Have you struggled with these chapters in Numbers? Here is something to remember as you read this book. This is the record of the years wandering in the wilderness. The Israelites have gone from a life of slavery to freedom. With freedom comes responsibility and learning a new way to live together. This new life brings many unforeseen challenges. Not as different from our own lives as we leave the comfort of home to an independent life. All of us remember those first years of freedom from a parent’s eye as years of both excitement and discouragement. The Israelites have periods of whining and disobedience as they learn how to be God’s people.
The Spiritual Formation Bible says it this way:
“God’s holy people are always formed through training; they are not born that way. For the seed to form a nation and grow into the People of God, the Israelites needed times of testing and struggle….Numbers tells the story of how God prepared a people who had been slaves for more than four hundred years for the freedom he had always intended for them. The book’s truest, deepest story is that of the transformation, through a journey into the wilderness by the hand of God, of a passive people of small vision and little faith into a powerful, faithful visionary people ready to claim the Promised Land.” (The Renovare Spiritual Formation Bible, Introductions to Numbers, (Harper Collins, 2005) page 194).
We may find the detail about tribal duties, sacrifices, and the census numbers tedious. We must remember these details are important to the formation of a nation. Details are likewise important to our personal spiritual formation. It is in the daily detail of our personal lives we either choose to obey God’s commands or we don’t. Will we be kind to the awful neighbor or ignore the neighbor? Will we gossip about our co-worker or change the subject? Will we make the time for a lonely person or keep to our ever so important schedule? Will we keep the promise made to our children or brush them aside? These are the personal details of our lives that reveal the love we have for God.
Here are some questions for your consideration as you read Numbers this week.
1. Numbers 21:5 “The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” (NRSV). How many times have we heard this from the Israelites? I find myself thinking, “Really? You still don’t get it?” However, I am no different. There are times when I feel I am walking in a wilderness and saying the same thing to God over and over. “Why?” “Can’t we end this?” In what personal wilderness are you walking? Do you feel like God has ignored you? Do you trust God to lead you out of it?
2. Balaam and his donkey. I don’t know about you, but I have behaved like Balaam. I have been so focused on what I wanted to believe that I couldn’t see or hear God at work. God’s voice comes to us in many ways…even a donkey. Can you remember a time when you stubbornly went your own way ignoring what you knew God wanted? A huge part of our spiritual maturity depends upon us learning to listen for God’s voice and direction. We seem to have the talking part down pat….oh that we would learn to listen.
3. Numbers 23:12 “He answered, “Must I not take care to say what the Lord puts into my mouth?” (NRSV) Sometimes I think we are not careful enough with our lives. How often have you known what God wants you to do or to say and you do or say the opposite? Why is it we argue so with God?
4. Numbers 23:27 “Then Balak said to Balaam, “Come, let me take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God to let you curse them for me from there.” (NIV) Can’t you relate? “Maybe if I ask God this way, He will give me what I want?” Sometimes we just can’t believe this is what God really wants for our lives. When is it the most difficult for you to believe God? Why?
5. Numbers 29:1 “On the first day…you shall not work at your occupations.” Do you think of rest as an important part of your spiritual life? Why or why not? Do you get enough rest? It is in rest we are reminded of God’s love and provision.
6. Numbers 30:2 “…he shall not break his word.” The study note in the Renovare Spiritual Formation Bible is worth quoting:
“God values the family. He taught the Israelites to value their family promises. Spiritually mature persons fulfill the promise they make to God concerning the family and do not enter such promises rashly. The degree of agreement between our words and our behavior creates or destroys our integrity. We are responsible for the words we say, and we should keep our promises even when doing so proves personally disadvantageous. We must not break our promises.” (page 237)
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