A couple of things that stuck me this time round. These readings were hard, as usual. I think a much more effective way of reading is to have a map of ancient israel compared to modern times next to me, a history book of israel text to me, and a lot of patience ;)
God is serious in His judgements. When the people of Israel complain, He is not slow in announcing His judgement; and would do so if Moses did not intercede time and time again. An interesting moment that caught my attention (and was also mentioned by Dr Chew (SIB) at Global Day of Prayer; which was last night at Stadium Melawati - it was awesome!) was the account when God's wrath was spreading in a plague throughout the camp. Moses quickly tells Aaron the priest to RUN to the people carrying a censer (a vessel made for burning insense) and he stood in between the living and the dead; causing the plague to stop - after 14 thousand people perished. Dr Chew mentioned that the censer was the prayers of the saints. How cool is that? Our PRAYERS act as insense to the Lord to halt the plagues of the evil one and counters the cup of wrath that is filling up with curruption and evil; the censer is filling with the prayers of the saints; causing grace instead of wrath to flow over this land.
The next interesting account in this reading was balak trying to get balaam to curse Israel. and a talking donkey! the most ironic thing was balaam answering the donkey back, i mean, if I were him, I would have totally flipped the moment the donkey talked; wouldn't have thought of replying back! So anyway, this account shows me that God STANDS FOR HIS PEOPLE. There were SOOO many accounts of God's wrath being poured forth on His people and of His people being killed. BUT this time, God really shows up for His people, just as how He did with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and in Egypt. He blesses them, through balaam, four times; to the annoyance of balak of course. It brings back a reminder even with all the chastening of God, it is for our own good, and He will always have our back covered, He is Love. Even in modern times, God stands for His people time and time again as can be seen with modern Israel, how God have stood for them in the 'six day war' and other wars, Jews are known for their superiour technology and intelligence and are place in positions of power and influence.
I'm reminded time and time again from these readings of the importance of obeying God's laws, the rewards of obeying them, and the consequences of failing to. I'm also reminded of the precious perfect sacrifice Jesus did at the cross. To cleanse us from our sins and wash us from our past. Jesus made it possible for us to be cleansed and forgiven without having to slaughter lambs and other offerings which was mainly an I.O.U to God until Jesus came to fulfil the debt of sin we owed. We were and are sinners, and are desperately in need of a saviour who died in our place so that we can be free and redeemed and forgiven, a debt that only Jesus Christ, who took the sins of the world upon Himself, could pay.
Let us not forget Jesus in all these readings on the law; but picture how He has come to fulfil it. And I am also reminded to pray for Israel, for Jerusalem, for the Jews, His precious people and nation. May they come to see that their Messaiah has come, He is risen, He is coming back again for His bride. Are we ready?
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