Page 90 - Pentateuch

choose a leader to go back to Egypt (14:2-4). They forget all the hardship back there. They forget the labor
and bondage. They forget the taskmasters. They seem to forget all the miracles they had witnessed to this
point, including the destruction of so much of what was the Egypt they knew.

Their response is instructive, of course, for all who read. As already noted, they are examples for us. We,
too, will look back at the old life and wonder if the new life is better. We, too, will be tempted to lack trust
in God’s ability to do as he has promised. We, too, will occasionally seek out some new leader to take us
back to the old life, the more familiar life, even with its troubles and torments.

God responded by giving them their fear. Their bodies would fall in the wilderness. Every last person in the
generation of adults who were numbered in the first census would die in the wilderness (14:22-23, 27-35).
Their children would be exempted, yet they would have to spend forty years
Forty years wandering around in the wilderness until the parents, the complaining generation,
had fallen. At the same time, God forgave them. He is “slow to anger, abounding in
love and forgiving sin and rebellion” (14:18-20). Yes, they will be punished for their
rebellion and distrust of him, but God does not destroy them instantly. He does not start over with Moses.
For his name’s sake, his mercy pardons them. The words God speaks to Israel sound familiar. They are the
words God spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai after the golden calf incident Ex. 33:12-34:9). God is teaching the
entire nation what he taught Moses at Sinai.

This, too, is instructive for us. God is gracious at the very core of his being. He is an absolutely righteous
judge, always following his standard of right and wrong. He is all-powerful, able to punish as he wills. He is
all-knowing and never confused about who deserves what. Yet he forgives. This is an essential part of his
glory. Remove his love, if that were possible, and his glory would dim. Remove his grace, and people would
be less attracted to him. Preach his law, yes, generating dread in the hearts of listeners. Preach also his
goodness, and dread will turn to awe. The first demonstrates need. The second provides relief.

Along with all this complaining by Israel, God gives them instructions about life with him, especially life with
him in the Promised Land. “After you enter the land, I am giving you a home” are the first words God
speaks after announcing judgment on one whole generation. He instructs them about food offerings (15:1-
21). He continues to teach them about unintentional sins (15:22-30), Sabbath-breakers (15:32-36), and
ways to remember his commands through wearing tassels on their clothes (15:37-41). Priests are taught
about their duties (18:1-7). The people are reminded of the required offerings for the priests and Levites
(18:8-32).

With God’s pronouncement of judgment, he also gives them very specific instructions about how to be
clean before him in the middle of so much death (Ch. 19). Nearness to a holy God is not like some hidden
trap. He tells them what to do to come before him. Often in the Pentateuch, “after an account of Israel’s
unbelief, more laws are added within the narrative.” 105 The design is always to push them to recognize the
need for his forgiveness. They are very much prisoners under the law, “locked up until the faith that was to
come would be revealed (Gal. 3:23).”

Besides the issue of trust in God, a second major issue is a problem for this generation: the status of Moses.
Some of the leaders among the Priests do not like his position with God. “The whole community is holy,
every one of them, and the Lord is with them. Why then do you set yourselves above the whole assembly?”
(16:3) is their charge.

105 Ibid., 387.
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