Revering the Word
Numbers 31 Comprehending the vengeance of God
good morning everyone this morning we are in numbers 31 and it is a difficult chapter and let me Lord help me to do my best in explaining what I believe the Lord would want me to say in teaching this chapter so let me pick it up and let's let's read about nine verses beginning in verse one then the Lord spoke to Moses saying take full vengeance for the sons of Israel on the Midianites afterward you will be gathered to your people Moses is about to you know be gathered to his people meaning he's going to die and he wasn't going to enter the promised land but before that word occur God's asking Moses to lead them in vengeance upon the Midianites Moses takes this command from God and Moses spoke to the people saying arm men from among you for the war that they may go against Midian to execute the Lord's vengeance on Midian a thousand from each tribe of all the tribes of Israel you shall send to the war so there were furnished from the thousands of Israel a thousand from each tribe 12,000 armed for war Moses sent them a thousand from each tribe to the war in Phineas the son of Elisa the priests to war with them and the holy vessels and the trumpets for the alarm in his hand so they made war against Midian just as the Lord had commanded Moses and they killed every male they killed the kings of Midian along with the rest of their slain heavy and recommend Zir and Her and Reba the five kings of Midian they also killed and this is important Belom the son of Bior with the sword the sons of Israel captured the women of Midian and their little ones and all the cattle and their flocks and all the goods they plundered a couple of things I want to add or read from this chapter take it in it's it's it's it's challenging let's take it in verse 15 when they brought the women and young children are the women and children to back to camp it says this and Moses said to them have you spared all the women behold now this is important take this and behold these caused the sons of Israel through the Council of Belom to trespass against the Lord in the matter of pure so the plague was among the congregation of the Lord now therefore kill every male among the little ones and kill every woman who has not known man intimately but all the girls who have not known man intimately spare for yourselves so the first thing I want to share with you is that we've talked about this Belom and remember he was the false prophet that was called to curse Israel but he didn't curse Israel but then in the end he ended up conspiring to have Israel end up worshipping Baal and also enticing Israel to not only take the gods of the Midianites Baal but also to be sexually immoral with the women of Midian and therefore there was a plague and Belom was part of this and God was very disturbed you know when God miraculously got Israel out of Egypt and now has provided for them in the desert and you know water from the rock and manna from the sky and quail came in and they've seen miracle after miracle but when they began to enjoin themselves in the plains of Moab to the Midianites they took born women and they worshipped foreign gods and God is extremely offended by that that is something he's very concerned about right now and he in them entering the promised land soon he's concerned that the society the the people the family that he's creating in Israel that they are going to just take on the gods of the other nations around them and they've already proven that they'll do that and God's very concerned because he's trying to set up a family that he's gonna bless and he wants them to purely worship him and he's sending a message in a lesson no you don't engage in worshiping the gods of the people around you and you definitely don't get involved with the women of these other countries and maybe they helped soften you to worshiping their gods God is is trying to set up people to worship God and worship him alone and as we kind of know it's not going to work but this is the dispensation or the season or the method at which God is trying to create a family right now he's trying to give them their land back he's trying to bless them and then have them worship him now let's just talk about this a little bit more going back historically God created Adam and Eve right in a wonderful garden and they were in a beautiful place and he told them you know to not eat of the tree and they ate of it anyways you know Eve was deceived Adam was passive and went along with it and sin came into the human race but God's original design was this beautiful garden for Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply well unfortunately when sin entered they got removed from the garden and now they're in the season of history where they're being fruitful and multiplying and Adam and Eve had children and indeed they multiplied but unfortunately they multiplied sin and you know we get many years later but only about five chapters later ish and we get Noah's ark and why did Noah's ark happen because sin was on the loose and all's the people did was thought corrupt things and did corrupt things all the time non-stop so God said you know I'm gonna start over through Noah so that's why he flooded the earth and then he allowed Noah to start over but unfortunately there was still this this sin problem then eventually God begins to make a family and that's what he's working on now he chooses Abraham Isaac and Jacob and he's gonna try to create a family that'll worship him and he does that and and he has them multiply in Egypt because he wanted them to multiply and and he heard their cry they wanted to be free to worship him so now he gets them out of Egypt in the desert and he's he's still trying to create a group of people that would be in his image and likeness and be fruitful and multiply but but honor him and now the challenge is well how are they gonna honor me when they keep being enticed by foreign gods and you know you know in America we have a constitution that you know really was originally the people were based on Christian biblical principles but it really didn't get into our constitution in that way like you don't have to be Christian to be you know in America or that wasn't woven into it even though most of the founders were of Christian heritage they were they were not wanting to force religion because they were forced by the king of England to worship the way that the king wanted them to worship and they felt America needed to be free and so you know we have this land now where people worship all kinds of gods and all you know all kinds of yeah I mean just you name it it's a plurality and but that's not what God was setting up in in this season God was trying to set up you know worshiping him and worshiping him alone in his family and that was the season that we were in now as I've mentioned the promised land is supposed to be a place where Israel will become prominent and Lord willing everyone will worship God and that they will be a blessing to the nations around them and that's what God set up through Abraham but they're not going to be a blessing if they just take on the foreign gods of the people around them so God God has built in here where they're going to defeat enemies they're not going to allow enemies they're not supposed to anyways but actually Israel even when they go in to take the promised land they don't route out their enemies as God is going to prescribe for them to do and indeed they end up becoming a snare and this is going to come up you know many times over as we go through the Old Testament here so this was the challenge how to how does Israel live in honor of God amongst other people without taking on their gods and man just can't seem to do it man struggles in honoring God in that way so now in the age that we live in it's different isn't it we don't have instruction for God to route out our enemies we don't have instruction from God to kill anyone that's not the dispensation or the season we live in now we live in a wicked world and we are to represent Christ and tell the world about him and get more people involved in worshiping our God that's our aim our goal as Christians as the church today and and really the parables that Jesus gave show that the kingdom is going to grow with Christians in it and the kingdom on this earth here is going to grow with pagans and people who worship other things and ultimately it's all going to get separated in the harvest of the end times so that's when God's future vengeance is going to take place so in this season we're in now in Numbers 31 God's taking vengeance out on trying to create Israel to have its own unique family that's not polluted but he's not doing it that way right now right now we live amongst this world and he's going to separate it all and he's going to bring vengeance later and we now are to represent him and we already love our neighbor as ourself and try to reach this world for Christ and and and that's so that people don't have to experience the Lord's vengeance but judgment is coming and vengeance is coming on anyone who does not receive Jesus Christ is Lord and it's really important that people get that message you know one of the things that I think it's hard for people their God God has vengeance let me just be frank with you God has vengeance and if you're learning that if you're going through the word of God now you're you're learning that and God's vengeance takes on different forms in different seasons right now Israel's asked to kill in order to create a pure family in our age God's vengeance is waiting it's waiting for his return it's like it's like he's actually giving people a chance to come to Jesus and to be saved and to become part of his bride and to get the Holy Spirit and to be forgiven of sin so that people don't have to experience the vengeance of God but his vengeance is coming you know I'm preaching this weekend in Revelation 19 we began the return of Christ and it was glorious because there was a wedding and God made his bride his in heaven right before his return and it was glorious and we we enjoyed that beginning portion of Christ's return and in in not this coming Sunday but in the next Sunday after that I'm gonna be talking about the Millennial Kingdom which is gonna be a glorious time with Jesus returning to earth and Satan's gonna be bound for a thousand years and it's gonna be a really wonderful time on the earth when Jesus is ruining and raining again on earth and it's not gonna have all the corruption that we have now but this Sunday coming up when I preach on the second half of Revelation 19 on the return of Christ there's Armageddon there's Jesus is coming back to defeat his enemies and the birds of the air are going to come and eat the flesh of everyone who has not accepted Jesus Christ as Lord so why am I saying all this this passage opens with in I turned back to Numbers 25 for a second to bring up that Belom passage but in Numbers 31 it says then the Lord spoke to Moses saying take full vengeance on the sons of Israel and right now God's vengeance is delayed for a future time and you know what we just don't want people to experience the vengeance of God but you know did you know that okay in the LSB version which is what I'm looking at this morning on my Boo Wetter Bible app there's 43 occurrences of vengeance and many of those are of God's vengeance not all but many of those in Deuteronomy we'll be getting to this soon it says vengeance is mine and retribution in due time their foot will stumble for the day of their disaster is near Deuteronomy 32 41 just a few verses later in Deuteronomy 32 if I sharpen my flashing sword in my hand takes hold on judgment I will render vengeance on my adversaries and I will repay those who hate me I mean we could keep going listen it actually says this happens in Revelation and it happens throughout the Bible listen to what it says here it's probably not how you think because we're used to seeing Jesus who was I guess you know he was really mad at Pharisees and he is the one who's going to bring vengeance later but in the season that Jesus lived he wasn't killing people he was loving people he was trying to get him the gospel and he was mad at the Pharisees but he was pleading with people to repent for the time is drawing near where vengeance is coming and you know what receive me but listen to what it says in Psalm 58 10 the righteous will be glad when he beholds the vengeance so there's actually something to be said in the Bible where God's going to reach those he's going to reach God's going to save those he's going to save people are going to come to Jesus they're not going to receive vengeance they're going to be saved and be promised eternal life but all the people that have persecuted Christians ridiculed Christians fought against God denied God ungodly sinners with no repentance who've lived in rejection of God they are going to receive vengeance of God they're going to receive wrath they're going to receive the birds of the air eating their flesh and they're going to be sent into the lake of fire and we just don't talk about that very much do we and you know I'm not saying listen I'm not saying I necessarily enjoy this but it's not up to me it's not it's not this isn't my choice whether I enjoy it or not I'm just saying that this is a part of who our God is and he is going to bring judgment and vengeance on those who don't believe Jesus behold the judges standing at the door and we need to get the gospel out we need people to get saved and God's wanting them to be saved so that they don't experience vengeance hallelujah we need a little bit of more of fire and brimstone and a little bit more of a sense of urgency because people are being destined for vengeance right now I mean right now a person dies without Jesus they're headed towards vengeance there's no return if the rapture to where the recurrent we come now you know the church is going to be spared from the wrath of God but everyone else is not raptured is going to experience a very difficult time in the tribulation called the wrath of God but there's still going to be opportunity praise God the mercy of God there's still going to be opportunity for people to come to Christ but if they reject him or if they take the mark of the beast then they're going to be destined for vengeance they're going to be destined for wrath so isn't it neat that in this dispensation that we live in now in the church age God is withholding vengeance but that is still part of who our God is we're seeing it lived out in in numbers and in the conquer of the promised land we're seeing God in the current bring vengeance but in our era he's withholding it for a season to get people saved but it's the same God it's just we're in a different season so may we get the message out may we get the gospel out God's wanting us to purely worship him don't worship any other God but Jesus Christ alone God God hates any worship of anything else other than Jesus there's only one true God and his name is Jesus Christ and that's the one where to follow and that's the way we get spared from any wrath or vengeance hallelujah thank you Jesus for the promise of eternal life the gospel is good news because judgment is coming but Jesus came to save us from the judgment that we're already under because of our sin he has the power to forgive us and give us eternal life thank God for the church age thank God for the cross of Christ and now let's love our neighbor as ourself and let's lead him to Jesus Christ so that they can have heaven and escape future judgment God bless you all you you you [BLANK_AUDIO]