223 THE WATERS OF MERIBAH. TIME passed on-the people had to fulfil all the appointed days of their wanderings: they returned once more into the desert of Zin, and there Miriam died and was buried. Again the lack of water troubled the people, and again they complained against Moses and Aaron, as helplessly and hopelessly as if they had never had any wants supplied by special miracle of GOD. The LORD answered Moses' cry for help, saying, "Take the rod, and gather thou the assembly together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their eyes; and it shall give forth water, and thou shalt bring forth to them water out of the rock, so thou shalt give the congregation and their beasts drink." Moses took the rod, and gathered the congrégation together before the rock, and he said to them, "Hear now, ye rebels, must we fetch you water out of this rock ?" And being vexed very greatly with the people, Moses lifted up his hand, and smote the rock twice, and the water came out abundantly, so that the congregation and all their beasts had plenty to drink. Then the LORD rebuked Moses and Aaron, and told them that because they had not believed His word, or obeyed Him to sanctify Him before the people, therefore they should not bring the people into the Land of Promise. It seemed a severe punishment for what we should be tempted to call a passing act of impetuosity and want of faith; but God had told Moses that He was a jealous GOD, and would be wholly and entirely obeyed. We are apt to speak lightly of a hasty spirit and temper, but see what it cost Moses, though his anger was in God's cause. Almighty God saw fit to mark that hasty temper, that provoked spirit," that "speaking unadvisedly with his lips," that want of patient faith, with so great a punishment. It seems as if their fault was chiefly that, letting themselves be carried away by the anger of the moment, they forgot the peculiar Presence and authority of the LORD, and so led them to speak as if it was their work that brought water from the rock, and as if they, not the LORD, were affronted and injured by the people's wilfulness. That hastiness caused some irreverence-some forgetfulness of GOD-and for this hasty speech, they lost the Land of Promise. Do we never peril our Promised Land by hasty, unholy words? Moses pleaded for forgiveness, saying, "O LORD GOD, Thou hast begun to show Thy servant Thy greatness, and Thy mighty Hand: for what God is there in heaven or in earth, that can do according to Thy works, and according to Thy might? I pray Thee, let me go over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain, and Lebanon." But the LORD answered, "Let it suffice thee, speak no more unto Me of this matter-get thee up into the top of Pisgah, and lift up thine eyes westward, and northward, and southward, and eastward, and behold it with thine eyes; for thou shalt not go over this Jordan." Soon after this, when the people were come into the land of Edom, the LORD called Moses, and said, "Aaron shall be gathered unto his people, for he shall not enter into the land which I have given unto the children of Israel, because ye rebelled against My word at the water of Meribah. Take Aaron and Eleazar his son, and bring them up unto Mount Hor, and strip Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Eleazar his son; and Aaron shall be gathered unto his people, and shall die there." That must have been a solemn ascent unto Q Mount Hor, those three servants of GOD going up with the knowledge that when two of them returned to their earthly labours, the third, their father and brother, would have entered into his rest, no more to see the glory of the LORD through a cloud only, but face to face. But all of them were accustomed to think only of God's will, and to obey that in calm, unquestioning faith: and so though we read that the children of Israel mourned thirty days when they knew that Aaron was dead; we are not told in Holy Scripture that Moses and Eleazar mourned or sorrowed over him who was departing from them for a season. Moses did as the LORD commanded, he took Aaron's priestly robes off him, and put them upon Eleazar his son, and then the LORD took Aaron out of the weary strife of this world's wilderness, and Moses and Eleazar came down again together, and returned to their labours, remembering that "their time was in His Hand," and ready to "wait all the days of their appointed time, until their change too should come." Perhaps it was at this time that Moses breathed his heart's prayer in the ninetieth Psalm, which has always been attributed in the Church to him. "A thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday, seeing that is past as a watch in the night. "As soon as Thou scatterest them they are even as a sleep; and fade away suddenly like the grass. "In the morning it is green and groweth up: but in the evening it is cut down, dried up and withered. "For we consume away in Thy displeasure; and are afraid at Thy wrathful indignation. "Thou hast set our misdeeds before Thee: and our secret sins in the light of Thy Countenance. "For when Thou art angry all our days are gone: we bring our years to an end, even as a tale that is told. . . . "O teach us to remember our days; that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. : Turn Thee again, O LORD, at the last and be gracious unto Thy servants. "Comfort us again now after the time that Thou hast plagued us: and for the years wherein we have suffered adversity. "Show Thy servants Thy work and their children Thy glory. "And the glorious Majesty of the LORD our |