Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
When was the last time you experienced the healing power of forgiveness or the deeply damaging power of unforgiveness? Yesterday I left you at the “Tent of Meeting” with Moses, Aaron and Miriam. They are siblings, do you remember that? Moses is the youngest of the three. Unlike most families, Moses didn’t grow up with his siblings Aaron and Miriam. Moses grew up in the Egyptian palace, an adopted son of the Pharaoh’s daughter who had picked him up out of a little basket floating down the Nile river! It was a terrible time for the Hebrew slaves, for in an effort to curb population growth, the Pharaoh had ordered all newborn baby Hebrew boys to be thrown into the river to drown! Moses’ parents were willing to risk death to themselves rather than kill their baby, so they set him afloat in a basket and prayed God would somehow provide a good family for him! You remember the story, right?
Now, more than 80 years later, Moses, Aaron and Miriam are reunited, along with more than 1 million other Hebrew formers slaves who have fled Egypt. They’ve spent about one year at Mount Sinai meeting with God and learning to live as God’s people in “God centered community”. But yesterday we saw there was leadership discord as Miriam and Aaron declared “Has the LORD spoken only through Moses? Hasn’t God also spoken through us?” (Numbers 12:2) God had responded sternly, calling the three of them to the “Tent of Meeting” and scolding Aaron and Miriam severely. Then, as the cloud of God’s presence lifted, they were shocked to see Miriam had leprosy! This dreaded, contagious disease had come upon her during God’s stern rebuke of their rebellion. There were strict guidelines for anyone found with leprosy or any other contagious disease. They were to leave their home, living way outside the camp, so they would not infect anyone else. (Lev. 13) It was essentially a living death in isolation. With our recent COVID global pandemic, we have some understanding of what that must have been like!
Aaron had repented and begged Moses to do something for Miriam. Look at Numbers 12:13 with me, friends: “So Moses cried out to the LORD, ‘O God please heal her!” Do you see Moses’ compassion? May I ask, how do you respond when you’ve been criticized or maligned or humiliated? God’s response was short: “Confine her outside the camp for seven days, after that she can be brought back.’ So Miriam was confined outside the camp for seven days, and the people did not move on until she was brought back. ” I don’t know if God healed her immediately or sometime during those seven days, but it’s not difficult for us to put ourselves in their sandals is it? What do you suppose Miriam and Aaron and Moses each thought about and felt during those seven days? And how many of those 1 million people understood the reason the cloud didn’t move and thus they camped there for seven days? I see no evidence there was ever again a problem of leadership discord between Moses, Aaron and Miriam. But sadly, disgruntledness and leadership mistrust was a cancer breeding deep in the hearts of many of these people, Moses was trying to lead in following God to the land of Promise He had for them. We see evidence of that in the next chapter of Numbers.
It appears God’s cloud led Moses and the travelling Hebrew nation to a place not far from the land God had promised them and the record of what happened there determined the destiny for everyone in the camp age 20 and older. Numbers 13:1 “The LORD said to Moses, ‘send some men to explore the land of Canaan which I am giving to the Israelites. From each ancestral tribe send one of its leaders. So at the LORD’s command Moses sent them out from the Desert of Paran…” (Numbers 13:1-3)
12 men, one from each of the ancestral tribes, each of them a recognized leader of the people. The mission Moses sent them on would determine their future, in fact the rest of their lives as well as all the other adults in the camp! None of them had ever seen this land of Canaan. It was the land God had first promised to Abraham and his descendants more than 500 years before. 500 years my friends! That’s a very long time and as you’ll recall Abraham and his sons Ishmael and Isaac, and Isaac’s sons Esau and Jacob lived in that land and made it home for their families for about 100 years. But then famine struck and Jacob moved his huge family to Egypt to survive with food available there. The famine only lasted 5 more years, but Jacob’s sons and wives and grandchildren liked the bounty of Egypt and so they all procrastinated. They knew they should return to their God given homeland, but Egypt was too enjoyable and they never did.
Generations passed and the leadership of Egypt changed and before too long all those descendants of Jacob found themselves enslaved in Egypt by a Pharaoh who felt threatened by them. And during all that time, many other people moved in and occupied the land God had given to Abraham. Do you see why it was important Moses select trusted leaders of the people, one from each tribe, to go in an assess the land and return with a full report for this more than 1 million former Hebrew slaves?
The record says: “When Moses sent them to explore Canaan, he said, “Go up through the Negev and on into the hill country. See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many. 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? How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees on it or not? Do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land…”(Numbers 13:16-20)
As you reflect on those commissioning words Moses gave these leaders preparing to go in and scout the land, what do you suppose their predisposition was? What did they hear? What were they expecting to find? Do you notice in Numbers 13:4-15 each of these ‘spies‘ is named in the record for all time? Their name, the name of their father, and the tribe they represented. Selection to this assignment was a very big deal and God wanted these men to understand the leadership responsibility they had. The record of their names would be considered for all time. More than 1 million people were depending on them to do good due diligence. Among these 12 we remember only the names of two… Hoshea, known as Joshua, the son of Nun, representing his tribe of Ephraim and Caleb son of Jephunneh representing his tribe of Judah. (Numbers 13:6,8)
We have no record of where they camped that first night as they began this adventure, nor what they discussed around their campfire that night. 12 men. All former Hebrew slaves who had experienced God’s great deliverance of them from Egypt by His powerful plagues. All had run through the Red Sea water tunnel and stood on the far shore watching the floating debris from Pharaoh’s drowned army. (Ex. 14) All had experienced God’s provision of sour water turned sweet at Marah (Ex. 15) and God’s daily provision of Manna (Ex. 16). They’d likely all been part of the fighting force Joshua had led at Rephidim protecting the water gushing rock from the attacking Amalakites, as Moses stood on the hillside with arms uplifted in prayer. (Ex. 17) They had all spent nearly a year at Mount Sinai. They had all heard the voice of God proclaim His 10 commandments and seen Moses bring the tablets down from his mountain encounter with God. (Ex. 20, 31)
As they sat under the stars that night pondering the mission Moses had sent them on, what do you suppose they talked about my friends? What would you have contributed to the conversation if you had been one of them? So let’s spend the rest of our day with them… reflecting, listening, trying to understand the opportunity and responsibility these 12 men had in determining the future of an entire nation of people! And let’s consider the influence each of us has with our families and friends. What impact do your words and mine have? How do we evaluate the world condition around us? What evidence do we see that God is at work in our crazy world? And how is God involving you and me in what He is accomplishing in our time?
Here’s a worship song to help us consider these questions, my friends…
Today’s Scripture is Numbers 12:13-13:20.
Choose below to read or listen.
Numbers 12:13-16
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Numbers 13:1-20
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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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