Moses was in
a hard, implacable situation. There was no water and people needed drink. At desperation point God
told Moses to “speak to the rock.” Moses obeyed, and out gushed water. A
miracle.
Yesterday I
texted a friend, seeking support over a hard situation. Someone whom I care
about very much feels rejected in life (by life?) and, no matter how hard I try,
I cannot seem to ‘soften’ things with the balm of love.
(A note on the side. When I texted the word
‘rejected’, I noted that predictive text wrote ‘selected’. I had to press the
button to change it to ‘rejected’. How intriguing. But I digress.)
“Jane!” my
friend texted back. “I think this must be an occasion when you must speak to
the rock!”
Me: “????!”
Friend: “You can’t change the sense of rejection. It
stands, immoveable, like the rock. BUT I think this is an occasion to do as
Moses did. He had to SPEAK to the rock. Then water came from it.”
Our text
exchange ended but I had food for thought. Am I (are we) called to “Speak to the
rock”? It feels such a huge step, I would need more faith than I have. But
then, faith IS a gift, and Jesus told us that His Father likes to give it to
us; we only need to ask...
And then? Am
I to address this spirit of rejection? Do I tell the person that something good
– something much needed – will gush forth? … that the desperate craving for
love, the ‘water’ of life, will become satisfied?
It would be
worth a try. Anything is worth a try. But it ain’t half challenging to consider
speaking to a rock…
