Moses knows the people need a God-appointed leader to
replace him. He is allowed to see the
promised Land but his sin at Meribah has disqualified him from leading the
people into that land. Moses asks the
Lord to choose his replacement, it is not his prerogative to do so himself, he
will not be presumptuous again. The Lord
chooses Joshua, surely a blessing to Moses as Joshua has been his aide-de-camp
all these years and would certainly have been the man Moses chose to take his
place. Joshua has to be brought before
the entire nation to be commissioned as the leader so that all will see and
know he is the man of the Lord’s choosing.
Rabbis chose their own students whom they believed would be
possibly capable of carrying on their life’s work. Typically, they chose young men who had
proven themselves exemplary in their studies and work and these men never
worked at any other labor. Even today
that is the tradition among the Hasidim, they are financially supported in
their studies as they have an important role in the society. Jesus chose fishermen, young men who had
obviously been passed over by the rabbis already and who had settled down to other
occupations, following in their father’s footsteps. There are times in their apprenticeship with
Jesus when it looks like He chose unwisely, but in the end, these men would
accomplish extraordinary things by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Paul was far and away the most well-educated of the
apostles. He was trained by what most
would have conceded was one of the two best rabbis of the day, a time of
extraordinary scholarship when the rabbis were greatly venerated by the
people. The source of Paul’s success,
here as in other places, was only partially due to his learning but much more
to do with the power of the Spirit working through him. That is what differentiated him from these
sons of Sceva, the Spirit that had come upon him and dwelt in him. Odd isn’t it that Paul, the one with the best
Jewish credentials, was sent to the Gentiles and his method was to have little
to do with the Law. The man who knew the
Law the best knew perhaps better than anyone what it meant that Jesus fulfilled
the Law, marveled at Him the most.
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