Exodus 17:16

REFLECTIONS

Reader! while you and I pause over the relation of Israel's unaccountable conduct, and from the part we bear in this wonderful history, feeling the same sources of unbelief, disobedience and murmuring, in ourselves, as we behold in them, which are the sad consequences of a fallen nature; may we seek grace to avoid their sin, that we may not come under their reproaches. But as we have authority to conclude that all these things happened unto them for our example, may a gracious God afford us these improvements from them, lest while we think we stand we are found to fall.

But above all other improvements from the perusal of this chapter, oh! let me leave everything to contemplate the view it gives me of the Lord Jesus Christ. In the smitten rock, may my soul lose sight of everything but Jesus. May my eye gaze with wonder and delight on what I there discover, until the ever-flowing, over-flowing stream fills my ravished heart. Dearest and ever-blessed Jesus! do thou both supply me now, and follow me through the whole of this wilderness state, as thou didst the church of old; making glad the city of our God in all ages. May I behold thee as the stone smitten by the rod of Moses, answering all the demands of God's righteous laws for me, and flowing both in atoning and regenerating supplies for all the wants of my soul. And oh! do thou, who alone canst smite the rocky heart of sinners, and convert the flinty stone into a fountain of waters, subdue all the stubbornness of my nature. Conquer and subdue in me and for me all the Amalekites of my salvation. Work in me both to will and to do of thy good pleasure, until grace comes to be consummated in glory, and my poor faculties are all brought into a state suited to the everlasting employment, of singing praises to God and the Lamb.