The following post is a summary of a message I gave a couple of weeks back from Week 6 of The Story:

“If you have been here recently you will know that we have seen the birth of a new nation ‐ right back to God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12, through the birth of the promised child Isaac, through the growth of the nation in Egypt and their exodus from Egypt to now being a tribe of well over one million people. There are two census in Numbers and each one comes in at just over 600,000 men aged over 20 years old.

Up until now God has spoken to one person at a time, be that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob or Joseph, how would he guide and lead a tribe >1,000,000 people? The promises are starting to be fulfilled, but what happens next? Some sort of order and structure is needed to organise this mass of people, some system of living is essential to prevent anarchy.

You can see all the yellow blocks below shows all the chapters about laws and regulations that God gives them. God tells them how he wants them to worship him, what they should eat, what to wear, how to fight, how to celebrate… etc. In the past people could claim ignorance and say they didn’t know any better ‐ not any more. Very little of life would be not be covered now.

But things were not as simple as one would hope. External enemies and internal resistance marred the progress of the Israelites becoming God’s people acting in accordance with his plan. The story of Numbers is the story of opposition ‐ opposition to the will of God for his people. We see scene after scene of failure to follow God in faith and trust. Every step forward seemed to be accompanied by another step backwards or sideways.

As soon as they leave Sinai we see the Israelites demonstrating every human, even natural weakness ‐ hunger, envy, fear, jealousy, thirst, impatience & sexual immorality. We see God’s provision and protection being constantly questioned, we see Moses’ leadership being repeatedly challenged and we see God judging and showing mercy to his fickle people…not much has changed has it? Are we so different? These are the results of a divine perfection colliding with imperfect sinners.

Through it all God was looking to find out if his people would trust him, if they would trust in his protection and provision and follow him obediently. God through Moses sets out the way to life before them ‐ all the yellow blocks… he says blessings will come if you obey, and curses will come if you disobey.

So what do we need to learn from all this? Deuteronomy 30.1 – when all these blessings and curses come upon you…ie some time in the future, when you come back in repentance, then God promises to circumcise their hearts in v6 so that we can love him with all our hearts…V 15‐19. When God says to you obey my law and you will live, we should respond “I cannot do it, I am too sinful, too weak. I chose not to live by the law. If keeping the law is the only way to life then I am going it die. My heart desires to obey, but my will is too corrupt, my emotions too fickle…give me another way or I am completely undone.”

Look at Romans 7.7-13 – the law teaches us that we cannot keep the law, it reveals sin in us. It is good in itself, but by its very goodness and our badness, the law brings us to our spiritual knees. And when we are on our knees finally, because we have failed over and over and over again and look up, what do we see? We see a dying Saviour, giving his blood to give us an alternative to living by the law…through a righteousness apart from the law. This is what the Israelites couldn’t understand, that the law could never make them right with God. Abraham believed God and it was credited as righteousness.

Later on in Romans 10.5-10.  Paul is deliberately putting these two passages alongside each other and saying Moses sets down a righteousness by law, Christ the righteousness by faith. So many Christians get this all mixed up, we don’t understand our relationship to the law. So many of us still live by the law, thinking that we will be accepted if we just try a bit harder. We must receive as a gift what we could never earn as a payment.

It reminds me of Poldark ‐ one episode he marries his scullery maid Demelza (a big scandal!) and after the wedding she goes back to scrubbing the floors and cleaning the pots. She hasn’t realised she is his wife now, she is still serving her master rather than loving her beloved. Eventually she learns how to be his wife, and even others notice ‐ at a ball one of the older ladies asks “who is that young person, quite lovely don’t you think”…”That’s Demelza, Ross’ wife”…”The scullery maid!” she replies with a look of horror. She has grown up so much that one of them turns to the other and says ‐ “I see no scullery maid Ma’ma!”

That is what God wants for his church. Faith in a promise, not my performance. He looks at us this morning and says to us I see no scullery maid! I see my  bride. Deuteronomy 30.19 vs Romans 10.9 the word of obedience vs the word of faith. Choose which one you will serve today ‐ choose faith, choose grace, choose life.