THE SECOND GENERATION: ADMONITIONS

The Second Generation: Admonitions

“ ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your
God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might’ ” (Deut. 6:4, 5, NKJV).


A Word to the Wise . . .
Joe Underhill, Berrien Center, Michigan, U.S.A
Introduction
1 Cor. 10:11

It is said that we are condemned to repeat the mistakes of our parents. Sometimes we try to blame our failures on our genes. we can argue that the children of the Israelites who were redeemed from slavery had the same character faults as their parents. All this may be true. However, God does not desire for us to continue failing the same way our parents have. rather, He desires for us to rise above our circumstances. “Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction” (1 Cor. 10:11, NASB).

I felt the pain of not having taken the time to study.

Personally, I have a difficult time learning from other people’s mistakes. I like to find things out on my own. This has led me to experience some pain that I could have avoided if only I had listened to the warnings I received. As a freshman at Andrews University, I received a lot of advice about going to bed at a decent time, eating right, and taking time to study. However, as many freshmen do, I completely ignored most of this advice. I stayed up late watching movies and playing video games. while it seemed fun in the beginning, when exams came around for Foundations of Biology and western Heritage, I felt the pain of not having taken the time to study.

I had ignored the admonitions of my parents, RAs, deans, and teachers. The children of Israel had the same problem. God and Moses warned them verbally. However, they also chose to learn the hard way. God again gave verbal warnings to the second generation to follow His commands so all would go well in their lives. It is important for our well-being to heed such warnings. ecclesiastes says it’s better to be a poor youth who is willing to receive admonition, than a rich king who is not (eccles. 4:13).

As you read the lesson for this week, I challenge you to examine your life and, with an open heart, take note of the areas God may be admonishing you to change.

REACT
1. Describe a time when you did not listen to the warnings of others. what did you learn from that experience?
2. Describe a time when you heeded the admonition of a friend and experi- enced the resulting blessing.




Better Off the First Time
J. Amanda McGuire, Berrien Springs, Michigan, U.S.A.
Evidence
Numbers 26−32

Numbers 26–32 deals with events prior to the Israelites’ conquest of Canaan. The last of the former generation has died (Numbers 26), and the second generation is preparing to enter. They are aware of their history and the trouble caused by their parents. The daughters of Zelophehad are aware that their father had sinned (Num. 27:3), but they wanted to ensure that he was not further punished for the lack of sons.* God backs the women’s request and commands that they be given their father’s inheritance. Here is an instance of God’s justice intermingled with mercy.

It is much better to obey God the first time!

Though the older generation was condemned to die in the wilderness, God spared their children and fulfilled His promises to the nation as a whole. To bless them, God must have their loyalty. He uses a number of offerings, laws, sacrifices, and vows (Numbers 26–30) to remind them of their ritual obligations to Him. These were to teach the Israelites the principle of substitutionary death for the forgiveness of sins. They were reminders that it is God who saves them from their sins.

Chapters 31 and 32 detail the final military acts of the Israelites, as well as the pledge that the Reubenites and half the tribe of Manasseh will join their kinsman in conquering the Promised Land. This second generation has proved more faithful than their parents, and the promise is about to be fulfilled. It is often easy to pass judgment on those who have gone before us, but we should avoid doing so. Yet, we need to learn from their mistakes.

What are you doing that is contrary to God’s will? Do you still expect Him to bless you? If He forgives you, will there still be consequences for your actions, in spite of His grace? The biggest lesson we can learn from the Israelites’ wilderness saga is that it is much better to obey God the first time! However, there is comfort in knowing that when we mess up, God can set things right, even though the road back may be longer and more painful.

REACT
What promises do you believe God has made to you, personally?
____________
*Roy e. Gane, Leviticus, Numbers: The NIV Application Commentary (Grand rapids, Mich.: Zonder-
van, 2004), pp. 740, 741.




Faithful Wounds of a Friend
Alvin Glassford, Berrien Springs, Michigan, U.S.A.
Logos
Numbers 26−32, Prov. 27:6; Romans 5

Deceived? (Numbers 31; 32)
Israel’s victory over the Midianites must have been quite impressive. Their commanding officers counted the soldiers and discovered that not one Israelite soldier had been killed (Num. 31:49). Moses had sent a thousand men from each tribe into battle (Num. 31:5), and all had returned victorious. Is it possible that the reubenites and Gadites were deceived into thinking that the conquests west of the Jordan would be just as easy? That their absence from among the fighting men would not make any real difference?

Turn away from God’s express will, and if you are fortunate, you will get to die a natural death in the desert.

Or perhaps it was just a simple matter of greed. God had already told Moses that the land was to be distributed by casting lots (Num. 26:54, 55). Had the sight of the fertile grasslands east of Jordan prompted an attempt at preemptive deal making?

The fact is, we are not told what their real motive was. We are left to surmise what lay behind their request by how Moses responded to them.

Mad Moses (Num. 32:6−14)
Moses was very near 120 years old (Deut. 34:7), yet his eyes and strength had not failed him—eyes that had seen Pharaoh’s army drown in the red Sea and strength that had lugged stone tablets written by the finger of God off the top of Mount Sinai. Now this! even today his response to Reuben and Gad seems to smolder on the pages of the Bible with righteous rage. Moses accuses them of wanting to sit out upcoming battles of conquest, of doing just what their fathers had done by refusing to follow God wholeheartedly, and of being “a brood of sinners” (Num. 32:14, NIV).

Moses had just sent twelve thousand Israelites into battle and defeated five Midianite kings (Num. 31:8). Amongst the dead was Israel’s old nemesis Balaam, son of Beor (Num. 31:8). Praise God! But you don’t have to go to war to suffer defeat! Moses had seen it too many times before. Turn away from God’s express will, and if you are fortunate, you will get to die a natural death in the desert. Moses loved these people. He knew for a fact that God loved even this “brood of sinners,” and so he warns them of the dire consequences of their actions. “If you
turn away from following him, he will again leave all this people in the desert, and you will be the cause of their destruction” (Num. 32:15, NIV).

Yes. Moses is angry! But notice he does not say, “If you turn away from following me.” He has learned to be angry about the things God is angry about and yet not sin.

Faithful Wounds (Num. 32:16−42)
For the sake of argument, let’s assume that Reuben and Gad were guilty of everything Moses accused them of. Notice the effect of Moses’ words: “Then they came up to him and said . . .” (Num. 32:16, NIV). whatever their motive might have been for making their request, the recounting of their father’s failures in the past had its desired effect, and they came even closer to Moses.

At best, Reuben and Gad had not taken offense at Moses’ tirade against them. At worst, they had quickly repented of their grievous mistake and had come up with a solution that honored God. However, they were still not in a hurry to assuage Moses’ fear of another full-blown apostasy. Instead, they restated their desire to build sheep pens and cities for their families east of Jordan (Num. 32:16). Then without a hint of hurt pride at Moses’ harsh accusations, they proposed to go ahead of all Israel and fight the battles of conquest on the west side of Jordan.

Moses favorably responded to their proposal, and the rest of Numbers 32 takes the format of a formal contract with all the conditions and promises being publicly restated, along with devastating consequence for any failure to follow through on the part of Reuben and Gad.
Proverbs 27:6 states that “faithful are the wounds of a friend” (NKJV). Reuben and Gad had allowed their eyes to be opened by the white-hot anger of Moses’ words, because they had come to trust him. even if Moses were dead wrong in his hasty judgment of their proposal, they knew where his heart was, and they did not take offense. what a dramatic change in leader and those being led!

REACT
1. God had given specific directions on how the land was to be divided up. Is He always this flexible and willing to consider human counteroffers?
2. Do you have a “friend” like Moses whose words you will listen to even when they are wrong or extremely painful?
3. Is there an instance in your life right now where you need to be in the fore- front of your fellow Christians’ battles for a place in the kingdom?




Write the Last Chapter
Susan Pellandini, Battle Creek, Michigan, U.S.A.
Testimony
Deut. 6:4, 5; 1 Cor. 10:11, 12

“Satan well knows the material with which he has to deal in the human heart. He knows—for he has studied with fiendish intensity for thousands of years—the points most easily assailed in every character; and through successive generations he has wrought to overthrow the strongest men, princes in Israel, by the same

“Today the challenge to Israel might be repeated.”

temptations that were so successful at Baalpeor. All along through the ages there are strewn wrecks of character that have been stranded upon the rocks of sensual indulgence. As we approach the close of time, as the people of God stand upon the borders of the heavenly Canaan, Satan will, as of old, redouble his efforts to prevent them from entering the goodly land. He lays his snares for every soul. It is not the ignorant and uncultured merely that need to be guarded; he will prepare his temptations for those in the highest positions, in the most holy office; if he can lead them to pollute their souls, he can through them destroy many. And he employs the same agents now as he employed three thousand years ago.”1

“They [Israel] had often felt impatient and rebellious because of their long wandering in the wilderness; but the Lord had not been chargeable with this delay in possessing Canaan; He was more grieved than they because He could not bring them into immediate possession of the Promised Land, and thus display before all nations His mighty power in the deliverance of His people. with their distrust of God, with their pride and unbelief, they had not been prepared to enter Canaan. They would in no way represent that people whose God is the Lord; for they did not bear His character of purity, goodness, and benevolence.”2

“Today the challenge to Israel might be repeated. The laws which God gave His ancient people were wiser, better, and more humane than those of the most civilized nations of the earth. The laws of the nations bear marks of the infirmities and passions of the unrenewed heart; but God’s law bears the stamp of the divine.”3

REACT
In what areas of your life are you ready to rely on God to lead you safely into
the heavenly promised land? ____________
1. Patriarchs and Prophets, pp. 457, 458.
2. Ibid., p. 464.
3. Ibid., p. 465.




Hope Amid Mistakes
Melissa Blackmer, Burtonsville, Maryland, U.S.A.
How-to
Num. 13:1–33; 14:1–43; 20:1–12

Two examples of what happens when we lose our faith in God and choose not to follow where He leads are (1) when Moses forgot that God was the One who brought water out of the rock and not he himself, and (2) when the people of Israel forgot that God Himself could win the battles with the Canaanites and that these victories would not involve the strength of their own armies. Both these stories end with the inability of God’s people to realize the destiny God so much wanted them to have. These stories can bring us hope if we remember the following:

All of us make mistakes.

Believe in the call and direction of God. If God has called you to do something, trust in His leading. Sometimes it feels as though He has promised us something that seems impossible to accomplish. Then it’s easy to second-guess Him or to feel that we must have misunderstood what He meant. This often causes us to set our own goals, which we feel we can accomplish ourselves. God, however, has given us many examples of the folly of looking to ourselves to accomplish something He has promised He will do.

Study the examples God has left for you. Not only through the Bible, but also through the life and testimony of those around you, God is calling you to learn from the mistakes of others and to choose to follow His paths. All of us make mistakes. But God asks us to learn from each other so that we can truly become like Him.

God loves you no matter how big or small your sins or mistakes may be. The story of God’s response to Moses’ striking the rock instead of just speaking to it, as God directed, gives us a clear view of how God feels about us when we sin. He could not allow Moses to lead His people into the Promised Land under these circumstances, but He never changed how He felt about Moses. Try to purposely see God in this way when you condemn yourself for a misstep or an outright sin. God wants us to repent. He does not always take away the consequences of our sins, but He doesn’t change how much He loves us. Our sins may change circumstances on earth, but if we learn from them, they also will help us grow closer to the God who loves us unconditionally!

Ask yourself tough questions. what would have happened if God had allowed His people to doubt Him, believe in their own strength, and still receive the same rewards promised? How do you see a loving God in these examples?




Follow Your Nose Home
Jenniffer Ogden, Austin, Texas, U.S.A.
Opinion
Num. 27:12−23

The human being’s sense of smell is the strongest of all the senses in trigger- ing memories. For me, the sharp scent of cedar makes me long for my Texas home. Moses had wandered for 40 years in the desert with his nation grumbling behind him. After one attempt to cross into the land God had promised, after lies were told and consequences faced, Moses once again stands at the edge of this land. He can smell it. So Moses asks God for a favor. And God responds.

If I were standing on the hills near my home . . . , I would be . . . trying like a ninja to get there.

Moses does not ask to go in, to just stick his toe over the border, or to go for a helicopter flight to see the territory. He doesn’t ask for a vision of what will be or for a bank deposit slip proving the future success of his beloved people. He simply asks who will take over what he has been doing for 40 years.

I know that if I were standing on the hills near my home and was told “No,” I would be wheedling and begging and trying like a ninja to get there. But Moses isn’t thinking about himself. He’s thinking about the people he loves, the people he has led and pleaded with for over the last four decades. Home is a quick jog away, but he only asks that God makes sure this baby nation is taken care of when he no longer has the job.

Sometimes, all I want is to be home, to sleep under the big bright Texas stars, and to breathe deeply the scent of cedar. And Moses? All he wanted was for Israel to suc- ceed in following God. Moses wanted the babies born in the desert to grow up on the land meant for them. Moses had been free in egypt. However, he had been traipsing through a desert for years, trapped by the failures of his people. Still, all he wanted was for them to make it home. And God? well, God did just that. He led them home.

REACT
1. who, in your life, has never given up on you? why do you think they continue to hold out for your success?
2. when you reach the end of your days and reflect on your life, what do you want others to remember about you?
3. Have you been impressed to pray for or encourage someone who appears to be struggling? Did you follow through on those impressions? what were the results?





Been There; Done That?
Gill Bahnsen, Auburn, Washington, U.S.A.
Exploration
Numbers 13; 14; 20

CONCLUDE
we can choose a different course for our lives based on what we learn from the lives of others. The stories of the Israelites wandering in the desert provide excellent material to study.


CONSIDER
Comparing the report Moses requested in Numbers 13:17–20 with the one he received from the spies in verses 26–29. what motive(s) did the majority of the spies appeal to when they argued for their preferred course of action?

Asking five or six physically fit people to stand side by side in a row. In- struct them to face forward as you walk behind them. Push one or two of the individuals out of line. Comment about how easy it was to do that. Next, have the members of the line link arms. Again, push one or two indi- viduals out (if possible). why was it more difficult this time? How does this relate to the ten fearful spies?

Discussing with friends which is more powerful in your lives—faith or fear—and under what circumstances each one is more powerful.

Listening to a copy of Michael Card’s album titled The Beginning. The songs “The wilderness,” “Lift up the Suffering Symbol,” and “A Face That Shone” are particularly appropriate for this week’s study.

Exploring in your journal the role fear plays in your life. Think about the information you receive that feeds your fear and about the times you have exercised faith. Ponder what the difference was between those negative and positive experiences. what can you do now to strengthen faith?

CONNECT
Hebrews 11:24–29. read April 19, May 11, and October 5 in Oswald Chambers’s My Utmost for His Highest. The readings can be accessed online at http://www.rbc.org/ utmost/index.php.