A Preacher Who Does Not Believe God

Numbers 20:10-11 (KJV)
And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said unto them, Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock?
And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock twice: and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also.

John Gill writes of this account, “that Moses and Aaron committed an evil which was displeasing to the Lord is certain, but what that was is variously represented. Some say their sin was, that the order was to speak to the rock, whereas it was smitten, and not spoken to; but why then was Moses bid to take the rod with him, if it was not to smite with it, as he had done before at Horeb? and besides, this would only have been the sin of Moses, and not of Aaron; others think, that what provoked the Lord was, that the Israelites were called "rebels"; but this is a name the Lord himself gave them, and was what they justly deserved; and what after this Moses says of them, which, had this been the case, he would have been careful to have abstained from, Deuteronomy 9:24. Others are of opinion, that what was displeasing to the Lord was, that the bringing the water out of the rock was ascribed to themselves, and not to him; "must we fetch you water", &c. Others suppose the sin was in smiting the rock twice, and in anger; but this could only be the fault of Moses at most. Dr. Lightfoot thinks the particular fault was this, that Moses expressed his displeasure and resentment to the Israelites, that on their murmuring a new rock was opening, which portended a new and long stay in the wilderness, as the opening of the first rock at Horeb did when he and Aaron were in expectation of being soon out of the wilderness, and now they feared they were beginning anew their abode in it; but it is certain from the text that unbelief was their sin; they were diffident about the will of God to bring water out of the rock for such a rebellious people, and they did not put them in mind of the miracles God had wrought in former time, to encourage their faith; and so the Lord was not sanctified by them before the people, as he ought to have been:”

I have heard it preached that it was the anger of Moses that disqualified his entry into the Promised Land. If Moses grew angry the Bible does not say so here. If it was a case of anger, then it must have been anger in both Moses and Aaron, unlikely that both would have equally lost their temper. It could not have been smiting the rock that God was angered with because Aaron had no part in that.

The passage says exactly what disqualified the two of them:
They did not believe God and
They did not sanctify God in the eyes of the people

They took the responsibility to provide for the children of Israel upon themselves. They did not trust that God would give the water, but that they somehow had to do it. They failed to point the eyes of Israel toward the Lord.

How easy it is to fall into this same pattern. People depend upon others, their parents, their doctors, their counselors, their pastors. Sometimes we get so used to them depending upon us that we forget to point them instead toward heaven.

I suggest that when a preacher begins to see himself as the answer for his congregation, it is time for God[1]to replace him.

[1]I said God, not the congregation. God will do this in His good time.

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Numbers 20:10-11 (KJV) A Preacher Who Does Not Believe God

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