Here were the trials of the wilderness.--"What shall we eat?" and "What shall we drink?" The waters of Marah tested the heart of Israel and developed their murmuring spirit; but the Lord showed them that there was no bitterness which He could not sweeten with the provision of His own grace. "And the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet; there he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them." Beauteous figure this of Him who was, in infinite grace, cast into the bitter waters of death, in order that those waters might yield naught but sweetness to us forever! We can truly say, "The bitterness of death is past," and nothing remains for us but the eternal sweets of resurrection.
Verse 26 sets before us the momentous character of this first stage of God's redeemed in the wilderness. We are in great danger, at this point, of falling into a fretful, impatient, murmuring spirit. The only remedy for this is to keep the eye steadily fixed on Jesus--"looking unto Jesus." He, blessed be His name, ever unfolds Himself according to the need of His people; and they, instead of complaining of their circumstances, should only make their circumstances an occasion of drawing afresh upon Him. Thus it is that the wilderness ministers to our experience of what God is. It is a school, in which we learn His patient grace and ample resources. "Forty years suffered He their manners in the wilderness." (Acts xiii. 18.) The spiritual mind will ever own that it is worth having bitter waters for God to sweeten. "We glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope; and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us." (Rom. v. 3-5.)
However, the wilderness has its Elims as well as its Marahs,--its wells and palm trees, as well as its bitter waters. "And they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and threescore and ten palm trees; and they encamped there by the waters." (Ver. 27.) The Lord graciously and tenderly provides green spots in the desert for His journeying people; and though they are, at best, but oases, yet are they refreshing to the spirit and encouraging to the heart. The sojourn at Elim was eminently calculated to soothe the hearts of the people, and hush their murmurings. The grateful shade of its palm trees, and the refreshing of its wells, came in sweetly and seasonably after the trial of Marah, and significantly set forth, in our view, the precious virtues of that spiritual ministry which God provides for His people down here. "The twelve" and "the seventy" are numbers intimately associated with ministry.