Sermon Tone Analysis

Numbers 32-36

The Passing of the Guard

Good evening everyone, finally a Wednesday evening without weather issues!

It is our hopes to complete the book of Numbers this evening.

A reminder to you all that we won’t have a midweek Bible study here or online next week as our winter session of Growth groups begins next week and I and I hope you, will be with my Growth Group.

So, let’s begin with prayer, and then pick up our study in chapter 32.

You leaders...

So what we have here is that after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness they get to the promised land, or really next door to the promised land.

And the Tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh say, yeah, Good enough!

This land right here is pretty sweet for raising cattle and livestock, and that’s what we do.

So just dump us off here, we’re good with that, and once you get into the land, there will be more for all of you.

I’m not sure how well you can see this, but this map shows the ultimate distribution of the Tribal allotments of Israel.

You can see to the East of the Jordan river, not in the promised land, actually all of the area that is present day Jordan, our map shows on the right side bottom, the tribe of Ruben, then north of them, we have the tribe of Gad, and then the northern most portion east of the Jordan river is East Manasseh.

No sense in us all crowding in together, we’ve got the spoils of war, this land is perfect for us, so see ya later.

Now Moses is about ready to blow a gasket.

They’ve been wandering for 40 years!

They were right at the gate once, and they got spooked after some of the spies they sent in gave a bad report, and refused to enter and now this is like Deja vu.

Let’s look at his response in verse 6...

Don’t you guys remember this!!!! Verse 9...

Do you guys remember what the Lord did and said when his anger was aroused.

He swore an oath saying all that left Egypt that were age 20 and up would not make it into the promised land except for Caleb and Joshua, who went in to spy it out and encouraged Israel to enter into the land the Lord had given them.

We were right there and the fear of your fathers cost us 40 years of wandering in this miserable desert.

You know what, you guys are just like your fathers!

That probably stung a little, so they reconsidered, thought on it and came to Moses with another plan.

Let us build cities here for our wives, our children, and our livestock, so they can stay and be safe.

Then we will arm ourselves and go into the land with you to take the land, and once things are settled, we will return here to be with our families, this land is our inheritance.

Moses considers what they offered, he repeats it back to them to clarify their commitment to him and Israel and then says in verse 23...

I just want to remind you guys of what we recently read in our Sunday morning study of 1 Corinthians.

chapter 10 vs. 11…says

There’s another verse in Romans chapter 15 vs. 4...

There is a spiritual picture here in the book of Numbers that is important for us to get.

These people are content with good enough, to get out of captivity wander around a bit, and then get close, but not enter into the fullness of the promises God had for them.

They were content to stay on the other side of the Jordan.

If you back up even further, the Bible often pants a picture of Egypt as being that old life of bondage in the world, our life of sin before coming to Christ.

As Israel was given their freedom by God escaping Egypt, they passed through the waters of the Red Sea, many say that is a foreshadow of salvation, it was a literal salvation to Israel on that day.

It could be symbolic of passing through the waters of baptism, showing a new relationship with God.

And then they were on their way to the promised land, free from their chains of bondage, as we are when we get saved.

But then somehow for many of us, instead of having a heart of gratitude and servitude for all that God has delivered us from.

Instead of seeking all that He has for us, we want to know, what is good enough?

Where is the line, the border.

How far can I go, how much can I do, and still be a Christian.

I’m looking for just barely good enough!

There are so many old spiritual song and hymns about the Jordan river, crossing the Jordan river, often times it is pictured as the crossing over point from life to death, or the old life and the new.

Sadly, for so many that profess to be Christians, they want to hang out in that in between spot, somewhere between the full life of victory in Jesus, truly walking in the Spirit, surrendered to the will of God, where Jesus is not just our Savior but is truly Lord of our lives, where old things have passed away, and all things have become new…they want to live in the land of in between.

One foot in the church and one in the world, and they are quickly defeated.

As you read on further into the history of ancient Israel at the time that the northern 10 tribes go into Babylonian captivity, guess what tribes were the first to fall and be taken into captivity?

Those that hadn’t fully entered in.

Those that didn’t have the protection of the boundaries, the Jordan river, the fellowship and protection of the full gathering of Israel, they were the first to fall.

It is such a dangerous spot for us to be in, that land of in between spiritually, where we just don’t feel like we fit in either place.

We don’t!

We were made in the image of God, the God who is sickened by lukewarmness.

I think we are also delusional in forgetting that what Moses says here in verse 23 still applies to us today...

There is no such thing as secret sin…we read in Hebrews "...all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account."

- Hebrews 4:13 NKJV

Jesus said, "That which is done in secret shall be shouted from the housetop".

The Bible says, "Everything is open and naked before Him with whom we have to do" (Hebrews 4:13).

Sin cannot be hidden from God, they can be removed by Jesus, but there is no hiding on our own..

So they commit to Moses that they will follow through, remember Moses isn’t going to be allowed to enter in either, God has already told him that.

Chapter 33 begins, well let’s look at verse 3...

Chapter 33 goes through and reviews the entire journey of Israel from the time they left Egypt until the present time where they are now in their journey.

If you read down through it, it is sort of like reviewing their Google timeline of all the places that they’ve traveled.

Some will be familiar to us if you’ve read through the book of Exodus and some are new, but it is a review of their wanderings until you get to verse 50...

KJV actually says destroy their picture, here it is engraved stones and molded images…God is saying throw Verse out their trash!

Their pictures are pornographic, their molded images are of their false gods, their high places are an abomination, utterly destroy it all.

I’m giving you this land and it is to be holy.

Verse 54...

God says the land is yours, but you need to drive out all that don’t belong and separate yourselves from them completely.

Anyone here know what Galvanic Corrosion is?

Galvanic corrosion (GC) occurs when two or more metallic materials having different reversible electrode potentials are coupled together and exposed to a corrosive solution or the atmosphere.

What in the world does that mean?

When you take two different metals like carbon steel and then say aluminum or copper, and put them together, especially in the presence of moisture, corrosion appears.

Something similar happens in our fruit bowls…what happens if you have a bowl full of apples and there is one on the bottom that is rotten?

It spreads?

Does that happen with people?

Of course it does!

Lots of times we think we are safe or that we can handle it, but in the next chapter we get to in 1 Corinthians, chapter 15 we read this warning, don’t be deceived, bad company corrupts good character.

Moving on…in chapter 34, the borders of the land are described.

Important to recognize a couple of things here…lets look at the first couple of verses…

Make note of the shall fall to you as an inheritance, a gift from God.

They would have to go in and drive the Canaanites out but it was to be understood that this was land given to them by God.

Not land that they fought for and earned or deserved, the same with the land for the other tribes, look down to verse…13

So all of this land belongs to Israel as an inheritance, a gift from them to God.

It is so important to understand this, especially when we listen to people talk about peace in the middle east and different countries try to get involved and renegotiate land boundaries with the Palestinians by what they think is fair.

God has made covenants with His people Israel.

The promises He made to Abraham, that we now call the Abrahamic covenant promised more than just a great people, but also land, and the Palestinic covenant expanded that land even further and won’t be fulfilled completely until the millennial age.

But make no mistake, they will be fulfilled!

So the promised land was theirs, given to them by God, all they had to do was to enter in and claim it.

Man, that’s our life.

God wants fullness of life for us with love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

A life where the passions and desires of our flesh have been crucified and we are living and walking in the Spirit.

God then assigns two men to help divide the land among the tribes and establishing their borders, in verse 17 we see that it is Joshua and Eleazar the Priest.

And the rest of the chapter just lists out the heads of each of the tribes for us.

In Chapter 35 God tells Moses that he wants cities set up for the Levites and God wants to establish cities of refuge.

Look at verse 2…in chapter 35

So if you remember from our earlier studies, the Levites aren’t to get any huge chunks of land as an inheritance.

The land was the inheritance of the rest of the tribes, but God told the Levites that He Himself was their inheritance, that they received the better portion.

So in chapter 35 among the land that was given to Israel small cities were to be divided up and given to the Levites.

48 of them in total.

42 of them to dwell in and then as a border around each of the cities going out another 2,000 cubits, that land would be common land common-land shall be for their cattle, for their herds, and for all their animals.

But there were 6 special cities to be set up as cities of refuge.