Exodus Chapter 17

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 Exo 17:1-2  Then all the congregation of the sons of Israel journeyed by stages from the wilderness of Sin, according to the command of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, and there was no water for the people to drink.  (2)  Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water that we may drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?”

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 1. Where did they expect Moses to get water from?

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 The problem with being in leadership is that much of the time you get too much credit and also too much blame. Moses clearly cannot provide water. God has led them into a situation where only by trusting in Him can they survive. They would not have made it through the Red Sea if he had not allowed it. So do they really believe that after leading them this far he would abandon them. Wouldn’t that be a waste? You see God is looking for faith, the kind of faith that Abraham had.

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 Gen 22:2-5 Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of

the mountains of which I shall tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him.⁴ Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.⁵ And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”

 How could he say “we”? God had told him to kill his son and burn him on the alter?

 But He also said ….

  Gen 17:19-22  But God said, “No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.  (20)  “As for Ishmael, I have heard you; behold, I will bless him, and will make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall become the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation.  (21)  “But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this season next year.”  (22)  When He finished talking with him, God went up from Abraham.

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 2. Have you ever been really thirty, thirsty to the point where it affects your judgment? How did it make you feel?

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 Desperate, complaining, unreasonable.

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 Exo 17:3  But the people thirsted there for water;

and they grumbled against Moses and said, “Why, now, have you brought us up from Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”

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 3. Why would God continue to put them in these difficult impossible situations?

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 He is trying to build their faith. “no pain, no gain”. This story of the deliverance of the Hebrews out of Egypt is a picture of our salvation, what we go through in our own Christian journey.  

 Mat 13:3-9  And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow;  (4)  and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up.  (5)  “Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil.  (6)  “But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.  (7)  “Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out.  (8)  “And others fell on the good soil and *yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.  (9)  “He who has ears, let him hear.”

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 Exo 17:4  So Moses cried out to the LORD, saying, “What shall I do to this people? A little more and they will stone me.”

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 4. Wouldn’t it be easier if Moses knew in advance what God was going to do?

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 Yeah it would, but God is not into easier, he is into building a kingdom of people based on trust.

 Trust  –noun  reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing; confidence.

 Believe and believe with trust.

Exo 17:5-6  Then the LORD said to Moses, “Pass before the people and take with you some of the elders of Israel; and take in your hand your staff with which you struck the Nile, and go.  (6)  “Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb; and you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.

 Water for possibly 2 million people and their animals. A minimum of 4 million gallons….. 12 Hearst Castle pools. 3.5 ft deep to 10 ft deep   104 ft long    avg width 75 ft.  345,000 gallons. How long would 2 gallons of water last you out in the desert.

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5. What lesson

should we take from the fact that God keeps telling Moses to use his staff to perform these miracles?

 We are to use what we have at our disposal.

 Exo 17:7-8  He named the place Massah and Meribah because of the quarrel of the sons of Israel, and because they tested the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us, or not?”  (8)  Then Amalek came and fought against Israel at Rephidim.

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 6. Who were the Amalekites ?

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 The Bible tells us that when the Israelites left Egypt, they were attacked from behind by Amalek and his people. The Amalekites attacked those who were lagging slowly behind the rest of the people: the elderly, the sick, and the weak. Instead of confronting the Israelite people in a traditional battle or war, Amalek ambushed them, as a terrorist would. The Amalekites were distinguished in the holy Scripture by two villainous characteristics: cruelty and cowardice. What makes the Amalekites particularly interesting is that these two characteristics are always glaringly present when an Amalekite is involved in any Biblical story. In every story in which an Amalekite is privileged to participate, the reader witnesses this extraordinarily evil people not only committing cruel acts, but at the same time committing those acts in an unashamedly cowardly manner. They were warriors, yes, but they were not noble warriors. They never fought a fair fight.

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In a tradition that encourages questioning and disagreement over text, there is only one way to read this story. The Amalekite people are the epitome of evil. They didn’t merely go to war with the Israelites. They slaughtered those who could not defend themselves. And therefore, God commanded the Israelites to wipe out the memory of Amalek.

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 7. What group of people would be modern day Amalekites?

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 Today we call them terrorists. They murder those who cannot defend themselves, unarmed civilians. (man caused disasters).

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 Exo 17:9-12  So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose men for us and go out, fight against Amalek. Tomorrow I will station myself on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”

  (10)  Joshua did as Moses told him, and fought against Amalek; and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.  (11)  So it came about when Moses held his hand up, that Israel prevailed, and when he let his hand down, Amalek prevailed.  (12)  But Moses’ hands were heavy. Then they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it; and Aaron and Hur supported his hands, one on one side and one on the other. Thus his hands were steady until the sun set.

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 8. We know Aaron was Moses older brother, but who was Hur?

 Hur was of the tribe of Judah. The most important descendant of Hur is his grandson Bezaleel, the master craftsman of the Tabernacle. Bezaleel’s father was Hur’s son Uri. (1_Chronicles 2:20 ) Hur had at least three other sons, and these men, or their descendants, were the founders of Kiriath-jearim, Bethlehem, and Beth-gader. (1_Chronicles 2:50-51 )

 Flavius Josephus stated that Miriam married Hur. The Bible does not corroborate this, but Miriam and Hur were almost the same age, so such a marriage would have been possible and reasonable. It would also have had a precedent, because Aaron married Elisheba, who was Hur’s first cousin once removed. So it is possible that Hur was Moses brother in law and Aarons cousin through marriage.

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 9. What was the significant about Aaron and Hur holding up Moses arms in order to win the battle?

 The staff Moses was holding was representative of the power of God. It was important for Joshua and the fighting men to see that god was still on their side. So much of ancient warfare was based on momentum. Spiritually whoever the leader is he needs the support of other believers.

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 Exo 17:13-16  So Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.  (14)  Then the LORD said to Moses, “Write this in a book as a memorial and recite it to Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”  (15)  Moses built an altar and named it The LORD is My Banner;  (16)  and he said, “The LORD has sworn; the LORD will have war against Amalek from generation to generation.”

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 10. Is it true that the Lord did war against the Amalekites from generation to generation.

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    Israel’s King Saul was sent by God on a mission to annihilate an Amalekite city in that promised land (1Sam.15). God would tolerate not one of this wretched race on His chosen soil. However, the timid King Saul bowed to the wishes of those in his army who wanted the Amalekite spoil for themselves, and, contrary to God’s clear command, he allowed the best of the sheep and cattle to be spared. God was so angered by this act of rebellion that He rejected Saul as king in Israel. There were other errors as well as this one which led to Saul’s rejection, but this singular failure to execute God’s great wrath on this people whom God despised was a terrible transgression, worthy of the severest punishment. As a trophy of war, Saul had also taken captive Agag, the king of the Amalekites, but the Almighty was not after trophies; He wanted peace for  His people. And He knew that so long as there remained one Amalekite alive, no humble and righteous person in Israel would be safe. Samuel the prophet arrived at Saul’s camp and obediently hacked “Agag to pieces before the Lord in Gilgal”, but immediately before doing so, Samuel reminded Agag that he had been (true to the cruel and cowardly nature of his breed) a murderer of innocent children. An “Agagite”, by the way, became a synonym for an Amalekite, the title being derived from the name of this and possibly other Amalekite kings.

        

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  ESVN………….ESV Study Bible Notes

·         MSBN…….MacArthur NASB Study Notes                     

·         NIVSN…..NIV Study Notes. 

·         JVM ……………..J Vernon McGee,

·         ACC ……………. Adam Clarke’s Commentary

·         BN ……………..Barnes Notes

·         WBC…………….   Wycliffe Bible Commentary

·         CN …… …………..Constables Notes 

·         IC………………….Ironside Commentary

·         NET……………….Net Bible Study Notes.

·         JFB…………..Jamieson  Fausset  Brown Commentary

·         VWS……………..Vincent Word Studies

·         CMM………….Commentary on Matthew and Mark

·         BDB………….. Barclay’s Daily Study Bible (NT)

·         Darby………..John Darby’s Synopsis of the OT and NT

·         Johnson………Johnson’s Notes on the New Testament.

·         NTCMM…………..The New Testament Commentary:  Matthew and Mark.

·         EHS………………….Expositions of the Holy Scriptures

·         CPP…………………The Complete Pulpit Commentary

·         SBC…………………Sermon Bible Commentary

·         K&D……………….Keil and Deilitzsch Commentary on the OT

·         EBC…………………Expositors Bible Commentary

·         CBSC……………….Cambridge Bible for Schools and College

·         GC……………………Guzik Commentary

·         RD……………………. Robert  Deffinbaugh

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