Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:00]
Dr. Manny Arango
Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango, and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the journey. To all my fellow pastors, I've got a question for you. Does your city know that your church exists? Listen, I get it. You're preaching, you're leading, you're discipling, you're doing ministry. We are in the same boat. And let's be honest, social media and marketing, not your strong suit. Not mine either. And that's probably the last thing on your mind. And that's why we chose to partner with Church Candy marketing for our church. Plant the garden. We out here, y'all. They help churches get more actual guests walking through the doors on Sunday without your eye having to stress over ads or algorithms or trying to crack the social media code. Right now, Church Candy is helping nearly 400 churches reach their communities with simple invite ads. And it works. It's super effective. I can tell you from firsthand experience. So if you're tired of being your city's best kept secret, how about you do this? Go to churchcandy.com Manny and book a free consultation book a discovery call. Their team will break it all down and show you how to start seeing new faces at your church this Sunday. I'm in the trenches with you, trying to grow the church. And how about we just start a whole campaign? No more empty churches. So let's partner with Church Candy and get our churches full. The glory of Jesus. Let's go. We're at the end of the book of Numbers. Okay, we got three chapters left. We got numbers 34, numbers 35, and numbers, chapter 36. You've done such a good job. Trekking through the wilderness is a good, good, good, good book. A lot of narrative compared to Leviticus, but still some parts that make you think, shouldn't this be in the book of Leviticus? Numbers, chapter 34, 35, 36. Feels like a bit of an anticlimactic ending to a book, but honestly, it's gonna flow seamlessly into the book of Deuteronomy. All right, and we'll get into the book of Deuteronomy tomorrow, but for today, if you've done the reading, I'm super, super proud of you, like, always. Gonna give you some context clues, gonna give you some nerdy nuggets, gonna Give you a Thomas Truth. If you have not done the reading, go ahead and go do the reading. Don't watch. Spoiler alert. Okay? Don't watch, don't listen. Go do the reading. All right, numbers, chapter 34 is gonna be land boundaries and land assignments. So get ready. If you keep trekking through the Bible with us, you're gonna get a lot of stuff that sounds like numbers, chapter 34 in the book of Joshua. A lot of people think, oh, yeah, the Book of Joshua. Action, baby. They're gonna conquer the land for the first couple chapters. That's true. And then we're gonna get into land assignments in the Book of Joshua. And it can honestly be a drag, but when we get there, I'll help you out. We're a couple books away. So land boundaries, land assignments. This is the details of a promise that God has made to Abraham. So we see this as kind of like boring land allotments, but for the people of Israel, this is the fulfillment of a promise that's been hundreds of years in the making. Okay, numbers, chapter 35. It's kind of where we're gonna probably spend the most time today. And it's gonna. It's gonna kind of tell us about some Levite towns, and then specifically, it's gonna outline six cities of refuge, and we're gonna talk about those cities of refuge because they are really, really, really, really important. And then numbers, chapter 36. You guys are like, what's going on? But Zelophehad's daughters. Okay, we're gonna get Zelophehad's daughters again. Okay, this is like the third time in the Book of Numbers where we're gonna focus on Zelophehad's daughters, which means these daughters are a big deal, actually. Okay, in the Bible, repetition always equals emphasis. Okay? Repetition always equals emphasis. The way that God emphasizes something is. Is by repeating it over and over and over. So this is the third time we're going to get mention of Zelophehad's daughters in the Book of Numbers, which means this is, like, vitally important. It's really, really important that the people of Israel get this right. God does not want to establish a system where tribes abuse one another and where. Where women are abused. God is establishing a system where women and children are cared for and where women have a seat at the table and are able to have a voice that does not take away from men leading. Okay? God's ideal is that men would lead. The best analogy for this that I've ever heard is Your right hand and your left hand, okay? My two hands are equal. They're equal in importance. They're equal in value. But my right hand and my left hand are not identical. Okay? My right hand is my strong hand. It's my dominant hand. I am a right handed individual. And if I were left handed, I'd be saying that about my left hand. Now, even when someone's ambidextrous, they still have a dominant hand. They still have a hand that they write with a little bit better. They still have a hand that they can play an instrument with or play sports with a little bit better. So even a truly ambidextrous person still has a dominant hand. And I would say that me and my wife have a pretty ambidextrous marriage, but I'm still the stronger hand. And so God's design is that the two hands fit together, that the two hands collaborate with each other, that the two hands become a team. So it's not like my hand is collaborating with my foot, okay? No, my hand, my right hand, my dominant hand, my strong hand is collaborating with my left hand. A co. Equal partner, okay? And hands are a great illustration of the equal importance that God places on men and women. Okay. My left hand is not less important just because it's my left hand. Okay? My left hand is freaking really important. Most things that I do require two hands, but I can't act as if my right hand is not my dominant hand. This is the leader hand. This hand leads, but this hand that doesn't. Make this hand a secondhand citizen. Yeah, that's funny. Second, secondhand citizens. Freaking hilarious. Anyway, all right, get it. Second class citizen. Second hand. Anyway, whatever. Let's dive into some context clues. One of the things that you're gonna. That I want to draw out as just a parallel, okay. Is that when Moses has to go up on a mountain to kind of see the land that God has promised, it's reminiscent of this moment in Genesis, chapter 13. Okay, so if we go to Genesis chapter 13, it says this. The Lord said to Abram, after Lot separated from him, raise your eyes now and look from the place where you are northward and southward and eastward and westward. For all the land that you see, I will give to you in your offspring forever. Okay? Not the land you see with your own eyes. This is the land that I'm showing you, okay? That's the opposite of Eve. That's the opposite of the Reubenites and the Gadites, okay? The land that you see, I will give you, not you Will take for yourself. Not you take and you give. No, I will give you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring can also be counted. Rise up. Walk through the length and the breadth of the land, for I will give it to you. So Abram moved his tent and came and settled by the oaks of Mamre, which are at Hebron. And there he built an altar to the Lord. So when we go back to Genesis, chapter 13, 14, okay, the author of the Torah wants us to see this in connection with Numbers. Actually, numbers, chapter 27. So if you, like, go to numbers chapter 27, you can actually see this connection. You start reading in verse 1:27, the Lord said to Moses, go up this mountain of the Abarim range and see the land that I have given to the Israelites. When you have seen it, you shall also be gathered to your people. Okay? So go up and see. This is Eden language, but it's reversed. The language of see is supposed to make us think of Eve, okay? Eve saw the fruit. But it's not just seeing, but it's believing what God said about what you see. So the Bible wants us to see that God is describing the land of Canaan in Eden, like language. He wants Abram, he wants Moses to see it, to see it and believe what he has to say about it. That this is what I'm gonna give to you, not what you're gonna take. Cause Adam and Eve take of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and Evil. They don't let God give it to them, they take it. Whereas Abram and Moses are charged to look and to believe that God is going to give it, okay, to the people of Israel, okay, With kind of all that context, we're now going to move into many Edens inside of the Eden land, okay? Many Edens inside of the Eden land. So numbers, chapter 35 is going to tell us that the one. The. Not the one thing, but one of the things that can derail, that can throw off, that can destroy this. This Eden, like rest land, okay? This fruitful, restful, abundant Eden land that God wants to give his people. The one thing that can throw this off is bloodshed in the land. The one thing that can throw this off is that if the land becomes polluted with bloodshed, which should immediately call us back to what Cain and Abel, that Abel dies and his blood cries out from the ground, that there's this relationship that blood has with the land. And that bloodshed is able to pollute the land. And that the land will vomit you out. Okay. That I will cause the land to vomit you out. So we have to get these mini Edens inside of the Eden land. And what are these called? They are going to be called Cities of Refuge. What happens with the City of Refuge? Two things. Number one, if someone kills someone on accident, what we don't want is that accidental death to then snowball into a cycle of vengeance. So let's say I kill someone by accident. What we don't want is that person's brother or sister or parent or spouse to then come and kill me. Because now that violent act of vengeance, that violent act of retribution will become a snowball. And now what if someone in my life now kills this person? This can get out of hand really, really fast. So what happens if I kill someone accidentally? If I drop something, if I'm, you know, working with an ax and the axe head falls off and hit someone. If there's an unintentional death, then me as the person who has killed another person. I have six cities of refuge that I can flee to. That the person trying to avenge the blood of their loved one cannot do anything to me as long as I'm in the city of Refuge. Now, the city of Refuge essentially now acts like Noah's Ark. Okay? The city of Refuge now acts like the house during the Passover that the blood of the lamb has been applied to. That city of refuge is a place where death is waiting for me outside. But as long as I stay within the boundaries of this city of Refuge, I have protection against someone who wants to kill me. This is actually just the same image. Whether it's the ark that Moses, his mother, puts him in and puts him in the Nile, whether it's the ark that Noah builds. Death is outside, but life is inside. Whether it's the house during the Passover. Right, right. Death is outside, but life is inside. This is an image that God wants to paint so that we can ultimately understand Christ. What is Ephesians going to tell us? That we are in Christ? That as long as I'm in Christ, I'm in life. That the worst thing for me to do is step out of Christ. If I step out of, oh, there's death outside. But man, the atoning sacrifice of Jesus allows me to be enveloped into him. That now I don't just deal with life as an individual. I'm in the body of Christ. I'm in the church. I'm a part of the covenant community. Okay? Death outside, life inside. Hey, this is a city of refuge. What God is trying to prevent here is the. The innocent shedding of blood turning into a guilty shedding of blood, which will now spiral and the land will be full of bloodshed. And we'll have. Essentially we'll be back at Genesis chapter 6, where chaos has now swallowed up order. But if someone has intentionally killed someone and they flee to a city of refuge, they are not allowed to stay in a city of refuge. They have to get put under trial. And the person who is seeking vengeance for their family, that. That person is going to actually get justice. Okay, so there's two things, two ways that the cities of refuge are supposed to act. Who runs these cities of refuge? The Levites. Okay, why would the Levites run these cities of refuge? The Levites would run these cities of refuge because this is a picture of sacrifice. This is a picture. This is a foreshadowing of what our high priest named Jesus is going to do for us. So it says this. The towns that you give to the Levites shall include. Oh, sorry, this is Numbers, chapter 35, verse 6. The towns that you give to the Levites shall include the six cities of refuge where you shall permit a slayer to flee. In addition to them, you shall give 42 towns. The towns you give to the levites shall total 48 with their pasture lands. And as for the towns that you shall give from the possession of the Israelites, from the larger tribes, you shall take from many. And from the smaller tribes, you shall take a few, each in proportion to the inheritance that it obtains, shall give to its towns to the Levites. Okay, so the Levites are gonna run these cities of refuge in the Levites in the same way that the Levites inspect whether or not your sacrifice is thumbs up or thumbs down. In the same way that the Levites are there to inspect houses in skin conditions to make sure that there's no mold or that there's no leprosy. The Levites are also there to mediate against blood vengeance or to prevent a blood feud by governing over these six cities of refuge. In our current world, we would describe these as asylum. Okay, asylum Bible nerds, I have an announcement. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos releases May of 2025 and pre orders are officially open. When I began to learn Genesis in its proper context, I learned that the creation account is not primarily about God creating something out of nothing, but rather God bringing divine order to the chaos of the cosmos. That one nugget was a Game changer for me, because I've been preaching to all the kids in my youth group that peace was a solution for their anxiety. But really, God's solution to chaos is never peaceful, but rather order. Peace isn't something that you stumble into. It's something that you intentionally step into, and that starts with aligning your life with God's order. I think that this book is a game changer. It's nerdy, it's practical, it provides a very contextual understanding of the book of Genesis. And if you grab a copy, you'll learn why there's a huge dragon on the COVID Head to the link in the show notes to pre order, or head to crushingchaos.com to to see the really dope trailer that we made for this book. I think it's time for you to crush the chaos in your life. And that starts with grabbing a copy of this book. Now back to the podcast. So, number one, our big context clue for the day is again, placing all of these chapters and numbers in the context of Genesis and kind of pulling out some Genesis themes so that we can kind of understand what's going on. Our nerdy nugget is to really talk through the life that's in the blood. That's not an idea that a lot of us live with, but the people of Israel, remember, are inhabiting a land that has vomited out its former inhabitants because of bloodshed. Now, that bloodshed was in the form of child sacrifice, but that's still bloodshed. That innocent blood was shed. And God is saying, hey, there's a relationship that you have to the land. I'll give another kind of nerdy nugget is that Adam. Okay, Adam comes from the Adama. Okay, so Adam the man comes from the dirt. So when his blood goes back into the dirt, there's a relationship between his blood and the dirt. We get the same in Latin. Actually, human comes from the word hummus. Hummus is dirt. Okay? And human is you or I. So God is saying, hey, there's this symbiotic relationship between you and the ground, and the land will vomit you out in the same way that I took you from the ground. The ground will totally expel you from the land if bloodshed gets out of control. So I'm gonna give you these cities of refuge. What is the city of refuge? It's an Eden within the Eden system that I'm creating for you. It's a new ark. It's a new Passover house. It's. It's a place where if death is waiting for you outside, as long as you stay inside, you are safe. So we gave you some context clues. Definitely gave you some nerdy nuggets. The timeless truth is that Jesus is the fulfillment of the cities of refuge. That Jesus is our city of refuge. As long as we are in him, we have life. John would say it this way. I am the vine, you are the branches. Okay? Apart from me, you can do nothing. Disconnected from me, you can accomplish absolutely nothing. But as long as you remain in me and my words remain in you, then nothing is going to be impossible. That growth will happen and life will happen, and life will be sustained. That is our timeless truth. That the goal. That the goal of every believer is to remain in him. As long as I remain in Him, I have life. As long as I remain in Him, I have order. Outside of him is chaos, but in him is life in order. All right, guys, that's the end of the Book of Numbers. Good job. Hey, tomorrow we're going to dive into the Book of Deuteronomy, and I love Deuteronomy. I cannot wait to march through Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy is actually one of my favorite books of the Bible. Can't wait to go through it with you. If you're on a streak, don't break your streak. If you're not on a streak. Hey, today's a good day to start one. You finished up numbers. Let's get into Deuteronomy tomorrow, and let's get on a streak. All you need is two days to start a streak. Okay? If you. If. If you got Snapchat streaks. If you got other streaks, not don't have other streaks and not have a Bible streak. Okay? All right. I love you guys so much. I'm so proud of you. Thank you for trusting me as your tour guide through the wilderness. Our trek through numbers was so much fun. Tomorrow we'll dive into the Book of Deuteronomy. I love you. Till next time. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show at thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebible department. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.