At Massah and Meribah the Israelites tested the Lord, saying, ‘Is the Lord in our midst or not?’ The First Reading for today presents us with an account of an incident that was a reflection of the evolution (not for the better, though) of the Israelites’ relationship with God during their sojourn in the desert. The journey from Egypt to the Promised Land was not an easy one for the Israelites. Besides traversing the unforgiving and treacherous terrain of the desert, they also had to make do with the sparse resources that the desert provided. In order to make the painstaking journey towards the Promised Land a little less strenuous, they pitched camp several times in the desert. It was a lifestyle that was uncomfortable for most of the time to say the least. As a result, the Israelites found themselves a couple of times looking back to their life in Egypt with nostalgia. In the passage we have read today, we see the Israelites demand water from Moses even as they accuse him of bringing them to the desert to die. Unknown to them, their demand for water was not only a rebellion against Moses but also a sin against God. 
The Israelites’ need for water on this particular day was not the first challenge they were facing as they journeyed through the desert. Every single day since their flight from Egypt, the community had to deal with one challenge after another. However, they had managed to overcome those challenges through the help of the Lord their God in whom they had put their complete trust. Not once had the Lord God failed to come to their rescue whenever they cried out to him. Had the Lord not made a way for them in the Red Sea even as the Egyptians were closing in on them? Had the Lord not drowned the Egyptian charioteers and their chariots before their very eyes? Had the Lord not provided quail and manna for them? Would the Lord who had provided food for them all along fail to give them water? To ask the Lord to provide them with water after everything they had witnessed was nothing other than testing the Lord. It was a demonstration of the community allowing doubt creating a dent in her relationship with God.
Our Lenten observances of prayer, fasting and almsgiving should have as their aim a return to the state of grace, that is, a state of harmonious relationship with the self and the other. The Lenten period is a time of returning to a harmonious relationship with God by learning how to trust God once again. Lent is not a time for us to see what much or little we can do without, but rather how our needs (and wants) can be met by God. When I decide to reach out to my brothers and sisters who are less fortunate in order to share what I have with them, I do so in confidence that the God who had provided what I have will not fail to provide for me when I am in need. Isn’t this what the fourth petition of the Lord’s Prayer is all about (give us each day our daily bread), a prayer that we all say on a daily basis?
We embark on our Lenten observances as the practical way of turning our care over to God who tells us not to be anxious about our lives and what we shall eat (Pope Benedict XVI,  Jesus of Nazareth). However, our asking for our daily bread whenever we say the Lord’s Prayer is not the same as putting the Lord to the test as the Israelites did. Rather, as the responsorial psalm clearly states, it is our recognition that we are a people whose shepherd is the Lord God. It is recognition that the Lord God is the Rock of our salvation, our creator and provider of all our needs.