The book of Numbers: Why all the counting counts
I grew up as a child of the 80’s which means that a great degree of my early education I owe to the phenomenon that was Sesame Street. I think almost every child of my generation could tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street. Big Bird, Mr. Snuffleupagus, Oscar the Grouch, Bert & Ernie, all were a daily part of my learning. One One of the most bizarre characters on the show was the creepy Count. Adorned in all black and a bowtie, the purple, snaggle-toothed puppet with a heavy accent had a distinct propensity to count everything. Today, I learned that we recently ran across the anniversary of the passing of the man who voiced the legendary character. His name was Jerry Nelson and he passed of August 24, 2012. It was a sad day for numbers to be sure. The Count counted everything. I’ve never really been good and numbers and counting things. Some people have a natural bent towards it, they want to count everything. I’ve met people who count ceiling tiles, lights in the room, everything! That isn’t me…at all. I just want all the overhead lights off But some people love it.
But have you ever wondered if God likes to count things? Is it important to Him? That’s certainly the impression you would get if you started reading the book of Numbers. Let’s just say this, it’s not at the top of anyone’s lists of favorite books of the Bible. But it doesn’t mean that it’s pointless and it doesn’t mean that there aren’t things for me to learn from it. In fact, here are 3 sermons I preached from this unique book. If you look past the “so-and-so begat so-and-so’s” all over the book there is a powerful messenger for broken sinners like me.
The book of Numbers was written to a group of people who had been redeemed. The story actually begins with a promise made to their ancestors to Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob; the forerunners of this great nation. From the simple obedience of one man who was willing to leave his homeland to go a land that God would show him, arose a nation of conservatively at least 2.5 million people. Chapter 1 records that there were 603,550 men over the age of 20 who were able to fight.
The family had grown into a nation in the land of Egypt. They got to Egypt because of the sins of Joseph’s brothers (which is another remarkable story for another day). They found themselves in bondage in Egypt and God through mighty acts of power delivered them from the most powerful nation in the world, all 2.5 million of them!
They had been miraculously delivered from bondage but not all of the promises of God to this people had been fulfilled, namely they had not come to the land God had promised them yet. So now they sit in the desert between bondage and fulfillment. It’s a land filled with temptations, and battles, and struggles. They would fail to enter the promised land because of their unbelief and they wandered for 40 years. But detours and delays are not dead ends with God, for just as He promised generations earlier, they entered the land flowing with milk and honey.
Now we come to the real beauty of this much maligned chronicle of counting. The book of Numbers reminds the people that they were God’s people, everyone of them. It reminded them that He knew the very hairs of their head, He knew every member of every family, every family of every clan, every clan of every tribe, and every tribe of the whole nation, and He was going to bring everyone into the land of promise.
As if that wasn’t enough on the plains next to Sinai, the children of Israel are reminded, complete with smoke, and fire, and earthquake, that God Himself would be with them. He would “tabernacle” with them. This was the God who was timeless, who was before them, and would be here long after they were scattered; this God would be WITH them. Though He was already before them in the Promised Land, though He walked with their forefather Abraham, God would willingly step into time, the time He created to, in a palpable and tangible way. God was with them every step between promised deliverance and promised fulfillment. This God that brought them out, would eventually bring them in, every last one of them. This God who began the work in them, would assuredly complete it in them, and bring them to the land of their hopes and dreams.
I hope that you can begin to see the parallels already. Beloved, we are the children of God. A people who because of our sin found ourselves in bondage. A people who were enslaved to the Egypt of our own sinful desires and saddistic addictions. But God delivered us through patient acts of even greater power. I love how the apostle Paul reminds Titus of this in Titus 3:3-7.
Titus 3:3–7 (ESV)
“3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. 4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”
And now we, like the children of Israel find ourselves in a wilderness of sorts, living in the in-between; Between deliverance and fulfillment. But thankfully God never leaves us in the wilderness. In John chapter 1, the apostle John tells us that “the Word (that was from the beginning) became flesh and dwelled among us.” The word “dwell” literally is tabernacled with us. He literally stepped into time to walk alongside of us. He subjected Himself to the temptations of the wilderness, felt our pain, our embarrassment, our shame, our humiliation. He knows what it feels like to be lied about. He knows what it feels like to be betrayed. He knows what it is to feel pain. He knows what it is die. And just before He left us, He left us the Holy Spirit. The One with the same nature, and the same power, the same essence, the same character; this Holy Spirit was left to “tabernacle” with us. We are His temple!
I’m so thankful that God doesn’t redeem us and leave us in the desert. No, He comes to “tabernacle” with us. He’s felt the burning heat of temptation, He’s felt the gritty sand of life in between His toes, and He will lead us. He will lead us through the sun and heat to the land, flowing with milk and honey. The land He has been preparing for us.
If you feel like your living between deliverance and fulfillment, wandering in the desert, let the book of Numbers remind you that you are not alone, your Guide has not left you as orphans. Jesus says in John 14:16-18, “16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. 18 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” Sure, like the children of Israel, we may fail Him in the wilderness because of our unbelief. But make no mistake, He knows every child that is His, He knows the hairs of your head, He knows every member of the family, He’s numbered them, and He won’t lose any of us! He is with us, and He will guide, sustain, and protect us in the wilderness, and lead us to the Promised land, the land of hopes and dreams.
