TCN's Biblical Journey- Feb 6th

Today's reading is Numbers 14-18

We see here the grace of God and judgment. The people were once again complaining because they thought they couldn’t take the promised land. What we see in the middle of this chapter is an interesting conversation between God and Moses where is appears that Moses is changing God’s mind. How can this be? If God doesn’t change then how come he is changing his mind here? I want to point out that he didn’t.

Some may argue my point is speculation and perhaps it is some but I believe it fits into the character of God. God says what is deserved is that the Children of Israel be wiped out and God raise up a better people. I have to interject here, I have wondered myself sometimes: Why didn’t God just forget them. Moses gives the answer, “Because if God can’t work with this group then he must not be great.” I don’t believe that God heard this and thought, “Your right Moses, I never thought of that.” God knew the reasons but by having Moses argue them in this verse, we are allowed to see why God didn’t hit the reboot button.

However, did God wipe out these people? The answer is yes, but he did it slowly. God made them wait in the wilderness. A note here, Joshua and Caleb were faithful, but the disobedience of others cost them 40 years away from the promised land. The actions of evil people affect the lives of good people.

There is another judgment coming in this chapter, the removal of God’s protection. At the end of the chapter, we see a number of the people decided they did wrong so to make it right they would attack the promised land. It is what God had told them to do earlier, but now everything had changed. They attacked not out of faith but out of shame and when something is done out of shame it rarely brings about anything of lasting good. What happened? They lost, not really a surprise since they didn't have God with them.

One final thought, Though God is great a redeeming our lives, there are still consequences which can't be undone. As they say, "You can't just put the cork back in the bottle."