Numbers 1

The Lord took Israel out of Egypt and led them into the promised land. He did not transport His people to Canaan directly. When God brought His nation out of bondage, He led them into the wilderness. There He spoke to them through Moses.

The Lord commanded Moses to count the people, but not each and every human being, only the males who were twenty years old and older who were able to go to war. The census was to be done company by company within the tribal structure of the Israelites.

The men of Israel were to be heads of households, leaders in warfare, and part of the fighting force that the Lord would use in bringing His people through the wilderness and into the promised land. At the head of each tribe was a leading man with a God-given responsibility. His name was listed in these records, and he was to be with Moses in the numbering of that tribe.

These men were each named by their given names that identified them particularly, but they were also named by their father's names, and by their tribal affiliations. There was a context within which their leadership was granted. Elizur, mentioned in verse 5 was not just Elizur the independent man all by himself. Elizur was the son of another man, Shedeur, his father. This was significant in terms of the way he was to understand himself and the way others were to view him. This sense of belonging was not only a family matter. Elizur the son of Shedeur was of Reuben, the first son of Jacob. He was also a part of the people of Israel. The Israelites were the people of God.

Identity was not only individual for this man. It was familial, tribal, and beyond the limits of humanity. Elizur was a part of the people of God.

You are to be a part of a fighting force, not with the weapons of this world, but under the banner of Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God who died for your sins and rose for your justification. In Him you are part of the household of God. You are not just an individual. You are part of a family, a family with a mission to overcome evil with good.

Your identification with your Captain, Jesus, should be more precious to you than any other affiliation that you can imagine. Apart from Him you still have human dignity, but you do not have a true future and a hope in the eternal promise of God. But you are in Him through faith. Help us Lord to live in that faith, to live the life of faith that works itself out through love.

The leaders, we are told in verse 16, were the ones “chosen from the congregation.” How were they chosen? That was not important for us to know. Whatever the method may have been, we should see the sovereign hand of the Almighty as He worked according to His own will.

Tribe by tribe, the number of males able to go to war was determined in the presence of the leaders. Reuben: 46,500, Simeon: 59,300, Gad: 45,650, Judah: the largest, and the one from whom David and the Messiah would come, 74,600, Issachar: 54,400, Zebulun: 57,400, Joseph's son Ephraim: 40,500, Joseph's son Manasseh: 32,200, Benjamin: 35,400, Dan: 62,700, Asher: 41,500, Naphtali: 53,400, all totaling 603,500 fighting men in Israel.

Only the tribe of Levi, the tribe of priests and tabernacle servants, was left out of the census. The Levites were to put to death any outsider who came near the holy things of the Lord that were in their charge. They were to keep guard over the tabernacle of the testimony.

Would your ancestors have been welcomed into the presence of God in that day about 1500 years before the birth of Jesus Christ? Unless they were Israelites, unless they were Levites, unless they were descendants of Aaron, there would have been a point beyond which they would have traveled at the cost of their lives.

But we who were once far off from Israel have been drawn near because of our adoption into the household of God. Not only do we have the rights and privileges of the sons of God, we have been numbered among the congregation as those who have a sacred mission to go forth and to make disciples of all nations. We are a force that will not easily be eliminated, not because of our own ability or wisdom, but because of the One who died and rose again. He is our great leader and our hope. We will not deny Him.