Numbers 32-33: Remembering the Journey

I have to be honest.  Sometimes, when I'm reading Scripture and I come to lists of genealogy, I kind of glaze over and skip ahead.  At first glance, it can be hard to see the significance in a list of names that I can't pronounce.  I felt the same way when I came to Numbers 33 and saw a list of all of the places the Israelites had journeyed to and from throughout their 40 year stay in the desert.  A bunch of names, not much content, so it seemed.

But I pressed in.  I asked God to show me something.  Because I know that God does not include anything in His Word that does not have purpose.  And, of course, in His goodness and desire for me to know Him more, He did show me something.  Actually, a few things:  Anticipation.  Remembering. Faithfulness.

Anticipation.  This is it.  Forty years have passed in the wilderness and the Israelites are on the edge of the promised land.  There are some last minute instructions to come in the next few chapters, but then it's time for the conquest.  It's time for God to fulfill what He has been promising to His people as they have wandered and endured and persevered, a promise given years before to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  I can feel the magnitude of this moment. The culmination of years of waiting and the anticipation of what is almost here.  This reminds me of an even greater anticipation, as many years later God's people would again long for a promise fulfilled.  The promise of the Messiah, the One who would come to redeem and restore a broken and sinful word.  And four hundred years after the last prophesy in Malachi, Jesus came. The Rescuer. The fulfillment of God's great promise to His people.  And He is coming again! May our hearts ache in anticipation for the final coming of our King when all of God's promises will be fulfilled and everything will be made new.

Remembering.  This list of places on the Israelites' journey (40 places, to be exact) is not randomly thrown in here.  I don't believe that God's assignment to Moses to record the starting places in their journey was a simple administrative task.  I believe it had much bigger purpose.  To cause them to remember.  To remember where God had brought them.  To remember every aspect of their journey.  To remember the suffering and hardship.  And ultimately, to remember His faithfulness. How easy it is to plow through life without stopping to remember.  To always be moving on to the next thing and the next thing, consumed with the tasks before us, not stopping to reflect and remember all that God has done. I love the placement of this list at the end of Numbers, at the edge of the promised land.  May we take a cue from God here and be people who stop and remember Him, where He has brought us and all that He has done!

Faithfulness.  Simply reading this list of places the Israelites traveled causes my heart to well up with praise for God's faithfulness.  Where they thought they were wandering, God was leading.  Where they thought they were wasting time, God had specific purpose.  Where there was need, he provided.  Where they rebelled, he redeemed.  He knew how it would unfold.  It was all part of His Story.  Every circumstance, each place they stopped, every road they traveled and every hardship they endured....He was faithful the entire way.  In fact, Deuteronomy 1:31 says that God carried them through the desert as a father carries his son.

Maybe this resonates so deeply with me because I am in somewhat of a desert place.  The past ten months have often felt dark and without purpose.  But just as the Israelites could look back and say that the Lord led them and delivered them through each and every road on this journey, so I declare that the Lord does that for me, and for all of us, as well.  Never does He leave us.  Never does He forsake us.  Never does He forget or fail.  He is faithful to all of His promises.  He leads us in love and in purpose.  Where we think we are wasting time, He is working with purpose for our good and His glory.  Where we think the pain is too deep and the road is too difficult, He continues to lead and sustain us.  So that one day, when we emerge out of the wilderness and into the fulfillment of His promises, we will look back and praise Him for all He has done.

But do we have to wait until we are out of the wilderness to praise Him?  How easy it is to look back at life and realize and proclaim God's faithfulness.  Hindsight is 20/20, after all.  But will we choose to worship Him even in the trenches?  Even when life is dark and hard?  Imagine how much more peaceful the Israelites' journey would have been had they chosen to praise Him in the desert rather than grumble and doubt and fear.  May this be a challenge to us.  May we praise Him, may we declare His goodness and faithfulness, not just when we arrive at the end of the journey but through the desert roads along the way.