March 16/Third Thursday of Lent
“Harden not your hearts as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah in the desert,
Where your fathers tempted me; they tested me though they had seen my works.” ~ Ps 95.8-9
So what actually happened at Meribah (in Hebrew, “quarrel”) and in the day of Massah (in Hebrew, “test”) in the desert, that warrants remembering in today’s psalm? How exactly did the Israelites test God in the wilderness? Narrated in Exodus 17, this is a classic story of kindness and ingratitude – Israel’s ingratitude then, mirrored by ours today. After God had led the Hebrews out of enslavement in Egypt to freedom, after he had bestowed bounteous gifts of quails and manna to the famished wanderers, you might think that he would have established his credibility as protector of his people. You would be wrong. No sooner had they set up their next encampment when they started harassing their leader, Moses, because they were thirsty. The complaints escalated to the point that Moses feared violence, and cried out to the LORD, ‘What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” At which point God came through yet again, this time striking water from the rock at Horeb. Throughout our lives we have amassed ample evidence of God’s past goodness – the friends and the families we cherish, the work we enjoy, the communities we are a part of, the beauty we glimpse around us – but life’s events don’t always seem like blessings. And when things don’t go our way, we gravitate immediately towards aggrievement and complaint, and shut God out from our hardened hearts. Are we, like the Israelites, “fair-weather” believers, praising the Lord when he gives, second-guessing him when he takes away? Our challenge, for Lent and beyond, is to keep our hearts open, trusting that God, as Paul wrote to the Ephesians (3.20), “by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.”
Lord God Almighty, Rock of our deliverance, Soften our hard hearts, and grant us infinite trust in your goodness. Amen.
To hear the Morgan State University Choir sing “We’ll Understand It Better By and By,” click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmC2nUUV1j0
For today’s readings, click here: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/031623.cfm
