Numbers Study - 2025-09-24

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Okay, so tonight, number 17, we're going to pray first, but it's Aaron's Rod. I'm sure some of you

guys or all of you have heard this passage before. Really cool. I feel like there's a ton to it that

we can even go get into in the small groups that I may have, you know, there's so many facets of it,

so there's things that I think we'll draw out in our small group time that I don't even have

prepared here. But one thing that I thought was really interesting and was cool was while I was

preparing for this, there's this tree next to my deck that is kind of like dying, has had to miss

you some termite stuff. And so it blooms in the spring and has purple flowers. It's actually really

pretty. And then, but this one branch was kind of dead because I had some termite damage. And

then this past week, while I'm getting ready for this message, this dead looking branch decides to

bloom, like seven months too late. And so the rest of the tree is losing its flowers. And this

has some green leaves and shoots and purple flowers. I took a picture we can look at in

my small group. I'm like, what are the chances? We're talking about Aaron's rod, which was a dead

stick, growing flowers, and here's this dead stick on a tree deciding to bloom seven months too late.

So I'm sure there's a scientific explanation, but I also think God was involved in that. So

let's let's pray and just ask the Lord to speak through his word. Jesus, we just thank you so

much that you're here, God. I thank you, and we worship you, Lord, because you're holy, God,

you're so loving, and you're so present in our lives, God. And I just thank you for your word,

Lord. Thank you that it feeds our soul. Thank you that it gives us what we desperately need,

Lord. It teaches us about you, Lord. It cuts through and removes the things that aren't meant

to be there, Lord. And it fills us with just an awe and wonder of you. And I pray that tonight,

as we read this passage, that, yeah, we would just be in awe and wonder of how amazing you

are, God, and how you are just written and hidden, Lord, throughout the whole entire entirety

of Scripture, God. And we love you, and we worship you and pray this in your son's name,

Jesus. Amen. All right, so if any of you guys have been here over the last few weeks, you know

that Moses has had a pretty bad month. Seems like anything that can go wrong does go wrong.

They got all these rebels challenging him and his authority every single step of the way,

and anyone with young kids feels the same way, right? I feel like my little kids will challenge

my authority and everything, every boundary I set all along the way. So Moses, I'm sure,

feels like a dad of a bunch of brats that aren't listening. And so we see here two opposing spirits

that are just in every story. We see the flesh, and we see the Spirit of God. We see

the flesh that has pride and selfish ambition and wanting to be first and best.

At the same time, lacking faith in God and being full of fear. And then the other side is the

people who are submitted to the Spirit of God, and they're filled with humility. They're filled

with faith and courage. And so every single one of these stories, these true stories we're reading

in the Old Testament, you can see the battle between the two spirits. And I think about

Galatians 5, 17, it says, for the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit,

and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other. And we see this

happening time and time and time again. And I want to run through some of these examples

that we've read over just to kind of set the stage for what we're coming into here.

We saw Aaron and Miriam, which are Moses' own brother and sister, challenge his authority and

his leadership. They said, has the Lord only spoken to Moses? Is he the only one that he speaks to?

He speaks to us too. And right away, suddenly the Lord says, come out here, come to my temple.

And his presence comes down, and he just lays down the law and says, yes, I speak to you,

but I speak to him differently. I've chosen him. And then the presence of God lifts, and there's

Miriam, his sister, with leprosy. And Moses could have been like, ha, that's what happens when you

mess with me, you know? And instead, he falls on his face and he prays, and Miriam is healed

after seven days of leprosy. So we see this rising up, hey, I want to be a leader too.

And then Moses on the other side falls on his face and asks for mercy for them.

And then we see all of Israel believing the bad spies saying, hey, we can't take the

Promised Land. It's too hard, right? And they say, we wish we died in Egypt. We wish we died in the

wilderness. Literally, like, we don't even want what you have to offer God. We wish we were dead.

That would be better than being your people right now, because, you know, this is too hard

for us. We're basically dead. And they try to find a new leader. Again, let's get rid of

Moses. We need a new leader. Let's go back to slavery in Egypt. So God gets angry. He's about

to wipe them out. What does Moses do? He falls on his face. Humility and asking for mercy.

And God relents. He doesn't kill them. But he says, you're not going to enter the Promised

Land. You didn't want it. You didn't have faith. You're not going to walk into it,

but your kids will. And then last week, Danny Jackson shared on the Korah rebellion, which is

one of the craziest chapters. I recommend you listening to his teaching. It was awesome.

And Korah was a tribe that, like, did Levitical things. They're like,

but they weren't the priests. They served in the tabernacle.

And that wasn't good enough for them. So they come to Aaron and Moses and say,

aren't we all holy? Isn't every single one of the people in the tribe and, you know,

of Israel holy? Doesn't the Lord speak all of us? Isn't he with all of us?

Why do you make yourself leaders over us? And they wanted to be priests too.

They said everybody should be able to be a priest. And what does Moses do?

He falls on his face, it says, right off the bat. And then he says, let's let the Lord decide it.

And sure enough, there's judgment. The land opens up and swallows all of them.

And in that same exact chapter, you'd think, okay, that's settled. Like,

people should stop messing with Moses, right? And with Aaron. All of Israel comes and says,

you killed the people of the Lord. Like, Moses did it. Like, I don't think he can make the land

open up and swallow them. And so then God says, okay, like, you still don't believe me. You still

are rejecting me. I'm going to wipe you out. Moses and Aaron fall on their faces and pray.

And as the plague starts, there is Aaron, the high priest, and he runs out and stands in the

middle between those dying and those who are still alive. And with incense, he makes atonement,

and the plague stops right at him. And what a beautiful picture of Jesus, right? He comes out,

like Jesus comes down in the flesh, and he stands in between the penalty that we deserve

and makes atonement. And the penalty of sin is death, and it stops at him because he paid for it.

Aren't you glad that we serve a God who came down? A God who stands in between the living and the

dead and pays for the penalty? And so now, after all of that, there's rebellion, rebellion, rebellion.

We don't want what you have to offer Moses and Aaron. In reality, they're actually rejecting God

because in the Lord says in Numbers 14, in the midst of all this, he says, how long will these

people reject me? And I think that speaks a lot to authority, especially in the church,

but authority in general, that if there is an authority put in place by God and we

don't respect it, we push it away, we think that we should be equal and the leaders of everything,

and our opinion matters most, and we're rejecting what God has set up, we don't realize that in

many ways we're actually rejecting God and what he says. And so the Lord, instead of bringing

judgment and more wrath and more punishment, he gets ahead of it and wants to do a miracle of

grace. He wants to say, let's just put all of this behind us, let's settle it once and for all,

not through wrath, but let's bring about a miracle of grace to prevent further sin

so that they can just trust in Aaron as the high priest and everything he's going to do,

that God wants to do through him and for God. And so this is where we jump in. After all that

rebellion, after everything just falling apart, God says, let's settle this once and for all.

So let's hop into Numbers 17.

All right.

And the Lord spoke to Moses saying, speak to the children of Israel and get from them a rod

from each father's house, all their leaders according to their father's houses.

Twelve rods, write each man's name on his rod, and you shall write Aaron's name on the rod of Levi.

For there shall be one rod for the head of each father's house.

Then you shall place them in the tabernacle of meeting before the testimony where I meet with you,

and it shall be that the rod of the man whom I choose will blossom.

Thus I will rid myself of the complaints of the children of Israel which they make against you.

Now, rods are important. There's a reason that God chose rods. He could have chosen stones or,

you know, sacrifices or whatever, but he chose rods. And rods are always a symbol of authority,

a symbol of leadership. You know, elders back then, the people who were leading these tribes,

they had rods, you see. Kings had scepters, which is a form of rod. Shepherds had staves,

which is another form of a rod where they guide the sheep. It's a symbol of leadership

and authority. And God is saying, take those symbols of leadership and authority,

bring them to me, and I'll tell you whose leadership and authority I'm going to bless.

So they wanted to see who would be the high priest. And I think about it like,

if I were Aaron, I would be like, okay, can't you just tell them who it is? Do we have to

do this test where maybe I'm not going to get it? Like, wouldn't you think that like, my rod's

in there with all of theirs, I guess there's a chance I could not, it might not blossom. Like,

who knows? He already messed up with the golden calf. There were things that he did that weren't

right. Like, is there a chance it's not going to blossom and there's somebody else who's going

to get it? So he's sitting there. I believe he had faith, but you just never know. I mean,

doubt can creep in. He could have been upset that his rod was just like all the others in

there. He could have been stressed. He could have been angry. And the other interesting thing is,

all these other people of the other tribes, you don't see them fighting and saying like, hey,

we shouldn't do this. This isn't a good idea. God already told chose Aaron. Like, we should just

trust what he says. They all bring their rods in and they're all happy to do it, it seems like.

And I think all of them were probably thinking it could be me. Like, this could be my shot.

Like, I'm a better speaker than Aaron. He's not too good at this. Like, finally,

it's my time to shine. Or maybe they thought he doesn't have the best personality traits for

leadership. And all these thoughts could have been going in their heads of like,

this is my time. I'm going to shine. And we don't know. Like, Aaron, we don't know how

good of a leader he was in his own flesh, in his own abilities. There may have been better people

from the world's perspective that were fit for this role. Right? I mean, we even see that with David

when he was anointed king. But his brother, all his brothers looked like they would have been

better kings. But the Lord chose him because the Lord doesn't look at the outward appearance,

but looks at the heart. One thing that I will point out though, is we don't see Moses say

anything. He doesn't say a thing. He doesn't try to argue with everybody. He doesn't try to point out

his track record. He doesn't try to show how he really is the best and puff himself up to maintain

control and power. But he was just quiet. And I think that shows a level of trust in God.

That he didn't have to defend himself. He knew that this moment, if God said it,

he's going to do it. If God appointed him and called him, then he's going to bring it to pass.

And I think that's important for all of us in our lives. Right? We're not the high priest, or

we might not have the highest place of authority in our life, in our job, in the church,

whatever it is. But God has called us, all of us, to something. Something that's very important.

And we need to trust God that he'll bring it to pass. We need to stay silent and not respond

to every accusation and try to prove ourselves, but just rest in what he said and trust that he'll

bring it to pass. And realize that, just like Aaron, it's God's choice. It's not our own

abilities, usually, that we walk into God's calling for us. And we know that God's gifts

and callings are irrevocable, even though Aaron messed up with the whole golden calf,

he was still called his high priest. So God's favor and choice on you is based on him,

not on you. So you don't have to fight for your place in the kingdom of God,

you just have to walk in it. So this whole test is to show whose authority will be blessed.

And the way that the authority is being blessed, this rod, is really profound.

It's not the dead ones that are blessed with authority, it's not the sticks that go into

the presence of God and just remain the same with zero change. It's the ones that go into

the presence of God and come to life. It's the one branch that, in the presence of God,

will respond, come to life, and bear fruit. It wasn't the people that, in pride, said,

yeah, throw my stick, throw my name in the hat, I could do this, this is my time to shine.

Essentially rejecting what God originally said, the people who wanted to steal this authority.

But it was the guy who was silent, this one who trusted God and put his branch in there.

And I think that these branches really are a reflection of their hearts.

I believe that these people who were so hardened to God, were so prideful,

never even heard what he was saying, never even heard the warning of the Holy Spirit,

don't do this. Instead, we see Aaron, who loved God, trusted God, ministered to God,

and we see in the presence of God, in the ark, his is going to blossom and come to life.

And that is a great rule, I believe, for good leadership, whether it's leadership in your home,

as parents, as in work, whatever it is, the best leaders are not hard and prideful,

but have a soft, responsive heart to God, soft, responsive heart to his presence.

That when we hear him, that just thing inside of you just turns on.

Your heart just almost feels like it's on fire a bit when you hear him speak,

when you read his word and you just feel something rising up in you.

Those are the types of people that God really wants to use, and anybody can be that.

It's not special, it's not unique, it's not your own ability.

It's really just a heart posture, saying, God, I don't want to be hard.

Forgive me where I've been hardened, Lord. Give me a soft heart.

And it says, he will take out a heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh.

That is his promise. And so that's what good, Godly leadership looks like.

It's the person who is soft before him, and when he speaks, we walk in it and it produces fruit.

And I think about Psalm 84, 10. All of you guys probably know this one.

It says, it says, better is one day in your courts.

Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere.

I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.

Look, not even a good position. I would rather just stand at the door and be near you, God.

For the Lord God is a son and a shield. The Lord bestows favor and honor.

No good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.

And I just think that is such a picture of Aaron in this chapter, that it was the Lord's favor and

honor that was going to come upon him, and that he just wanted to be in God's presence.

Now, let's read verses 6 through 11.

So Moses spoke to the children of Israel, and each of their leaders gave him a rod of peace,

for each leader, according to their father's houses, took twelve rods, and the rod of Aaron was among

their rods. And Moses placed the rods before the Lord in the tabernacle of witness.

Now it came to pass on the next day that Moses went into the tabernacle of witness,

and behold, the rod of Aaron, of the house of Levi, had sprouted and put forth buds,

had produced blossoms, and yielded ripe almonds. Then Moses brought out all the rods from before

the Lord to all the children of Israel, and they looked, and each man took his rod. And the Lord

said to Moses, bring Aaron's rod back before the testimony, to be kept as a sign against the rebels,

that you may put their complaints away from me, lest they die. Thus did Moses just as the Lord

had commanded him. So he did. Now, Aaron's staff blossomed and produced fruit. A lot of people

believe that it was actually not that it went through all those stages, but that it had all

those stages at the same time, which is extremely rare, that it would have sprouts, and buds, and

blossoms, and fruit all at the same time. And the reasoning for that is that it is even beyond

the fact that it's a rod that has blossomed and brought forth almonds and had a name on it,

the fact that it would have all those at the same time is impossible to replicate. You can't go out

and cut off a branch from an almond tree. It would have all the same stage, all at the same time,

either it's just shoots, or it's just a bunch of blossoms, or all flowers, or all of it has

almonds. But it would never have all of them across the branch at different times, because

that would happen at different times of the year. So this is an infallible proof that God

had did a miracle and proved that Aaron was the high priest. And the other interesting thing is

since it's coming back to the ark to be an example and a testimony against the rebels who

might challenge it again in the future, it's pretty clear that these would have lasted continually

in the ark, in the presence of God, that the flowers would not wilt, the branch, the rod

would not die again, and there would still be almonds on there, fresh almonds. And there's a lot

of depth there that we're going to get into. But when I read this, especially in light of

this past Sunday with Jesus being the high priest, the Order of Melchizedek,

I see Jesus all over this, and I see the gospel all over it. Because we know that Jesus is

truly the high priest. We know that Aaron and all of this Levitical work and everything,

the sacrifices, the Bible says it is a shadow of the heavenly things. It is a foreshadowing

of what was going to come and be done by Jesus, and then everything would come to light and it

would all make sense. So we know that Jesus was truly the high priest, the chosen one.

And so just like Aaron was accused of not being, he shouldn't be the high priest,

you know, is this truly like the one that should be doing this? He didn't answer a word.

He didn't say a thing. He waited for God to vindicate him, and we see Jesus

accused of blasphemy, accused of all types of things that he didn't do, accused of sinning

all this stuff, and did he defend himself? He was silent, says like a lamb being led to the

slaughter. He didn't defend himself, didn't try to prove himself right. He was quiet,

and he waited for the Lord to vindicate him through his resurrection to prove his legitimacy

as the true high priest. And the other thing I see is that the rods, there were a bunch of rods,

and Aaron was just one of the rods in there, that he was essentially numbered with the rebels.

And we know Jesus was numbered among the sinners, numbered among the rebels on the cross. He was

surrounded by two sinners. He looked like, from the worldly perspective, just another one of those

guys, right? And this piece of wood that's the rod that sprouted new life, so we see Jesus on his

cross of wood brought new life to all of us. And just like that rod sitting in the secret place

before God's presence, right, overnight we see Jesus resting in the grave.

And in the morning when the rod was pulled out and showed unto everyone, proving the legitimacy

of Aaron, so in the morning on the third day Jesus rose again, showing himself to this followers,

proving that he is actually God, the Son of God and the high priest. And just like that rod

stayed blossomed and had eternal fruit inside the Ark of the Covenant, so we see Jesus is

forever risen. He didn't rise, it's not past tense, it's current when we say he is risen,

and he is seated at the right hand of the Father in his presence and glory. And the fruit that

lasts forever is the fruit of salvation, it's me and you, our souls. Just like those almonds

that will never wither and die, so are you and I because of his work on the cross. It continues,

the good news of Jesus and his ministry as high priest continues eternally to bear fruit

in souls that are now in his presence. And I see that like Jesus's words mean even more when I

think about this passage when he says, abide to me and I and you and you'll bear much fruit,

that he is the true vine and we are the branches. And just like that branch that there's no way it

should have blossomed, there's no way it should have bear fruit, but it was the presence of God

that made it happen, so are you and I who really don't deserve it. We're like dead in our sin and our

trespasses, all of it, just like the rebels, right? If we abide in him, the true high priest

that brings life, if we just surrender to him and live with him and honor him, he'll bear fruit

through us, eternal fruit for salvation. And this miracle for all of Israel is really just pointing,

he's the high priest, really it's saying through the high priest is life, through this sacrificial

system, you will live not because of the sacrifice, but because of the coming sacrifice of Jesus.

And he's saying your ways are death, your ways are dead, your rods will never come to life,

your authority will never do anything good, but the authority of Jesus brings about life,

the authority of Jesus frees you. And so these last couple of verses 12 and 13,

very interesting, it says, so the children of Israel spoke to Moses saying, surely we die,

we perish, we all perish. Whoever even comes near the tabernacle of the Lord must die,

shall we all utterly die? A lot of dies, a lot of perishes, very negative. They totally missed it,

like here is the gospel put before them and God is essentially saying, just don't follow your

own ways anymore, follow mine and you're gonna live. And instead they're like, well,

we're gonna die, we're dead, we're just gonna always die. So when you read this,

some people take it as repentance, like, oh, they're aware of their sin. Other people say,

this is just them kind of saying God is a harsh God and he's gonna kill us at some point.

And I like to read this guy Matthew Henry, his commentary, it's a little hard to get

through sometimes, but he's from the 1600s and so it's really great to read people that are

nowhere near your time zone so you don't have like common modern era stuff influencing it.

So this guy is from the 1600s and this is what he says about it and I really liked it. He said,

the Israelites here seem to speak despairingly. So they're discouraged, you know, despairingly

they're speaking about God as if he was a hard master. They sought that would seek advantage

against them and that as if he took all occasions to pick quarrels with them so that

if they even took a misstep, they would die by his wrath and that's why they're

basically insinuating that God would never be satisfied with their blood and ruin.

They completely miss the gospel and I think about it, isn't that everyone today though?

Like you could hear the good news of Jesus where John 3 16, God so loved the world that

he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life

for God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but to save the world through

him. People will hear that gospel and somehow take it as if God is a mean God. Oh, he's the

only way. Oh, people have to perish? There's hell? Like not realizing that we're sending

ourselves to hell through our own sin and God himself, the judge of the world,

literally stepped down and took the penalty upon himself. Like that's the type of God,

that's the judge that they think is harsh is the one who actually took the penalty we deserved on

himself. And so that is what we run into every day when we share the gospel. Either the Holy

Spirit opens their eyes and they say, man, I don't deserve this. I deserve death and they

repent. Or they see just a God, a misconception of the God that we truly know, thinking he's

wrathful and they don't want to love and worship him. But I think it's important, the best way

really to share the gospel is not to eliminate, you know, the hard truths of it. And it's,

but it's very important to also share the entirety of it, that it's not like a picket

sign saying you're going to hell and sin is, you know, if you're sinning, you're the worst

person in the world. It's like, no, it's to say for all of sin to fall short of the glory of God,

but he came and did this for you and I in love. So I'm just so thankful though, that like,

as we, as we study the Old Testament, we, we can see the gospel through all of it,

that this was not just a plan B, but it was the only plan all along. And I just wanted,

I do have some questions that I want to run through in a small group. I think we have,

we could put them up, but I just want to pray to close this out and just let me see. Yeah,

let's pull up the questions. Let's pray and close this out. So Lord, we thank you so much

just for your love for us, God. We thank you that you are the one who mediates the new covenant,

God. Thank you that you desire, Lord, mercy, Lord, you desire to bring grace into our lives, Lord,

through your son. And I just pray that as we read your word, Lord, and as we talk tonight,

that we would just worship you, Lord, because you're holy, Lord, worship you because you're worthy,

and that we would give you all the honor that's due your name, God. And I pray that you just

bless this time and this conversation and that it be encouraging to us and to you in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thanks for joining us at Lansdale Life Church as we praise God and discuss His word.

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