Day 249

I've been reading in Numbers and can I just say - I don't like it as much as I did the first time I read it through.  I've read it a few times now and each time, I seem to have more stand out to me.  The numbers, don't seem so distant from me.  What I mean is, when I first read it, the numbers were remarkable. It was about the numbers for me, the thousands of people and the different tribes, days it took you to become clean, years they wandered, etc.  

This time, it has been more about the people.  For instance, today there were 250 men rebelling against Moses and Aaron.  They thought they didn't need them, that there was nothing special separating them from these two men.  So, they rebelled.  God killed them and them men the camps/households of the men that started the entire thing.  

Then "the very next day" after the ground swallowed up entire camps, thousands of people come to complain and God's plague starts killing them.  Aaron grabs the incense runs out and he and Moses intercede for the people, Aaron gets to a point where he's caught up with the plague. He's standing between the Israelites and God's presence and the plague stops (after killing over 17,000 people.

The people the other day were wining about not having meat, that's when God sent the Quail.  Before that Miriam and Aaron were complaining about Moses.  

I'm giving a very lose "skim" of some things that stood out to me personally, please read Numbers for yourself to get the full and complete view.  

My point is this.  Personally, I was so caught up in the numbers and intrigued by them that I missed how much of the book is about people not appreciating what they have or accepting what God does for others.  

I guess tonight, my thought is this.  Lord, please help me to be more like Moses,  Numbers 10:3 says, Moses was "very humble, more humble than any other person on earth."  That's the kind of person God comes to defend.  I want to be someone God would defend.