Day 39: Numbers 1, 2 and 3

Take a census of the whole Israelite community by their clans and families, listing every man by name, one by one (Numbers 1:2).

Many find Leviticus difficult to read with its endless instructions for sacrifices and observances. Upon its conclusion, those who don’t know better might breathe a sigh of relief… until they start reading the census in Numbers 1. The first (and last) chapters of Numbers make Leviticus look like Disneyland.

We’ve spent the last half of Exodus, all of Leviticus, and now the first portion of Numbers camped at Mt. Sinai. Twelve months have passed since the Israelites left Egypt. Chapters 10-25 cover highlights spanning the next 39 years, including fascinating episodes recounted from wilderness travels. But truth be told, the last ten chapters of the book (including a second census) can again get a little tedious.

What’s the point? That takes us back to the above verse. Every ten years the United States takes a census. We would be wise to remember that our country is not just one homogeneous group of people who look, act and think alike, but a nation of individuals. While Ancient Near East cultures were more about the group (clan, village, etc.) than they were the individual, the writer of Numbers reminds us right from the start that the Israelite community is composed of clans, families and individuals – and every story is important.

TODAY’S MEDITATION

What does it mean to know you are part of something bigger than yourself?

Day 38: Leviticus 25, 26 and 27

What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not plant or harvest our crops? (Leviticus 25:20).

Why is it so hard for us to trust God? In my fifty plus years there have been times I have been faithful to God and times I have been unfaithful. There have been times I trusted him and times I did not. But I can say with certainty, there has never been any wavering with God – God has always been faithful; God has always been trustworthy.

The Israelite people suffered from that same lack of trust. Even though God had assured them he would provide – they’d seen it with their own eyes – they felt the weight of providing for themselves and their families as if that responsibility rested on their shoulders alone. God had shown himself to Abraham as Yahweh-Yireh (God my provider) in Genesis 22:14, a story treasured by all Abraham’s descendants. Traditionally, as this word was being delivered to the people, they were eating their fill of quail and bread every day (including the Sabbath when they were restrained from gathering manna). They had a ready example of God’s faithful provision.

And yet whether it’s the odd Israelite out collecting manna on the Sabbath, or planting crops in the seventh year, or David counting his fighting men, or us worrying about our bills, lack of trust seems to eclipse even our imagined lack of resources.

TODAY’S MEDITATION

Does trust come hard or easy for you? How will you show faith in God’s provision this week?

Day 37: Leviticus 22, 23 and 24

Tell Aaron and his sons to treat with respect the sacred offerings the Israelites consecrate to me (Leviticus 22:2).

This is God’s command for Aaron and his family to be faithful with offerings brought to the tabernacle by the people of Israel. There was no denominational governing body to provide oversight, nor was there a Sinai Council for Financial Accountability.

When we bring our tithes and offerings and present them to God via the church, it’s good to know that those monies are not taken for granted, but appreciated and stewarded with respect as sacred. Congregations have many of the same bills as do families. They have to pay for water and for trash removal, a light bill and building maintenance costs. As corporations they also have to pay for salaries, insurance, and even unemployment.

Some of us are dreamers and visionaries, and some of us are nuts and bolts kind of people. That’s by God’s design. We can be thankful for those business minded men and women who watch over our facilities and finances to make sure we’ll be ministering and dreaming well into the years ahead.

Take comfort that God-ordained and equipped stewards are treating as sacred the gifts you bring to the church. It is a holy calling.

TODAY’S MEDITATION

Did God make you a dreamer, or more of a nuts and bolts kind of person? …or maybe somewhere in the middle? What does that say for where you should be serving in your home church?

Day 36: Leviticus 19, 20 and 21

Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy (Leviticus 19:2).

I used to dread this verse as an impossible command, a requirement with which I could not comply. No matter how good my intentions or committed my effort, it never achieved the desired result. As C. S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity, “No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good” [1]. The more I tried to change my behavior, the more frustrated I became. My efforts seemed doomed to failure.

New Testament scholar Paul Achtemeier writes of Romans 7:15 (…what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.): “What Paul describes in these verses therefore is the dilemma of all human beings who seek to follow God’s will apart from Christ” [2]. This is my experience when trying to conform to Scripture relying only on my own strength.

In his book Rebuilding the Real You, Pastor Jack Hayford invites us to receive this verse as a promise, rather than a threat. He illustrates how a child may inherit a receding hairline, big feet, or a cleft chin, from a parent. God is our parent, and God is holy. Holiness is in God’s DNA (so to speak). As his children, that DNA is our inheritance [3]. We don’t have to scuffle and scheme to be holy; we simply have to receive what, because of our parentage, is rightfully ours.

TODAY’S MEDITATION

Meditate on the significance of sharing spiritual DNA with your heavenly Father? What’s that say for your potential?

Day 35: Leviticus 16, 17 and 18

On this day atonement will be made for you (Leviticus 16:30).

Chapter 16 is where we find instructions for Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement). This was the one day of the year when the High Priest entered the Most Holy Place (the Holy of holies), to make atonement for the nation’s sins. Yom Kippur, the most important day of the Jewish calendar, is the final day of a ten-day period of repentance beginning with Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashana falls in September on the western calendar.

The writer of Hebrews refers to the Day of Atonement and its trappings as copies of heavenly things (Hebrews 9:23). In other words, the Old Testament sacrificial system was as close as they could come to Christ’s saving work on the cross for a people living in pre-Incarnation times. God’s heart for reconciliation didn’t just begin with the coming of Christ. He has always been working to reconcile humanity to himself.

We have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all (Hebrews 10:10). Unlike the offering brought by Old Testament priests, there was no need for Christ to repeat his sacrifice yearly. The cross, while absolutely necessary, was also completely sufficient to bring reconciliation between God and humankind.

Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit (John 19:30).

TODAY’S MEDITATION

What does it mean to you that Christ’s offering of himself was a once and for all sacrifice? As you reflect on that, can you thank him that “It is finished”?

Day 34: Leviticus 13, 14 and 15

You must keep the Israelites separate from things that make them unclean (Leviticus 15:31).

This is, I’m afraid, a rather difficult reading pertaining to infectious skin diseases, mildew and… discharges. Let’s bring this to where we live.

A while back some people I know were quarantined in their apartment because of viral pneumonia – complete with a sign on their door and everything. The health department hadn’t gotten a handle on the infection and didn’t want it spread to the schools where the kids attended.

When’s the last time you heard about meningitis spreading through a college dorm? With all those kids living in close contact, that’s one of the health concerns of the 21^st century… a fertile breeding ground for germs and disease.

Here we have the account of thousands and thousands of people traveling through the wilderness in close community – anything infecting one member could easily and quickly spread to others. Two things which scared any Ancient Near East people were leprosy and mildew. Infected people could not cohabit with healthy people, and infected homes could not be inhabited at all. So, in a sense, once these things got rooted in a group of people, this very effectively broke community, and God’s all about community.

That was then; this is now. What infections can break our God-given community in the church? Immorality? Gossip? Dissension? Resenting those in leadership?

TODAY’S MEDITATION

What can one person do to guard against anything that threatens community?

Day 33: Leviticus 10, 11 and 12

Would the Lord have been pleased if I had eaten the sin offering today? (Leviticus 10:19).

Nadab and Abihu, Aaron’s sons, offered fire before the Lord in a manner contrary to what had been prescribed. The consequence for this unauthorized fire was a death sentence by fire from God’s presence.

After the tragic deaths of his children, Aaron and his two younger sons were not only forbidden to take the day off from their work in the tabernacle; they were barred from showing any sign of mourning at all. Later in the day, Moses found that a goat sacrificed as a sin offering had been completely consumed by the altar fire, along with a burnt offering, even though a portion of the sin offering was specifically to be eaten by the priests. Aaron defended himself and his sons by reminding Moses they had been faithful to carry out their duties that day in spite of the loss they had endured.

It is probable the three men did not eat because of their grief over the deaths of Nadab and Abihu. They did not display their mourning by calling in sick to work, or by tearing their clothes, but they may have been too burdened or heart-sick to eat.

Having heard Aaron’s explanation, Moses was satisfied that the digression was birthed out of sincere hearts, and not meant as an offense against God.

TODAY’S MEDITATION

Have you ever had to defer grief? If so, you know how Aaron and his sons felt. If you’re in that situation now, where you’re hurting but life must go on, ask for strength and make an appointment to grieve later.