The Lord is prepared to destroy all those who have
participated in the rebellion against Moses and Aaron's leadership but both men
fall on their faces and plead for the congregation. They don't plead for the leaders of the
rebellion, they pray for the people who got caught up in it. The Lord had said, in Exodus 34 that He will
punish the wicked and here there is a swift punishment, the earth opens and
swallows up the rebels and their families.
There is a clear correspondence with the sin and punishment. Moses knows that ultimately this isn't a
personal matter, they have rejected the Lord's choosing of he and Aaron as
leaders. The rebellion is against God
Himself and therefore it will be dealt with by Him. We too often personalize these matters, I
have been horribly guilty of that very sin, and what we really need to realize
is that sin is rebellion against God, it is a spiritual battle we fight not a
fleshly one. We spend too much time
fighting flesh and blood by earthly means when we should be on our knees and on
our faces fighting them.
Peter's question, “See, we have left everything and followed
you. What then will we have?” seems to indicate that he believes they have done
the essential work necessary to inherit the kingdom and he wants to know what
the reward is for having done so. Jesus'
answer seems like a materialist answer doesn't it? You'll have thrones, you will judge Israel,
you will have a hundredfold whatever you give up, whether that is houses, land,
relatives, whatever. There are two
questions that go begging here though.
What is this "new world" and when will it be that the Son of
Man sits on His throne? Second, how will
we "have" these things? Clearly
Jesus is speaking of when His kingdom is fully established, in eternity, and He
is not speaking of having these things in the same way we have things in this
life, as possessions. We will have them
rightly, without ownership and dominion entering the picture.
Abraham was justified by faith and not works and he is also
the example to us of what it means to have things by promise and not by
possession. He was promised amazing
things, progeny and prosperity, a name for himself forever, fame and
renown. Did he enjoy the possession of
those things during his life? It would
seem that he had prosperity but it never mattered to him because he didn't have
the one thing he really wanted, a son, one who would carry on his name. When he received that promise, God tested him
and told him to sacrifice him and Abraham's faith was proven in his obedience
to a command that made no sense to him.
It was all about grace, we know nothing at all of Abraham apart from
God's calling him, nothing to commend him as an obvious choice to be the father
of the people. It is all about grace,
nothing else added to it.
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