Lessons from Numbers- the danger of rebellion (part 4)

One of the reasons I find reading Numbers so difficult is not so much the chapters which record lists of names and genealogies, but that it focuses on several acts of rebellion on a micro and macro level - rebellion by one or two individuals, or by the whole of Israel - and all of them are judged swiftly by the LORD. Miriam is given leprosy. The sabbath-breaker, at God's command, is stoned to death (ch 15). Moses is told he will never enter the promised land because he didn't follow God's instructions to speak to the rock, not strike it (ch 20). Phinehas is commended by the LORD for spearing an Israelite and his pagan woman (ch 25). And Korah, Dathan, Abbiram along with their families and followers are swallowed up by the earth in an act of devastating judgement from the LORD. (ch 16)

It all seems so harsh; so sudden; so irrevocable. What happened to grace? I'm sure this is one of points where people say 'Look, the God of the Old Testament is just full of judgement. The God of the New Testament if one of love. The Bible contradicts itself!' Or at least, maybe some Christians feel that as we're under grace not law, thankfully these kinds of things don't happen anymore and don't apply to us.

But that viewpoint is not taken by the New Testament writers. In fact, they are hugely influenced by the book of Numbers. Look at what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 10:

'For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers,a that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.'

Paul says that Christ Himself was with Israel all those years in the wilderness! This isn't a case of Jesus coming in the New Testament and suddenly it's all about love. Moreover, Paul sees these accounts as 'examples for us'. Numbers warns readers not to make the same mistakes as Israel, of taking God's commands lightly, forgetting His goodness, hankering after the past and coveting what you do not have. It links all these sins to the heart issue: unbelief. This is still relevant for us today. Whenever we fail to believe God's promises; whenever we choose the pleasures of sin above obedience; whenever we question God's appointed leaders and their authority, we run the risk of behaving in exactly the same way as Israel, and 'with most of them God was not pleased... and were destroyed.'

Hebrews is another epistle very influenced by Numbers, and very focused on warning God's people not to harden their hearts, let sin deceive them, and walk away from the truth.

'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, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, 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. For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned.' (Heb 6:4-8)

In Numbers, there is no atonement for apostasy. Those who knowingly reject God's covenant promise are disinherited and destroyed. Their unbelief led to disobedience and treating God with contempt. There was no way to undo their sin. They could never enter the land; they died outside the land of promise. The writer of Hebrews similarly gives a stern warning to believers because if they commit apostasy (entering a covenant with God then rejecting Him; this may be done consciously or through persistent, deliberate unrepentant sin), they cut themselves off from Christ, the only sacrifice for sins under the new covenant. As the New Bible Commentary states:

'Nothing is impossible for God, but He offers us no hope of reclaiming those who take a continuous and hard hearted stand against Christ. Those who harden their hearts may reach a point where they are hardened beyond recall.'

The message of Numbers is that none of us can ever get complacent about our relationship with God, and that is supported by the New Testament as well. We are responsible for diligently making our call and election sure (2 Peter 1:10), knowing that if we are still standing at the end, it's because of God's phenomenal grace to us. We can't stay faithful without His enabling, so knowing our own human capacity for weakness and disobedience, we should throw ourselves upon His mercy and grace daily in prayer and ask Him to keep us faithful to the end.

Lessons from Numbers- the danger of rebellion (part 3)

Numbers 13 introduces a crisis which is the very heart of the book. The main theme of the book is God's promise (in covenant) of giving the people a land of their own, as well as descendants and blessing to other nations through them. Chapter 13 recounts how they sent spies into Canaan, who discovered that the land was good, but they were terrified by the 'giants' who occupied it. Joshua and Caleb were the only two who had faith to believe God would do as He had promised; nothing was too hard for Him:

“The land, which we passed through to spy it out, is an exceedingly good land. If the Lord delights in us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land that flows with milk and honey. Only do not rebel against the Lord. And do not fear the people of the land, for they are bread for us. Their protection is removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them.” (Numbers 14:7-9)

Chapter 14 details the people's reactions to the spies' report. No one seems to listen to Joshua and Caleb; they all start talking about choosing a new leader and heading back to Egypt (v4). Moses has to again intercede for them before the LORD, who says He will destroy them. In the end, the faithless spies die, and everyone else has to travel the wilderness for 40 years as none of that generation are allowed to see the promised land, except Joshua and Caleb.

It's a sobering lesson in what it means to have faith. You're never going to be 'mainstream'; you'll be in the minority. God describes Caleb as having 'a different spirit' and commends him for following Him 'fully' (v24). How many of us can honestly say that we are following God fully too? There are often areas of our lives where our discipleship is a bit lack lustre and half hearted, or perhaps where we think we are following God wholeheartedly, but the reality is, we've never been tested in those areas.

It is so easy to be held back by fear, but the lesson in Numbers here is that ultimately, the things the Israelites feared (falling prey in the wilderness) actually happened because they didn't trust God. It's safer to go forward into the unknown when God is with you, than to try to stay safe without God. That's no safe haven at all.

Lessons from Numbers- the danger of rebellion (part 2)

The second rebellion I want to look at is in Numbers 12, where Miriam and Aaron speak against Moses: 'Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman. And they said, “Has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses? Has he not spoken through us also?” And the Lord heard it.' (v1-2)

Just like the rebellion in the previous chapter, this involves words. It's another form of complaining. Again, I'm struck by the fact that I don't really view this as being that serious. Everybody grumbles, it's not that big a deal, right? But God intervenes again in this chapter, and again with a severity that initially makes me feel surprised. The LORD calls them into the tent of meeting, tells them how wrong they are to speak against Moses, and gives Miriam leprosy. God's words really highlight the issue of the sin here: 'With him (Moses) I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?' (8) In opposing Moses, Miriam and Aaron were really opposing God Himself. God had put Moses into his position of authority; for them to question that authority was to question God's wisdom and sovereignty and His anointing on Moses' life. It revealed an ugly pride on their part, that they felt there was nothing particularly special about Moses. 'God can speak through us too,' they claimed. But they weren't really focused on bringing God's words to the people; they were more concerned about status.

I really recommend the Revive our Hearts series of podcasts on Numbers 12 (the series is called 'Remember Miriam'). It contains some very convicting application of this chapter into our lives today. For me, I feel especially conscious that we need to uphold those in ministry over us, not pick holes in their leadership and criticise.

God uses this physical punishment of leprosy to force Miriam to see her need for Moses as a mediator; it's through his prayers for her that she is healed. But God still physically removes her from the camp for a time, and I think this too is a frightening picture of how God will intervene with those who are not obedient and humble before Him. He will remove them! Perhaps from ministry, for a time, or even for the rest of their lives. Rebellion against God's appointed leaders is never going to lead to blessing, and we do well if we guard our tongues to make sure we don't speak out against them too.

Lessons from Numbers: the danger of rebellion (part 1)

Numbers 11 opens with a sobering verse: 'And the people complained in the hearing of the Lord about their misfortunes, and when the Lord heard it, his anger was kindled, and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some outlying parts of the camp.' We don't tend to see complaining as a serious sin; certainly not one that would cause fire from God to consume us. But then Ananias and Sapphira didn't see their concealment of the full amount of money they received from selling some land as a terrible sin; yet they were struck dead for lying to the Holy Spirit. (see Acts 5) As the writer of Hebrews reminds us 'Our God is a consuming fire'. (Heb 12:29) If we have lost the sense that God is "dangerous" in that He is unpredictable, holy, awesome and righteous in judgement, then we've lost sight of who God really is.

In this instance, as with many other similar examples in Numbers, Moses intercedes by praying for the people, and the fire dies down. But by verse 4 of the same chapter, the people are complaining again: “Oh that we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. But now our strength is dried up, and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.” (v4-6) It's almost comical. The minute detail of longing for cucumbers, melons and leeks just shows our human tendency to hanker after the 'good old days' when the reality was far from rosy. Yes, you may have had greater variety in your diet, but in Egypt YOU WERE SLAVES!!! You had to work ridiculous hours in back-breaking manual labour for a cruel Pharaoh who threw your babies into the Nile. It is scary how the grim reality has been forgotten; with a 'grass is greener' mindset, all the people can remember is that the food was better. And so often we can do this too. We can miss what God is doing in our lives now, what amazing plans He has for our future, because we're experiencing hardship and difficulty, and we look back to the past and feel a sense of nostalgia or even a jealous longing to be back there. Perhaps it was an old job or an old relationship. We can kid ourselves that this time was where life was really good, life was really going well, and if we got that old job or old relationship back, then the good times would return too. The problem with this mentality is that it doesn't accept God's right to bring us into times of suffering and difficulty, and the fact that this is good for our soul. If we want to genuinely follow Jesus, we can't go through life seeking good times and avoiding pain at all costs. That isn't the path of the cross.

The Israelites' comment 'there is nothing at all but this manna to look at' makes me feel cold inside. This is just so shockingly insulting to God. They were there in the desert, in the wilderness, and He had miraculously provided food for them through this manna appearing every morning for them to collect. And now in their tone they are dismissing it as just some everyday food-stuff that they're getting pretty fed up with, thank you very much. Can't you vary the menu a bit God?

This makes me feel cold because I know I do it too! My life is just stuffed full of blessings, yet so often I take them for granted and sometimes even reject what God has given me. Perhaps I could rephrase the complaint to 'there is nothing at all but this dirty laundry to look at' for the times when I'm resentful of my domestic duties. Or 'there is nothing at all but this demanding child', or 'this endless workload'... The list goes on. The point is, God has put me where I am right now for a reason, and I need to live each day not longing for a different season, but making the most of this moment and this time.

I'm also really bad at the 'if only' vein of thinking. If only I had made this choice instead of that one, then right now I would be... But would it really be any better? Probably not. It's my mindset that's going to determine whether I am content or not, not my circumstances. (see Philippians 4:12)

In this chapter, God gives the people what they want: meat through the quail that settle above the camp. But He also brings devastating judgment through the plague that hits them as they bite into it. It's a terrifying picture which makes me question, 'how far are you willing to go to get what you want when it's against God's will?' You can see in some people's lives today that they have abandoned God's ways to make choices that are clearly against His Word, and they seem to be enjoying themselves. But the day will come when, if they don't repent, God's judgement will come upon them. Rebellion is always judged; perhaps not always with the immediacy that is often the case in the book of Numbers, but you can know that it is always futile to fight God.

Rest in time of need- some more thoughts

I'm coming back to this theme of rest; I looked up all the times 'rest' is mentioned in the KJV and I was really struck at the story of God and God's people it showed me. From the rest of God in Genesis 2:2 to the pattern of rest He created for His people as shown in the Law (Ex 20:11, Deut 5:14), God knew that man would always be searching for rest. One of the biggest things that stood out to me is that biblically, rest is not found in not working per se, but in God Himself. So in the laws and commands about keeping the Sabbath, the reason for those commands was so that people could take time to draw near to God, rather than simply stop working and put their feet up. Look at Ex 33:14:

'...My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.'

As Moses communes with God, whose holy presence has filled the tabernacle, God gives him this assurance of His ongoing presence with Israel even though they are a 'stiffnecked people' (v5). This promise is fulfilled as in Numbers it says 'At the commandment of the Lord the children of Israel journeyed, and at the commandment of the Lord they pitched: as long as the cloud abode upon the tabernacle they rested in their tents' (Num 9:18). They physically rested from travelling when God's presence filled the tabernacle, but I wonder if that is also a picture of a spiritual rest. They knew God was close to them; they had nothing to fear.

What went wrong?

The writer of Hebrews quotes Psalm 95:

'Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years. Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways. So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.' (Heb 3:7-11)

Rest was only to be found in God, but instead of drawing near to Him and listening to Him, they grumbled and let their hearts grow hard against Him. They were denied rest, because they would not find it in God. They wanted just to have their temporary needs met of a varied diet and a permanent home (see Numbers 11).

The writer of Hebrews argued that since Israel failed to enter God's rest, then there 'remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.' (Heb 4:9) How do we enter it? He then goes on to write about our 'great high priest... Jesus the Son of God' (v14). Jesus was a man who entered the rest of God and so could offer it to others (Matt 11:28-29). He kept the Sabbath in the way it was intended, by using it to draw close to God and others rather than simply following some legalistic rules about not picking corn (Luke 6). Isaiah prophesies about a Branch, a root of Jesse, who will come and 'the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him' (v2). This seems to be shown in John 1:32 when the Spirit rests on Jesus at His baptism, and Jesus Himself referred to similar prophecies in Luke 4:18 (Isa 61) and said they were fulfilled in Him.

Isaiah 11 goes on to talk about the new creation where the wolf shall dwell with the lamb (v6), and it says that 'in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.' (v10). So this must refer to Jesus, standing as a flag or banner of God's people, the One the Gentiles seek, and His rest shall be glorious because He has brought salvation to the nations. And this will be our rest too!

What about now?

Well, going back to Hebrews 4, after pointing us to Jesus as our high priest, the writer reminds us that he was 'in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.' (v15) What deprives us of rest in God? Sin. But if we come to Christ, we can share in His perfect rest in God, because He was sinless.

'Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.' (Heb 4:16)

This is the real key for us as Christians. There will be times of trouble for us, sometimes because of our sin and mess-ups, but also from sickness, or persecution, or other factors beyond our control. How do we find rest in all these circumstances? By going to the throne of grace, seeking God for His mercy and grace to help us in our time of need. The answer to our frantic busy-ness, to our despair, to our desperation, is found not in retreats, finishing tasks, new possessions, relationships or entertainment, though I know I have tried to find it in all of these things. It's only in God Himself that we can find the rest we crave.