Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / June 25, 2023 | Numbers - The Blood Avenger

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June 25, 2023 | Numbers - The Blood Avenger · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: You made it.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's the last message in our numbers series.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: So Gold Star, Free Burrito.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: You made it.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so this morning we'll be we'll be finishing out the book of Numbers, and next week we'll be starting a new series.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: And um uh the extra extra, which is our monthly podcast uh for July, we'll basically we'll totally ring out the rag and we'll talk about uh chapters 33 through 36 of the book of numbers.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: So if you want to get kind of the last little crumbs of what we're talking about here in this book, you can find it there.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: So uh this morning we'll be in uh Numbers chapter 35.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: And um for any of you who ever grew up uh like in a neighborhood where you played tag or maybe out on the you know playground at schoolyard or something like that at recess, um, there was always like home base, right?
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Where you could go and you would protected and you couldn't be tagged anymore, you couldn't be frozen.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um when I was growing up, we played this game in our neighborhood.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: We had a bunch of young boys all about the same age, and we just did during the summer this like free-for-all wrestling tournament where you would pick in the yard your your home base, and then you would rest there, and then whenever you were ready, you would go back out into the fray, and it was just pandemonium as everybody was like tackling each other and taking each other down to the ground.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, home base, you know, was something where you were safe, you couldn't be hurt anymore.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um in numbers 35, uh, we're kind of going to be talking about a home base.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: The difference is in this case, um, somebody who has unintentionally killed somebody else and is being chased by an individual known as the blood avenger may go to a city of refuge and be protected.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a little bit different, but not much.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's basically wrestling during the summer.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we'll begin in chapter 35, verse 9.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we'll see that the Lord is giving another instruction to Moses while they're on the east side of the Jordan River, uh, that when they cross over into the promised land, this is to be another thing, he does this quite a bit, uh, another thing that they will institute as a law uh once they enter into Canaan.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: So the Lord said to Moses, speak to the Israelites and tell them When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan, designate cities to serve as cities of refuge for you, so that a person who kills someone unintentionally may flee there.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: You will have the cities as a refuge from the Avenger, so that the one who kills someone will not die until he stands trial before the assembly.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: The cities you select will be your six cities of refuge.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: Select three cities across the Jordan and three cities in the land of Canaan to be the cities of refuge.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: These six cities will serve as a refuge for the Israelites and for the alien or temporary resident among them, so that anyone who kills a person unintentionally may flee there.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so you might remember uh that when we're talking about the tribes of Israel, one of them is the Levites.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: And the Levites have a very special designation in that they are to serve as the priestly class.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody who's a Levite, um, every male is going to serve as a priest.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so their inheritance and their um uh their ability to live and survive off of the land does not come from receiving a portion of the promised land like it would for the other tribes, uh, but it is from the give the tithes, literally, from the other eleven tribes that they give to the Levites to survive.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so one of the ways that that factors in is when they are now about to go into the promised land and the Levites are like, we're not getting any land.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: They uh Moses is going to establish that 48 of the cities belong specifically to the Levites.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: There are gonna be other people who live in them too, but of these forty-eight cities, six of them are going to be cities of refuge, which have this very special role that we're gonna be talking about.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: And there are three on the east side of the Jordan, and there are three on the west side of the Jordan in the promised land.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so um as we go on, we're gonna be talking about these cities where the Levites live, where these priests live, but also you'll notice here at the very end of this passage that these cities will serve as a refuge not just for Israelites, but anybody who is now going to be in the land of God, who um might not be descended from Abraham, but by faith is a part of that community, that they might be able to take advantage of this mercy as well.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the thing that is going to come up a lot in this pat in this story, this narrative of Numbers 35, is how God views um death and the punishment for causing death.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the reason why God cares so much is that he values life.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so when somebody takes a life, even unintentionally, which is gonna be the case uh throughout this sort of section, um, they are still guilty.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: They're guilty of depriving the world of somebody that God made in his image.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so, though we're gonna call it manslaughter, right, because it's unintentional uh death that was caused, which, by the way, manslaughter sounds way worse than murder, right?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Nevertheless, that's the crime that we're really looking at that would be in our laws today.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: So if somebody commits manslaughter, um they're being chased by the Avenger, and they can go to one of these cities of refuge.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's up to where we're at.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: As we keep going, if anyone strikes, though, now this is going to talk about murder itself.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: If anyone strikes a person with an iron object and death results, he is a murderer, the murderer shall be put to death.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: If anyone has in his hand a stone capable of causing death and strikes another person and he dies, the murderer must be put to death.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: If anyone has in his hand a wooden object capable of causing death and strikes another person and he dies, the murderer must be put to death.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: The avenger of blood himself is to kill the murderer.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: When he finds him, he is to kill him.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Pretty straightforward job description there.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: Likewise, if anyone in hatred pushes a person or throws an object at him with malicious intent and he dies, or if in hostility he strikes him with his hand and he dies, the one who struck him must be put to death, he is a murderer.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: The avenger of blood is to kill the murderer when he finds him.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Two things.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: One, murder, word used a lot, right?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: So the Bible clearly distinguishes between murder and killing.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: And murder is something that is uh when you have, as it as is expressed here in this passage, like a willful desire to end somebody else's life.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of like how we would think of the word murder.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: But then they're also going to put a different category in there.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: There's another Hebrew word here for death, for somebody who inflicts death upon somebody, but it's unintentional.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: And that's sort of the space that we're in.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: There's two things that happen in the way that somebody's life might have been lost.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: One was somebody hated them and struck them with an object and killed them, in which case they're to be put to death, or somebody unintentionally did it, and they are also to be put to death, but they have special circumstances, okay?
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: But the thing that draws most of our attention here is this uh blood avenger, right?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: So this is not some like new R-rated Marvel movie, okay?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: This is going to be a um nobody's seen Marvel, that's fine.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: So this is um it's a it's a company, they uh comic books, it's you should look it up.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: So this blood avenger, though, okay, the the word that is used for avenger here, it is in Hebrew, it's gaal.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: And really what it means is redeemer, okay?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so what is happening is there is a role that you would have as next of kin, where if your your brother or your sister or somebody very close to you, next to kin, like I said, dies or is killed, you now have a responsibility.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you have a number of responsibilities as this G'al, the Redeemer of the family.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if uh in fact, if you're familiar with the book of Ruth and we know about Boaz, and we call him a kinsman redeemer, you this is the same job, okay?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: He was functioning as the next of kin to help out in marriage to extend the family line.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um the redeemer could collect debts owed to a family member, they could buy a family member out of slavery brought on by poverty, they could protect family property by purchasing it back or preventing it from being sold, or in this case, they would be redeeming the loss of blood in their family, right?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Which still sounds pretty metal, but at the same time, it's a little bit different than going on a revenge tour.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: This is not like some action movie where somebody is, you know, angry and they they're going to go on this sort of rampage to destroy anybody who affected them.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: It is very much the Old Testament life for a life.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so blood was shed, and they are going to redeem their family's blood.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: But, like we said, there is also this situation where somebody did this unintentionally.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: They committed manslaughter.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so if anyone suddenly pushes a person without hostility, or throws any object at him without malicious intent, or without looking, drops a stone that could kill a person and he dies.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: But he was not his enemy and didn't intend to harm him, the assembly is to judge between the person who kills someone and the avenger of blood according to these ordinances.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: The assembly is to protect the one who kills someone from the avenger of blood.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Then the assembly will return to him, return him to the city of refuge he fled to, and he must live there until the death of the high priest who is anointed with the holy oil.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: So this gives the situation for unintentional death.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how you are frequently enough dropping a stone that could kill a person and they die unintentionally, but apparently it was happening enough that Moses is like, we need a rule for this.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: People are dropping stones so carelessly everywhere around Israel.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's gotta stop.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: So this is unintentional death.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: And they are going to have a separate path because they are also being pursued by the blood avenger, okay?
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: But they also need to hustle and get to a city of refuge because that is the only place in Israel, these six cities, that is the only place where they might avoid the punishment that they rightly deserve for spilling the blood of an Israelite.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now, something very interesting happens here, right?
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: We we've already constructed this situation where we've said the city of refuge is the only place that they can go.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the only place where they can be exempted from the punishment that they deserve, where they where their guilt will not really be acted upon.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: The community will judge that they were innocent of intentional murder, and they can hide here.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now they have to hide here, they have to stay in this city until the high priest dies.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: But it it presents a really interesting thing.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: What is it about the high priest dying where then they're able to just walk free?
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's what it is saying here.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: All these people who've unintentionally committed murder, well, who have killed somebody accidentally, right?
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: They go to these cities, and then once the high priest dies, they're like, get out of jail free, right?
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: They're they're going back to their homes.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible isn't really clear about this.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's an undisclosed reason, both here and elsewhere in the Old Testament, about the high priest.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: But there's something about it where we understand that the high priest, right, the one who is over the entire nation, right?
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh in the book of Numbers, we've been talking about Aaron first, and then later Eliezer, right, his son, and then there have been some others.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: Phineas comes along and will be a future high priest.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: But there is a role that they occupy, and this is shown through something like the Day of Atonement, where to a certain degree they bear the weight of the nation's sin upon their shoulders.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: And though they are not ultimately responsible through the death of the high priest, God says that death of this one who was righteous is going to set free those who are guilty.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: So they are fine, they are finding this home base and probably waiting for the high priest to die, which is sort of an interesting thought, but anyhow.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so the last little bit here that we get of the city of refuge is they say, So it's home base, you've done this thing, so you've accidentally killed somebody, and you were able to make it to the city of refuge before the blood redeemer caught up to you.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: But now you need to stay there.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: And if you leave the city of refuge, if you walk outside of its walls of protection, then your life is in your own hands.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: The blood redeemer is still able to kill you, as they are taking vengeance upon you for the death of their family member, and they would be right to do so, so you have to stay inside these city walls.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a reminder of both the severity of the sin, right?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna get to this in a second, but uh it perhaps some of you by now you're like, I don't get what the big deal is.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: They have they've accidentally done this thing, and now they have to go and live in the city for the rest of their life, or until the high priest dies, right?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, what we consistently see through this story is that the guilt of the one who committed manslaughter is still present in their life, and it is present even when they are within the city of refuge, they are just exempted from experiencing this punishment.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so God's mercy through protection is also shown.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: So the death of this priest redeems the killer.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: But uh the final thing that we'll learn here in Numbers 35 is that God is very specific about how somebody could be set free from this punishment.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: It is through the death of the high priest, and there's no other circumstances other than that by which somebody could be saved.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: If anyone kills a person, the murder is to be put to death based on the word of witnesses, but no one is to be put to death based on the testimony of one witness.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: You are not to accept ransom for the life of someone who is guilty of murder, he must be put to death.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: Neither should you accept a ransom for the person who flees to his city of refuge, allowing him to return and live in the land before the death of the high priest.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so what this is saying is there would be people who are coming along and they're like, Can I bail out my relative?
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: He's in the city of refuge, he's done this thing, but uh here, all of this gold, and what God says is, no, it's not a matter of payment here.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you're rich or you're poor, you're falling under the same system of judgment in God's kingdom, right?
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: There are certain situations in the Bible, you know, you accidentally kill an ox or something that belongs to somebody, and you do pay them back.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: And it is a monetary exchange.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: But when a life is ended, there is only one future, which is death.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so God is saying, doesn't matter how rich, it doesn't matter how poor you are, you're still following, and the avenger of blood is coming after you.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: So then it brings up a really, really important question, and frankly, it will be the key to unlocking this passage, which I understand is obscure, and that is a charitable word to describe it.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: What is key to understanding this passage is all of the language about blood.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: And that might make some of you squeamish.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: I am married to a wonderful woman who cannot look at her finger when she cuts it with a kitchen knife, okay?
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I know that some of you, the idea of blood sort of makes you curdle.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: But the concept of blood is foundational to understanding the way that God is working throughout this passage and frankly how it applies to us and ultimately to Jesus.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that we see here is that God is continually bringing them back and saying phrases like they are guilty of bloodshed.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's not just a life was ended, but there's something about the blood itself.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: So this goes back all the way to a command that God gave to Noah when the flood had subsided and he had just initially come out of the ark.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: God was restarting, basically.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: Noah was supposed to function as basically another Adam because the first one had done messed up.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so Noah has come out of the ark, and God says to him, Do not defile the land where you live, for bloodshed defiles the land, and there can be no atonement for the land because of the blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of the person who shed it.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: Do not make the land unclean where you live and where I dwell, for the Lord for I, the Lord, reside among the Israelites.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: So that that's the end of Numbers thirty-five there, and then the part that I said was coming in Genesis nine.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: He's saying to Noah, But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is its blood.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: From every beast I will require it, and from man.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: And there you have the reason, because the one who died was made in God's image.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody is created in God's image.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the life of every single individual is valuable, and is far more valuable than an animal, it is far more valuable than any one thing, it cannot be paid for with money because they are made in God's image.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so you'll see here that he says that blood must be exchanged.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so that tells the answer is two things for us about Numbers 35.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: One, it tells us why the punishment for manslaughter was so severe, that in God's kingdom intent did not factor into guilt.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it was intentional or unintentional, even the accidental act of taking a life was still significant enough to incur guilt.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: It tells us why that's the case.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it also tells us why the punishment for sin was to bring along this blood redeemer, right?
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: Because the only the only payment for life, only the payment of life could cover the sins of life.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is why the Mosaic Covenant involves all those sacrifices, right?
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: If you were with us when we went through the book of Leviticus, you know that we talked a lot about blood.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: This is where it's coming from.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because God is saying that He has a people who are guilty, and only life can pay for the sins of another life.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: So this tells us some very important things about our own life.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, it tells us how God views our sin.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: And you might say, how in the world does a city of refuge tell us about how God views our own sin?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it tells us a sobering fact, which is that your intent, whether it was accidental or intentional, your intent does not factor into whether or not you are guilty before God for your sin.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible is very clear that your intent does factor into the degree of punishment, as it does in Numbers 35, but we are all guilty before God, even for the ways that we have fallen short of his standard accidentally.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's sobering because we would prefer to not think of it that way.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: We understand sort of logically why, based upon our own experiences, somebody who intentionally rebels against God is worthy of punishment.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: But it's harder for us to understand in the Bible, and we often throw stones at it.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: That those who have done something accidentally might have fallen short of God's standard.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: But yet we don't have a problem with that when we think of other examples in our life where the same thing applies.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like, if you walk into a beautiful pottery store and you see a sign at the front that says, if you break it, you buy it.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: If you accidentally knock a stack of plates off of a shelf and they shatter to the ground, you are still responsible for the payment because you have broken something of value.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: This is the way that we are working within God's kingdom.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: This is also why when Hannah takes me to stores that have very delicate things on the shelves, I usually stand by the door because I hit the doorways in my own house, and I'm certainly not about to pay for some little China knick-knack that fell to the ground.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I recognize, though, that I would still be responsible if those things fell to the ground, even if I didn't intend for it.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: This is why the all-inclusive passage that Paul gave us in Romans 3.23 is so powerful when he says that all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: Every single person.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: We have all done it perhaps to different degrees, right?
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: There is room to talk about that.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us have been much more willful in our rebellion than others, but every single person has fallen short of God's standard.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so when we talk about these things, we look at the Old Testament, and it is often a criticism of the Old Testament.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: We say, why were there so many rules?
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the Bible, the Bible's very clear that that was part of the point, is that there were so many rules that they were to follow that God was trying to communicate to his people that there is not a single person, that nobody has succeeded in living a righteous life.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: You say, well, why couldn't I eat, you know, pig?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, because God is setting up standards for his people for a time that would set them apart from the nations, but also to show them, because bacon is delicious, that there are some things that are very hard to follow about his commands, and also that we consistently are unable as people who love to go our own way, that we like to rebel against God's plan.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Part of God's plan in bringing about the covenant with Moses and the Israelites was to show that nobody succeeds in living a perfect life.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: But Numbers 35 then gives us the opposite end of the spectrum, where on one side is God's justice, where he is righteous to bring punishment against those who have destroyed things in his creation, we also see the city of refuge coming out, and how God's mercy is extending to people who do not, by his definition, deserve that mercy, but yet he gives it to them anyway.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: We also know from the Old Testament that it is always pointing us towards something greater.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: So if I can summarize, the city of refuge.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: On the one hand, we have God's justice being shown, and that through the loss of a life, a payment of blood is expected.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: And then on the other hand, with the city of refuge, we have an example of somebody who is guilty being forgiven and being exempted from punishment because of God's mercy.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: So then we go back to that example with the pottery store.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: And we recognize that if you break it, you buy it.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: Except in this example, what God has done as the owner of the pottery store is he has walked in and seen all around you is shattered dishes and cups and fancy things.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: All around you are just the shards of beautiful, one-of-a-kind pottery, some of which you have shoved off the shelves and some of which you have accidentally bumped off.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: But your feet are littered with debris.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: And the owner of the pottery store, as God comes in and says, I will pay for all of it.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: I will pay for all of your mistakes.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: All of the pottery that you shattered that I made, I will pay for it so that you don't have to.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so we take that and we sometimes we ask this question and we go, how could God judge us for breaking all of these rules?
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then we, it's the same as asking the question, why would the potter not be upset that we had just destroyed their entire store?
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: The greater question is, why would he ever pay for your mistakes?
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: That is the question that we should be asking.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: Not why is there punishment, but why in the world have we ever been exempted from punishment when we have consistently broken the things in his world?
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is where Jesus comes into the picture, and specifically the bloody cross.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because you say, why did Jesus not only need to die on the cross for our sins, but why did he need to bleed so?
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: And the answer is because only blood can make a payment for your sin.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it should be your life on the cross, it should be my life on the cross.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_00: The punishment for the sins that we have committed against God are deserving of our death.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: But because of Jesus Christ and his death on the cross, and specifically the blood that he shed, you are now free from the punishment that you deserve because of your sins.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so God is bringing all of these things together, and we see the bloody cross, but then, hey, we also see, this is the shadow of things to come in the Old Testament, that obscure passage about the high priest dying.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, because the Bible is clear to show, especially in the book of Hebrews in the New Testament, that Jesus is the once and for all high priest.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so through the death of the high priest back in the city of refuge, well, the death of the high priest in our world, and now he lives today resurrected, the death of that high priest is what cleanses you of your sin and my sin.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: So there is one final thing, though, that we must learn about the city of refuge.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it is the one that is the hardest for our society to accept.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: Because we love the idea that we wouldn't be punished for sin.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: Pretty easy to get on that train, right?
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think we always fully grasp the magnitude and the reasons why Jesus was hanging on that cross, why he had to go through the type of death that he had to go through because God loves you.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the prevailing elements of the city of refuge for any Israelite or visitor was that if they were guilty, they had to stay in the city.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: They couldn't leave.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the direct relationship is not that somebody, you know, could never leave the Christian faith, but we have to understand that the apostles described this situation by saying, and there is salvation and no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: The thing that is hard for us to accept is that Jesus is the only way to be forgiven of our sins.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the only path to forgiveness, and it is the only option that we have if we desire to have a relationship with God and not incur the penalty for our mistakes.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: He is the way, the truth, and the life, and nobody goes to the Father except through Him.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so we are reminded that Jesus is our city of refuge, and he is the only place that we can go for this kind of thing.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so there are two final ways you can think about that.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: The very clear, very direct application is that there are some of us right now who do not trust in Jesus as our Savior and need to go and trust in him, go within the protection of his city walls, and recognize that that is the only place where we might find sanctuary from what is righteous judgment on the outside.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: That Jesus is the only place that we can go.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_00: And by believing in him as your Savior, you might be able to be forgiven, you will be forgiven of your sins.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: But the other application, though, is for those of us who have trusted in Jesus Christ already.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: For those of us who might even have this decades-long relationship of living inside this city of refuge.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: The thing for us is that we have to continue to remind ourselves what a great joy it is that the death of Jesus Christ protected us from sin for all time.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: That it forgives us of our sin in the past, in the present, and in the future.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Because he was the perfect high priest, and because his blood, his sacrifice was sufficient to satisfy the wrath of God for anybody who is guilty and trusted in Jesus, we have to continually remind ourselves that it is within the city of Jesus that we are able to be made right with God.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: And furthermore, as a child of God made in his image, that he values and loves, that God desires to have a relationship with us within that city.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: That he is calling every single Christian who has trusted in Christ to come near to him and to recognize the continual and consistent value and wonder of being forgiven by God.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: You might place yourself in the shoes of the one who had committed manslaughter back in Numbers 35, who was sitting inside the city of refuge and looking outside the walls and saw the Redeemer of Blood waiting for him.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_00: And you might, I think, fairly imagine him saying, That is the punishment that I deserve, but by God's grace I am saved.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: That is the same thing that we say today.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: We recognize that God is just in his judgment of sin.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: We recognize that we deserve that judgment, but we also recognize that God loves us so much that he sent his son to be the blood sacrifice so that we might have a relationship with him again.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: And if all of that is kind of odd to think about, I think it is just extending the beauty of the sacrifice of Christ.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: I know for many of us it's just believe in Jesus and know that you're saved.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: But I care deeply that you understand why you are saved.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: Not just that God loves you, but what was happening through that sacrifice, why it needed to happen that way, because of the things that we have done.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so as we conclude our series on the book of Numbers, we see that there have been so many examples throughout these chapters that we've looked at, 36 in total, 36 chapters, where God is leading a sinful and rebellious people into a land that they do not deserve, yet he wants to give to them out of his love for them.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: And as they continually rebel against them, God continually goes back to them and says, Yes, but I care about you, and I want you to understand and experience the fellowship that can only be had when we have a right relationship with each other.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: He says over and over again, I dwell among you, and that is why you must be clean.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: That is why there are these rules.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, so you would see that you are sinful, but also so that we could have fellowship.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: But when we look to our own lives today, we should see the same thing.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: God is looking at a people who are continually rebellious, and he says, I want you to believe in Jesus Christ because this is the only pathway where you might be saved and we might have a right relationship with each other.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: And God is not, should not be defamed because he is just.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: You want to worship a just God.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: You want to worship a God who punishes evil.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: But I am thankful that I get to say that we worship a God as well who saved us from that wrath that we deserve.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: And by the blood of Jesus Christ is protecting us, and for an eternity is protecting us so that we might have a right relationship with Him.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: We have been saved, even though we do not deserve it by the blood of Christ.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: Father, we come before you, and I confess that often I do not appreciate the depth of your love for us.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: God, I am amazed every time I think about all of the ways in which we have smashed the beautiful things around us.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, Lord, you pay the price and pick those things back up again and restore them to their beautiful state.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: God, you are in the business of saving souls.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_00: And Lord, it is through your hand alone that we are saved.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_00: It is through no work of our own, it is only through the blood of Christ.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: And God, I pray that Numbers 35 would be something that we can see how, Lord, you work out your justice and your mercy at the exact same time.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: We hold both of these things in concert with each other, believing and trusting in a God who is righteous and who is also filled with mercy.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: God, we recognize that your mercy is something we do not deserve.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yet we come to you again and again and again, and we say thank you.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_00: Lord, we thank you for Jesus Christ, and it's in his name we pray.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: Love you.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great week.