Honey from the Rock

Honey is an interesting subject.  A natural food, bees gather nectar from flowers and make sweet honey encased in a wax honeycomb.  Someday I would love to take up beekeeping as a hobby!  If packaged properly in the right conditions, pure honey has an incredibly long shelf life.  Proverbs 24:13-14 reads, "My son, eat thou honey, because it is good; and the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste: ¹⁴ So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul: when thou hast found it, then there shall be a reward, and thy expectation shall not be cut off."  Honey is good, and it is good for you.  It is a natural source of energy and some even have dubbed it "The Perfect Food."  Whether it is perfect or not I do not know, but one point on which all people agree is that good honey is sweet!

God promised to bring His people out of the land of bondage in Egypt and into the Promised Land, a land "flowing with milk and honey."  It was a land of fatness and sweetness.  It was a place of prosperity, freedom, and victory.  In a similar way, Jesus Christ through the Gospel brings sinners from death to life by grace through faith.  It is a life of freedom, victory, and sweetness.  Just because the Israelites were brought into Canaan, it did not mean the battles were over.  In fact, there were many new battles to be fought with nations long entrenched in the land.  When we are born again and become Christians through faith in Jesus, we have battles to fight against the habits and desires of our flesh, the sway of this world, and Satan.  It is only through God that we can be victorious in these battles.

Sometimes we can be so caught up in fighting, putting on the whole armour of God, resisting the devil, and being sober and vigilant, that we forget that the life of a Christian is not limited to the field of battle.  Perhaps there are some soldiers who can fight day and night for years without respite, but they are as elusive in reality as Bigfoot or the Loch Ness monster.  Even Jesus was ministered to by angels after 40 days of fasting and satanic assault.  God made our bodies to need sleep, and Jesus knows that we need rest for our souls.  Let us never remove our spiritual armour, continuing to walk in the Spirit.  Let us keep the Sword of the Spirit - God's Word - at the ready.  But let us not neglect our need for nourishment and physical and spiritual vitality which comes from resting in Christ and meditating on His Word.  If we will fight on effectively, times of rest and recovery are vital.

This Sunday at Calvary Chapel Sydney we spoke about the time in 1 Samuel 14 when God used Jonathan and his armour bearer to smite a Philistine garrison.  After the battle, Jonathan and some of the victorious men ventured into a forest where they saw honey dripping.  Because King Saul had placed a curse on anyone who ate before evening, no one ate any of that honey.  They were faint and famished but they feared the consequence should they indulge in just a taste of the sweet honey which dripped to the ground.  Jonathan, having been attacking the Philistines all day, was not aware of the oath of the king.  He gathered up a bit of honeycomb with the rod in his hand and tasted it.  His eyes instantly lit up and he felt refreshed.  How good that honey tasted!

God had promised His people a land flowing with milk and honey, yet the people were afraid to eat of the honey because of their king's foolish oath.  There is a class of Christian today who heavily emphasises the fact we are in a spiritual battle and must be able to endure hardness as a good soldier of Christ.  Everything is a battle, everything is a bitter fight, and they feel everyone is against them.  Weary and tired, even after being concussed from a thrown lower millstone which glanced off their head, they try to grimly continue on alone.  Monks of old would buffet their bodies with whipping and fasting, thinking their cold cells and hard beds were the means of gaining spiritual vitality.  Please do not misunderstand:  there is a place for denying the flesh through fasting.  It is certainly true we are in the midst of a spiritual battle of epic proportions:  open war is upon us!  But let us not think that a miserable life is the most holy one.  There will always be a fight, even as there will always be needs in the world.  All Christians can be weary and wounded.  In Christ we are to labour with our hands faithfully, but there is sweetness and rest in our Saviour.

Honey is an interesting study in scripture.  After God freed His people from slavery in Egypt, He caused bread to fall from heaven called "manna."  Exodus 16:31 says the taste of manna was like wafers made with honey.  Jesus later compared Himself to manna:  the Israelites ate the food of heaven and prolonged their lives on earth, and He was the "Living Bread" come down from heaven (John 6:30-37).  All who partake of Christ through faith will live forever!  There is sweetness in Christ.  Deuteronomy 32:4 says of God, "He is the Rock, His work is perfect; for all His ways are justice, a God of truth and without injustice; righteous and upright is He."  And what do God's people draw from this Rock?  Deuteronomy 32:13 says, "He made him ride in the heights of the earth, that he might eat the produce of the fields; He made him draw honey from the rock, and oil from the flinty rock..."  From Christ, the Rock of our Salvation, flows Living Water to satisfy our thirst, honey to give us energy and enlighten our eyes, and oil to keep our lamp shining bright.  Our God has indeed provided everything for life and godliness - even sweetness.

God could have provided us a lifetime of spiritual gruel, grey and flavourless.  Instead He has provided great sweetness through Christ and the Word.  Ezekiel 3:3 tells of when the prophet was told to eat the scroll which contained God's words:  "And He said to me, "Son of man, feed your belly, and fill your stomach with this scroll that I give you." So I ate, and it was in my mouth like honey in sweetness."  What sweetness we have in God's promises towards us!  Is your life one of bitterness of sweetness?  When the children of Israel came to the waters of Marah, they could not drink of those waters because they were bitter.  They complained with the LORD:  three days without drinkable water was just too much!  Exodus 15:25 reads, "So he cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a tree. When he cast it into the waters, the waters were made sweet..."  Jesus drank the bitter cup of God's wrath when He was crucified on the tree on Calvary so we can partake of His sweetness.  Instead of bitter herbs and wormwood we can draw sweet honey from the Rock.  Have you tasted and seen that the LORD is good?  Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!