Numbers 2:3-9

hey hey good morning good morning good morning welcome to coffee and devotions this where every day you and I well every weekday you and I we get together we get into God's word we have a little bit of coffee and we grow in our love for the Lord together and this year 2024 Lord willing we're going to make it through Numbers Deuteronomy and Hebrews it's going to take me a while to say that but Numbers Deuteronomy and Hebrews so glad to be with you this morning let's have some coffee we'll pray and we'll get to God's word let's pray father you are an amazing God generous and merciful abounding and loving kindness father we pray that you would please help us to understand your word Lord we pray that you would please be merciful to us teach us and be gracious to us in Jesus's name amen all right so we are at Numbers Chapter 2 Numbers Chapter 2 and we're going to beginning at verse three if you were here with us yesterday to see Ellie creating a lot of noise and being very fun you know she was uh talking a whole lot about uh just how she uh right we have different camps and in these different camps are are where they going to be and God's going to be in the middle and they're going to Camp around it uh and so as we're working through the book of or chapter 2 of numbers that's what we're looking at is where these different camps are around the Tabernacle so we're going to start with verse three on the east side toward the rising of the sun those of the standard of the forces with Judah shall Camp according to their armies and Nan the son of amminadab shall be their leader of the children of Judah and his army was numbered at 74,700 those who Camp next to him shall be the tribe of issachar and Nathaniel the son of zuar shall be the leader of the children of issachar and his army was numbered at 54,400 then comes the tribe of zebulun and eliab the son of Helen shall be the leader of the children of zebulun and his army was numbered at 57,4 all who were numbered according to their families of the forces with Judah 86,400 these shall break Camp first so this is the Eastern Camp right you're going to have the Tabernacle in the middle and on on the Eastern side you have three different tribes who are kind of camping together you have Judah first and then you have issachar and then you have zebulun those three tribes together make up 186,000 this is going to be the advancing Army right so as they go and as they they March out it's going to be the first camp and that's going to be the one to the east from the rising of the Sun and these three tribes this lines up with what Abraham told uh his son Judah it's not going to be Reuben who's the most important leading the entire Army out but it's going to be Judah in who there would be the scepter and who would Rule and so interestingly that's what's going on here is the Eastern three tribes are led by Judah and they're numbered 186,000 I mean that's a lot of people this is this not a small number of people I'm of the opinion that these numbers are actually accurate that this is true because I think that Moses wrote this and he wasn't writing figurative narrative I think he was writing the truth here about what was being taught and so uh there's 186,000 just of these three tribes on the Eastern side so uh what's the best verse to summarize this well I would underline verse 9 all who were numbered according to their armies of the forces with Judah 186,000 these shall break Camp first uh what does this teach us to do what are we called to do how does this show us Christ well I think this shows us The Covenant faithfulness right that God made to Abraham that he was going to make him into an amazing nation and now just three of his son's peoples right 186,000 people this is huge numbers God was faithful to his promises but he also is faithful in Abraham's blessing of Judah this was coming true now it's still going to be a while later I mean hundreds of years later before King David emerges but I think here we see just a taste of that lion who had come from the tribe of Judah that they would be the advancing Army and that the first Army to pack out that's where the king would come from and that's where our King comes from that's his lineage they came from Judah and so God is faithful to his Covenant God faithful to his promises and God is working even here to show that he was going to bring an anointed one and so I think this is what a beautiful passage it doesn't just say this out clearly but this is where we see just glimmers of Hope Shadows of what would come to fulfillment in the beauty of Jesus Christ's Incarnation and of his rule so let's go ahead and pray father we thank you so much for raising up these three tribes for giving to them the Patriarchs and the covenants and the promises and for even bringing this tribe to a prominent role and using that rule even here as we see that eventually would bring our savior our Lord Jesus Christ Lord we pray that we would live our lives knowing that you keep your promises and that you are a wonderful God in Jesus's name amen may God bless you may you walk knowing that the lion of the tribe of Judah has a emerged he goes out first he has conquered our enemy even death and sin itself he's our king and you can follow after him he's in our midst all right I'll see you next time bye thanks for listening to this week's message from God's word for you a Ministry of Sharon RP Church in rule Southeast Iowa we pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith and your life this week if if you'd like to get more information about us feel free to go to the website Sharon rc.org we'd love to invite you to worship with us our worship time is 10:00 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue Morning Sun Iowa 52640 may God richly bless you this [Music] week