Hello my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
Some of you live in cold winter parts of the world, and lately we’ve seen remarkable reports of below zero temperatures and blizzard conditions, frequently in these first days of ’22! My wife and I also lived in one of those places for many years, and this time of year can be dangerous, so we’re praying you stay warm and safe!! In those cold winters we learned to especially be careful when you are out alone in those dangerous temperatures! But my friends all over the world, have you found “alone” is a dangerous place to be no matter what the climate is that you live in?
In our journey with Moses and more than 1 million Hebrew former slaves, you might think it would be impossible to feel ‘alone’ in such a crowd. But in these past two days we’ve been looking at an incident which Moses recorded for us in Numbers 11 which has fascinated me for a long time. Moses was feeling alone, discouraged and even close to despair, as he carried the heavy load of leading these 1 million people who too often fell into raucous complaining. Moses was both leading these people in leaving Egypt and following God’s cloud to each new destination, and he was trying to lead them in learning to live as a people of God. Moses actually came to the place of saying to God: “Why have You [God] brought this trouble on Your servant? What have I done to displease You that You put the burden of all these people on me? Did I conceive all these people? Did I give them birth? Where can I get meat for all these people? They keep wailing to me ‘Give us meat to eat’! I cannot carry all these people by myself, the burden is too heavy for me. If this is how You are going to treat me, put me to death right now…” (Numbers 11:11-15) Now, that’s despair isn’t it my friends? How close to that have you ever come?
God’s response assured Moses that He understood Moses’ pain in view of the tsunami of complaining people all around him, so God said to Moses: “Bring Me 70 of Israel’s elders who are known to you as leaders and officials among the people.” I love that! Leadership is difficult enough, but when you are doing it and you feel all alone, the load of responsibility can be crushing. But maybe even worse, is being forced to lead a large responsibility with a group of people you don’t know and can’t trust!
But here I see God saying two important things to Moses: God told Moses to bring 70 together to help him. Not just 5 or 10 but 70! God was showing Moses that He understood the magnitude, the complexity of the leadership load that Moses was carrying! God also told Moses to make sure these 70 were men Moses knew well, Moses had worked with them, Moses had watched them in some leadership capacities, and they had earned Moses’ trust as leaders. Therefore we can assume their ‘on ramp’, into forming a leadership team with Moses, would be relatively short. Oh my, I thank God for that! Often in my life when I’ve been in a leadership situation feeling what Moses was feeling, I’ve turned to this story in the Bible to find hope and God has always been faithful in providing partners to help me carry the load of responsibility that HE has entrusted to me! Have you experienced that my friends?
Also, please notice God did not say anything that would shame Moses or cause him to feel that God didn’t see the leadership load as very heavy. By God’s response God was affirming Moses’ analysis of the situation, but walking Moses back from the cliff of despair, by offering well qualified men to help him. But these men were lacking one thing…an anointing from God. So notice please that God invites Moses and these men to meet with Him at the “Tent of Meeting”. Can you imagine if you were one of those men, minding your own business at your home or your job, and you get a message from Moses… “Come quickly, God wants to meet with you and me at the “Tent of Meeting”!! How would you react to that? I would have dropped whatever I was doing, and rushed to the “Tent”, but I admit, I’d be very anxious for what I was about to hear!! Oh friends, let’s not allow ourselves to become bored with God. It’s essential we live in AWE of His majesty.
So look with me at what happened next: “So Moses brought together 70 of the elders of Israel and had them stand around the “Tent of Meeting”. Then the LORD came down in the cloud and spoke with them. And God took of the Spirit that was on Moses and put the Spirit on the seventy elders. When the Spirit rested on them, they prophesied…” (Numbers 11:24,25) What does that mean my friends? I believe it means God placed upon each of these men the same Holy Spirit which God had placed on Moses. I use the phrase “placed upon” because while it is very similar to what Jesus promised His followers would experience, it is not exactly the same. For people who have fully trusted in Jesus Christ to save them from their sin condemnation and enslavement to sin, Jesus promised God the Father would send His Holy Spirit (John 14:16,17,26) to live within these people who God has Redeemed (Eph. 1:7) and Adopted (Romans 8:14-17) and Justified (Romans 5) and whom the Holy Spirit has Regenerated with a new Spiritual nature (John 3:3-7).
For these elders, while it was the same Holy Spirit of God, their temporary ‘anointing’ was for the task of leadership partnership with Moses. Similarly Gideon was briefly anointed by the Holy Spirit of God for the temporary task of leading a small band of Hebrews in defending the people against an advancing, vastly outnumbering army. (Judges 6:34) And king Saul was anointed by the Holy Spirit for the task of being Israel’s first king. (1 Samuel 10:6) Sadly, in Saul’s case he soon turned prideful and disobedient to God and so God removed the anointing of His Spirit from king Saul. (1 Samuel 16:14)
I cannot tell you exactly what God wants us to understand happened when Moses records that those 70 elders “…prophesied, but they did not do so again.” (Numbers 11:25) I do notice the same thing temporarily happened when King Saul received an anointing of the Holy Spirit. (1 Samuel 10:10,11) What I do know is Moses received from God the leadership help he needed as 70 respected leaders joined with Moses to form a large leadership team, and God anointed their natural leadership talents with a powerful anointing of the Holy Spirit, to guide them in this huge leadership challenge!
Briefly look with me at something else unusual here. Numbers 11:26-28 tells us two of the 70 chosen to help Moses were evidently either ill that day or so busy doing something they were not able to come to the “Tent of Meeting” with the others. But suddenly the Holy Spirit came upon them, wherever they were, at the same time the Spirit came on those who had come to the “Tent” to meet with God. I think God was assuring the entire contingent of 70 that they were individual leaders and God would guide them by His Spirit, not only when they were geographically near the “Tent”, but wherever they were in the camp, whatever challenges they were facing. Their anointing to leadership would now be for the duration of time that they were in that leadership role.
One last thing I’d like us to see today. I don’t think Moses had any idea how significant his words would be 1400 years later, and even in our day. When it was reported to him that two of the 70 had not been present but had received the Spirit anointing upon them, Moses responded: “I wish that all the LORD’s people were prophets and that the LORD would put His Spirit on all of them!” (Numbers 11:29) Just one short statement but do you see how it applies to you and me, no matter where we live in the world, no matter our gender or our ethnicity, or our age or marital status? If you and I have fully trusted in Jesus, what Moses had wished, is our reality today!! The Holy Spirit of God IS in every Christ follower around the world!
WOW, can you celebrate that my friends, and do you see God’s Spirit alive and at work in your life? If not, may I urge you to pray and ask God to show you what HE wants to do with the Holy Spirit in your life? And here’s a worship song to help us contemplate these wonderful concepts today. . .
Today’s Scripture is Numbers 11:24-30.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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