Immanuel Sermon Audio
Numbers (4:66)
All right, if you have a Bible, take it out. If you don't, grab one in front of you, find the book of numbers, book of numbers. And while you turn to numbers, Leon has some handouts. If you don't have an outline or a handout and you'd like to follow along, wave it, Leon. Thank you to Tony and Mark for leading us again, appreciate you guys leading us in worship. I don't want you daydreaming during the talk about numbers, but I had told Dorothy Cook that she was going to pick our last hymn tonight and they couldn't make it because she wasn't feeling well. So somebody's going to have to pick it. So you may just have that running through your brain that you have one you want us to sing at the end when we're wrapping up. There's a giant ramp up here. It will not be there forever, but Mr. Jerry Darby built that for us so that we can get five pianos on the stage in a couple of months when we have our five piano concert. And so we had it set up in here to get approval from the piano moving crew and they gave it the thumbs up. So I'm excited about that book of numbers in the United States. We like stories that have a happy ending and that's maybe changing a little bit in some movies that don't have a happy ending. We watched one a couple of nights ago that was just depressing from beginning to end. Not one good thing happened in the movie, but for the most part we like movies that have a happy ending. And so I've tried to think of a good example of that and here's one example of movies with a happy ending that comes from the Coleman House and it is the Toy Story series. Three of these movies and they all have a happy ending. So Toy Story 1, the big danger is that Buzz is going to get blown up by Sid who lives next door and it's tense and it looks like it's all over for Buzz and Woody comes and saves the day and they all live happily ever after until number two. And in number two it's Woody who's in danger and Woody's about to get shipped off to the Toy Museum in Tokyo and this time Buzz comes and Buzz rescues him and everybody lives happily ever after until number three. And in number three they're all in danger, they're all in trouble, they're all going to get tossed out and if you've seen it it looks like they're just going to get burned in hell at the end of the movie is what it looks like, they're in the dump, they're going into the incinerator and it's intense and your heart's beating fast and then the aliens come. You can see the alien, one of the aliens on there up in the front, aliens come save the day. Happy ending, everybody likes Toy Story, it gives you the warm fuzzies and this is one of the only movies on rotten tomatoes. You guys know what rotten tomatoes is? Internet site where you can review movies and see movie reviews. So the only movies on rotten tomatoes that is a hundred percent fresh, so fresh tomatoes are good tomatoes, the ratings are a hundred percent perfect for the Toy Story series, one of the only movies that that's true for and as a result the Toy Story series has made two billion B two billion dollars which is an awful lot of dollars and so you can look around and you can say well, I think we're starting to as a society produce more movies that have bad endings and that's true but for the most part those movies do not make money. The movies that make money are the movies that have happy endings and we like that and when you come to the book of numbers, you've looked at Genesis, you've looked at Exodus, you've looked at Leviticus, you've seen the beginning of all things and the beginning of God's people, you've seen how God rescued them from Exodus and brought them out, then you've seen that once he brought them out, then he gave them his law and you get to numbers and you're ready to just ride off into the sunset. You just think this is great, this is just heartwarming. These people, God created these people, he called these people to himself, he's done amazing things for these people, he brought them out of Egypt after he sent them to Egypt to keep them alive in the first place so that was a great thing, then he rescued them from slavery, he gave them his law and all these rules about how life works best and you're just sort of ready for Israel to walk right into the Promised Land and the sun goes down and the credits start to roll and you just, it's a good story and you get to numbers and everything goes wrong as if it hadn't already been going wrong for God's people, it totally, the wheels just come off the bus in numbers. It's absolute chaos from beginning to end, nothing goes right and instead of Toy Story, the book of Numbers is a lot more like the story that George Orwell wrote called 1984. Any of you guys read this book, maybe you read it in high school, it's been out for a long time so if you are about to have the plot ruined I don't feel sorry for you, you've had a chance to read it. So here's how it goes, okay? The story takes place in the year 1984, very good, some of you are paying attention. It was not when it was written, 1949 it was written, 1949, so he's looking into the future, he says, "1984, there's three countries on the whole planet, just giant mega countries. One of them is called Oceana and in Oceana there are two people who sort of bump into each other and the guy's name is Winston and the lady's name is Julia. Winston and Julia, they live in Oceana. Oceana is a bad place to live and they call the government in Oceana, anybody know? Big brother and big brother is everywhere, big brother is in your living room watching you, big brother is on all of the bulletin boards, big brother is in the subway station, big brother is on the news, big brother controls everything, decides everything, has its arms and its hands and its tentacles in everything, big brother rules the show in Oceana. All the way down to relationships that people have with each other and all the way down to what is the truth and so part of the government in Oceana is the truth department and they decide what's true and what's not true and they go back and change things and they go back and add things and they say this is true and this is not true. So you've got Winston, you've got Julia and it's just a classic love story. They meet, they fall in love, they're not supposed to be together, they're not supposed to be doing all the things that they do but they just can't help themselves, love overtakes them in this romance blossoms and you're just rooting for Winston and Julia, I hope they make it, I hope they make it, I hope they make it, well they get caught and big brother doesn't like it. And big brother basically arrests them, separates them and begins to torture them. And the goal of the torture is not really to get any information, they know everything. The point of the torture is not really just to kill them, they don't want them dead, they want to be able to use them to their own purposes. What they want is for Winston to blame it all on Julia and they want Julia to blame it all on Winston, they want them to turn on each other. And so you follow Winston and Winston is being tortured and Winston is being tortured and he loves Julia, he's not going to betray Julia, he stands firm, he stands strong and then he crumbles. He crumbles when they take a cage of starved rats and strap it to his face and they say to Winston all you have to do is tell us to do this to Julia and we'll go do it to her. Now they had no intention of doing it to Julia, they just wanted him to say go do it to Julia and he tries to be strong and he tries to be strong and they're strapping the thing on and finally he just loses it and he says do it to Julia, don't do it to me do it to her. And pretty much when that happens they say okay you're free to go now, we broke you, we win, you lose, the relationships over, you betrayed her, that's it, go back to life where we can control everything that you do, say and think. So it goes back to life. And here's the ending to this story, it's terrible, Winston and Julia bump into each other sometime later around town and there's no spark, there's no love and they sort of look at each other and Winston admits I betrayed you. I gave it all up to save my own hide and Julia says well, really no big deal because I did the exact same thing to you. They had me pinned against the wall up in the corner and I said you go do it to Winston, don't do it to me. And they look at each other and they realize they don't love each other and they walk away from each other, credits roll the end. That's the kind of story you see in the book of numbers. There's no aliens coming in to rescue you with the big dump scooper at the end. There's no woody coming to save the day, there's no buzz coming to save the day. The wheels come off the bus and everything goes completely, completely haywire. And so we're going to talk about this lovely book, the book of numbers tonight. So take your Bible, look at numbers and let me start by putting the outline up here. This is the outline for the book of numbers, chapters 1 to 10, talk about the Abrahamic blessing, chapters 11 to 25, the Israelite rebellion and 26 to 36 is the new generation. The blessing that God promised to Abraham, the rebellion of the Israelites and then the new generation that's going to go into the Promised Land. Those are the three sections of the book. Now rewind your brain as you're filling those in and tell me back in Genesis what were the things that God promised Abraham? Abraham, I'm going to give you offspring, okay? You have none and I'm going to give you many. What else did he promise him? All of the nations are going to be blessed through you and we understand that that is a reference to Jesus. Someone from your family will come, all the nations will be blessed. So he got this promise for children, he got this promise for a Messiah to come from his family and one more thing that God promised him, land. I'm going to give you some real estate, I'm going to give you a place to live. Kids, a place to live, and the greatest of all the Messiah comes through your family. When you look at chapters 1 to 10, that's starting to come true, right? Abraham who had no kids all of a sudden just look at numbers and look at all of the kids. Numbers 1 verse 20 to 21, Reuben had 46,500, Simeon, 59,300, Gad, 45,650, Judah, 74, 6, Isacar, 54, 4, Zebulan, 57, 4, Joseph, a frame, 40 and a half, Manasseh, 30, on and on and on. These are Abraham's kids and you say, look, God kept that part of the promise. He said he was going to give him all of these offspring and here it's coming true. They started small and it grew and it grew and now he's got thousands upon thousands, ten thousands, hundreds of thousands of descendants. God's keeping his promise and you keep reading in chapters 1 to 10 and God starts to give them instructions about look, here's how it's going to go when you get into the land. You're going to do this and this is how you settle, this is how you live, this is how it's all going to go and light bulbs are going off and you're saying, hey, wait a minute, that was part of the promise to Abraham too. He's got kids, he's about to get land and you just feel like it's being set up. Here we go. God's going to keep all of these promises to Abraham and then you take a big left turn out of nowhere when you're ready for a happy ending and look at Numbers 11. This is where things start to go haywire. Numbers 11, look at verse 1 down to verse 6, the people complained in the hearing of the Lord about their misfortunes and when the Lord heard of it his anger was kindled and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some outlying parts of the camp. Then the people cried out to Moses and Moses prayed to the Lord and the fire died down so the name of that place was called Tabarah because the fire of the Lord burned among them. Now the rabble that was among them had a strong craving and the people of Israel also wept again and said, oh, that we had meat to eat. We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, the garlic, but now our strength is dried up and there is nothing at all but this manna to look at. They don't even say we have this manna to eat. They say all we have is this manna to look at. We're so sick of it of what God's giving us for free. Remember they're complaining about the fish. We got it for free in Egypt. Now we have this stupid bread for free and all we do is looking at it. They're so sick of eating it. We just want some meat so they complain and they grumble and God is gracious to them and He sends them quail so that they can eat and you could read the rest of that chapter and at the end of chapter 11 the quail comes and a plague comes and so you can look at that later. Look at chapter 12 starting in verse 1. More misfortune, more rebellion, more disobedience, Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married. For he had married a Cushite woman and they said has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses has he not spoken through us also so it seems like their complaint is on two levels. One they don't like his wife and two they don't like the fact that Moses in their view has set himself up as the supreme leader among these people. They say hey what about us? We've talked to God. Why can't we be equals with Moses? Why can't it be the three of us up here on top? Siblings, we should be running the show all together so they're not happy. The Lord heard it and the man Moses was very meek more than all the people who were on the face of the earth and suddenly the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron and to Miriam come out you three to the tent of meeting and the three of them came out and the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood on the entrance of the tent and called Aaron and Miriam and they both came forward and he said here are my words there is a prophet among you I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision I speak with him in a dream not so with my servant Moses he is faithful in all my house with him I speak mouth to mouth clearly not in riddles and he beholds the form of the Lord why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses and the anger of the Lord was kindled against him and he departed and you can keep reading about Miriam who gets leprosy God gives her leprosy as a punishment God heals her of that leprosy at Moses' request now look at numbers 13 it just continues to snowball we've seen the grumbling we've seen his siblings grumbling numbers 13 the Lord spoke to Moses saying send men to spy out the land of Canaan which I'm given to the people of Israel from each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man everyone a chief among them and then jump down and look at numbers 13 starting in verse 25 at the end of 40 days they returned from spying out the land they came to Moses and Aaron to all the congregation to the people of Israel and the wilderness of Peron at Kadesh they brought back word to them and to all the congregation and showed them the fruit of the land and at this point you really expect the spies to break out in one of the songs we just sang right here we go the promised land is right in front of us it's time to cross the shores here we go this is going to be great they told them we came to the land which you sent us it flows with milk and honey and its fruit however the people who dwell in the land are strong and the cities are fortified and very large and besides we saw the descendants of a knock there the Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb the Hittites Jebusites Amorites dwell in the hill country the Canaanites dwell by the sea and all along the Jordan but Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said let's go it wants let's occupy it for we are well able to overcome it then the men who went up with him said we are not able to go up against the people for they are stronger than we are so they brought to the people of Israel a bad report the land that they had spied out saying the land through which we have gone to spy it out is a land that devours its inhabitants and all the people that we saw in it are of great height there we saw the Nephilim the sons of a knock who come from the Nephilim we seemed ourselves like grasshoppers and so we seemed to them we don't want to go we're too scared we don't stand a chance I know God did some great stuff in Egypt but you guys weren't there you can't believe how much the odds are stacked against us we better not do it chapter 14 verse 1 all the congregation raised a loud cry in the people wept that night and all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron the whole congregation said to them would that we had died in the land of Egypt or would that we had died in the wilderness why is the Lord bringing us into this land to fall by the sword our wives and our little ones will become a prey would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt let's just go back Pharaoh drowned his armies dead let's just go back wave the white flag that'd be the best plan and verse 4 they said to one another let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt you keep reading in chapter 14 Moses prays for the people and he says God please don't destroy him and God says Moses because you prayed I'm not going to destroy him but there is going to be a judgment there are going to be a consequence at the end of chapter 14 you can look over there in verse 36 the men who returned and made all the congregation grubble against him by bringing a bad report the men who brought a bad report of the land died by plague before the Lord so God killed those guys and God says to the rest of them you're going to walk around in the desert for 40 years and you're all going to die you wanted to go back you said it would have been better to die okay that's what you want you get it what a frightful thing that sometimes God gives sinners exactly what they want is this what you want you can have it and all the consequences and everything that goes along with it look at numbers 14 39 down to 45 it's kind of funny some of these folks hear this and they see the spies die in this plague before the Lord and some of them say maybe we should go fight maybe that was not the right decision and some of them go to fight and they get their tail whooped and they come back home nobody's going in they're all walking around in the wilderness for 40 years and here's what the wilderness looks like that they're going to walk around in for 40 years let's put a picture of it up 40 years of that just walk around now not all of it looks like that some of it looks like this so you get an idea and you get some idea honestly you get some idea of why they were complaining about food and water and all of those things look at it you got kids you got animals you got livestock you got a family what are you going to eat their questions were legitimate questions the problem is they had no faith in God to provide the problem is they were not grateful when God did provide and so God says look you don't want to go in and fight you just walk around out there 40 years and all of you who are old enough to have made this decision who raised this ruckus and grumbled and complained you all die out there you don't want to go in I'll take your kids in now you can go back to the early chapters of numbers and you can read we read all those simian had this many so Judah had this many Levi had this many you can add all of those up and you can try to come up with a guess about how many people were out there total let me just give you a a conservative guess of how many people let's just say that there was two million okay that is not a high-end number that's not a low-end number that's just kind of right in the middle there was two million people in the generation that we're going to walk around in the wilderness and we take out Caleb right because Caleb was going to get to go in and we take out Joshua okay so two million minus two you divide that into 40 years every day for 40 years on average 137 dead put them in the sand 137 funerals every day walking around in the wilderness today 137 funerals tomorrow 137 the next day 140 the next day it was a good day 130 you get the idea people just dropping that's a lot of people that had to die over a 40-year period and God says you're all going to die none of you are going in look at numbers again numbers 14 verse 4 14 4 they said to one another let's choose a leader and go back to Egypt skip over and look at verse 25 since the Amalekites and the Canaanites dwell in the valleys this is God speaking to Moses turn tomorrow set out for the wilderness by way to the what go back go back to where he came from we'll just hit reset and we'll do the whole thing over that was a consequence for their rebellion you read chapter 14 and you think oh my goodness this is bad this is really really really bad nothing is going right and then you come to chapter 16 and it gets worse look at number 16 it says now chorah the son of ishar son of cohath co-hoth son of who Levi and dathan and a barum sons of Elias and on the son of Peleth son of Reuben took men and they rose up before Moses with the number of the people of Israel 250 chiefs of the congregation chosen from the assembly well-known men they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron and they said to them you have gone too far for an all the congregation for all in the congregation or holy every one of them and the Lord is among them why do why then do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the Lord now hit rewind go back to Mount Sinai Moses is up on the mountain he's getting the 10 commandments and the people are doing what breaking the 10 commandments worshiping the calf that Aaron made that he fashioned that he put into the fire you remember that story when Moses came down and Moses said who's with the Lord who was with him the Levites the Levites said hey Moses this is crazy remember Moses was from this tribe they said this is ridiculous this can't go on anymore and what did God tell those God tell those guys to do take your sword you go up and down through the camp and you start cutting necks and they did it and thousands died and God said to Moses Levi is to be commended for being faithful to me now you fast forward to the wilderness and Levi and his crew are saying let's form let's form a coalition here let's have a coup against Moses he thinks he can set himself up above us like he's our boss but we're not going to put up with it anymore everyone in the camp is just as good as Moses we want to rebel against him they try to overthrow Moses in number 16 and look at numbers 1641 these guys rebel there's this showdown where God makes the earth open up and swallow these men who rebelled right that's what happens Moses the rebels the earth opens up and swallows them look at number 16 verse 41 the next day the day after the earth swallowed the rebels the next day all the congregation of the people of Israel did what grumbled against Moses and against Aaron saying you have killed the people of the Lord now I don't know about you but I'm just thinking that if I'm watching this and there's a showdown and you got team Moses and you got team Cora and the earth swallows Cora I think I'm going with team Moses and the very next day all of the congregation says this is all your fault and they grumble and they complain in this spiral keeps going and God sends another plague in 15,000 people die look at chapter 17 is a story of Aaron's staff budding and it was another sign to the people to say look I'm with Moses I'm with Aaron the high priest these are my people they are the leaders you need to follow them it was a sign for the folks and you keep going all the way up to numbers 20 and this is a really bad chapter for Moses numbers 20 look at numbers 20 verse 1 people of Israel the whole congregation came into the wilderness of Zinn in the first month and the people stayed in Kadesh and Miriam died there and was buried there so his sister dies then you go over and you look at numbers 20 verse 24 and it says let Aaron be gathered to his people for he shall not enter the land that I have given to the people of Israel because you rebelled against my commandment at the waters of Maraba take Aaron Eleazar and basically Eleazar is the new high priest down in verse 28 it says Aaron died there on top of the mountain then Moses and Eleazar came down from the mountain all the house of Israel wept for Aaron 30 days so a sister dies his brother dies and in the middle you have the worst story in Moses's life numbers 20 and look at it beginning in verse 2 there was no water for the congregation and you remember the picture we had up there right that's where they're at there's no water they assembled themselves together against Moses and Aaron they have seen the earth swallow rebels they have seen Miriam who just died get leprosy when she rebelled against Moses they have seen most recently 15,000 people be killed by a plague from God for rebelling they have seen a dead piece of wood blossom as a sign that they should listen to Moses they gather themselves together against Moses and against Aaron and they quarreled with Moses and said wood that we had perished when our brothers perished before the Lord we wish we were dead we were about to get it verse 4 why have you brought the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness that we should die here both we in our cattle and why have you made us come up out of Egypt to bring us to this evil place it is no place for grain or figs or vines or pomegranates and there's no water to drink then Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the entrance of the tent of meeting and fell on their faces and the glory of the Lord appeared to them and the Lord spoke to Moses saying take the staff assemble the congregation you and Aaron your brother and tell tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water so you shall bring water out of the rock for them and give drink to the congregation in their cattle and Moses took the staff from before the Lord as he commanded him as one side note in that verse in that passage we just read it's interesting that sometimes God gives sinners exactly what they want right the people come up to the promised land and they say we don't want to go in there we do not want to go to the land flowing with milk and honey and pomegranates and figs and water and all that stuff God says okay turn around and go back that way they got exactly what they want did it make them happy they walk around out there they get exactly what they want and they say this stinks this isn't any good we don't like this God says Moses take the staff get everybody together and speak to the rock and tell it to bring you water verse 10 Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock and he said to them here now you rebels shall we bring water for you out of this rock and Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock with his staff twice and water came out abundantly and the congregation drank in their livestock and the Lord said to Moses and Aaron because you did not believe in me to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel therefore because you just did this you will not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them these are the waters of Maribah where the where the people of Israel quarreled with the Lord and through them he showed himself holy. Miriam dead Moses you blew it you're not going in. Aaron dead you get to the end of chapter 20 and you say okay people have been dropping for 40 years 137 137 137 137 there goes Miriam there goes Aaron Moses is one of the last guys alive and just like this because of this sin he doesn't get to go into the promised land numbers 21 it gets worse it gets worse verse 4 from Mount Hore they set out by the way to the Red Sea to go around the land of Edom and the people became impatient on the way and they spoke against God and against Moses why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness there is no food and no water and we loathe this worthless food that's an amazing thing to say for people who just got water out of a rock to say we have nothing to eat was that true that man I in quail every day we have nothing to eat did they have water there weren't rivers gushing through the wilderness but God provided it when they need it and they say we don't have any of the things we need and then they acknowledge that they do have some of the stuff they need because they said this food is worthless it's disgusting and we don't like it so there's a great story the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people so that many of the people of Israel died they came to Moses they said we've sinned we've spoken against the Lord and against you prayed to the Lord that he take away the serpents from us Moses prayed for the people and the Lord said to Moses make a fiery serpent set it on a pole everyone who is bitten when he sees it shall live so Moses made a bronze serpent set it on a pole and if a serpent bit anyone he would look at the bronze serpent and live this serpent is a picture of what God's grace right you look to it and you live you look to it and you avoid judgment what happened with this serpent many many many years later you remember it was destroyed but why did they destroy it a good king destroyed it why yeah the people had started worshiping it you see the sin of the people they're crumbling against God God gives them this way of escape from these snakes and hundreds of years later they're worshiping the statue not the God who saved them from all of it and spared them from it that's the sin in their hearts that's the sin in our hearts you also think about this snake and you think about Jesus talking to who Nicodemus and he tells Nicodemus as a serpent was lifted up in the wilderness the son of man must be lifted up and when he's lifted up he'll draw all people to himself so a little quote from Jesus there in the gospel of John chapter 22 and 23 and 24 we don't have time to read but you can read them later they're interesting chapters and the gist of those chapters is this people are starting to die out and the new generation is getting ready to go in and there's a king named Bayluk who realizes that these folks are a threat the nation of Israel is a threat to him and so he hires a magician named Baylam okay Bayluk the king hires Baylam the magician and he says I want you to curse these people right and Baylam has every intention of cursing these people so that he can collect a paycheck and every time he tries to curse the people what happens he just starts praising God and blessing the people and saying all these good things that are going to happen and Bayluk gets matter and matter and matter and you see God's grace in this right they're trying to bring this curse on God's people and despite all their sin God says I'm not going to let you do it you're not going to curse them you're not going to curse them I'm going to protect them I'm going to bless them there's nothing you can do to stop that and so they're saved from these curses but then you get to numbers 25 and look what it says when Israel lived in Shidim the people began to whore with the daughters of Moab and they invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods and the people ate and bowed down to their gods so Israel yoked himself to bail a payor and the anger was kindled against Israel. Baylam was involved in this he wasn't allowed to curse them but he was allowed to tempt them and the people of Israel took the bait and they yoked themselves to these pagan people and they go after these false gods and they worship these gods that's numbers 25 then you get to numbers 26 okay so that's 11 to 25 it's the most depressing section in all the bible it is one of the clearest pictures of my heart in your heart that you will find in all of scripture if you begin to ever think you know I'm a pretty good person I'm not that bad of a person you just need to read numbers 11 to 25 and say I'm no different than those people rebelling grumbling trying to overthrow God not listening to God not trusting God not praying to God not worshiping God that's us then you come to 26 to 236 and there's a new generation and they're getting ready to enter the land and Joshua is the new leader of the people and they win a few battles and they get instructions about how to settle in the land and that's the end of numbers you come to numbers 36 and the last verse in numbers says these are the commandments and the rules that the Lord commanded through Moses to the people of Israel in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho and so you've seen this picture the people come out of Egypt and they come right up to the edge of the promised land send the spies the spies come back we don't want to go we can't do it we're scared we would rather die in the wilderness it would be better for us to go back to Egypt let's get somebody who can lead us back there God says that's what you want you go back towards the Red Sea while you're going you're going to drop like flies all of you when all of you are dead your kids will be grown and I'm going to bring the kids back and he brings the kids right back to the plains of Moab right to the Jordan River and they're getting ready to go in and we pick up right there next week in Deuteronomy now four lessons from the book of numbers the first lesson is this God takes sin seriously he takes sin seriously and you can look at numbers 15 we're not going to read it but you can look at numbers 15 32 to 36 and there is a Sabbath breaker who was executed and I don't know about you but you look at the Ten Commandments and you say yeah idol worship is bad yes murder is not good we all agree you shouldn't lie but the Sabbath it really is it is it does it deserve to be in the top 10 there's no other law that you could put in there more important than that one and you look at this passage of numbers and you say look don't question God's law don't question how he defines right and wrong and sin and righteousness just understand that he takes it very very seriously you may think some things are a big deal not a big deal God takes it seriously and you can see that in that story in numbers 15 number two sin has real consequences has real consequences and after you write that down I want you to look at numbers 32 23 this is the end of the book the tribes are getting ready to go into the promised land some of them want to stay on on the other side of the Jordan but look at numbers 32 23 says if you will not do so behold you have sinned against the Lord and here's what I want you to see be sure your sin will find you out be certain that your sin will find you out do you see that in Moses's life all right the people want the water Moses goes to the tent and Moses and Aaron are talking to God God is not talking to all the people he's talking to Moses and he says to Moses take the staff get the people together and do what speak to the rock he's talking only to Moses and Moses goes and he stands before everybody and he takes the staff and he gets all the folks together and he does what he hits it and nothing happens so what does he do he hits it again and water comes out and everybody drinks does anybody watching that know that Moses just sinned against God they didn't know the instructions they're thinking last time he hit the rock this is the second time he's done it he hit it two times maybe that's how it works next time we hit it three times then you hit it four times I don't know they don't know that he's just sinned but numbers 32 23 says be certain that your sin will find you out that's the biggest lie when you and I fall into sin we think no one's going to know this I can keep it under control I can keep it under wraps I can manage it it's not that big of a deal and number says it is that big of a deal and your sin always has consequences and your sin will find you out and that played true and proved true in Moses's life number three good news finally God has a plan to bless his people despite their sin he has a plan to bless his people despite their sin and these verses are worth looking at numbers 15 two verses in here remember that numbers 15 is right in the middle of that middle section of numbers where everything's going bonkers everything's going haywire rebellion rebellion rebellion rebellion rebellion numbers 15 verse 2 the Lord spoke to Moses saying speak to the people of Israel and say to them when you come into the land you are to inhabit which I am giving you when not if not hey it's kind of 50/50 right now how this is going to go if it plays out I want you to do this he says when you come into the land I don't care how stubborn you are I don't care if I have to kill another generation in the wilderness I am bringing you into the land whether you want to go or not you're going to get into the land I'm going to bless you despite your sin look at numbers 15 and verse 18 Lord spoke to Moses saying speak to the people of Israel and say to them when you come into the land which into which I bring you you'll eat of the bread you'll present a contribution of the first of your dough you bring this contribution through the from the threshing floor you present it the first of your dough you give to the Lord as a contribution throughout your generations when do you do that you do it when you come into the land you are going into the land I have a plan to bless you in the middle of all this sin and rebellion I'm going to do a good thing for you and that leads to number four last truth from numbers God will bless his people because of Jesus he will bless his people because of Jesus numbers 14 18 might be the most important verse in all the numbers so fill that last blank in and look this verse up with me numbers 14 18 again right in the middle of rebellion numbers 14 18 says the Lord is slow to anger and a bounding instead fast love forgiving iniquity and transgression but he will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation listen to it again the Lord is slow to anger and abounding instead fast love for giving iniquity and transgression got it but he will by no means clear the guilty God forgives people he's gracious he's kind but if you're guilty you will not be cleared which one is it how can both of those things be true either you forgive it or you don't either you're abounding instead fast love and you're going to be patient and forgiving and gracious or you are not going to clear the guilty because it's the guilty who need the forgiveness and it says he's forgiving and he won't clear the guilty and in the Old Testament you read verses like that and you say which one is it how can it be both of those things and God's people wrestled with that and they tried to figure out what does it mean how can God forgive us and how can he not just overlook sin and sweep it under the rug because we know he's not going to do that how can he do both of those things and the answer is what Jesus at the cross where he does not clear the guilty he takes punishment that we deserved and he puts it on Jesus and the punishment is taken the price is paid right the wrath of God is poured out justice is served and as a result what happens the guilty are cleared the guilty are forgiven this is the exact opposite of George Orwell's 1984 right you've got Winston and you've got Julia and they're in separate rooms and they're being tortured and at the last minute Winston says what do it to her don't do it to me I don't want to take it give it to her this is the exact opposite when Jesus on the cross says what give it to me I take the punishment I take the wrath of God for these people I pay the penalty for their sins I die so that they can live right that's the book of numbers that's the most important truth in numbers is numbers 14 18 that he does forgive iniquity and he does it without clearing the guilty and he does that through Jesus so in light of that let's pray a prayer of thanksgiving for Jesus for his blood and we will wrap up numbers father as much as we do not want to admit it we see ourselves in this book we see our stubbornness we see our wickedness we see our our bent towards evil and complaining and grumbling father we see our our love for sin and our surety that if we get what we think will make us happy then we'll just be content and father we're just like the people sometimes you give us exactly what we think we want and we're not happy with it and we grumble about that and we complain about that when you give us exactly what we wanted so father we just come to you confessing our depravity confessing our sin confessing our rebellion and father we thank you that you are a god who is slow to anger and abounding instead fast love we thank you that you had a plan for these people in the midst of their rebellion you had a plan to bless them and father we're reminded that in the midst of our sin you sent Jesus while we were still sinners the Bible says Christ died for us your love was shown to us not in that we loved you but that you loved us and you sent Jesus to be the propitiation for our sin to be the sacrifice for our sin to take what should have fallen on our shoulders and to deal with it at the cross father we're grateful father we love you because of your grace and your mercy shown to us at the cross father thank you for the book of numbers help us to take away these lessons about sin and its severity and its consequences but father most of all help us to take away a greater appreciation for your grace and your mercy and your patience and your blessing in our lives we love you we pray in Jesus name amen