Numbers 18 – 20
In chapter 18 we learn how the
Levites and the priest are to be taken
care of by tithing and how the Levites are to be separated for the work of the
Lord and how they will not receive and land inheritance.
Numbers 18:1 Then
the LORD said to Aaron: "You and your sons and your father's house with
you shall bear the iniquity related to the sanctuary, and you and your
sons with you shall bear the iniquity associated with your
priesthood. 2 "Also
bring with you your brethren of the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father,
that they may be joined with you and serve you while you and your sons are with
you before the tabernacle of witness. 3
"They shall attend to your needs and all the needs of the tabernacle; but
they shall not come near the articles of the sanctuary and the altar, lest they
die -- they and you also. 4
"They shall be joined with you and attend to the needs of the tabernacle
of meeting, for all the work of the tabernacle; but an outsider shall not come
near you. 5 "And you shall
attend to the duties of the sanctuary and the duties of the altar, that there may
be no more wrath on the children of
Once again we see God
reinforcing the idea that the Aaron and his sons are in charge of the
tabernacle and the Levites are given to them as a gift to help take care of the
tabernacle. In verses 8 – 20 Aaron is told that
he and his family will receive the benefits from the offerings made to God. All the best
of the land that is offered will be used to supply Aaron and his family with
food and other essential items. However, there are some parts of the offerings
that Aaron has to give to God.
Numbers 18: 17
"But the firstborn of a cow, the firstborn of a sheep, or the firstborn of
a goat you shall not redeem; they are holy. You shall sprinkle their
blood on the altar, and burn their fat as an offering made by fire for a
sweet aroma to the LORD. 18
"And their flesh shall be yours, just as the wave breast and the right
thigh are yours. 19 "All
the heave offerings of the holy things, which the children of Israel offer to
the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and daughters with you as an
ordinance forever; it is a covenant of salt forever before the LORD with
you and your descendants with you."
20 Then the LORD said to Aaron: "You shall have no
inheritance in their land, nor shall you have any portion among them; I am your
portion and your inheritance among the children of
Not only did God have
this plan for Aaron and his family he also had made sure all the Levites were
taken care of as well.
Numbers 18: 21
" Behold, I have given the children of Levi all the tithes in
While the Levites would
not inherit any land God has given them these tithes of the heave offering as
their inheritance. Tithing was commanded by God under the OT and the children
of
2 Corinthians 9:6 But
this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who
sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
7 So let each one give as he purposes in his
heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver.
When we give we are to
give from the heart and we are to do so
cheerfully. Being able to give back to God some of that which he has
blessed us with should make us feel happy to do so. We should also give based
on how much we prosper.
1 Corinthians 16:2 2 On the first day of the
week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper,
that there be no collections when I come.
There is a definite
difference between OT giving and NT giving. The reason I want to point this out
is because may are confused in the religious world when it comes to giving
because many of them teach that tithing is something that applies to the
NT Christian when it does not. Giving
10% or tithing is no way form of fashion taught under the new covenant. The
passages that we just looked at show that God has not given us the choice on
how much we give to the Lord. Now we may give 10% then again we may give 20%
but God knows our heart and he knows if we are giving out necessity or if we
are giving out of love. I guess the main reason so many are confused about
tithing is because they don’t understand that
the OT law does not apply to us today. They haven’t taken the time
to understand such clear passages such
as.
Hebrews 8:13 13 In that He says, "A new covenant,"
He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing
old is ready to vanish away.
Colossians 2:14 14 having wiped out the handwriting
of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken
it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.
These are 2 passages out
many the teach that we do not go by the OT laws and therefore we are not under the law of tithing. Those who
practice tithing today only do so with their money. Again, they still don’t
understand the practice of tithing because it was much more than just giving
a tenth of their money it involved a
tenth of many of their possession such as livestock and grains. Now lets turn
our attention back to our text starting in verse 25.
Numbers 18: 25
Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 26
"Speak thus to the Levites, and say to them: 'When you take from the
children of Israel the tithes which I have given you from them as your
inheritance, then you shall offer up a heave offering of it to the LORD, a
tenth of the tithe. 27 'And
your heave offering shall be reckoned to you as though it were the grain
of the threshing floor and as the fullness of the winepress. 28 'Thus you shall also offer a heave
offering to the LORD from all your tithes which you receive from the children
of Israel, and you shall give the LORD's heave offering from it to Aaron the
priest. 29 'Of all your gifts
you shall offer up every heave offering due to the LORD, from all the best of
them, the consecrated part of them.' 30
"Therefore you shall say to them: 'When you have lifted up the best of it,
then the rest shall be accounted to the Levites as the produce of the
threshing floor and as the produce of the winepress. 31 'You may eat it in any place,
you and your households, for it is your reward for your work in the
tabernacle of meeting. 32
'And you shall bear no sin because of it, when you have lifted up the best of
it. But you shall not profane the holy gifts of the children of
Isn’t that interesting?
Until I started preparing for this lesson I had not remembered this aspect of
their tithing. I didn’t realize that
once the Levites took 10% that they had to turn around and give a tenth of the
tithe to the Lord and Aaron. When you take just a little bit of time and study
the OT you can find all kinds of neat little tidbits like this one.
Chapter 19 gives us the
details on how a person it to made clean after touching a dead body. I want us
to look at the first 10 verses just see what the priest had to do in order
provide away for someone to be made clean.
Numbers 19:1 Now the
LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, 2
"This is the ordinance of the law which the LORD has commanded,
saying: 'Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring you a red heifer
without blemish, in which there is no defect and on which a yoke
has never come. 3 'You shall
give it to Eleazar the priest, that he may take it outside the camp, and it
shall be slaughtered before him; 4
'and Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger, and
sprinkle some of its blood seven times directly in front of the tabernacle of
meeting. 5 'Then the heifer
shall be burned in his sight: its hide, its flesh, its blood, and its offal
shall be burned. 6 'And the
priest shall take cedar wood and hyssop and scarlet, and cast them into
the midst of the fire burning the heifer.
7 'Then the priest shall wash his clothes, he shall bathe in
water, and afterward he shall come into the camp; the priest shall be unclean
until evening. 8 'And the one
who burns it shall wash his clothes in water, bathe in water, and shall be
unclean until evening. 9
'Then a man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and
store them outside the camp in a clean place; and they shall be kept for
the congregation of the children of Israel for the water of purification; it is
for purifying from sin. 10 'And the one who gathers the ashes of the heifer
shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until evening. It shall be a statute
forever to the children of
I always find it amazing
how many detailed steps these people had to go through. Verse 11 – 22 basically
states that if a person touches some dead that they will be unclean for 7 days
and then part of their purification consist of them using water on the 3rd
and 7th day and these ashes of this burnt bull were to be used as
well. If a person did not go through the purification process they would remain
unclean. It also tells us that whatever an unclean person touches becomes
defiled and if you touch what they touched you will be unclean until the
evening. When you think about what they had to back then to make themselves
clean it should really make us thankful today that we don’t have to go through
so many ritual that all we have to do is made clean once through baptism into
Christ and from then on if we sin all we have to do is repent and confess our
sins to God and they will be forgiven.
When we begin looking at
chapter we need to realize that about 37 or 38 years have passed by. We only
learn about the first few years of their journey and the last few years of
their journey.
Numbers 20:1 Then
the children of Israel, the whole congregation, came into the Wilderness of Zin
in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh; and Miriam died there and
was buried there.
We find out that Miriam
dies at this time. I am sure by now that there were very few of those who were
20 years and older still alive at this time.
2
Now there was no water for the congregation; so they gathered together against
Moses and Aaron. 3 And the
people contended with Moses and spoke, saying: "If only we had died when
our brethren died before the LORD! 4
"Why have you brought up the assembly of the LORD into this wilderness,
that we and our animals should die here?
5 "And why have you made us come up out of
Well as you can see even
this new generation seems to have a problem with complaining and trusting that
Moses is their chosen leader by God. Once again we will see Moses come to the
rescue.
6
So Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the door of the
tabernacle of meeting, and they fell on their faces. And the glory of the LORD
appeared to them. 7 Then the
LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 8
"Take the rod; you and your brother Aaron gather the congregation
together. Speak to the rock before their eyes, and it will yield its water;
thus you shall bring water for them out of the rock, and give drink to the
congregation and their animals." 9
So Moses took the rod from before the LORD as He commanded him.
So far everything seems
fine. Moses is doing his usually thing and praying to God to help the children
of
10
And Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock; and he said
to them, "Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring water for you out of this
rock?" 11 Then Moses
lifted his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod; and water came out
abundantly, and the congregation and their animals drank. 12 Then the LORD spoke to Moses
and Aaron, "Because you did not believe Me, to hallow Me in the eyes of
the children of
I want you to think about
all the things that Moses did wrong here. First of all he disobeyed Gods
command. Instead of speaking the rock he spoke to the people and struck the
rock. Second of all he did not give God the glory for this miracle instead he
said must we bring water from this rock. The third thing that he failed to do
was to have enough faith in God that speaking to the rock would bring about
water and finally the fourth thing he failed to be an example of how a Godly
man should behave. Because of his sin and Aarons God makes the judgment call
that now Moses nor his brother will enter into the promise land. I really think
this shows that God is a just God and that he does not show partiality. Even
though Moses and Aaron did many wonderful things for God it did not excuse them
from this sin that they committed against God.
I think we learn several
things from this. First of I personal think that Moses simply lost here.
Normally he was very humble man but in heat of the moment he sinned against
God. We to learn from Moses example to do our best not to allow the heat the
moment to cause us to sin. James gives us the best advice on how to maintain
our composure.
James
We also learn from Moses
that it is important that we obey God instructions and not try to do it our way
as Moses struck the rock instead of speaking to it. Another thing we learn is
not to give ourselves the glory for something God has done. Notice what Paul
teaches us.
Colossians 3:17
And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord
Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.
Finally we learn from
Moses that we should not doubt in Gods ability to do what he says he will do,
instead we should take great comfort
knowing that he is all powerful and that he keeps his promises. If we do all of
the things then certainly we will be good example of what Christians is all
about.
14-21 We learn that Moses wants to go through
Numbers 20: 22
Then the children of Israel, the whole congregation, journeyed from Kadesh and
came to
Here we see God keeping
his promise about Aaron entering into the promise land. I am sure that Aaron
was happy to see his son take his place
as he died on top of the mountain. The whole congregation was sad at his
passing and they mourned for 30 days the same amount days that they mourn for
Moses later on when he passes away as well.