"Old Warehouse" by Travis Wise via Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

Bible Illumination: ‘Strike the rock’

Photo: “Old Warehouse” by Travis Wise via Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
Cropped & lettered by Kyle Oliver for prayr.cc (CC BY 2.0)

"Old Warehouse" by Travis Wise via Flickr (CC BY 2.0) - Strike the rock

The LORD said to Moses, “Walk on before the people, and take the elders of Israel with you, and take the rod in your hand with which you struck the Nile, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb. You shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.”

Curator’s note: I had already finished the image before I remembered that this was from last week’s scripture readings. Sorry about that!

Exodus 17:1-7

World English Bible, Public Domain

1 All the congregation of the children of Israel traveled from the wilderness of Sin, starting according to the LORD’s commandment, and encamped in Rephidim; but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink.”

Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?”

The people were thirsty for water there; so the people murmured against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us, our children, and our livestock with thirst?”
4 Moses cried to the LORD, saying, “What shall I do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”

5 The LORD said to Moses, “Walk on before the people, and take the elders of Israel with you, and take the rod in your hand with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb. You shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 He called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because the children of Israel quarreled, and because they tested the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us, or not?”