The providences of God were manifested to Moses through His dealings with him. This is one of God’s ways of making himself known to us. But our eyes must be open to the fact that it is God who deals with us in our conditions and circumstances of life—yes, it is God. We may say that it is Nature, that it is Law, that it is Force, but herein are we blind, for God says that “In this thou shalt know.” The doings of God are frequently through nature, sometimes above nature, as in the case of turning the water of the river into blood, but we are to be able to see that it is God’s hand that moves and God’s voice that speaks. If a man knows not God he will always attribute the doings of God in his life to some other cause or causes; but if he know God, he thus becomes better acquainted with God. So in the case of Moses, God’s promise was sufficient to allow him and the Jewish people to accomplish results which were replete with honor and glory. These pilgrims on their way to the Promised Land of Canaan were full of faith and confidence in God, they believed Him, they knew Him. He had promised them that He would bring them to this land that “Flowed with milk and honey” and nothing could turn Him from the fulfilment of this promise; no, not even the sins of His people. For did they not rebel against Him and sin most grievously against Him in the wilderness, and yet did He not bring them into Canaan?
“Behold I will smite the water of the river with the rod that is in mine hand and it shall be turned into blood.”
The church is the receptacle of truth. God has always committed His truth to His chosen people, to the believers, the church. The church is devoted and consecrated in word and action to the glory and the service of God. Through it He has caused the light to shine in darkness, His love to fall into our hearts, the light of His knowledge and glory has appeared in the face of Jesus Christ, His Son, who is the great Head of the Church. God appeared to Moses through Jehovah, the Head of the Church, and it was upon the strong arm of Jehovah that Moses leaned and it is upon the same strong arm that we, the church in this day, also lean. Moses saw the fire in the Burning Bush and he heard the voice out of the Bush. He turned and saw that the Bush was burning, but that it was not consumed. My brethren, do you know that this Burning Bush of the desert is a type of the church? It is the church passing through the fiery trials of this world, the church burning on every hand with temptations, troubles, doubts, distresses, tribulations, sufferings, and yet she is not consumed. So Moses was taught at the very beginning of his ministry that God was in the church through the mediation of Jesus Christ and that things were made to work together for good to her. Thou, the Church, shall know that I am the Lord. Lofty cedars, towering oaks, bramble bushes, the national capital, the House of the Lord, all these may attract the multitudes of sight-seers, but God’s own people shall know that He is God and that there is no other God.
The text also teaches us that.
II. God is prompt in the keeping of His promises.
Wherever two or three of God’s servants are gathered together in His name, God is in the midst of them to do all that He has promised. He is prompt to keep His word. He rides upon the wings of the wind and upon the wings of angels and upon the lightning, that He may meet all His engagements. We see Him in the return of His prodigals. We see Him every where, keeping faith, doing His will, fulfilling His promises. He is the omnipresent God! Because of His promptness His people are always able to confide in Him.
God is prompt in sustaining the physical needs of the universe. It is worth our while to look into God’s storehouse to see how He has filled it with food for the flying fowl, the fish of the sea, the beast of the field, and man, the Lord of the earth. Food and fuel, light and heat, air and water, soil and seed, wind and rain, snow and frost, these are the agents of His prompt action as the Father of the Universe. Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord, and see if I will not open the windows of heaven and pour you out such a blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it. (Mal. 11:1-11.)
God is as prompt in sustaining the needs of man’s soul. He was with our forefathers, He was with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He was with Noah, He was with Enoch, He was with Abel, He was with our first parents, Adam and Eve, all these in their experiences and lives attested the fact that God saved them and saved them at the right time. He gave them His own salvation and not the salvation of another. All the Saints of the ages have depended on God’s promptness to do what he promised He would do. There is not an instance in the history of His people or in our own experience, if we interpret His dealing aright, where He has not promptly kept His word of promise. Every child of God has his spiritual battles to fight. But depending on God with the musket of His grace he will rout the enemy. Satan in all his hellish rage is not able to overthrow the bulwarks of the church behind which the believer stands to destroy the forces of evil. God was prompt in striking the sea and His people were prompt in crossing. He was prompt in leading His armies and they were prompt in winning the victories. Jehovah is prompt in aiding His own and His own are quick in winning the land of spiritual freedom.
The river was turned into blood and all the waters of Egypt were instantly changed into blood. But God’s river is a river of the water of life. Consider, my brethren, these great types of the Bible—these rivers of blood, these rivers of water, these rivers of life! God stands with His rod stretched over every river; your sins, your wickedness, may turn the waters of life into the blood of death; which, what, shall it be? God says to you and hear ye His voice, “Come now let us reason together, your sins though they be as scarlet, I will make them like snow, though they be red like crimson, I will make them like wool.” None, my friends, but God can work these changes. The church is moving on with the march of the centuries. She is grandly marching on! Moses has gone, Joshua has gone, the prophets have gone, the apostles have gone, the saints of the Christian era have gone, and we are passing on, but God is with us and He is prompt in keeping His word.
“On the other side of Jordan, in the sweet fields of Eden,
Where the Tree of Life is blooming, there is rest for you.”