SCRIPTURE: Numbers 33 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: This chapter recounts the stages of their journey through the wilderness to the promised land. If finishes with a warning not to be enticed by the culture and religion of the land. Compromise will be deadly! This may seem harsh, but only if we underestimate the poisonous corruption and cruelty of the…
Author: Norm
remember Lot’s wife (or looking back)
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 32 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: At first Moses is not impressed by what the tribes of Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh ask – to take the land on the east side of the Jordan. What he hears them asking, and what he gets so angry about, is basically to stop before entering the land. Moses reminds…
light in the darkness
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 31 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: Although I do not like this chapter – people as plunder, kill the boys, save the virgins – in an odd way I see Jesus in this passage. The mess of sin is our responsibility, but God does not abandon us to it. He does not snap His fingers and end it…
struggling with patriarchal passages
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 30 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: This chapter is not about vows first of all, it is about “relationships between a man and his wife, and between a father and his young daughter still living in his house”. [Numbers 30:16], applied to vows. “Her husband may confirm or nullify any vow she makes or any sworn pledge to deny…
‘service’ replaced by service!
Church Cancelled! Tomorrow our ‘service’ is being canceled, so that service can happen. Crossroads people are spreading out in Durham region tomorrow morning to perform a variety of community service assignments. These are not projects planned by the church, just individual and family initiated efforts. Handing out flowers at the hospital, picking up garbage, planting…
seventy seven times
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 29 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: The seventh month was a bloody festival month – the Feast of Trumpets, the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur, most solemn of Jewish holy days) and the Feast of Tabernacles. In addition to the regular daily offerings, special sacrifices were made. And the Feast of Tabernacles (‘tents’, remembering God’s provision and protection…
pray for the church in India
My wife’s cousin Ruth and her husband Nitin, who is from India, sent out this request for prayer in the volatile religious, political and cultural tensions in their area. Please pray for the whole community, as well as for our brothers and sisters in the Lord who face unbelievable conflict and threats for the name…
first and foremost!
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 28 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: Here we go again. Another list of sacrifices. Sometimes it’s hard to fathom why so much bloodshed. And Samuel’s words seem hard to believe: “Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the LORD? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed…
working with the Lord of harvest
SCRIPTURE: Numbers 27 OBSERVATION/APPLICATION: We serve a compassionate God. Jesus, Who shows us what God is like, embodies the love and mercy of God. He is concerned for everyone, no matter what their background, story, race, sin, gender, age, etc. He sees the whole mass of the human race as sheep needing a shepherd – “When…
God’s Earth Day!
Today is Earth Day. It would be better to call it “God’s Earth Day”. Our world belongs to God! “As followers of Jesus Christ, living in this world— which some seek to control, and others view with despair— we declare with joy and trust: Our world belongs to God!” We should celebrate “God’s Earth Day”…