_(c)_ That ultimate future should be the great object of our hope. Surely it is chiefly in order that we may have the light of that great to-morrow brightening and magnifying our dusty to-days, that we are endowed with the faculty of looking forward and 'calling things that are not as though they were.' So we should engage and enlarge our minds with it. II. The form which that ultimate future assumes. The Israelites thought of Canaan, and in particular of 'Zion,' its centre-point. _(a)_ Perpetual rest. 'Bring in and plant'--a contrast to the desert nomad life. _(b)_ Perpetual safety. 'The sanctuary which Thy hands have established,' _i.e._ made firm. _(c)_ Perpetual dwelling in God. 'Thy dwelling,' 'Thy mountain,' '_Thy_ holy habitation' (ver. 13), rather than '_our_ land.' For Israel their communion with Jehovah was perfected on Zion by the Temple and the sacrifices, including the revelation of (priestly) national service. _(d)_ Perpetual purity. 'Thy sanctuary.' 'Without' holiness 'no man shall see the Lord.' MARAH 'And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were bitter: therefore the name of it was called Marah. 24. And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink? 25. And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet....'--EXODUS xv. 23-25. I. The time of reaching Marah--just after the Red Sea. The Israelites were encamped for a few days on the shore to shake themselves together, and then at this, their very first station, they began to experience the privations which were to be their lot for forty years. Their course was like that of a ship that is in the stormy Channel as soon as it leaves the shelter of the pier at Dover, not like that of one that glides down the Thames for miles. After great moments and high triumphs in life comes Marah. Marah was just before Elim--the alternation, how blessed! The shade of palms and cool water of the wells, one for each tribe and one for each 'elder.' So we have alternations in life and experience. II. The wrong and the right ways of taking the bitter experience. The people grumbled: Moses cried to the Lord. The quick forgetfulness of deliverances. The true use of speech is not complaint, but prayer. III. The power that changes bitter to sweet. The manner of the miracle is singular. God hides Himself behind Moses, and His miraculous power behind the material agent. Perhaps the manner of the miracle was intended to suggest a parallel with the first plague. There the rod made the Nile water undrinkable. There is a characteristic economy in the miraculous, and outward things are used, as Christ used the pool and the saliva and the touch, to help the weak faith of the deaf and dumb man.