Numbers 20:12 English Standard Version (ESV) And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe in me, to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.”

We will see this again, we have seen it in our generations. Leaders for various reasons disobey God’s command and lose their position and influence over flock. Sad but true and it just means they are human. Perhaps it is hard to be humble when so many people trust you and depend on you to lead them. I say you in the generic sense because I am not a leader. My readers may not be leaders now but God has plans for all of us.

Learn the lessons of past leaders and why they went astray. Moses struck the rock twice when told to speak to it to receive water. That does not seem like a big thing to many but God sees things differently. The Rock was a representative symbol of His Son Jesus Christ. He had been struck once and now Moses strikes Him again. The reference passages appear thousands of years later but for God it happened there and then at Meribah.

Hebrews 6:4-6 English Standard Version (ESV)

⁴ For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, ⁵ and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, ⁶ and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.

Then remember also that the water still flowed at Meribah and Moses continued to lead Israel to the promise land but he himself did not enter into the inheritance.

The singular Hebrew word for man (ish) is used here to portray a representative example of a godly person; see Preface

This has been called “The Preface Psalm” because in some respects it may be considered “the text upon which the whole of the Psalms make up a divine sermon.” It opens with a benediction, “Blessed,” as does our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5:3).

Both of these footnotes are for Psalm 1:1 and there are good instructions from both the ESV and the AMPC.

The second example is from the AMPC and gives the preface, the ESV only make note of it and does not quote the preface.

We are blessed to have multiple versions of God’s Word to study and we all have our personal favorites to read for different reasons. The discovery of these differences in footnotes came about because of a curiosity of wording. So often we read another bible version as it is quoted to us from a friend or study group. Do we know our own versions well enough to be curious about variations?

This may be one of the ways that the Holy Spirit speaks to us. His ability to bring into remembrance what we have read and placed in the library of our minds is certainly biblical truth. (John 16:13) It is also possible that in noticing the variation in text is an encouragement to investigate further. What was it Moses said in Exodus 3:3 “I will now turn aside, and see…”

Our days are filled with concerns and responsibilities but in our quiet time, in the time we have set aside “habitually” (AMPC wording again), we can surely turn aside to see what marvelous sights the Word has to offer.

Thousands of learned men, dedicated to God, have spent a lifetime in preparing footnotes and commentaries and definitions just for our edification. It would take a lifetime to read them all, but only a moment to answer the Holy Spirit’s nudge on any particular one.