Author: Author | 3/19/2017 9:47:24 PM
Jehovah-Rophe
"The Lord our Healer"
(Exodus 15:22-26)
In this study, we will look at another occasion in the Old Testament where God gave a new name by which He may be known. It is important to keep in mind the importance and significance of these names. Our Lord Jesus Christ said that the very essence of eternal life is to know God: ...this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent (John 17:3). In fact, the shorter version of the Westminster Catechism says that the chief end of man is to know God and to enjoy Him forever.
When we first meet a person whom we want to get to know, what is the first question we ask? Well, of course, we ask, What is your name? A name can often tell us much about a person. This is even more true in the Bible and especially with regard to these names of God. God gave them to us with the specific purpose in mind of revealing Himself to us in order that we might come to know Him. It is an awesome privilege to come to know the most glorious being that exists anywhere, the Lord God Himself!
The Historical Occasion
Often, the significance of a name which God gives grows out of the historical occasion when it was given. On this particular occasion, God had just delivered Israel from its bondage in Egypt. Israel had just experienced another demonstration of the miraculous power of God in the parting of the Red Sea and the destruction of the armies of Pharaoh. After Israel celebrated and sang a song of victory, Moses had led Israel three days journey into the desert when they came to water at Marah. The people were thirsty, but the water was bitter and they could not drink it. They began to murmur against Moses.
When Moses cried out to the Lord, the Lord showed him a tree nearby which Moses took and threw into the water, and the water became sweet. Then we read in verse 26 that the Lord said: If you listen carefully to the voice of the LORD your God and do what is good in His eyes, if you pay attention to His commandments 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.
Those last words, ...I am the LORD who heals you, are, in the Hebrew language, Jehovah-Rophe. So here, in this historical context, God reveals Himself as the Great Physician, the Great Healer! There are some important lessons in what happened on this occasion and what the meaning of this name suggests.
Man's Need for Healing
In the first place, we need to think about mankind's need for healing. To begin with, think of the great need for the healing of the fleshly body. Think of all the sickness and disease from which people all around the world suffer. We suffer from heart disease, rheumatism, arthritis, blindness, cancer, diabetes, muscular sclerosis, etc., etc.
Think of all the hospitals, clinics, asylums, institutions, etc. Think of the tremendous cost and the happiness people have lost because of disease. And this includes all classes and races of people. Disease is no respecter of persons. Mankind desperately needs healing- a physician to heal the bodies of men and women.
Many of the diseases He healed were at least suggestive of the deeper, underlying "sickness" of the soul: demon possession suggests a life dominated, controlled and enslaved by sin; leprosy is suggestive of the over-all foulness of sin in our soul; blindness is suggestive of our spiritual blindness before we are saved (II Co. 4:4); paralysis suggests how we are rendered incapable of pleasing God by sin.
Also, the teaching of Marah is wonderfully fulfilled in Christ. There, they were taught the corruption of bitterness of waters that were once pure and natural. Only the tree of God's choice could purify and sweeten and sanctify. Peter tells us, in the New Testament, He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree... (I Peter 2:24). In a sense, God cast this tree into the bitter waters of this world to bring sweetness and healing.
When our Lord spoke to the woman at the well, He contrasted the water of this world with the water He had to give: ...Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life (John 4:13-14). Therefore, Jesus is both the water and the tree. He is the fulfillment of Isaiah 12:3, With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.
Conclusion
How appropriate to close this study with these words from Revelation 22:1-2 & 17: Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, ...And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. ... The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" And let him who hears say, "Come!" Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.