Numbers 35:1-8

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we start Numbers chapter 35, Numbers chapter 35, and talk about the cities that are given over to Levi, since they don't have an inheritance like everybody else. Let's have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into God's Word. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word. We thank you that your Holy Spirit is alive and working in our hearts. Father, we pray that as we read your word, we would come as children ready to learn from you, our Heavenly Father. Lord, we pray that we would know what these words meant in their time and what they may apply to in our lives today. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so Numbers chapter 35. And we're just going to do the first eight verses, so here we go.
And the Lord spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan, across from Jericho, saying, Command the children of Israel that they give the Levites a city to dwell in from the inheritance of their possession. And you shall also give the Levites common land around the cities.
They shall have the cities to dwell in, and their common land shall be for their cattle, for their herds, and for all their animals. The common land of the cities which you will give to the Levites shall extend from the wall of the city outward a thousand cubits all around. You shall measure outside the city on the east side two thousand cubits, on the south side two thousand cubits, on the west side two thousand cubits, and on the north side two thousand cubits. The cities shall be in the middle. This shall belong to them as common land for the cities.
Now, among the cities which you will give to the Levites you shall appoint six cities of refuge, to which a manslayer may flee. And to these you shall add forty-two cities. So all the cities you will give to the Levites shall be forty-eight. These you shall give with their common land. And the cities which you will give shall be from the possession of the children of Israel. From the larger tribe you shall give many, from the smaller you shall give few. Each shall give some as its cities to the Levites, in proportion to the inheritance that each receives." Well, we need to ask ourselves our three questions. A, what's this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what are we called to do in response to these words? hey, what's this about, right? Well, he's already talked about you going through this tribe, through this tribe, through this tribe, through this tribe, and we said there's nine and a half tribes still left.
What about Levi? Actually, nobody from Levi was mentioned, right? Eleazar, the high priest, is kind of overseeing all this, but the Levites don't get one common land, right? So one kind of strip of land with a certain area, right? We know that Judah gets the south, Benjamin a little bit in the middle, Dan way up north, right? But Levi? No, no, no. Levi is going to be scattered. Some here in this inheritance, some in Naphtali, some with Asher, some with Benjamin, some with Judah, some with Simeon, right? Some with Manasseh. They're going to be all over the place, right? Because there's duties that the Levites are going to have.
And so they're given these 42 different cities to live in. So throughout the whole land of Canaan, they're going to be given all these different lands. or it's all these different cities and they just get like 2,000 cubits around the city as well to herd their cattle and things like that. So they don't have an inheritance in the same way as a tribe that the rest of the people get. So they get these 40 Two different cities, plus six cities of refuge. Tomorrow we're going to get into what those cities of refuge are, or the next time we get together will be those cities of refuge.
But that's what this is talking about. The Levite's inheritance, largely, is the Lord. But they still gotta have houses to live in and they still gotta have places to have their sheep graze and their gardens to raise their vegetables and things like that. So that's what that is for.
So what's the best verse to summarize this? B, what's the best verse to summarize? Well, in my Bible, I would say verse 2, command the children of Israel that they give the Levite cities to dwell in from the inheritance of their possession and you shall also give the Levites common land around the cities. So, well, pardon me.
So I think that's what this is talking about. That's the best verse to summarize. This is verse two. It's the last seek calling. What are we called to do? Right? Well, we don't have Levites. We don't have priests in the same way. We don't, we don't, we don't have this type of stuff. So what is this about?
Well, notice the Levites are meant to be spread throughout the people. right, that the people of God are not going to be left without someone in that service who's able to open the word with them, read to them, remind them what the law said. Everybody is going to, each inherited land is going to have kind of their own Levites that they get to protect, they get to care for, and the Levites serve a function to care for them. But at the heart of this was that they would know that God had given them land, God had set apart Levites to do this work, and the Levites got God himself and the priesthood and their service in the sanctuary as their inheritance.
The Lord says, isn't that enough? Isn't that enough? Now the beautiful thing in the New Testament is God has made us a kingdom of a royal priesthood, a holy nation. And so now each one of us get to serve not in the tabernacle made by hands, but we get to boldly enter into his throne of grace.
We, as we're spread throughout the earth, we get to be those who go to the Lord in prayer. who go and remind people of God's Word and seek to tell people about how wonderful the Lord is. So I hope that that gives you a certain amount of grace, but also I want to maybe another calling here is to support the work of the tabernacle and to support the work of the Levites was going to cost them part of their inheritance, right? And their work was worthy of wage. And so they gave freely to them.
And so this is one of those areas where, again, I don't think that we have a priesthood in the same way that they had a priesthood in the Old Testament. I don't think that the office of a Levite still continues. However, we do see that even the apostle Paul, he says, right, if you're going to feed your ox while it's working for you, maybe you should make sure that you also feed those who are laboring in the church, right? And so this is one of those principles that we even see that God makes sure that the Levites are cared for, even though they don't get an inheritance of land.
So let's go ahead and pray. Father, we thank you so much that you are the one who gives us our daily bread and you are our inheritance. Lord, what a blessing it is to know that we can come to you, that we can serve you, and that you watch out for us. Lord, we pray, Father, that we would follow after you. and that we would take comfort. Because if we have you, we have enough. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, may God bless you. May you be comforted knowing that God has not spared any good gift from you, but has even given you his own son, Jesus Christ. I'll see you next time. Bye.