Tag Archive | blogthrudabible

Numbers 33 – Destroy it or be Consumed by it…

Dec10

Good evening y’all. Today we are studying Numbers 33. Be blessed 🙂

In this chapter we see Moses recount the journey of the isrealites from Egypt to the place where they are camped now. They are about to enter the promised land. God gives them a few instructions on what to do to the canannites when they get to the land and tells them the consequence if they dont obey him.

My focus today is on verses 51 – 56.

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“Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘When you have crossed the Jordan into the land of Canaan, then you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, destroy all their engraved stones, destroy all their molded images, and demolish all their high places;  you shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land and dwell in it, for I have given you the land to possess. And you shall divide the land by lot as an inheritance among your families; to the larger you shall give a larger inheritance, and to the smaller you shall give a smaller inheritance; there everyone’s inheritance shall be whatever falls to him by lot. You shall inherit according to the tribes of your fathers. But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell. Moreover it shall be that I will do to you as I thought to do to them.’” (51 – 56 NKJV)

God told the Israelites to drive out the inhabitants of the land of canaan and destroy all their idols and evil practices. God didn’t want them to get contaminated by this people and their evil practices. He knows the children of Israel are easily led astray, so he gave the command for them to make sure they get rid of all the inhabitants of the land and their idols before they completely settle into the land. This is the only way they can enjoy living in the promised land.

There are times when God tells us to let go of certain things or habits, but we refuse. Perhaps it’s because of the temporal pleasure we get from those things. In the end those things destroy us if we don’t get rid of them. That’s why Paul says “…let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us” (Heb 12: 1 NLT).

God has given us the land. It’s ours but we have a part to play as well.  We need to rid ourselves of anything that’s not of God. In the Israelites case, that meant dispossessing the inhabitants of the land, destroying their lands and idols. If they do not drive out the inhabitants completely, they will become a thorn in their life.

Sin is like that. If we do not deal with the things we ought to deal with now, they later become hindrances that come back to bite us. Needless to say the Israelites suffered this consequence.

Anything you don’t deal with completely, will only destroy you. You might think you can cope with it. It’s not a big sin…. but I tell you a little sin is enough to destroy ones future. 1 Cor 5: 6 says “...Don’t you realize that this sin is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough?”

Sin will take you where you didn’t plan to go. It will keep you longer than you planned to stay. And it will cost you more than you intended to pay

Some of us cannot fully enjoy our promised land because there are things in our past that we should have dealt with, that we haven’t done. You know God wants you to let go of that habit or break off that relationship but because of the pleasure from it, you choose to hold on and that’s the reason why you can’t progress.  Those things have now became a thorn in your life that control and dictate what you do thereby making sure you don’t have full victory.

Lets ask God today to search us. Perhaps there are still sins that we haven’t dealt with or Instructions from God that we haven’t obeyed, lets ask for mercy and grace to do the right thing.

Psalm 19:13 and 139:23 says

“Keep your servant from deliberate sins!
         Don’t let them control me.
   Then I will be free of guilt
   and innocent of great sin” . (Psalms 19: 13 NLT)

“Search me, O God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my anxious thoughts.
Point out anything in me that offends you,
    and lead me along the path of everlasting life” (Ps 139: 23 NLT)

Let this be our heart cry today to God.

I pray Sin will not have dominion over our lives and with the help of the Holy Spirit, we will get rid of the wieights and idols that stop us from possessing our promised land. In Jesus’s Name. Amen

Thanks for joining today. I’m blogging through the bible with good morning girls. Check us out at www.goodmorninggirls.org.

We will be going on break from the 14th Dec to be back on the 4th Jan with the book of Job. I’ll post more details in tomorrow’s blog.

Have a blessed evening 🙂

***With God all things are possible***

Numbers 28 & 29 – Offerings

Dec4

Good morning y’all. I’m lagging behind this week, pls pardon me 😦 .

Today’s blog is on Numbers chapter 28 and 29. I have to admit I couldn’t really see how to apply this chapter personally, seeing as it was all about the kind of offerings that should be offered to God when the Isrealites get to the promised land.

One of the things I did notice though, was the amount of sacrifices they had to make in order to atone for their sins. They had to repeatedly make those sacrifices because offering them one time just couldn’t cover for the sins. Aren’t we grateful for Jesus? He paid the price once and for all for us. His blood atoned for our sins. Hallelujah!!!

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I’d like to share a few bits from an article by John Karmelich on both chapters

Be blessed 🙂

“Know that Chapters 28 and 29 go well together. If I were in charge of the chapter breaks (and I’m not), I would have made this one single chapter. They are in effect one continuous story of what God requires of the Israelites once they actual enter the land of Israel.

Think of these chapters this way: The Israelites are now camped just outside of the land of Israel. They realize they must fight the inhabitants there in order to conquer that land.I’m guessing the average Israelite soldier is thinking, “How long will it take to win? How long before I just get to settle down there and live with my family? Will I even survive through that war myself? Yes I believe God will lead me to victory, but what is the cost?

In that sense, these two chapters are designed to calm the hearts of the Israelites by saying in effect, “Not only will you win this war, but here is how I (God) want you to worship Me once gets into the land of Israel.” I believe these two chapters are here to calm the Israelites fear that not only they will win this war, but that they will be able to focus on God throughout their years living in that land.

With that said, these two chapters in effect describe each of the daily, weekly, monthly and special holiday sacrifices that the Israelites must make in order to worship God.
   i)  To put it simply, the Israelites are required to sacrifices thousands of animals, over a ton of wheat, and many gallons of wine to God yearly on a sacrificial altar.
  ii)  What that also means is that God will provide for them all of the animals, wheat and grapes in order to make those sacrifices in the first place.
  iii)  God is saying, this land of Israel will be such a good land for one’s animals and for growing things, if the Israelites agree to follow My (God’s) instructions, there will always be plenty of food for them in order to obey these laws.

Now for the important question: why should we care about any of this?

The first thing to keep in mind is that God takes sin seriously. A reason why all of these sacrifices are made is to remember how seriously He does take sin. The idea is that there is a price to be paid for sin. Those animals being burnt up on that altar were in effect the price paid for their sins. Since Jesus literally became sin for us, we should never, ever take our own sins lightly as He died for every one of our sins, past, present and future.

The way I like to describe the life of the Christian when it comes to sin is, if we do believe that Jesus is God, why would we want to disappoint Him by sinning? We don’t avoid sin out of fear of going to hell. We avoid sin as that is the best way to live our lives and we don’t want to disappoint the one who did die for our sins.

Let’s assume we all know that fact about Jesus. If that is true, why should I care about all of these details about how many animals and non-animals are sacrificed throughout the Israelite calendar year? It is to think about all of these animals that were killed and realize that is how seriously God wants us to take sin”.

– Excerpt from “Numbers Chapter 28-29” by  John Karmelich. Full article can be found here

Thanks for joining today. I’d like to hear your thoughts and comments on the chapter 🙂

I’m blogging through the book of Numbers a chapter a day with Good Morning Girls. Check us out at www.goodmorninggirls.org

Have a blessed day 🙂

***With God all things are possible***