Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 11-13.

Back in Exodus chapter 12 it mentioned that when the Israelites left Egypt many other people went with them.  Here it calls those non-Israelites who accompanied them “rabble”.  I believe that the writer was referring to those who accompanied the Israelites, but had not yet integrated themselves into any of the tribes more than a year after leaving Egypt.  This “rabble” stirred up the Israelites to demand some sort of food other than manna.   Rather than turn to God and ask Him for meat, they began to complain and rebel because they did not have meat.  In turn Moses complained to God about the people complaining to him.  In particular, Moses complained about being overwhelmed by the demands the people were putting on him.  So, God tells Moses to select 70 elders upon whom God will pour His Spirit and that He will provide them with meat.  Moses asked where he was going to get meat for 600,000 men.  To which God replied, “Is the Lord’s arm too short?”  Moses then appointed 70 elders upon whom God poured out His Spirit and God provided the Israelites with so much quail that they became sick.  So, whatever trials you face, remember, the Lord’s arm is not too short to reach out and solve them for you.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 11-13.

The first thing I thought about when I read today’s passage is that skeptical historians hold that the Exodus could not have happened as described by the Bible because the Sinai Peninsula could not have supported a group of people as large as the one recorded here and elsewhere in the Bible.  That position relies on the belief that miracles do not happen.  This passage makes it clear that God miraculously provided for the Children of Israel while they were in the wilderness.  However, I want to focus on Moses appointing seventy elders at God’s command.  Previously, Moses’ father-in-law had told him that he needed to delegate some of the task of managing the Israelites to others.  Nevertheless, when we get to this passage, Moses is still taking the full burden on himself, which leads him to beg God to give him help, or to take his life.  In response, God told Moses to bring together seventy elders and leaders of the people and God would pour out His Spirit upon them.  Two of the seventy whom Moses appointed did not come to the meeting of the elders which Moses called.  Nevertheless, God poured His Spirit out on those two when He poured it out on the other sixty-eight.  All seventy began prophesying when God’s Spirit came upon them.  Joshua wanted Moses to stop the two who had not joined the others at the tent of meeting, but Moses refused.  Moses replied that he wished God would pour out His Spirit on all of His people.  We should wish the same today.  Or more precisely, we should wish that off of God’s people accept His Spirit being poured out upon them and into them.  Further than that, I wish that all of the people I know, and even the people I do not know, would accept God’s Spirit.

I want to add a note that I believe there is a connection between Moses choosing seventy elders and Jesus sending out seventy disciples (some manuscripts say seventy-two, but the parallel to here makes me think it was seventy).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 11-13.

Today’s passage recounts several occasions where trouble broke out among the people of Israel.  Before today I never noticed that the passage indicates that a part of the fault for these problems belonged to Moses.  First, some of the discontent among the people resulted from Moses failing to set up a system for the people to resolve conflicts and report their discontent.  When the people began complaining about the lack of variety in their diet, Moses recognized that he could not carry the burden alone and cried out to God for help.  God answered Moses by pouring His Spirit out on 70 leaders of the people chosen by Moses.  Then we have an incident where Miriam and Aaron complain about Moses getting all of the credit for leading the people (complaints which the passage tells us came about because Moses had married a non-Israelite).  The writer chooses this point to tell us that Moses was a very humble man.  I read this as telling us that Moses was hesitant to shut down arguments for another course of action after a decision had been reached.  Now I want to be clear, I do not think that Moses was to blame for these incidents, merely that there were things he could have done differently which may have ameliorated the discontent.  For example, Miriam and Aaron, who complained about Moses getting all of the credit for speaking with God, could have stepped up and established a team like the 70 leaders whom Moses appointed when things got to be too much for him.   For that matter, the people could have appointed a team like that to report to Moses.  So, while Moses could have done things better as a leader, those who followed him are to blame for not making up for his shortcomings (and when I say “shortcomings” I do not mean that someone else would have been better, every human being has ways in which they fall short of this sort of leadership task).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 11-13.

My first reaction to reading the story of the quail was to think, “How often have I been guilty of what the Children of Israel did here?”  It also seemed to me that it is hard to avoid.  When times are hard and life consists of the same thing over and over again, it is just human nature to desire something different.  However, then I realized that the desire for something different was not their sin.  Their sin was in complaining about what God had provided.  They complained because they did not have the luxuries which they had experienced and desired to go back to the terrible situation which they had begged God to rescue them from.  They did not beg God for some variety.  They complained that He had rescued them from a terrible situation because their new life did not include the luxuries of that previous life.  So, their sin here was not the desire for more variety than God was providing them.  It was not even the fact that they were ungrateful for the way in which God had provided for them (although that is also a sin which we should avoid).  No, their sin was complaining that God had not provided them with variety and wishing to be back in the situation from which He had rescued them.  Asking God, even pleading with Him, to relieve the tedium of your life is not a sin, but complaining about the ways in which He has provided for you is.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Numbers 11-13.

Yesterday I wrote about the fiery cloud which led the people of Israel through the wilderness.  Yet despite that daily evidence of God’s presence with them, today we read that the Israelites complained about the food which God provided them.  Even Moses complained to God (although his complaint was mostly about having to deal with the rest of the Israelites).  There are two lessons here.  The Israelites complained because they chose to remember only the good parts about their time in Egypt.  When they thought about the things in Egypt which they missed, they failed to remind themselves why they had given those things up.  As for Moses’ complaint, that arose from him not delegating any of his responsibilities.  He tried to do it all himself, which no one could have done.  Many leaders suffer burnout just as Moses did because they do not recruit others to carry some of the burden with them.

Then Aaron and Miriam complained about Moses’ authority.  When Moses began delegating some of his authority to the 70 elders, Aaron and Miriam felt slighted.  Before Moses chose the 70 elders, for all intents and purposes, Miriam and Aaron, as his siblings and the only people to whom he had delegated any power, had equal power with Moses.  When it was just the three of them, the people had to assume that anything Miriam or Aaron said represented what Moses said.  The 70 elders were a small enough group to go directly to Moses for clarification if they thought something Miriam or Aaron said did not match what Moses had said.  So, despite the continual evidence of God’s presence and care, the Israelites, even the highest among them, complained and whined about what God provided for them.