Exodus 17:2 says the people “quarreled with Moses and said, ‘Give us water to drink.’ ”  The word “quarreled” is rib, which can be used as “argued,” but it is also the word used when bringing a lawsuit (as in Deut. 25:1). In this setting Moses may be facing legal charges for a breach of contract for having failed to deliver his promise which was promised, promoted and clearly stated in Exodus 3:16-17, “Assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—appeared to me and said:…I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites…a land flowing with milk and honey.’

Now the people demand that Moses produce the minimal expectation, “Give us water to drink!” And, then they charge Moses of bringing them out of Egypt to kill them in the desert. This “argument” has all the markings of a legal trial against a leader who appears to have betrayed his people and broken a contract. Surrounded by his accusers, Moses knows the evidence is stacked against him.

Moses takes the problem to the Lord and indicates the people’s verdict is almost decided when he tells the Lord, “They are almost ready to stone me.” This trial is really not against Moses, but instead the people have put the Lord on trial. The people are “testing” the Lord, but it is the Lord who has the people in the wilderness to test and train them. Israel refuses to listen, learn and obey. So, here again, the people “test” God, instead of “trusting” him.

"He is the true Gospel-bearer that carries it in his hands, in his mouth, and in his heart."
- Desiderius Erasmus

In 1650 Anglican Bishop James Ussher published “the Annals of the Old Testament, Deduced from the First Origin of the World.” Ussher set 4000 BC as the beginning of human history and the Second Coming in 2000 AD. This was based on the concept that God created the world in six days and “a day is as a thousand years.”