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Recently, in a weekly Bible study, the group poured over this Exodus passage, and someone remarked, "I am impressed by how contemporary this sounds." The Exodus story? Contemporary? Generally we think of it as anything but contemporary! Near the dawn of recorded human history a band of primitive Middle Eastern Bedouins, having fled from Egypt, now makes its way on foot through the savage desert wilderness. The threat of death and disease from the ever present dangers lingers over them like a cloud; they have no sense of scientific certainty, no sense of geography; they are not even sure where they are going or why. Contemporary? Is your life like that? Is mine?

Backed up against the Red Sea and fearing for their lives, the Hebrews had complained bitterly to Moses about their safety - but they were rescued; later, worried over the long desert trek ahead of them and fearful that their provisions might not prove to be enough, they moaned and accused Moses again - yet they were fed by the manna; later yet, now fretting over their water supply, they accused Moses of trying to kill them by dehydration - and again they received the fulfillment of their needs; later yet, in a passage from Numbers 11, if you're interested in cataloging the complaints of the Israelites, you will find them even complaining over the menu because, it seems, their diet of manna and quail and water had become boring. When things were going badly or when things were going well, the one constant seemed to be their complaining.

Captains of ocean--going ships tell lots of interesting stories, but one I've heard which seems so appropriate to this Exodus account comes from cruise ship captains. Most unseasoned travelers will say they dread a storm at sea more than anything. But often, after seven glorious sunsets, seven days of shuffleboard on the lower deck, seven days of swimming in the pool on the upper deck, seven days of sumptuous feasts at every meal and often between meals, and seven nights of refreshments and beautiful music and dancing, some passenger is bound to turn to the captain at some point in the voyage and ask hopefully, "Do you think we'll have a storm?" Satisfaction with what we have received just doesn't seem to be part of the human capacity, does it? And that is as contemporary as the last time we complained about the limited choices on a restaurant menu.

The continual murmuring and complaining of the Hebrews in their desert wandering had only partly to do with real human needs. If we look at their murmuring against Moses concerning water, at first glance it sounds like a pretty legitimate complaint. "Hey, Moses! What are you thinking about? Didn't you know that people have been known to get thirsty in the desert? Did you choreograph this grand escape but forget to make plans for water for the thousands of us?"

On the surface of things, it sounds legitimate enough. Just ask any of the troops who stood on the sun--bleached sand of the Saudi Arabian desert whether they thought it was important for their commanders to have made plans concerning water supplies. If there were no such plans you can bet they would be complaining in voices just as loud and just as anxious as the ancient Israelites. So that is at least one way this story sounds contemporary. But there may be more.

I am struck especially in realizing that Moses found their complaint went far beyond a request for water. They said, "Give us water to drink," and he responded, saying, "Why do you find fault with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test?" Then he turned to God and said, "They are almost ready to stone me!" Now, what did he hear that I didn't hear? They are thirsty, they are anxious about it, they ask him to provide water since he seems to be in charge of this enterprise, but here is where Moses senses a danger quite apart from a physical need for water. It is a danger that has to do with perception, with attitude, with the deeper places in our souls which may surface as nothing more than complaining, but which reveal so much more about us. Moses knows better than anyone there that since he first set his eyes on the burning bush in the wilderness around Midian that he is definitely not in charge. When they find the accommodations to be less than they require, their conflict is not with Moses, it is with the author of this whole undertaking and that is God, and that is why Moses wants to know why they insist on putting God to the test, why in their request for water there lingers a doubt that in God's own way, provision has been made for them.

He was right on target. "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?" They have moved from requesting water to doubting their election by God, questioning the very nature of their salvation. Why did you bring us up, Moses? They are saying, in effect, there is no God, there is only Moses, and if we had to choose a king to rule us and give us food and water, we'd just as soon have Pharaoh who has much more experience with this sort of thing anyway.

Whining and complaining against a world where we have already pretty much decided to live as though God wasn't present anyway, where we are more or less left to our own devices, our own craftiness, where the very last thing we consider in making our daily decisions about which clothes to wear, what to shop for at the grocery store, what arrangements to make for the weekend, what car to buy, as though God had no interest or care concerning those day--to--day plans - yes, this sounds more and more contemporary to me all the time. These weren't stupid people who failed to see God's obvious presence among them. Rather, God's presence seemed anything but obvious to them, as often the presence of God is anything but obvious to us in the ordinary course of our days. When the passage closes with the naming of that watering place with the remembrance, "Is the Lord among us or not?" it could be the very contemporary cry of modern people. Honestly now, in what ways is it obvious to you and to me from day to day that God is an ever--present reality?

These people were in the midst of an identity crisis. The only thing that made them a people rather than a mob was their calling from God. Apart from that, they were likely just to become a mob, and act like one, as Moses' fear of being stoned makes evident. Any time they began to lose sight of the One who had called them to be his people, they simultaneously forgot who they were. It can happen to us. That is why so often churches cease being places where the gospel is preached and where the people strive to align their lives to that gospel, and instead become sort of shadow social service agencies or cozy fellowship clubs or fashion shows, anything but a called people who know whether the Lord is among them or not. Yes, this is sounding more contemporary to me all the time.

The Psalmist described God as "the rock of our salvation," and there is little doubt that this is the Bible story he had in mind, this story of water from a rock. But we so seldom live as though God were truly the rock of salvation - the very foundation on which our lives are built. More often we live by our wits and think of God as a bearded, distant, disinvolved old man from childhood stories we once knew.

Jesus called Peter, called all of the disciples, really, the rock on which his church would be built. Why? Because they were exceptionally daring or wily or crafty? Because they knew how to organize thousands, develop snappy new initiatives? No, rather because they had a glimmer of the source of their new life, the nature of the One who was prepared to save them from living as though their own craftiness was all there was in the world that they could rely on.

As individuals, or even as a group, apart from their confession of Jesus as Messiah, they would have no identity. The church is not created, formed, introduced by individuals on their own authority, initiative, insight. The leaders of the first or any church - this one included - are not called to be reliable anywhere nearly as much as we are called to be reliant, reliant on a power not our own, on a power which has called us to be God's special people, has set us apart, not made us more like the rest of the world, but different, distinct, a community of witness to the world, what Paul calls "a colony of heaven." The church is not the result of a free undertaking of people who have gathered together to decide which doctrines and confessions best suit our needs and seem most appropriate to us. Karl Barth - theological veteran of the World War II years in Europe - said we should have the right and the duty to appeal to the grace of God to be blessed outside of such a church, a church made by our own hands, our own wits.

The church - like the people of Israel - has nothing to do with human initiative, human insight, human empowerment, even self--generated human liberation, and everything to do with God's decision and act of self--revelation, whether at a watering rock at Horeb, or before Peter and the disciples in the form of Jesus of Nazareth. The decision, the initiative, as it turns out, is entirely God's.

Which is how it is with what we think and know of ourselves once we have made the heart--felt confession that Jesus is Lord. It is not even an act for which we can entirely make account in and of ourselves. Even our confession is part of God's graciousness. We know who we are, not because of self--esteem or self--motivation, but because God has declared in Christ for us just who and what we might become. We might become children of God.

The search for identity has been the cry of our age. Going out to find ourselves was the fascination of my generation, and to a large degree, still is. The result of such inward searches is often that we discover there is less of us than we had wished there would be. Reliance upon our individual resources is seldom a reliance upon something entirely dependable.

Not long ago, a friend of mine sat in a church staff meeting, and as he did, he realized he was gathered with incredibly gifted people the congregation had asked to come and help make their church into a witnessing community. And because theirs was a church full of incredible gifts and abilities and energy, naturally they had called staff members who mirrored a lot of what they were. It was an amazingly competent and able staff of people whose source of energy sometimes seemed boundless. They were so - well, reliable. And because they are a reliable group, folks that one can count on almost as surely as we can count on the sunrise, it occurred to him that perhaps even reliability can sometimes be an idol, can give us a false sense of self--sufficiency. And as he sought to find words for a prayer with the staff that day, it occurred to him to ask God to make them ever more reliant. With this group, reliable takes care of itself. Being reliant on the power that called us to be a people, that is the self--emptied style of living that often escapes us.

If we would build the kingdom, we must be reliant even more than we are reliable. We must be made to see every day who it is that calls and sustains us. In the end, an identity crisis for a people boils down to knowing whose we are more than who we are. We are children of God, servants of the God of Israel, who calls us to be his own. May God make us equal to that calling.