Living in the Western Desert, one becomes acutely aware of one thing: that water is life.
Because of this, you are always thinking of how you can get it if you need it.
In town that is not a problem since the water supply is reliable but if one was to run out of water in the desert it could be quite a problem.
I was aware of all the usual sources: the creeks that flow sometimes, the springs that occur when the ground dips below the level of the water table, the possibility of digging down to water table in low-lying areas and even the old trick of using plastic bags to collect water from green plants.
But one thing I've never come across before was what are called ‘rock-holes’.
A rock-hole is a rock in the ground, the top of which is at the same level as the ground surface, but which has a cleft in it which is usually long, narrow and rather deep and which serves to collect and store rainwater.
It is kind of a natural water tank.
There are at least two of them within 10 kilometers of Kintore, where I am living.
In the book of Exodus we read of a time when the Israelites had left Egypt and were wandering around the desert.
They were complaining to Moses that they had no water so Moses asked God what he should do.
God told him that he should take them to a certain rock on a mountain called Horeb.
Moses was instructed to strike the rock with his staff and water would come from it to meet the needs of the people.
Not quite the same as the water from the rock here in the Western desert but it reminded me of this account all the same.
The Israelites had been grumbling at Moses because they did not have the faith that God would provide for them and had become fearful that they would perish in the desert.
pharaoh.
With this act, God would prove to them both his power and his willingness to care for their needs, despite their lack of faith.
The apostle Paul, writing to the church at Corinth, said, “They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.”
Paul is here connecting the miraculous provision of water from the rock in the Old Testament and the spiritual nourishment now provided by Christ.
When we give our lives to Jesus, He frees us from sin by giving to us the gift of forgiveness and eternal life which He secured at that very first Easter, when He was so brutally crucified on the cross at Calvery.
We today have the same choice that the Israelites had some 3400 years ago: either a life of trusting in God, or one of slavery to sin.
In Saudi Arabia today, the split rock of Horeb is still there near Jebel al Lawz.
It is a tall rock with a split down the middle, with abundant evidence of massive past water activity in the immediate surrounds, exactly as one might expect.
– DAVID YOUNG