Jehovah Rapha The Lord Heals

Jehovah Shalom (Peace), Jehovah Nisi (Banner), Jehovah Rohi (Shepherd), Jehovah Shammah (The Lord is There), and today….

Exodus 13:19-27

The Hebrews.  God freed them miraculously.  10 plagues.  The last was the killer literally, the death angel killed the first-born son of every Egyptian household and Moses “let my people go” and finally Pharaoh did. Moses and about 1 million people move forward to the promise land, they have to go through the Red Sea, God parts it so much so that it is dry ground, and the people are moving forward….and so we dance and sing…

19 For when the horses of Pharaoh with his chariots and his horsemen went into the sea, the Lord brought back the waters of the sea upon them, but the people of Israel walked on dry ground in the midst of the sea. 20 Then Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women went out after her with tambourines and dancing. 21 And Miriam sang to them:

“Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously;

the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea.”

The Israelites were on a high, emotionally, spiritually, everything is clicking!!

Bitter Water Made Sweet

22 Then Moses made(because you can’t live on what God did 10 years ago, or a month ago!!  People will say that one time when God moved…and God would want us to say God is moving…and in order for that to happen God will make us move from Red Sea experiences too…)Israel set out from the Red Sea,and they went into the wilderness of Shur. They went three days in the wilderness and found no water.

That is so interesting, having come from water, now they have none.  The wilderness isn’t exactly an exciting place to be, but it was the only way they could get to where God is taking them.  The only way from Egypt to Canaan (a land flowing with milk and honey) was through wilderness. 

You remember that old song we are going on a Bear Hunt…this applies.

You can’t go under it!!  You can’t go around it!!  You can’t go over it!! 

YOU HAVE TO GO THROUGH IT!!

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23 When they came to Marah, they could not drink the water of Marah because it was bitter; therefore, it was named Marah. 24 And the people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?”

When the Israelites came to this bitter water they did what you and I would do: 

they grumbled against their leader Moses. 

Because that is what we do. 

We Complain. We grumble. 

Forgetting that the same God who parted the waters could surely do something with these waters.

He hadn’t led them outside of God’s will—an important point to note.  You could be in a dry land even while still being in God’s will. 

You could be in God’s will and not have a job or the job u want.  (get a job, no excuses now)

You could be in God’s will and not experience perfect physical health. 

You could be in God’s will and still run into a dry spell, just at the Israelites had done. 

God often uses these situations to administer a test.

God understands that the process is as important as the result. 

The question is what do you do with the bitter water? 

The bitter waters of Marah revealed the bitterness that lodged in the heartsof the Israelites. 

Notice that they grumbled against Moses.

The external obstacle revealed the internal realities of their hearts.  

Hebrews 12:15“See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness, springing up, causes trouble, and by it many be defiled”

Bitterness and bitter roots are all throughout the BIBLE.

Some of it may not even be your fault, this week I heard a story of young boy beaten and locked in a dark closet by his mother’s boyfriend.  NOT HIS FAULT. 

I saw kids getting bullied and near rioting at Oaklawn.  NOT EVERYONE’S FAULT. 

Divorce. 

Abandonment. 

Church Hurt. 

God Hurt.

Something has made you bitter.  Something had made the water at Marah bitter.

The question becomes, what have you become because of it? Israel became Grumblers!!

God used the water to teach the Israelites a lesson about His name…  the Israelites couldn’t drink the water because it was bitter, and the bitterness was an indication of something much worse.  The water had somehow become polluted, diseased, or bacterially infested.  It was undrinkable.

25 And he (Moses) cried to the Lord,

Notice that they grumbled against Moses while Moses cried out to Yahweh. 

Moses trusted Yahweh (with the bitterness) and cried the problem out to Yahweh. 

So, then there are two types of people in the room. 

Those who have allowed their bitterness to take root and grumble against others, repeat the same patterns, never to be healed, grumble, mumble, jumble, and their bitterness affects everything.

and those who like Moses cry out to God!!  AND WHEN YOU CRY OUT GOD SHOWS UP.

and the Lord showed him a log, (this may not be what he wanted to see)

Our English translations obscure this focus because of the difficulty in translating the verb for Yahweh “showing” or “directing” Moses to a tree/piece of wood.  The verb used actually means to instruct or teach. 

Yahweh instructed/taught Moses a tree. That does not make much sense, but it is important to note because this verb is the root verb of the word “Torah.” Torah means instruction/law that God gave Moses on Mount Sinai for how the Israelites were to live in covenant with the God who brought them up out of Egypt. 

We might say that Yahweh “torahed” Moses a tree.

and he threw it into the water, and the water became sweet.

How did the bitter water become sweet? 

The tree. The Torah. THE WORD. How does one become Yahweh-centered?  The answer is Torah, God’s instruction.  It’s kind of a circle.  By listening to Yahweh one become Yahweh-centered which in turn enables one to be a better listener which in turn increases one’s Yahweh-centeredness.

How did the bitter water become sweet?  Yahaweh, the giver of the tree.

How does one become Yahweh-centered?  The answer is Yahweh, the giver of the Torah.

When Moses cast this torah tree into the bitter water, the water became sweet. 

Torah is not for water, however, but for people.   

To get the Marah out you have to put the Torah in.

To get the Bitterness out you have to get the WORD in!!

There the Lordmade for them a statute and a rule, and there he tested them, 26 saying, “If you will diligently listen to the voice of the Lordyour God, and do that which is right in his eyes, and give ear to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you that I put on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, your healer.”

Jehovah Rapha --  The Lord Heals

Because it demonstrates that when you align yourself under God in order to live in light of His healing power, (say this while bulling bitterness out of the bucket with the word…)

Yahweh transforms the heart by means of Torah, Yahweh’s instruction/word for sweet living. 

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…” Jesus is our Torah, our transforming Word form Yahweh on and for life.  As we receive and follow Jesus, as we become Jesus-centered, we discover a healing transformation being worked within our hearts.

The Lord Heals your Disease.  Yes!

The Lord Heals your Emotions.  Yes!

The Lord Heals your Circumstances. Yes!

He can give you more than enough.

Exodus 15:27 says “Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve springsof water and seventy palm trees, and they encamped there by the water.”

Not the Red Sea.  Not the Bitter water of Marah.  Not one lake, But twelve springs!!

It is the internal journey form the bitter waters of Marah to the twelve spring of Elim, from barren desert to seventy palm trees.

So, we have gone form no water to bitter waterto purified waterto plenty of water. 

This is what happens when we allow Jehovah Rapha to HEAL!!

A spring isn’t just a pool of water.  Rather, it’s a continual flow of fresh and pure water.

When Marah (Bitterness) is removed from our hearts God can then show himself as healer!!

The message for us is clear:  Whatever the bitter obstacles that we encounter in life’s journey we can count on God to transform them, to use/redeem them for good, as God leads us to Elim. 

When we cry our Marah out to God, God is able to sweeten them, that is, to make them drinkable,to turn them into a resource for the next leg of the journey.