Did You ever Miss God's Best?

 

Friday, January 8, 2016

“When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter” (Exodus 15:23).

Hey gang, One of my favorite lessons that I shared with the boys, as chaplain at the Village, was based on this passage of Scripture.    I would give them a piece of paper with ten boxes side by side.  The first one, large and beautiful, represented all the money they could possibly spend.  The second represented all the places you ever dreamed that you would like to visit.  And the third, all of the things in this world that you have always wanted that could now be yours. 

Each one contained one of those things that makes our mouth water with lust of the eyes, when we think about them.  But there was one last box.  It was ugly to the eyes and seemed totally out of place.  It had no title attached to it.  And there was always one of the troops that asked the question, “Mr. H. what is in that little ugly box on the end.

I would then tell them contained within that box was a book titled The Lamb’s Book of Life and an invitation to The Marriage Feast of the Lamb.  I used an illustration of the first car that I was able to buy.  I loved that car.  When a speck of dust landed on it I immediately washed it off.  Weekly it received a cleaning inside and out and barely a month went by when I did not put yet another coat of wax on it. 

I loved that car.  But one day I noticed a small area of rust, just under the driver’s side door.  An area that soon began to expand and other areas began to surface as well.  And then one day when driving down the road I lost power.  The fuel pump had breathed its last. This was followed with tire and other mechanical problems.  And then one day my beautiful car breathed its last and was dragged to the nearest graveyard.

When I read the story of the Exodus I wondered why God directed Moses to take the southern route through the Sinai.  The Northern route was much, much shorter and there were freshwater wells along that route.   The southern route had no such wells.

Scripture tells us they were three days into the desert and were coming to the end of their water supply.  Why did God send them down that path? Was there a little green box attached to that decision?

We have since learned that the crystal clear waters of Marah contain calcium, and magnesium which forms into dolomite, a muscle relaxing drug used by long distance runners to prevent cramping in hot weather. It is also taken by heart patients to keep the heart from going into fibrillation.

The Bedouins have a saying, “One drop on the tongue, and you go for three days.”  If you drink the water for a day or two, the purgative actions stops and your body adjust and you can drink the water.

 So ,was Marah God’s best for the traveling troopers from Egypt?  Keep mind they were mud stompers; they made mud into bricks.  The water came from the Nile which was infested with parasites and amoeba that penetrate the blood stream, zapping the carriers of energy and stamina and the root of many diseases.  If they would have drunk the water of Marah and kept drinking it, the purgative action would have cleaned their bodies of all unwanted guest.

We read that many died of their diseases.  Does that make God’s promise not valid?  Not so!  It does point out the conditional nature of God’s promises.  Paul, in Galatians 3:13 wrote, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law having become a curse for us - for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”.    

 Blessings, Gramps