Numbers 6
Well here we are in Numbers, and it’s good to know those benedictions, which I used to listen to as we adjourned at my church affectionately referred to by my brothers and me as First Prez, were taken from scripture.
“The Lord bless thee, and keep thee, The Lord make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee: The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel, and I will bless them.” Numbers 6:24-26
Numbers 12
“Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.” Numbers 12:3
God chose the meekest guy to lead so I’m seeing here that he values humility and meekness. Kinda cool. I remember this passage making an impression on me the first time I read it that God values humility and meekness and didn’t go find some type-A Goliath kind of guy to do the job.
Numbers 13
“And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it.” Numbers 13:30 So he had faith and confidence when everyone else was saying no way can we beat the bad guys. This is Caleb having confidence in God that they could defeat the bad guys and take their land but nobody else saw it that way and were all scared so they didn’t go for it like God had told them to. God was chafed. I think we should pronounce that "Chafe Ed." Just for fun.
Then check out what God says about Caleb a couple verses later:
“But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath followed me fully, him will I bring into the land whereinto he went: and his seed shall possess it.” So God rewards us when we seek him and trust him.
Numbers 14
Then God is blasting everyone else:
“And the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, which murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me.” Numbers 14:24 and 27 Then he says some serious, wroth stuff to the people regarding their complaining and murmurings and punishing them in a way that has to do with their carcases, not fun. I think when God starts to talk about their “carcasses” He generally means business. So I’m just seeing here that God rewards those who seek him and trust him, and who have a “different spirit” as in a heart that is fully turned toward the Lord. That and: God don’t play.
Numbers 15
“Remember all the commandments of the Lord, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring.” Numbers 15:39
Ouch, does it really say that? God is such a trip sometimes, the way He words things.
Numbers 21
“And the Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that everyone that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.” Numbers 21:8
This is possibly sort of a foreshadowing kinda thing of looking up to the cross of Jesus later. Not sure about the theology but sometimes I wonder if the people in the Old Testament got their salvation the same way we do: trusting in Jesus’ resurrection. Only for them, it was trusting what hadn’t happened yet (the hope of Christ in the future), and for us it’s trusting that it did happen (the hope of what Christ did in the past + he will come again). Either way none of us was actually there so we are believing in something we didn’t see with our own eyes but rather trust in our heart. I mean David had to go to heaven right? Daniel, Ezekiel, Moses, Noah all those good God fearing dudes. Not through their own righteousness but their belief in the coming savior. So they were all about proclaiming what would happen whereas the apostles taught about what did happen. Either way on the time scale slash number line, the salvation comes from the resurrection.