supplying what they thought they needed. They lost sight of the person and promise of God in the face of problems. Rather than trust God they tested Him. Rather than rest in Him they resented Him. We experience salvation when we believe that Jesus died for our sins on the cross. We experience healing when we embrace the cross and die to our own agenda.
6. God refreshed them 27
Then they came to Elim where there were twelve springs of water and seventy date palms, and they camped there beside the waters.
God does not always send testing our way. In His abundant mercy and grace He often leads us to a place of refreshing where He supplies the water that satisfies our thirsty soul. This stage of the journey is a reminder of the fact the God is our good shepherd who leads us beside the still waters.
The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul; He guides me in the paths of righteousness For His name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; My cup overflows. Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life, And I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever. Psalms 23:1-6
We must, however, listen to His direction and go where He tells us. If we have not surrendered our heart, we will not follow His lead. We will not see how the bitter tree can sweeten the bitter water. We will not even see the tree. We will not experience His refreshment when we insist on satisfying our thirst on our own terms.
"Be appalled, O heavens, at this, and shudder, be very desolate," declares the LORD.
"For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, The fountain of living waters, To hew for themselves cisterns, Broken cisterns That can hold no water. Jeremiah 2:12-13
"Why do you spend money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, And delight yourself in abundance. Isaiah 55:2
