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Introduction: Welcome to Expound our weekly worship and verse by verse study of the Bible.
Our goal is to expand your knowledge of the truth
of God as we explore the Word of God in
a way that is interactive, enjoyable, and congregational.
Numbers, chapter 1. How many of you, just to show of hands before
we pray, how many of you, on a show of
hands, have never studied through the book of Numbers? Don't
be ashamed. Great! So glad you're here tonight with us
and I trust that the Lord will use it and
speak through this part of God's curriculum, his Word, the
fourth book of Moses, the book of Numbers.
Let's pray just to focus our minds to make that
commitment to the Lord that we're going to do our
best to concentrate and when we read through and struggle through
some of these names and places and numbers, etcetera, and
discover why the Spirit of God has included them. Let's pray. Lord,
we are always excited whenever we have the opportunity to
study a brand-new book or one that we haven't visited
for quite some time. There are fresh lessons, some of
which either we have forgotten, or never seen before. And they're
new just like your mercy is, new every morning. I
think of the prayer of David who said, "Open my
eyes that I might behold wondrous things out of your law."
And as we read the fourth book of the Law,
open our eyes Lord, the eyes of our understanding that
we might see, grasp and apply the truths that come
from your law, the wonderful, wondrous truths. Keep our minds keen and
clear and intact and not distracted, as there are so
many things in this life. And our minds have been
conditioned to be distracted with all different sorts of media and
messaging. We just want to return to a simplicity of
reading and applying, in Jesus' name, amen. If
I could transport you back into the backseat of a 1960s era
Rambler Station Wagon without air-conditioning, red vinyl upholstery, a trip
of about three thousand miles, and four ornery, whining, complaining boys
in the back, you have some idea of what a Heitzig
family vacation was when I was growing up. Or if
I were to do it, perhaps, it would be best
in a Rod Serling Twilight Zone voice. Imagine being transported
to a white Rambler Station Wagon going across the vast
landscape of America with four whiny boys. You have just
entered the Twilight Zone. [laughter] My vacations
were a father who believed in covering lots of miles in
one time, just stopping long enough to get gas. Hotels? Didn't
want to do that. If they knew somebody in the
area, we'd stay there. But we would travel from California
to Minnesota in the summertime in that station wagon. I
don't know how they did it listening to us. Whenever
there was an A&W Root Beer---remember those places?---the best! [laughter] Or a Stuckey's,
remember those places? Always wanting to stop.
Now, as I look back and I think how tough it
was for them to endure that. Here I am I
with my three older brothers; take that scenario times about
a million, so two to three million or so people, for
not three thousand miles or a week vacation or two
or three weeks, but for forty years, and you have
a scenario of where we are in the book of
Numbers. It says the book of Numbers, and it's a title that
throws a lot of people. "Numbers? I hate math." You
can relax. It's called the book of
Numbers because of the census figures that appear in chapters 1
and chapters 26. A census is taken of the children
of Israel twice and recorded twice. And there are thirty-eight
years and ten months between chapters 1 and 26 filled
with years of wandering. The book of Numbers, we get
the title from the Latin Vulgate Translation. In Latin it's
called Numeri. The Septuagint or Greek translation of the Old
Testament Hebrew is the term Arithmoi, where we get the word
"arithmetic" from. It has been called by
some scholars the Book of Journeyings, or by others the Book of Wanderings, or
by others simply The Fourth Book of Moses. My title for
the book of Numbers---"On the Road Again." [laughter] And again, and again. [sings]
On the road again. Moses and I are traveling on the road
again. It's just this unending circular movement where they're not
really going forward. I guess I would subtitle it, "How
to Make a Two-Year Trip into a Forty-Year Trial."
I say that because when we will get, Lord willing,
to Deuteronomy, chapter 1, we are told that it is
an eleven-day journey from Mount Sinai to Kadesh Barnea, eleven
days, less than two weeks. That's how long it should
have taken the children of Israel to get from where
they were encamped by Mount Sinai, at the foot of it,
into that Promised Land, Kadesh Barnea, the border that takes
you up into the land of Canaan---eleven days, about one
hundred fifty miles. One hundred fifty to two hundred
miles, depending on the route that you take, but you take
that sea route and you go right up. But as
I mentioned, we have thirty-eight years and ten months between
chapter 1 and chapter 26. What should have been an eleven-day
journey took almost a forty-year agony to get there. Just
like the previous book Leviticus, all happened in one spot
at the foot of mount Sinai, they never moved. Here
they are on the move. Now, let me
just, because we're chapter 1, give you a little bit
of setting and background and we will catch up and
move into it. If you look at it from the
beginning of our Bibles, we've been through, so far, Genesis,
Exodus, Leviticus, and now Numbers. And our practice has been an
Old Testament book, then a New, then an Old, then a New, then an Old, then a New,
now another Old. And it just kind of keeps it
interesting, keeps the spice in it, a little bit of
alteration. The book of Genesis is the
book of beginnings, everything begins there. The heavens and the earth begin
there. The nation of Israel begins there. Sin begins there.
God's plan of redemption begins there. The family of Abraham
that will eventuate into the nation of Israel begins there.
The book of Genesis has four great events and four
great people. The four events are: the
formation of the heavens and the earth; number two, the
fall of man. Everything changes after that point. We are
plunged into despair looking for redemption. Event number three, the
great flood of Noah. Event number four, the fallout because
of the sin of humanity that will spread from generation
to generation. Those are the four great events, followed by
four great people: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph.
That's the book of Genesis in a nutshell, or as
we once said, The Bible From 30,000 Feet. That's Genesis from
thirty thousand feet. We move then into the book of
Exodus which is a book of redemption, rescue, and a
book of revelation where God speaks his commandments, his covenant
promises to the people from Mount Sinai. We get to
the book of Leviticus, it's all about an approach to
God through sacrifice and through sanctification. Holiness,
worship, are themes of that great book, how to approach
God. And then we come to the book of Numbers. Here's
another way to look at it: in the book of
Genesis it's all about wondering. We wonder at God's power. We
wonder at God's creative genius. We wonder at God's patience
with mankind. It's a book of wondering. People are wondering at
God. He is a wonder to them.
The book of Exodus is a book of waiting. We're
waiting for redemption. The children of Israel were waiting in
Egypt as slaves, waiting to get rescued. That's what God
promised would happen. And then they're taken out of Egypt
and they're waiting for the Promised Land. The book of
Leviticus is a book of worshiping. It's all about priesthood. It's all about
the tabernacle, how to hang out with God, how to
approach him in worship. So we have wondering, waiting, worshiping,
and now wandering. And you're going to
see the children of Israel moving but not making progress---boy, is
that frustrating---expending energy, working hard, and never going anywhere. Now
all of us, just to make a general application of
the book, all of us face wilderness periods of our
Christian walk where we feel alone, and isolated, and dry, and in despair. And we
feel like we take one step forward and three steps
backward. But we were never meant to stay there. We
were never meant to live in the wilderness.
And though there are seasons, as Peter said, "Though you
go through trials, for a season if need be," it's a
season. It's never God's intention for us to hang out there perpetually,
but to move on. So, just think about your own life,
your own spiritual vitality. Are you growing or are you just aging? Are you
growing up or are you just growing old? Are you
just watching the wrinkles appear but never making spiritual progress
the closer you get to eternity? It
could be that you're in a similar pattern to the
children of Israel going in circles for thirty-eight years, ten
months. When you put all the chronology together, about forty
years. In First Corinthians 10, which is a Scripture I
often turn to whenever I study the book of Exodus or
the book of Leviticus or the book of Numbers, so I've
done this before. But let me just read this to
you. Paul is speaking about the Old Testament and he's
speaking about this time period of the children of Israel.
First Corinthians 10, let me just read it to you.
"Moreover, brethren I do not want you to be unaware
that all of our fathers were under the cloud, and
passed through the sea," the Red Sea, "were baptized into
Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and they ate of
the same spiritual food, and they drank of the same
spiritual drink. For they drank of the spiritual Rock that
followed them, and that Rock was Christ. But with most
of them God was not well pleased." Now you remember
reading this, yes? "God was not well pleased." You're going
to find out why God was not well pleased in
the book of Numbers. "With most of them God was
not well pleased, for their bodies were scattered in the
wilderness." "Now these things became our examples,
to the intent that we should not *** after the
evil things as they also lusted. And do not become idolaters
as were some of them. As it is written: 'The
people sat down to eat, and drink and rose to play.'
Nor let us commit *** immorality, as some of them
did," speaking of this era in the Old Testament, "and
in one day twenty-three thousand fell." In the
book of Numbers we have organization, followed by disorganization, followed
by reorganization as they are entering into the Promised Land.
They organized themselves, under the commandment of God they number the
people. They organized into camps according to God's commandments. Then
they become very disorganized wandering about, sinning against the Lord,
complaining against the Lord, experiencing the judgment of Lord. There's
some bright spots followed by reorganization of another census given
before they enter into the land. Now, in the first
four chapters we have the organization of the priesthood, and
the organization of the people; first the people, then the priesthood. So, we're
in chapter 1, verse 1, "Now the Lord spoke to Moses
in the wilderness of Sinai," just that part of verse 1
could be an entire sermon series. "The Lord spoke to
Moses." How did he do that? Did he text him?
Was it an e-mail? Was it an impression he got
on his heart? Well, according to other portions of the Torah, the
Law, we have already read that God spoke to Moses
intimately. The term is face-to-face as a man would speak
to a friend, and that God's voice was audibly heard
by Moses from between the cherubim on the mercy seat
of the Ark of the Covenant and the Tent of
Meeting, the tent of the tabernacle. God
spoke to Moses, but we must go on, we can't
stop there. "In the wilderness of Sinai, in the tabernacle of meeting, on
the first day of the second month, in the second
year after they had come out of the land of
Egypt, saying." So with this chronology they were there at
Sinai, when we get to this point, for about eleven
months, and then this census is commanded to be taken. Now,
there is some geography I just want to cover basically
with you. First of all, we have the wilderness of Sinai. You
have maps in the back of your Bibles, unless you
have a little phone or an iPad, then you have
to figure out which button to push to get to
your map. But the Sinai wilderness looks
like a triangle with the widest part of the triangle
on top, and the narrowest tip on the bottom. The
wilderness or the Sinai Peninsula, as it is sometimes called,
is about twenty-five thousand square miles of abject wilderness. You
don't want to be caught there. At its widest tip
or widest expanse on top, it's about one hundred fifty
miles long across. It is about two hundred fifty miles
deep from top to bottom. On its
west side it is bordered by the Gulf of Suez;
on its other side it is bordered by the Gulf
of Aqaba. It rising as a tableland to about an
average or a mean altitude of twenty-five hundred feet. So
it does have its seasons, though it's typically hot and
hotter. That's the wilderness of Sinai. Then there is Mount
Sinai. Now Mount Sinai is the place where God gave
the Ten Commandments, God gave the Law, God gave the
blueprints to the tabernacle. That's the place Moses went up and
heard from God and came down and spoke to the
people. So there's the Sinai wilderness and
somewhere in the Sinai wilderness is Mount Sinai. Now, I
have heard, I have read, I have watched the TV
specials, and seen the DVDs on where the real Mount
Sinai is, enough to say we don't know exactly where it is.
So you can spare giving me the books or giving
me the DVD or the new National Geographic Special that you saw where
the real one is, because I've seen them all. And
typically they're a rehash of the ones that went before.
So, we don't know. There are two places traditionally where Mount Sinai
has been placed and I say "traditionally" because the people
with the DVDs say it's neither of those places, but
it's over in Saudi Arabia. But traditionally there is a
central spot and there is a southern spot. The southern
spot, the most popular one down in the southern Sinai
is a mountain range called Jebel Musa in Arabic. Jebel Musa arises seventy-five
hundred feet in elevation. It really is
three mountain peaks, one of which is called Mount Horeb, where Elijah
fled from Queen Jezebel. And the furthest peak away, the tallest one
has been traditionally called Mount Sinai. There's a monastery there,
though many scholars do not say that is the place. But,
if you were to say that was the spot, and,
again, we don't know, at the base of Jebel Musa
is a large expansive plane which could fit the scenario
of two to three million people camping out, wandering around
before they make their way up to Kadesh Barnea.
Now, I want you to picture in your minds being
Moses, looking down at a few million people in the
middle of nowhere. And what you think in your mind as pandemonium,
you have to take out of your mind, because it
was very, very organized. Because we see here God organizing
it, numbering the people, organizing them according to clans, according
to families, and according to tribes; so that you could
literally be anywhere in a that encampment and with a few
reference signs, which I will show you, you could know
exactly where you are in the camp and which direction
is which. It was very organized. You
would look down from Mount Sinai to an expanse and
in the very center of all of those people, you
couldn't miss it, would be where God is to be worshiped.
In the middle of town was the tabernacle. By the
way, European towns have been built on this structure, where
the church with the steeple is in the middle of
the town. The tabernacle---do you remember the tabernacle? If you were to look at it from
the outside, looked plain and simple. You'd
see a seven-foot-high white linen fence, just cloth, and it
was cloth just so you couldn't see inside. And what
was going on inside was kept kind of private, away
from the outside. If you were approaching the tabernacle from
the east, you would notice that the courtyard is seventy-five
feet wide by a hundred fifty feet deep. Again, a
linen fence all the way around, pillars of acacia wood
every several feet, capped by silver sockets, silver hooks, and
silver rods to keep that linen material tight and in
place. So, you enter through the gate,
immediately on the eastern portion, the nearest portion to where
you have entered, you see two articles of furniture, an altar made out of brass where
animals where sacrificed. It's a quite large piece of furniture
for an altar. Its seven and a half feet squared
and four and a half feet tall. A priest climbs
up a ramp with the animal to offer it on
that brass altar. Next to that just
a bit beyond it would be a laver or a
wash basin where the priest would go through a ceremonial cleansing
to sacrifice and between sacrifices and to deal with the
enormous amount of blood that would be used in the sacrifices.
Then as you keep going forward toward the western side
of that 150-foot-deep courtyard, you come to a tent structure
completely covered in skins. You can't see what's inside. But
you look at it and it measures about fifteen feet
across by forty-five feet deep. Now, you
don't know it, but if you were to go inside,
you would see it's divided into two sections, that tent, that little covered tent.
The first section is called the Holy Place. The second
section is called the Holiest of All or the Holy
of Holies. No one could go there except once a year
the high priest on a particular day could go into
that Holy of Holies. In that first little encampment on
the left-hand side would be a menorah, a brass---excuse me, a brass---it's because I
go to Jerusalem and they sell brass ones---a gold, solid
gold menorah, candelabra. On the right-hand side as you enter in
would be a table with bread on it. Right in
the middle before a veil that separates you from that
Holy of Holies would be another little altar, not like
the brass one in the outer courtyard, but a small
one, and taller than it is wide, a gold altar
of incense where incense is burned and it's fragrant smelling.
And then, finally, where the ark of the covenant is
kept in that special room, the Holy of Holies. That
is the tabernacle, that is the center, that is town center. Now,
that is how it's going to be in Israel for
good. Later on they're going to get rid of the
tabernacle and build a---what?---a temple, a permanent structure. Solomon will
build that temple. Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians will destroy that
temple. Zerubbabel will come back from captivity and rebuild that
temple. And, eventually, we get to the New Testament era,
Herod the great will enlarge that temple. So if you're ever
reading historical books and you read the first temple period
and the second temple period, the first temple is the
Solomon's temple, or temple of Zerubbabel, rebuilt. The second temple
period is the temple of Herod the great, the enlarged one. The
tabernacle then will become, eventually, the temple, and that will
happen in Jerusalem. That's where God lives. That's where God
hangs out among his people. You want to
hang out with God? Get close to that structure, go through those sacrifices,
approach God with that priesthood. Now aren't you glad we
live in New Testament times under the new covenant, because
under the new covenant all of that doesn't matter. As
Stephen in Acts, chapter 7, said to the Sanhedrin, quoting
even what Solomon said, "For the Most High does not dwell
in temples made with hands." God doesn't
care about the temple, the building; God inhabits people, not
property. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit. God
dwells in you and God corporately dwells in us. And
there's a special power and a special presence, I believe,
when we gather together, two or three or more. Something
special happens. God inhabits the praises of his people. So
God inhabits people, not property. The body
of Christ is central. The temple of the Holy Spirit
is more important than the structure. So God didn't care when
we met in a theater down the street, and before
that an apartment complex, and after that a strip mall,
and then, finally, a Tuff Shed that's been converted, a
soccer arena that's been converted. It should always be about
people, not about property. "So the Lord
spoke to Moses"---I'm sorry, I've only gotten through verse 1. [laughter]
And this is what he said, verse 2, " 'Take
a census of all the congregation of the children of
Israel, by their families, by their father's houses, according to
the number of names' "---notice this, "the number of names,"
and names will be given after this---" 'every male individually.' "
What's so great about a census? What's so great about
a bunch of numbers or even names? Some of these
names are tough, trust me. What's so great about them?
Nothing, unless it's your name. If you're in that list, it's
pretty great. Those who were in this list, these who
were numbered and named, it was pretty great.
And I believe I see in this book God saying,
"I love you, and I love you, and I love you, and I
know you all by name individually. You're important to me."
There are numbers and there are names in this book.
And this is God's command, so it tells me that
people and individuals are important to God, and God says
count them. Whenever God counts people, it's because people count to
God. There's a great story by Marvin Rosenthal
in a book called Israel My Glory, where somebody was
going through a neighborhood taking a census, a poll for
the city population. Came to one house, there was a
mother there with her three children. The census taker said,
"Yes, ma'am, I'm here to take a census. How many
live here in this house?" She said, "Well, I'm here
with my three children. Let's see," she's starts naming, "there's Billy, and there's Martha." And
she starts naming all the names. And the guy said, "I don't care about
the names, I just care about the number." And she
said very frankly back to him, "My children don't have
numbers, they have names." God knows your name. Your name,
the Bible says, is written in the Book of Life,
the Lamb's Book of Life. Jesus said
to his disciples when he sent them out around the
Sea of Galilee and they were all stoked that they had power over demonic influences, he said, "Don't rejoice that you
have power over demons, rejoice that your names are written
in heaven." God knows your name. And God knows the
number of the hairs of the your head. And for
most all of us that changes every single time we
put a brush through it. [laughter] You're important to God.
So he says, " 'Take a census.' " Verse 3, " 'From twenty years old and above---all who are able to go
to war in Israel.' " So, this is a military
census. " 'You and Aaron shall number them by their
armies. And with you there shall be a man from
every tribe, each one from the head of his father's house.
And these are the names.' " So, you have fourteen
people. You have Moses; you have Aaron.
Then you have leaders of the twelve tribes who are
about gathering the information from their respective tribes to take a
census, to figure out the number of men from twenty
years old and above who can fight and go to
war. Well, that's pretty revealing on a couple of fronts.
Number one, because they had been in Egypt as slaves
for a number of years, and every time there was
a problem, who fought for them? God fought their battles. God did miracles.
Egypt is over; he wants to mature them into a
nation and tells them to develop their own standing army.
So, God is commanding an army to be brought out,
and you count the number of people in the military
service, conscripted for military service. We live in a fallen
world and we live in a world that has war.
And I appreciate all the bumper stickers that say, "Lay
Down Your Arms," and "Don't Have War," and "Visualize World
Peace." But they don't do a lick of good except
making the people who put them on their car feel
really good that they hold that position and their friends honk and go, "Yeah."
It's about all it does. We live in
a fallen world and because we live in a fallen
world there are scoundrels who gain power and get weapons
and abuse people. And since there has been humanity, until
Jesus comes again, we will have to take up arms
and either defend ourselves from an attack or attack those,
according to Augustine who called it a "just war," who are
attacking those who are helpless. So, though I love to
read the pacifist position of "no war," "no arms," it
just does not work in this culture, in this society.
It never has and it never will. I'll make that
prediction right now. You can put me on record as
saying that. It never will. Visualize it all day long,
man. Give the peace symbol all day long to your
friends. It's cool; it just doesn't work. Now some people
think that in reading the Sermon on the Mount that
Jesus was advocating a total pacifistic position. For he said,
"Don't resist an evil man. And if somebody hits you,
just turn the other cheek," which you should do.
Jesus was speaking personally, not nationally, not corporately. On a
personal level, if somebody personally attacks you, that's where you
love your enemies. That's where you turn the other cheek. But---and here's
why I bring this up: there was a book that
made a great impact, still makes a great impact, you've
probably heard of it or read it, by Leo Tolstoy called
War and Peace. And taking the premise
of what Jesus said on the Sermon on the Mount, Tolstoy
advocated that a society should not have an army, should
not have police, should not even have courts or judges,
because those things resist evil. So, if we took Tolstoy's model of absolute pacifism, it
is a prescription for any tyrant to completely run amok
in that kind of a world. Francis Schaeffer---if
you've never read his writings, I commend them to you.
He said, "I am not a pacifist in today's fallen
world, simply because for me to be a pacifist would
mean I neglect the people who need help the most."
Here's his example: You walk down the street tomorrow. As
you walk down the street you see a thug, some middle-aged
guy with a bat, and he's beating a little girl who's
about twelve-year-olds. At that moment in time and space what
does love mean to you? What does love mean? It means you hit your
microphone really hard. [laughter] I'll do it again. Sorry. No, that's what I'd do to
the guy. [laughter] That's what love means to me at
that point. I do something to stop.
Now, at first I give a verbal warning, and I'm
very nice about it. I'm going to enter into a negotiation.
"Please, sir, that's a naughty thing you're doing. Your mother
would not like you doing that if she saw you
today. [laughter] I beg you, please, put that down." And he
says, "Pfft, forget it! Get out of here or I'll get you too with it." "Well,
if you don't stop I'm going to raise my voice
and get louder and keep saying it over and over
again." At some point, if he does not cease and
desist, what does love mean to you then? It should
mean that you will do whatever necessary, whatever it takes
to stop that man from injuring that child.
So, I think that's an important setup, because here is
God saying, "Get an army together. Get them ready." Because they're going to enter into
the Promised Land in the book of Joshua and they're
going to face battle after battle after battle by the
will of God as he gives them the land of
Canaan. Boy, we better get going. " 'These
are the names,' " verse 5, " 'of the men who shall
stand with you: from Reuben,' " now, from the tribe
of Reuben, one of the twelve sons of Jacob, the
tribe of Reuben. " 'Elizur the son of Shedeur; from
Simeon, Shelumiel the son of Zurishaddai; from Judah,' " that is,
the tribe of Judah. " 'Nahshon the son
of Amminadab; from Issachar, Nethanel the son of Zuar; from Zebulun, Eliab
the son of Helon; from the sons of Joseph,' " remember he had two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh,
" 'from Ephraim, Elishama the son of Ammihud; from Manasseh, Gamaliel the son of Pedahzur; from Benjamin,
Abidan the son of Gideoni; from Dan, Ahiezer the son of Ammishaddai; from Asher, Pagiel the
son of Ocran; from Gad, Eliasaph the son of Deuel;
from Naphtali, Ahira the son of Enan.'
"These were chosen from the congregation, leaders of their fathers'
tribes, heads of divisions in Israel. Then Moses took these
men who had been mentioned by name, and assembled all
of the congregation together on the first day of the
second month; and they"---notice this---"they recited their ancestry by families,
by their fathers' houses, according to the number of names,
from twenty years old and above, each one individually."
It amazes me that they could recite their genealogy. Now let me let you in on something:
if you've ever traveled to Africa or parts of Middle
East, this is not uncommon. There's a great book that
I read by a woman named Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She
was a Somali Muslin woman raised in Somalia. The name
of the book---she left Islam and it's a great treatise on Islam in the real world.
She left Islam and she tells about it as a child growing up
in a Somali culture. She since left
Somalia, moved to the Netherlands, and eventually became part of
the Dutch parliament in that country. What she said, as a Somali
she was taught to memorize and be able to recite
her father's genealogical record for the past eight hundred years, eight
hundred years. It was something trained early on and every
African clan, she said, can do that. All the way
back to the beginning of her father's clan, eight hundred
years. Now it's done for two reasons:
to honor their ancestors. And, number two, so that when
you have a conversation with a person that you meet,
you keep going back in your genealogical records until you
find some common ancestor. And you, "Oh, we're related six
hundred fifty years ago." [laughter] You'd be able to do
that eventually. So they were able---it was very important to
keep genealogical records. And to recite them that far back
was a practice that has been going on around the
world until modern times. Some of you don't even know who your great-grandparents
are and you have to get on a computer and on
go to, like, ancestry.com and pay money to figure that
out. Not a bad practice, but they memorized it. They
were chosen, and they did it according to families. Now,
let me just apply this, because the rest of the chapter is going to go
very quickly. You have a spiritual pedigree, a spiritual ancestry.
You are children of?---God. Very good, all three of you. [laughter]
All one of you. [laughter] "Children of---I don't know. Am I supposed to put
in my dad's name now? my mom's name?" [laughter] "God" or "Jesus" are always good
answers in a church, just sort of a general rule.
First John, chapter 3, "Behold what manner of love the
Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called the
children of God!" And that is what we are, said
John. how do you become children of God? "As many
as received him [Jesus Christ] to them God gave the
power to become children of God." You have a spiritual pedigree, man,
a spiritual heritage. You've been grafted in and you're a
child of God by faith because Jesus Christ did that
for you, made you and gave you that spiritual heritage, that spiritual pedigree.
"Now," verse 20, "the children of Reuben, Israel's oldest son,
their genealogies by their families, by their fathers' house, according
to the number of names, every male individually from twenty
years old and above, who were able to go to war:
those who were numbered of the tribe of Reuben were forty-six
thousand five hundred." Now, remember I told you that there
are two different figures for a census given in this
book, one in chapter 1 and one in chapter?---26. Good memories.
It's interesting to make a comparison between this census and thirty-eight
years, ten months later as they're entering the Promised Land.
How many are there? According to these numbers, this tribe is forty-six thousand;
there will be forty-three thousand seven hundred in the second
census. So there will be a 6 percent drop in
this tribe. They'll have less in almost forty years, than
more. Verse 22, the second tribe after Ruben is Simeon.
"From the children of Simeon, their genealogies by families, their fathers'
house, those who were numbered according to the number of
names," it's given in verse 23, "fifty-nine thousand three hundred."
In chapter 26 there will only be twenty-two thousand, a
dramatic drop, 63 percent drop. Verse 24,
"From the children of Gad," verse 25, "those who were numbered of
the tribe of Gad were forty-five thousand six hundred and
fifty." In chapter 26 it will drop to forty thousand
five hundred or 11 percent drop. Five-thousand one hundred and
fifty less; 5150. If you're in the law enforcement, that has
whole different meaning to you. This is the crazy tribe, 5150.
Verse 26, "From the children of Judah, their genealogies by
their families." Verse 27, "Seventy-four thousand six hundred." Now, they're
going to gain, in chapter 26 there will be seventy-six
thousand five hundred, a 3 percent increase. Verse 28, "From
the children of Issachar," and verse 29 tells us "fifty-four thousand
four hundred." There will be sixty-four thousand three hundred in
chapter 26, so an 18 percent gain in that tribe.
Verse 30, "From the children of Zebulun," and verse 31
tells us, "fifty-seven thousand four hundred." In chapter 26 there
will be sixty thousand five hundred, so a 5 percent increase. Did I cover verse 30
and 31? Yes? Okay, I thought I did. "From the son
of Joseph," verse 32, "the children of Ephraim, their genealogies,
their families," there's "forty thousand five hundred" listed here. There
will be thirty-two thousand five hundred listed in chapter 26,
or a decrease of 20 percent, pretty significant.
Verse 34, also one of the sons of Joseph, "From
the children of Manasseh, their genealogy by their family," and it's
listed in the next verse as "thirty-two thousand two hundred."
In chapter 26 it will drop down to---or it will go up
to fifty-two thousand seven hundred. That's an incredible 64 percent
increase in this tribe's population from Manasseh. There's reasons for
that. You don't need to know tonight.
Verse 36, "From the children of Benjamin, their genealogies by
their families," and the next verse tells us, "thirty-five thousand
four hundred." It will increase to forty-six thousand five hundred
in chapter 26, or a 29 percent increase. Verse 38,
"From the children of Dan," and the next verse tells
us "sixty-two thousand seven hundred." It will be sixty-four thousand
four hundred in chapter 26 by the time they enter
the Promised Land, a 3 percent gain. Verse 40, "The
children of Asher," their number is given at "forty-one thousand
five hundred." It will increase to fifty-three thousand four hundred,
almost twelve thousand people, a 29 percent increase. "From the
children of Naphtali . . . fifty-three thousand four hundred." It
will drop down to forty-five thousand four hundred, a 15
percent drop in their population. Now look at verse 44,
summing it up. "These are the ones
who were numbered, whom Moses and Aaron numbered, with the
leaders of Israel, twelve men, each one representing his father's
house." So a total of fourteen men. "All who were
numbered of the children of Israel, by their fathers' houses,
from twenty years old and above, all who were able
to go to war in Israel. All who were numbered
were six hundred and three thousand five hundred and fifty."
Six hundred and three thousand five hundred and fifty men
of war or military age, twenty years and above.
By the time we get to chapter 26, the conglomerate
number is going to drop 3 percent to six hundred
and one thousand seven hundred thirty. Now once again, let
me just propose to you: There should have been a gain
after almost forty years, but there's a loss. Again, there's
a lot of reasons to talk about why that happened.
However, we're going to see some of the reasons, the judgment, the generation
that dies in the wilderness because of the judgment.
God's purpose was for them to be fruitful and multiply,
to grow. That's what he said, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill
the earth." They will go down in population. They're going
to make a lot of motion, but not really have growth.
And, again, you apply that personally. Are you growing up? Are you maturing? Are you
expanding spiritually? Or are you just growing old? There is
a considerable drop in the genealogy record.
Verse 47---see we're almost done with the chapter. "But the Levites
were not numbered among them by their fathers' tribe; for
the Lord had spoken to Moses, saying; 'Only the tribe
of Levi you shall not number, nor take a census
of them among the children of Israel; but you shall
appoint the Levites over tabernacle of the Testimony, over all
of its furnishings, over all the things that belong to
it. " 'They shall carry the tabernacle
and all of its furnishings; they shall attend to it
and camp around the tabernacle. And when the tabernacle is
to go forward, the Levites shall take it down; when
the tabernacle is to be set up, the Levites shall set it up. The
outsider who comes near shall be put to death.' "
So only this tribe handles the stuff in the tabernacle. " 'The
children of Israel shall pitch their tents, everyone by his
own camp, everyone according to his own standard, according to
their armies; but the Levites shall camp around the tabernacle
of Testimony, that there may be no wrath on the
congregation of the children of Israel; and the Levites shall keep
charge of the tabernacle of the Testimony.' Thus the children
of Israel did; according to all that the Lord commanded
Moses, so they did." The Levites were not
to fight at all. They were not to be fighting men. God wanted
them to make jeans---just kidding---Levi jeans. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. [laughter] Now, the reason
God wanted the Levites wasn't, again, a purely pacifistic---"Well, you're
to be the pacifist." It was a simple reason. Reason number
one, you're all about the holy stuff, all about the
tabernacle, all about worship. And because it's central to the
camp, there needs to be a staff full-time that deals
with this. Number two, if a Levite were
to be a soldier, he would be defiled because he would
be around corpses. Somebody would be dead on the battlefield.
Any contact with the dead makes him immediately defiled ceremonially.
So as to avoid the ceremonial defilement, the Levites were
totally for the work of tearing it down, setting it up,
and transporting it across the wilderness. So as we close chapter 1, there's
a couple important lessons: God knows your name, you're an
individual, you're important to God. Your name is written in
the Lamb's Book of Life. Your name is written in
heaven. Lesson number two: there's a unique place of service
for each one of you in the body of Christ.
That's a New Testament concept. Let's take it out of
the Old Testament concept of the tabernacle and the tribes,
the New Testament is a more well-rounded, more beautiful, more
understandable metaphor. We're a body, the body
of Christ. Christ is the head. We are members of
one body. Some of us are eyes. Some of us are ears.
Some of us are internal organs. Nobody's least, but vital
to the health and the resilience of that body. And
as Paul said in First Corinthians 12, "The eye cannot say to
the ear, 'I have no need of you'; nor the hand
to the foot, 'I have no need of you.' "
But God has placed us uniquely and individually with certain aptitudes, certain propensities, proclivities, skills, anointings
that help us do what God called us to do,
so we could do it with passion. And somebody will
ask, "Well, I want to get involved. How should I get involved?" I've
actually had people say, "Well, I've decided not to get
involved until Pastor Skip comes up to me and says, 'Here's
what you're supposed to do.' " Ain't gonna happen. [laughter] It's not going to happen
because I don't know you individually. You know yourself, you
know how God made you, and discover the giftings of
the Holy Spirit that God has given you. And I
always ask people, and they go, "Well, what shall I do?" I say, "Well, what do you want to do?"
"Well, I love telling people about Jesus." "Well, tell people about
Jesus." "Well, I don't like to be front, I like
to be just like behind to scenes serving." There's so
many different areas and places, find the strengths you have,
plug in. Because we all need every part of the
body, otherwise we have, like, parts of the body that aren't working. That's
really tough to carry that around. We all work together.
Chapter 2---okay, I got five minutes. I'm watching the clock.
We won't be able to get through, but it is
to me so awesome, because God commands the structure of how they are to camp around
the tabernacle. So there's a tabernacle, and then there's the priests
around the tabernacle, and the priests are designated by clans
and families. So, on the eastern side
of the tabernacle, that's where Moses' tent is. That's where Aaron
the high priest, that's where his tent and his family
is there. On the other side, the opposite side, the
western side of the tabernacle is where the Levitical clan, the Gershonites---you're going to
get to know these guys, trust me. The Gershonites are out west or
right immediately on the western side of the tabernacle.
On the northern side of the tabernacle is where the
family of Merari is, all part of that Levitical tribe. And then on
the south side are the Kohathites, or the Kohanim, the priests.
So we have the Levites, according to their clans, built
around the tabernacle. Then God says, "That's not enough, I
want more structure. You've taken a census, now disperse the
tribes, the twelve tribes into four camps." Four camps:
the camp on the eastern side will be three tribes,
on the south three tribes, on the west three tribes,
on the north three tribes. So you have four camps
of three tribes. The tribe on the east, that is,
the kingpin tribe, the tribe that has the standard or
a banner that anybody can see. Remember I said you
could be at anywhere in the camp of Israel and know exactly where
you are? Well, on the eastern side you would see the
standard of the kingpin tribe of those three, the tribe
of Judah. On the western side you'd
see three tribes of Israel that are pitched out west
under the tribe of Ephraim. His banner would be flying
high, and you could see, "Oh, that's looking west. Oh, that's Judah, that's looking east."
On the north there were three tribes under the banner
of the tribe of Dan, and he had his insignia,
his logo, his standard. And then to the south was
the tribe of Reuben along with two other tribes. So you have three, three, three, and three;
twelve tribes broken up into four camps.
So, just like you can be in Albuquerque, you can be
anywhere in this town, and you always know which way
is east, because what's east? The mountains are east. You got the---we're in the
Rocky Mountain southwest, and where we are here the Sandia
Mountains jet up, and you always know that's east. And
it's a very easy city to navigate. It's just built
on a simple grid. Very easy to get around. It
struck me when I first moved here, after a day,
it's like---I got this place wired. It's, like, the easiest
place to move around in. You could
be anywhere in the camp of Israel and know what
direction you're in because of the these four camps and
these four standards. The most interesting thing is what is
on, what symbols are on these four camps of Israel.
They're not by accident. And when you see what these
are, and you compare them with the book of Revelation, and
the four gospels, and a few other Scriptures, you see
unmistakably the thumbprint, the fingerprint of the Holy Spirit. It's
an incredible message. Again, four camps, four
standards or banners or insignias or logos, so that you
could be anywhere and you could look up and see them.
What's amazing is what's on those banners. But time's up. And
you knew that was coming, right? It's always a little
teaser. It is to me one of the most fascinating things
about the book of Numbers, and I think you need
to know what's on those banners to really understand other
things that are going on in heaven, as well as
in the New Testament. Okay, let's pray. Father,
we thank you for the opportunity to as a family
gather around the exposition of your Word in a book
that is just not that familiar to us. But it
is familiar in our experience. For often we go to
wondering, and then waiting, and even worshiping, to wandering. And
I pray for any of my brothers and sisters who
are struggling in a wilderness situation in their own existence.
There's a lot of movement, but they don't feel like their
making progress. And I pray for us, your people, that
we would be growing up in Christ, not just growing
older. That the vibrant life of Christ would be reproduced
in us and through us, and we would grow from
glory to glory into the same image as our Savior, in Jesus' name, amen.