21. The Cross in Numbers

The Cross in Numbers

Now let us turn to Numbers. What is the teaching of the book of Numbers? Many people say it is a dry book, but the message of Numbers is just the most practical meaning of the cross, and it is this, that the life which has been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb and is indwelt by God, called into fellowship with God, can never be an idle life. As you read this book of Numbers you will see that there were three things which God required of His people in those days: first, activity; second, arrangement; third, aggressiveness. And the key verse of Numbers, we may take asNumbers 1:54, “And the children of Israel did according to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so did they.” At the source of all life of Israel, God’s demand was for explicit obedience, and God’s expectation was that, that obedience would be granted. If there is any virtue which the cross requires for the full outworking of the purpose of redemption on the part of the believer, it is obedience. The Calvary chapter of this book (and you will find that each one of these books contain Calvary chapters—Genesis 3, Exodus 12, Leviticus 16 and Numbers 21), shows us that disobedience is absolutely fatal.

Let us look for a moment at those three things that God required of His people, and see how they link us on to the New Testament teaching. The first thing He required was activity. It is scarcely necessary to say that that is bound up with a living Christianity. A dead faith is always a do nothing faith; but the Christian life is full of potency, force, passion, enthusiasm for Christ, and therefore for the needs of the world. These are some of the powers which drive on Christian life in service, and at the back of each one of them, as its inspiration, is the sacrifice of the Lamb of God who went to the cross.

Then, will you take the second thing God required of His people, which was arrangement? One of the chief facts of the book of Numbers is the importance and value of details for their march, their work, their worship. Think of the practical teaching of the cross in the New Testament. Take for instance, 1 Corinthians 12, and you will see that the same close attention is insisted upon by the cross in all the details of Christian life and work. God leaves nothing to chance. Each one of us is called to take his right place and do his or her bit of work, and the only way in which the Body of Christ can be developed and made strong and fit for her purpose is by each member of the Body of Christ falling into the right place and doing the God-revealed bit of work. I want to say this, especially to those who are in Christian service: your attention or inattention to details in your work will make or mar your work. It will either solve your difficulties or increase them. Remember, everything counts in the service of God, because everything means something. And the cross puts this demand upon every child of God in regard to service, that we shall be honest and honorable even in the smallest bit of work that we have to do. I want to emphasize that. The demand of the cross is that we shall be honorable and honest and straight in every bit of work that we are asked to do, although it be just the most trivial bit of service that has to be done. It has its place in God’s work, and every bit of God’s work requires to be rightly accomplished.

Now take the other thing that God required of the Jew and of Israel in those days, and you will find aggressiveness. Look at Number 1 and see how it opens with the call to battle. There is a sentence that rings through that chapter, I think thirteen times, “Able to go forth to war,” “Able to go forth to war.” What is the message of the cross? It is a call to arms, and never did that call sound more loudly in the ears of God’s people than it sounds today. For we are in the fight today as perhaps we have never before been.

I was preaching in one of the most interesting of mission halls in New York, the Jerry McAuley Mission, and I picked up a magazine, when I was sitting on the platform, and, turning over a leaf, I caught these words: “The war of Satan against God.” I said to myself, “That man knows something, whoever he is. He has the right idea of the situation.” For that is the truth of the situation today, we are in a fight. Are you all in the fight? I find there are a great many Christian people who do not know there is a fight on, and they are taking it easy, and the call of the cross is a call to arms for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Read the Epistle to the Ephesians, and what do you see? It is an epistle of warfare that leads to victory and rest. We are, together with the believers in the Epistle to the Ephesians, seated with Christ in heavenly places. What is that? A challenge to Satan that he will not shirk. The whole purpose of the devil is to get you down from that pinnacle, not positionally, of course, but practically, and when he gets you down from that position he will defeat you.

We are seated in heavenly places, and so Paul goes on to describe, in Ephesians 6, the great conflict into which every Christian is summoned. And what do you find? That the cross is not only that which calls you to fight, but is the ground on which you stand in order to fight. Do not let us forget that. The only way in which we can fight the devil today is by the cross, and as you stand at the cross, and as you claim the victory of Calvary against him and all his works and wiles you will find that Calvary spells Victory.

Here in Numbers the Lord Jesus Christ is revealed, in Numbers 24:17, as the scepter who shall rise out of Israel and shall smite the corners of Moab and destroy all the children of Seth, and in the New Testament you have Him revealed as the Victor, and the victory won by Him on the cross makes sure the victory won here.

There are two things in this book of Numbers which speak of Calvary. There is Numbers 6, where, in the separation of the Nazarite, we see the condition of life to which the cross calls as essential for true Christian life and service. Then in Numbers 16 you have the sin of Korah, and in that we need to be very wide awake, today, because it is at work. What is it? What was the sin of Korah? The intrusion into the office of the priesthood of an unholy man and unholy fire—counterfeit holiness and counterfeit power.

Today the air is vibrating with the doctrines of demons and the spirits of evil are at work everywhere, and only by the cross can you meet them, and only by the cross can you find out the truth about these doctrines. I beseech you, test every writing of man today by the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the touchstone. You will see it in its true light. You will come to know this and thank God for it that the cross is your instrument of defense against the wiles of the devil and your instrument of offence against the powers of darkness.