Count 'Em...Now Count 'Em Again

Fresh off of the dry book of Leviticus, we find ourselves in Numbers and to my great disappointment, things don't get any more interesting any time soon. The first half of Numbers describes the census. We get counts of the descendants of the 12 tribes of Israel - how many men "twenty years old or more who were able to serve in the army." Guess what? There were a lot of them. A Lot. 603, 550 to be exact. Then we learn where all 603,550 of these people had their tribal camps. Keep in mind, we're still wandering in the desert. These are not their permanent homes, yet we get a full description of where each tribe camps in relation to the other tribes. Riveting stuff. Then we get descriptions of what each tribe is to carry as they continue to wander the desert. And then we take a census of how many men are in certain tribes. The author throws in a chapter about how to tell if a wife has been unfaithful and then we count some more people. And then, THEN, we get to see what each tribe brings as an offering to God. That goes on for 3 pages. The only thing that was of much significance to me in the first half of this book was the introduction of the priestly blessing. It is one that is used to this day in our church and one that I've always kind of liked myself.

"The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face to shine upon you
and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face toward you
and give you peace."

Finally in the second half of this book, we see the Israelites prepare to take occupancy of the promised land - the land that they were promised flowed of milk and honey. In preparing to do this, there were many offerings given. Aaron dies - he angered the Lord a while back and was told he would never enter the land promised to his fathers. The Israelites do battle with many other peoples and defeat them all because God has gone before them. Even with all this proof that God is with them, they are quite the group of complainers. They keep crying out that they were better off in Egypt and why did Moses take them out of that land where they had plenty to eat. Well, apparently their memories were short and warped. They were slaves in Egypt and their lives were pretty miserable back then. So in the desert they complain that they have no food so God sends them manna, which I'm guessing is some sort of grain-based item. Then they complain that all they have to eat is manna and they want something else so God sends them quail - and lots of it. They're never happy.

So, yeah, I see the lesson here. Not so much with all the counting, but here yes, I get it. Humans are never satisfied. I know I'm not. I tell myself, I'll be happy when I buy a house. I buy a house and I'm not happy. I tell myself I'll be happy when I find a way to go to graduate school. I finish graduate school and I'm not happy. I tell myself I'll be happy if I could run a marathon. I run a marathon - heck I run two for good measure - and I'm not happy. You see the pattern here. See, I don' think I'm all that unusual in this respect. I couldn't have accomplished any of those things without God, yet am I satisfied? Do I even bother to thank God for what I've been given? Nope. I'm just worried about what unfulfilled want is next on my list. I think that's human nature. Yet, while I was reading this book, I couldn't help but think how stupid these people are. How could they be so blind to the blessings they've received? It took several days, and a sermon from Pastor Larry, for me to see that I've done the same thing.

The book of Numbers ends with the second census. Back to the counting before we cross into the promised land. Ok - the book actually ends with descriptions of all the places the Israelites camped, in chronological order, no less.

But come on, there was a lot of counting.