Healing Truth: I Am The Lord Who Heals You
Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea, and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they travelled in the desert without finding water. 23 When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. That is why the place is called Marah. 24 So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What are we to drink?” 25 Then Moses cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became fit to drink. There the Lord issued a ruling and instruction for them and put them to the test. 26 He said, “If you listen carefully to the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you.” Exodus 15:22-26 ESV
The Children of Israel had been in Egypt for four hundred years. The memory of God’s covenant with Abraham had faded. God wanted to reacquaint them with Himself and with their covenant.
On their journey, they came across the waters of Marah, which were ‘bitter’ or brackish- a mix of fresh and saltwater. Brackish water is found where water from saltwater lakes or seas meets and mixes with water from freshwater streams. Saltwater cannot be drunk, it will make you sick. Freshwater can be drunk; it will give you life.
The brackish water was a metaphor of what was in their hearts. On the one hand, they were glad God had redeemed them out of Egypt, but on the other, they missed the security of being able to work for their keep. After four hundred years of slavery, works had become deeply embedded in their psyche. As a result, they began to grumble and complain.
If they were to continue along that route, they would end up no better than their Egyptian rulers- stricken with disease and strife. As Christians, we’re not to mix the Law with Grace, or faith with self-righteousness, or we to will end up back in the same situations we were in before we were saved.
God did not want them drinking from brackish water with a bitter heart. So, He showed Moses a log. Actually, it was probably a small tree because it’s the same word on the Hebrew. This was no ordinary tree. This tree turned the salty water into fresh drinking water.
In this context, the Bible is using trees to refer to the sacrifice that Jesus made for us on the Cross. In Galatians, Paul writes:
For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14 so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith. Galatians 3:10-14 ESV
After turning sickly brackish water into life-giving freshwater, God revealed one of His redemptive names to the Children of Israel. He said, “I Am the Lord your God, who heals you” - I AM JEHOVAH RAPHA.
The Children of Israel had no right to be healed. God, The Lord Who Heals looked forward the Cross, where Christ himself would bear our infirmities and carry our diseases (Isaiah 53:4, Matthew 8:17), and applied the grace of Jesus Christ to their situation.
If we have received the forgiveness that was given freely to us when Christ hung on the Cross, then He is our Healer. He will be to us Jehovah Rapha; The Lord Who Heals Us.
