CLARENCE SANTEE by CLARENCE SANTEE

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 29, 1913

CLARENCE SANTEE

By CLARENCE SANTEE

From Egypt to Canaan

CLARENCE SANTEE

Perhaps the greatest trial of faith that can come to a human being is to be brought face to face with hunger and thirst, with no visible means of satisfying either.

When encamped at Rephidim, waiting for the pillar of cloud to move, there being no water in that place and that which they had carried with them being all spent, the children of Israel did what others have done, and sought the men whom God had led, determined that they should bring relief or be put to death. Ex. 17: 3, 4. Thus ever has Satan led his subjects to vainly believe that to silence the voice of God's ministers who have faithfully warned them of the results of their wicked course, would bring relief. It was so when Samaria was besieged by the Syrians, while the prophet of God, Elisha, was one of the sufferers from the famine in the city. They said, Kill Elisha. 2 Kings 6:26-31. It was so when Jeremiah earnestly pleaded with Zedekiah to obey the Lord. The counselors said, Put Jeremiah to death. Jer. 38: 4, 5. So it will be when the final warning has been given to this world. "It will be determined to strike in one night a decisive blow, which shall utterly silence the voice of dissent and reproof. . . . In every quarter companies of armed men, urged on by hosts of evil angels, are preparing for the work of death."—"Great Controversy," page 635.

But now, as then, God will deliver his tried ones who have trusted in him. The message they gave was not theirs, but God's. They had simply followed the guiding pillar, not being responsible for where it led, knowing that it led toward Canaan. But for this, the wrath of the enemy must concentrate upon the visible representative, because it could not reach the God who sent them.

Moses sought the Lord for the relief so sorely needed by the short-sighted people who had followed him from Egypt's darkness. The Lord commanded him to take of the elders of Israel, and go before the people to the rock in Horeb. He was to smite the rock with his rod, but God must give the water. "Moses smote the rock, but it was Christ who stood by him and caused the water to flow from the flinty rock."—"Spirit of Prophecy," Vol. I, page 228. See also 1 Cor. 10:4.

Moses' weary heart was refreshed as he stood once more at the feet of that rock in Horeb where many times he had rested his sheep. Ex. 3:1. It had been to him, indeed, "the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." Isa. 32:2.

What a lifetime of experience had been his since he heard the call of God to deliver Israel. It was here that he had received the promise from God when called to return to Egypt: "When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain." Ex. 3:12. Wonderful events had taken place in that short time. If, when pleading in that place with God to send some other man, the meek shepherd of Midian had known all that he was to pass through before again reaching that mountain, he would no doubt have still refused, to his rejection of God and his own ruin. But seeing and walking but a day at a time, he had learned lessons of divine power, resource, and love, that were fitting him to become a messenger to bear words of encouragement to the Son of God when in his time of temptation and trial. Luke 9:30, 31.

Even so today; we can see but a step, but by taking that step another is revealed, and again power is given. Is it not all we need? God never calls upon any person to take more than one step at a time. Then, weary, care-burdened soul, trust God and take another step. It is all you need now. The last one—though but one—will carry you across the threshold of the great pearly gate, and inside of the city of God.

As Moses smote that time-remembered rock, in the shadow of which he had rested from the heat, the waters flowed out, not a feeble, trickling stream, but a mighty fountain. "He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers." Ps. 78:16.

O that Israel had now learned the lesson of faith! They had been delivered from the bitterest servitude. Their lives had been preserved from the armies of Egypt; they had been fed with the "corn of heaven" (Ps. 78:24), water had been given from the flinty rock. Could they not now trust their all—wives, children, cattle, goods—with God?

They had barely camped when Satan made another attempt to thwart the plan of God by their destruction. He instigated Amalek to gather their armies, hoping to blot out the posterity of Jacob from the earth. The old hatred of Esau was in their hearts, they being his descendants. Gen. 36:12.

Amalek began by seizing those who had lagged behind. God here taught a lesson through Moses that should never be forgotten. While Moses, with the shepherd's rod pointed toward heaven, prayed, Joshua and the men of Israel fought. The prayers and the doing continued until the close of day, and the enemy was defeated. Ex. 17:9-13. God has prepared no place in which to lay off the armor until the day is gone. Prayer and faithful battling will be sure to win. To dispense with either, will leave the other weak and profitless. "Divine strength is to be combined with human effort." As a result of that day's battle, it is said: "Nor was any one of the Hebrews slain, but the slain of the enemy's army were too many to be enumerated."—"Antiquities," book 3, chap. 2, sec. 5.

Again many hundreds of years after, Amalek made another, a supreme, attempt to blot Israel out in the days of Esther, but was himself destroyed from under heaven. (See the book of Esther. Haman was an Agagite. Agag was king of the Amalekites. 1 Sam. 15:8.) Because they, as the descendants of Esau,

"had a perpetual hatred" (Eze. 35: 5), the Lord had said, "I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven." Ex. 17: 14.

While encamped before Sinai, Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, came to meet him, bringing his daughter, Moses' wife, with her sons. Moses' wife and children had been sent back to the quiet of Jethro's home while those stirring events, the trials in Egypt and on the way, were taking place.

Loma Linda, Cal.