A lot of people aren't very well acquainted with the biblical book of Numbers. As the title suggests, there are some incidents of counting of the people contained inside. However, there are also a number of very interesting stories included as the freed people of Israel wandered in the wilderness.
In fact, the primary reason for the 40 years of the wilderness wanderings is found in the book of Numbers. Read through Numbers 13 and Numbers 14 and you will find that reason. To summarize it, the people had been freed from Egypt, and God was prepared to lead them to the land that had been promised to Abraham centuries earlier. So Moses sent 12 spies, one from each of the tribes, to go spy out the land. They went and saw a wonderfully fruitful land, but they also noticed something else. There were a lot of powerful people living in that land. For 10 of the spies, this proved to be too much. They reported back to Moses that there was no way they could claim the land, since the people already there would easily defeat their army. They even spread word about this throughout the camp, causing the people to wonder why God had brought them out of Egypt in the first place.
Only two spies thought it was possible. Caleb and Joshua were two men who saw the same thing as the other 10, but remembered how God had brought them out of Egypt. The people of Israel had done nothing to rescue themselves from Egypt. God had done it all, and all the people there had been witnesses of God's mighty hand at work. So Caleb and Joshua reported back that God would be able to give them the victory. However, their voices were drowned out by the other 10, which then caused God to pronounce the judgement that the people's unbelief would mean that the whole current generation would not enter the promised land. They would die in the wilderness for their lack of faith, and their children would then inherit the land.
As people of the faith of Abraham, this is also our story. These are our ancestors of the faith, and we see a lot of them in ourselves still today. Remember, these people had seen God's great work in freeing them from Egypt, but now, just over a year later, they didn't believe that God would truly give them the land as easily. They doubted even though they had seen God's great miracles. They saw only the might of their arms and that of their enemies, and pictured victory only based on human strength.
How often have we focused primarily on what we are capable of, and then given up, simply because we could not see how God could truly accomplish something great? One of the things that I have come to believe is that we try to leave God in a no-win situation when it comes to miracles and His mighty work. We want Him to do something of our choosing and design, and to do it now, but then, when we face obstacles and challenges that He is more than willing to give strength and guidance toward, we turn instead to our own capabilities, and then give up when we realize that we can't do them on our own. I could give numerous examples of this, but I am sure that you can come up with your own too.
That's part of the story of faith. Far too often, we are like the 10. We see and hear and believe that God has done great things, but we fail to believe that He will continue to act as we move forward in life. That causes us to give up when we really should rely upon God's strength and faithfulness, and so we end up wandering the wilderness, wondering where it all went wrong, and why God isn't doing something about our situation.
In fact, the primary reason for the 40 years of the wilderness wanderings is found in the book of Numbers. Read through Numbers 13 and Numbers 14 and you will find that reason. To summarize it, the people had been freed from Egypt, and God was prepared to lead them to the land that had been promised to Abraham centuries earlier. So Moses sent 12 spies, one from each of the tribes, to go spy out the land. They went and saw a wonderfully fruitful land, but they also noticed something else. There were a lot of powerful people living in that land. For 10 of the spies, this proved to be too much. They reported back to Moses that there was no way they could claim the land, since the people already there would easily defeat their army. They even spread word about this throughout the camp, causing the people to wonder why God had brought them out of Egypt in the first place.
Only two spies thought it was possible. Caleb and Joshua were two men who saw the same thing as the other 10, but remembered how God had brought them out of Egypt. The people of Israel had done nothing to rescue themselves from Egypt. God had done it all, and all the people there had been witnesses of God's mighty hand at work. So Caleb and Joshua reported back that God would be able to give them the victory. However, their voices were drowned out by the other 10, which then caused God to pronounce the judgement that the people's unbelief would mean that the whole current generation would not enter the promised land. They would die in the wilderness for their lack of faith, and their children would then inherit the land.
As people of the faith of Abraham, this is also our story. These are our ancestors of the faith, and we see a lot of them in ourselves still today. Remember, these people had seen God's great work in freeing them from Egypt, but now, just over a year later, they didn't believe that God would truly give them the land as easily. They doubted even though they had seen God's great miracles. They saw only the might of their arms and that of their enemies, and pictured victory only based on human strength.
How often have we focused primarily on what we are capable of, and then given up, simply because we could not see how God could truly accomplish something great? One of the things that I have come to believe is that we try to leave God in a no-win situation when it comes to miracles and His mighty work. We want Him to do something of our choosing and design, and to do it now, but then, when we face obstacles and challenges that He is more than willing to give strength and guidance toward, we turn instead to our own capabilities, and then give up when we realize that we can't do them on our own. I could give numerous examples of this, but I am sure that you can come up with your own too.
That's part of the story of faith. Far too often, we are like the 10. We see and hear and believe that God has done great things, but we fail to believe that He will continue to act as we move forward in life. That causes us to give up when we really should rely upon God's strength and faithfulness, and so we end up wandering the wilderness, wondering where it all went wrong, and why God isn't doing something about our situation.
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