I thought it high time I do another Bible-reading check-in / reflection. My plan is to do this periodically, as my schedule and bandwidth allow, and as prompted by the Spirit. Today's Biblical deep dive takes us to Numbers 13 and 14. This is the turning point (unfortunately) for the Israelites sojourning through the desert on the way to Canaan from Egypt. To provide a little background, I've been familiar with the first half of the book of Exodus, the part where God (through Moses) leads the Israelites out of Egypt after basically destroying the entire country (and Pharaoh), for most of my life. At some point in early adulthood, I had become aware of what happened with God's people afterward, and how their rebellion cost them entry into the Promised Land (although their children would enter). But it has been (and continues to be) a long process of understanding and coming to terms with how and why God didn't allow them to enter.
I've also stated previously about how re-reading parts of Scripture that I've historically struggled with (the book of Job being a prime example) has led to God imparting into me greater wisdom and understanding, which ultimately has led me to coming to terms and agreement with God's side of things. It's been a gradual process. Two years ago, when I last read through these passages, I had begun to come to terms at that point that the Israelites were denied entry because they were moaning and complaining (and especially their persistent lack of faith). Prior to that, I would have held the opinion that God was being unfair to them, especially considering that prior to their exodus all they had known was slavery. But, as I began reading through the passages of Numbers 13 and 14 yet again (of course, with the entire books of Exodus, Leviticus, and the first 12 chapters of Numbers all relatively fresh in my mind), I get it. I understand God's righteous anger against His rebelling people and I have to agree with it. Moreover, as I examine my history of struggling with this juncture in Biblical history, a key part of my historical struggling can be traced to the fact that, historically, I've been a lot alike these rebellious Israelites in terms of my attitudes on various things, even in more recent years. Sure, the circumstances between their lives and mine are quite different. But God still judges the heart:
The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? “I the Lord search the heart and examine the mind, to reward each person according to their conduct, according to what their deeds deserve.” Jeremiah 17:9-10, NIV
One final context note about this whole swath of Scripture, really from mid-Exodus, through the end of Deuteronomy: thanks to the accompanying Bible Recap videos I watch at the end of each day's reading, another key understanding I've begun to gain is that a big part of why this takes up so much ink is that so much time is devoted to God painstakingly setting up His relationship with them because He wants to be near them. He did all this fully knowing not only His people's wicked hearts but also what they've been through and what they would need in order to learn how to have a proper relationship with Him, including learning how to trust Him and to obey His commandments. I used to think that the elapsed amount of time between exodus from Egypt and the moment of opportunity to enter Canaan (which the Israelites rejected) was a lot longer than it was. It was only about a year! (Or two.) Now, part of that was because, even during the first year, signs of the Israelites' rebellion caused delays. But, until this latest reading, I had not known that 38 of those 40 years spent wandering in the desert occurred only after God's people rejected His invitation to receive the blessing that He had long promised them, not to mention that He had been faithfully telling them about it the whole time.
Here's the infamous moment in Israelite history that changed the course of events for that whole generation:
17 When Moses sent them to explore Canaan, he said, “Go up through the Negev and on into the hill country. 18 See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many. 19 What kind of land do they live in? Is it good or bad? What kind of towns do they live in? Are they unwalled or fortified? 20 How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees in it or not? Do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land.” (It was the season for the first ripe grapes.)
21 So they went up and explored the land from the Desert of Zin as far as Rehob, toward Lebo Hamath. 22 They went up through the Negev and came to Hebron, where Ahiman, Sheshai and Talmai, the descendants of Anak, lived. (Hebron had been built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) 23 When they reached the Valley of Eshkol, they cut off a branch bearing a single cluster of grapes. Two of them carried it on a pole between them, along with some pomegranates and figs. 24 That place was called the Valley of Eshkol because of the cluster of grapes the Israelites cut off there. 25 At the end of forty days they returned from exploring the land.
Report on the Exploration
26 They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land. 27 They gave Moses this account: “We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. 28 But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there. 29 The Amalekites live in the Negev; the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan.”
30 Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.”
31 But the men who had gone up with him said, “We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are.” 32 And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, “The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. 33 We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.”
Specifically, this next passage really highlighted where the majority of the Israelites' hearts stood:
1 That night all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. 2 All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, “If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness! 3 Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?” 4 And they said to each other, “We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”
In the next passage, Joshua and Caleb pleaded one more time with the people to change their minds:
5 Then Moses and Aaron fell facedown in front of the whole Israelite assembly gathered there. 6 Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had explored the land, tore their clothes 7 and said to the entire Israelite assembly, “The land we passed through and explored is exceedingly good. 8 If the Lord is pleased with us, he will lead us into that land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and will give it to us. 9 Only do not rebel against the Lord. And do not be afraid of the people of the land, because we will devour them. Their protection is gone, but the Lord is with us. Do not be afraid of them.”
Understandably, God was ticked off at the whole assembly, as revealed in the next passage:
10 But the whole assembly talked about stoning them. Then the glory of the Lord appeared at the tent of meeting to all the Israelites. 11 The Lord said to Moses, “How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me, in spite of all the signs I have performed among them? 12 I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them, but I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they.”
Moses then pleaded with the Lord to relent on His anger and on killing the entire Israelite people (except Moses):
13 Moses said to the Lord, “Then the Egyptians will hear about it! By your power you brought these people up from among them. 14 And they will tell the inhabitants of this land about it. They have already heard that you, Lord, are with these people and that you, Lord, have been seen face to face, that your cloud stays over them, and that you go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. 15 If you put all these people to death, leaving none alive, the nations who have heard this report about you will say, 16 ‘The Lord was not able to bring these people into the land he promised them on oath, so he slaughtered them in the wilderness.’
17 “Now may the Lord’s strength be displayed, just as you have declared: 18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger, abounding in love and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.’ 19 In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.”
God agreed to relent. He's a God who forgives sin. At this point, Jesus had not come to earth yet, so His blood had not yet been shed as an atoning sacrifice on our behalf. But God had already made a way, albeit through animal sacrifices performed by the priests, for His people to be made right with Him. That's how much He loved His people then, rebellious and angering as they were. That all said, sin still has its consequences:
26 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron: 27 “How long will this wicked community grumble against me? I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites. 28 So tell them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Lord, I will do to you the very thing I heard you say: 29 In this wilderness your bodies will fall—every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me. 30 Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun. 31 As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected. 32 But as for you, your bodies will fall in this wilderness. 33 Your children will be shepherds here for forty years, suffering for your unfaithfulness, until the last of your bodies lies in the wilderness. 34 For forty years—one year for each of the forty days you explored the land—you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.’ 35 I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me. They will meet their end in this wilderness; here they will die.”
36 So the men Moses had sent to explore the land, who returned and made the whole community grumble against him by spreading a bad report about it— 37 these men who were responsible for spreading the bad report about the land were struck down and died of a plague before the Lord. 38 Of the men who went to explore the land, only Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh survived.
One comment about sin: God did not invent sin. Just because it is a common word used in the Bible to describe 1.) our wrongs against God and others, 2.) the fact that by nature, this is what we humans do, and without God we cannot right ourselves to become perfect and pure in His eyes, and 3.) people who don't come to God with their sin, they will end up in hell when they die ... just because sin is this common word that non-believers have come to hate and somehow choose to use this as a reason to reject God, doesn't mean He invented it. In fact, He didn't invent sin. In Genesis 1, when God created the heavens and the earth, there was no sin. In Genesis 2, when God made a helpmate for Adam (whom Adam later named Eve), there was no sin. There was no evil, there was no sickness, and there was no death. It was only beginning in Genesis 3 when the devil, in the form of a serpent, deceived Eve into not only disobeying God's (at the time) one and only command but also leading Adam to do the same. The judgments that God pronounced over the serpent, then Eve, then Adam, in Genesis 3:14-19 was because these were the consequences of sin. This didn't come about because God was in a foul mood that day and decided He hated His people; not at all! God gave us free will, and He still continues to give us free will today. And more importantly, He loves His people, which today means all of us. But we must love Him back.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. John 3:16-17, NIV
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 1 John 4:10, NIV
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. Deuteronomy 6:5, NIV
And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, Deuteronomy 10:12, NIV
So if you faithfully obey the commands I am giving you today—to love the Lord your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul— Deuteronomy 11:13, NIV
you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. Deuteronomy 13:3, NIV
The Lord your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live. Deuteronomy 30:6, NIV
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ Matthew 22:37, NIV
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ Mark 12:30, NIV
He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Luke 10:27, NIV
And even though the Israelites had received this command to love God (and one another) via the Ten Commandments, they did not obey. God's own people did not love Him. And before anyone accuses God of being mean or unloving, etc, I would pose this question to you: what would you do if someone you loved dearly not only did not love you back but repeatedly disrespected you, hurt you, insulted you, and humiliated you? Would you endlessly forgive them and try to show love to them? Or would you want to end the relationship with them? ...Or worse? Considering that the Israelites had been grumbling, complaining, and rebelling for over a year by this point, if you were in God's shoes, what makes you think you would have done any better in dealing with them?
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. 2 Peter 3:9, NIV
God was and is still exceedingly patient. He wants you in heaven with Him. It's why He sent Jesus. But even before He sent Jesus into the world, He still desired to forgive sin because He loves us.
The Lord replied, “I have forgiven them, as you asked. Numbers 14:20, NIV
This isn't the end of the 14th chapter of the book of Numbers, or of the Israelite's story, but this is the end of today's post. Sin still has consequences, as that entire generation of God's people would soon find out. But God still loves you and wants a relationship with you. This is why I preach about coming to Jesus Christ and surrendering your life to Him. Because it's the only way through.
