Series E -- God’s Laws

Lesson 15

CONTEMPT FOR GOD

BACK TO THE WILDERNESS

From Numbers 14

“When the people of Israel heard the unfavourable report of the spies, they began to cry with a loud voice. They cried all night, raising their voices against Moses and Aaron with bitter complaints. If only we could have died in Egypt! They moaned. Or even if we could have died in the wilderness! Why does the Lord bring us to this new land where we will be killed with swords and our wives and children be taken into slavery? Wouldn’t it be better for us to return to Egypt? Let’s find a new leader to take us back there. Moses and Aaron fell with their faces to the ground before the people. Two of the spies, Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, tore their clothes and spoke to the people. The land on which we spied is a good land, they insisted. If the Lord is pleased with us, He will bring us into the land, a land flowing with milk and honey and give it to us. But you must not rebel against the Lord or fear the people of the land. They are like bread for us to eat, for the Lord has taken away their protection and He is with us. So you must not fear them.

When the people heard this, they talked of stoning Joshua and Caleb.

But suddenly the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people at the tabernacle. Then the Lord spoke to Moses. How long will these people reject Me? the Lord said. How long will they refuse to believe in Me, even though I have shown them so many miracles? I will strike them with a great plague and cut them off from Me and I will make a great nation from you and your descendants, a nation greater and mightier than they. But Moses pleaded with the Lord for the people. The Egyptians will hear of this and they will tell the inhabitants of the Promised Land about it, he said. They know how You took our people from Egypt with mighty miracles and how You go with us and talk with us face to face. They know how You are here in the pillar of cloud and fire, leading us and protecting us day and night. But if You kill all these people, the nations who have heard of Your miracles will say, ‘The Lord could not bring these people into the land He promised them, so He killed them in the wilderness.’ Now please show the power of Your forgiveness, even though You have said that You punish sin, even to the third and fourth generations. Forgive these people, I beg You, as You have forgiven them through Your steadfast love since we left Egypt.”

Yes, I will forgive them, as you have asked, the Lord said. But you know how My glory surely fills all of the earth. Just as surely will these men never see the land I promised to their ancestors. For they have seen My miracles in Egypt and in the wilderness and yet ten times have they refused to listen to Me. But My servant Caleb may go into the land, for he has a different spirit and has trusted Me completely. I will bring him into the land and his descendants shall possess it. Now, since these people fear the Amalekites and Canaanites who live in the valleys, you must turn away from them tomorrow and go back into the wilderness toward the Red Sea. The Lord also told Moses, How long will these wicked people complain about Me (for I have heard all their complaints)? Tell them that I will do all they have feared, for they will indeed die in the wilderness. Not one of these complaining people who is twenty years of age or older shall enter the Promised Land, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun. But their children, whom they said would become slaves, will go into the land they have despised. The dead bodies of these people will fall in this wilderness, for they must wander in the wilderness for forty years. Because of the unfaithfulness of these people, their children will have to continue living as shepherds in the wilderness for forty years, until the last of these complaining people dies.

“As the spies were in the land for forty days, so shall these people remain in the wilderness for forty years; one year for each day; bearing the burden of their sins and learning My displeasure of them. I, the Lord, have spoken. This I will do to all those who have conspired against Me in this wilderness. In the very wilderness where they have turned against Me, they will die. Then the ten spies who stirred the people against the Lord died of a plague before the Lord. Only Joshua and Caleb were spared. There was great mourning among the people when Moses reported what the Lord had said. Early the next morning they were ready to go into the Promised Land. We have sinned, they said. But now we are ready to go to the land which the Lord has promised. No! Moses urged. You are disobeying the Lord again, for He has ordered you into the wilderness. You must not go into the land or your enemies will defeat you. The Amalekites and Canaanites are there and they will conquer you with the sword, for you have turned away from following Him and He will not be with you. But the people went anyway, going to the hill country with neither the Ark of the Covenant nor Moses with them. As Moses had said, the Amalekites and Canaanites defeated them, chasing them all the way to Hormah.

COMMENTARY

THE ROUTE OF THE SPIES

The Israelite spies did not peek around corners and rush from bush to bush. The road they travelled, later named “Route of the Spies,” was probably undefended. Years later, it was protected by a line of forts, which makes it possible to trace the route taken earlier by the spies. The twelve men travelled through the Wilderness of Zin to Arad. From there they took the road of Aphrath and travelled on to Hebron, a very old city. Abraham himself stayed in Hebron and his body was buried there. The spies were frightened at the strength of the tall people who lived there, called the Anakim. Farther on, they found the fierce Amalekites of the Negeb, the Amorites, Jebusites, the Hittites of the hills and the Canaanites by the sea. But the fruits of this land were as tantalizing as the people were forbidding. The spies returned with a cluster of grapes so large they named the valley “Eshcol,” which meant “Bunch, Cluster.” Yet the Israelites ignored the plenty and remained frightened by the danger.

TEST YOURSELF

1.) Which of the following best describes how the people of Israel reacted to the spies’ report?

            A) Wailing and moaning

            B) Profound gratitude

            C) Joy and merriment

            D) Ambivalence

2.) What did the people discuss doing to Joshua and Caleb?

            A) Give them wives

            B) Make them leaders instead of Moses and Aaron

            C) Give them money to shut up

            D) Stone them

3.) Who were the only two people of that generation of Israelites who would enter the promise land?

            A) Samuel and Brisbane

            B) David and Aaron

            C) Joshua and Caleb

            D) Ergo and Murdock

4.) What was the road the spies travelled into the promise land called?

            A) “The Road of Wilderness Doom”

            B) “The Path of The Twelve”

            C) “The Route of The Spies”

            D) “The Road of Clustered Grapes”

5.) What changes came over this road after the Israelites occupied the promised land?

            A) The road was paved

            B) Palm-trees were planted along it

            C) Forts were erected along it

            D) Wine presses were build at each end