And the LORD spake unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tabernacle of the congregation, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they were come out of the land of Egypt, saying: Numbers 1:1
Do you know why the book of Numbers is called Numbers? It’s because it contains two different census reports on the children of Israel as they made their way through the wilderness from the Red Sea crossing to the Jordan crossing. It also contains many details of what happened to that vast migration of Israelites between those two crossings. The first census taken early in the journey showed more than 600,000 men of military service age. The second census taken almost 40 years later showed more than 600,000 men of military service age, just a few less than the first census. But they were not the same men!
God had a wonderful future for the Israelites and had made wonderful promises to them. And He kept those promises. But in the 40 years after He first made the promises, the children of Israel stumbled and wandered, and rejected the report of the good spies who tried to convince them to enter the land of promise. In those 40 years of wandering, at least 41 of those men of military age died every day, leaving their carcases in the desert. That’s not counting the women who died also. So an entire generation was lost. God eventually gave the people their promised land, a new generation willing to step forward in obedience.
God has given us rich and precious promises too. Have we claimed them? Have we moved in the direction He led, or has our life been directed by uncertainty and belief? God’s promises and God’s leading are always for the very best for us. We are always the losers for not claiming His promises and not following His direction. Sometimes we need to let Him change us into the person who He can bless. If we don’t, God’s promises will be kept, but not to us, but to someone else who will. Think about that. -Jim MacIntosh
Here is the link to the video of this message: https://youtu.be/XhikHnGbFvw