Now let's take our scriptures this morning. And we will turn to Numbers 26. Numbers 26. I'm a little bit worried about preaching now, to be honest, because I'm speaking today on the final straight. And that concerns me. How Moses was replaced by Joshua. I trust there's no parallel there. But nevertheless, Numbers 26. We might not get as far as Moses and Joshua. I might deliberately slow down so we don't get there today. But Numbers 26. Let's commence our reading at the verse number one. And they came to pass after the plague, and that was the plague that came upon them because of their whoredom with the daughters of Moab and Midian. that Balaam had inflicted upon Israel. So, verse 1 of Numbers 26, And it came to pass, after the plague, that the LORD spake unto Moses, and unto Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest, saying, Take the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel, from twenty years old and upward, throughout their father's house, all that are able to go to war in Israel. And Moses and Eliezer, the priests, spake with them in the plains of Moab by Jordan, near Jericho, saying, take the sum of the people from 20 years old and upward, as the Lord commanded Moses and the children of Israel, which went forth out of the land of Egypt. Verse five, Reuben, the eldest son of Israel, the children of Reuben, Hanok, of which cometh the family of the Hanokites, of Palu, the family of the Paluites, of Hezron, the family of the Hezronites, of Carmi, the family of the Carmites. These are the families of the Reubenites, and they that were numbered of them were 40 and 3,730. and the sons of Pelul, Eliab, the son of Eliab, Nemuel, and Dathan, and Abiram. This is that Dathan and Abiram, which were famous in the congregation who strove against Moses and against Aaron in the company of Korah, when they strove against the Lord. And the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them up together with Korah. When that company died, what time, the fire devoured 250 men, and they became a sign. Notwithstanding, the children of Korah died not, the sons of Simeon after their families. Verse 14, these are the families of the Semonites, 20 and 2,000 and 200. Verse 15, the children of Gad. Verse 19, the sons of Judah. Verse 23, the sons of Issachar. Verse 26, of the sons of Zebulun. Verse 28, the sons of Joseph, and they were two, both Manasseh and Ephraim. Verse 33, and, I apologize, verse 35, these are the sons of Ephraim. Verse 38, the sons of Benjamin. Verse 41, these are the sons of Benjamin, their number. Verse 42, these are the sons of Dan. Verse 44, of the sons of Asher. Verse 48, of the sons of Naphtali. Verse 51, these were the numbered of the children of Israel, 600,000 and 1,730. Amen. We'll just end our reading there, and essentially that is the census of the people of Israel. Well, I don't know If any of you have ever been involved in cross country racing, I know some of you have been. Some of you have done the Duke of Edinburgh and other cross country events. But certainly when it comes to racing, there is nothing as delightful as the final straight. When you see the finish line at the end, when I was in secondary school, that's quite a few years ago for me now, we would have competed with our other class friends in Ballet Claire. We came here to run and we ran on different occasions. I can't say I'm particularly dressed with trophies and medals, I never got one, but I did enjoy the running and I have fond memories of that final straight our teacher always said to us, or PE teacher always said, don't burn yourself out. Until you get to the last leg of the race, then run for all you're worth. He always said, make sure and finish well. And that's what we did. Not everybody had that mentality, so it was always a great encouragement to us to come that final straight and maybe pass five or six fellas in the last few seconds. That was always good. But the final straight is good to approach, and that is the exact location of Israel in Numbers 26. They are on the final straight. They are homeward bound. The borders are almost within sight of this over 40-year journey. You see, in Genesis, the Lord called out a people from humanity. The Lord called out a particular people and he called them Israel. And then in Exodus, the people of Israel, they depart from Egypt and they journey into the wilderness as far as Sinai. And when they get to Sinai, you know all that happened and they were there for quite some time. The book of Leviticus comes next. in the Bible order, and Leviticus was given at Sinai. And then we come to the book of Numbers. And Numbers is where they left Sinai and traveled to the promised land. The first nine chapters of Numbers is given over to preparation, the preparation just to leave Sinai. The second third of this book is their first approach to the promised land. They leave Sinai, they go to the promised land, they fail, and that then takes us into the final third of this book, which is their wandering which leads them to their final approach into the promised land. We have spent several months considering Moses as he led Israel, but here they are. They're now on the final straight. 40 years has passed. Many changes in this congregation, indeed, far greater changes than we have here in 10 years. But here they are coming near the promised land. So they are in the final straight. Firstly, this morning, I want you to see the numbering. The numbering. Essentially, chapter 26 is a census. And perhaps you might read this sentence a little bit repetitive. It doesn't look particularly interesting. But it is most important. The book of Numbers is well named because the people of God are numbered twice. But can I say, the Lord didn't number these people for his benefit. The Lord didn't need Moses and the elders to count the people. The Lord knew the very numbers of the hares that was on their heads. He knew how many there were. This numbering was left for our benefit today so that we might learn something. from what God was doing with Israel. And I trust we'll see that as we work through this chapter. The first numbering of Israel was in chapter one. The second numbering is here in chapter 26, where we are this morning. And Moses was the one informed by the Lord that he should do this. Look at verse 1. And it came to pass after the plague that the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Elias the son of Aaron the priest, saying, Take the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel. Now, sometimes we sing that hymn, perhaps. We should have sang it this morning, in hindsight. But we sing about counting your blessings. Number them one by one. And there is a sense here that the Lord is calling Moses and the people to number their blessings, but as we'll see in a moment or two, to number also the curses. We don't sing so much about numbering the amount of times where God chastened us and rebuked us. This numbering is to remind the people of what has happened and what they have come through to prevent them from sinning and to encourage them to press on. The people here were numbered. You might recall in your mind, and it might be a difficulty to you, that David numbered the people of Israel. Remember when he was king He'd been king for some time. He was a mature man of God who had proven the Lord over and over and over again with a small army as he did with a big army. But when David told Joab to go and number the people, even Joab knew that this was wrong, that he shouldn't do it. Nevertheless, David's word prevailed, the Bible says, and Joab went to number the people, and as a result, a curse came upon David and the people. God rebuked them. So what's the difference? Why is God here telling Moses to number them, but he cursed David later on? There is something we have to learn there about providence and the will of God. The Lord at one time may say not to do something, at another time he may tell you to do it. It's not because God's will changes, it's because God knows what he's doing. You see, when David numbered the people of Israel, it was out of pride. He wanted to see how big his army had become. He wanted to number them so that he could depend upon them. It would give him courage. Look at my army. Look at the size of these men of war. His motivation was wrong. But here the Lord says to number them and the Lord's motivation is not wrong. He is telling the people to number your blessings and number also your chastenings. That's the idea of this passage. So you find the total. It might be good, perhaps, just for a moment to look at each tribe here to give you a sense of their numbers, just to give you something to compare and learn. We have 18,000 people. All right, 18,000 people here in Lorne. In the whole of Northern Ireland, there is almost 1.9. To be precise, well, I suppose the census that I was looking at was 2019, I think, and it said in 2019 there was 1.88 million people in Northern Ireland. So we can round up and say 1.9. I'm sure it's near that today. So keep that in mind. So look at these tribes here. Verse 5, you have Ruban. The number, let me see, the number is found in verse 7. These are the families of the Reubenites, and they that were numbered of them were forty and three thousand and seven hundred and thirty. Verse 12, the sons of Simeon. Verse 14, these are the families of the Simeonites, 20 and 2,200, significantly less. And that's important, I'll tell you why later. Verse 15, the children of Gad after their families, and the number is found in verse 18. These are the families of the children of Gad according to those that were numbered of them 40,000 again, not 40,500. Then you come to Judah, verse 19. The sons of Judah were Ere and Onan, that's his immediate children. And then the rest of his family is numbered. Verse 22, these are the families of Judah, the tribe, according to those that were numbered of them, three score and 16,000. and 500, massive in number. Verse 23, the children of Issachar. Verse 25, these are the families of Issachar according to those that were numbered of them, three score and 4,300. So you're getting the sense, these are big numbers here. It's a lot of people. And perhaps you can look at it yourself later on, but we'll skip to verse 51. And here we're told the grand total. There were These were the numbers of the children of Israel, 600,000 and 1,730. So to put it into maybe more common dialect, that's 601,730. 601,730. Remember our population here is 1.9 million. There, there was 600, well almost 602,000. But I want you to keep in mind who was numbered. That's not the number of every single individual. Perhaps we'll go back to the beginning of the chapter, chapter 26, and look at verse two, because the Lord is very specific in who is to be numbered. And sometimes people may ask the question, why do you never find women in the genealogies? Well, here's the answer. Here's why. Verse two, take the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel from 20 years old and upward, throughout their father's house, all that are able to go to war in Israel. So as always the case, that numbering was to number the army. Those who would take a sword, a shield. Those who would go into a battle and fight to the death. Those are the people that were numbered. They had to be above 20. It's not stated here, but elsewhere in the Bible, from memory, it was something like they stopped numbering them who were over 60 when they came to the army, because that obviously was retirement age from the army. It was around 60, anywhere thereabouts. So what you have then is 601 or 602 men above the age of 20. So think about that for a minute. If there's 602 men, You could double that, give or take maybe a few thousand, because of all the women. So straight away that takes us now to 1.2 million. Then you have to count in all the men who were under 20. And I don't think in this counts Those at the other end of the scale were not counted, so we'll just count in those who are under 20. And even aside from that, there were the Levites. And the Levites were never numbered in these census for different reasons. So I can... Definitely say there was a population here equivalent to the size of Northern Ireland when you take them all. And it would have been about 1.7 million or thereabouts. And Moses was the man leading them. That shows us the size and the skill of this people. But don't miss this. Go with me, please, in that chapter 26 to the verse 63. And look what it says here, because this is quite solemn. These are they that were numbered by Moses and Eliezer the priest, who numbered the children of Israel in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho. But among these There was not a man of them whom Moses and Aaron the priests numbered when they numbered the children of Israel in the wilderness of Sinai. You see, at the beginning of numbers, they were at Sinai. And in chapter 1, the tribes were numbered. This is why. God had them numbered. And then they went to the promised land and they failed. And God said that not one of you saved Joshua and Caleb. Not one of you who were numbered. Now remember, the men under 20 were not numbered, the women were not numbered, and the Levites were not numbered. But we're told in this count that not one of them that were numbered by Moses and Aaron were there that day, see, of Joshua and Caleb. That's sad, but this is why they're numbered, so that the numbering again would remind them of how they were chastened for their sin. And I can't help but notice here how that every single person in the tribe of Israel were all replaceable. The Lord replaced them all. That's true of us all today. We can all be replaced. Every one of us. You think on King Saul. King Saul was the great leader of Israel and the people rallied around him. But Saul had to be replaced by David, a man after God's own heart. So we can see, men and women, that nobody, nobody here is unreplaceable. except for Christ, in whom our faith rests. So let me take some time just to show you some of the judgments and mercies that this numbering highlighted. If you would, look at verse number five with me here. We have here the children of Reuben. So Reuben was the eldest son of Jacob, or Israel, as his name was changed to. And Reuben had some relatives that you will know of. Verse number 9, and the son of Eliab, Nemuel and Dathan and Abiram. This is that Dathan and Abiram, which were famous in the congregation, who strove against Moses and against Aaron in the company of Korah when they strove against the Lord. And that verse is there. to remind the people during this numbering that there's some in the family of Reuben who are no longer with you, and they're no longer with you because of judgment God judged them for their sin in this case. These were young men. Indeed, these were young men involved in the service of God. But the Lord had to remove them, as it were, when they were young. They had certainly a ministry ahead of them, but the Lord put them to the side. Men and women, these are solemn words. It is there to remind the people and to highlight the people of the tragic results of rebellion against God. These are the men who made strange fire before the Lord and the Lord burnt them up. Sad stuff. If you go on then to Judah, Look at Judah. Verse 19, the sons of Judah were Ere and Onan. And there's two young boys, two young men, I suppose they would have been, who are mentioned here. But it goes on to say, and Ere and Onan died in the land of Canaan. Again, God's judgment upon Judah's two firstborn sons. You see, just because you're in a Christian family does not mean that you are automatically exempt from the judgment of God. God dealt with these men in the strongest of terms. He took out their life in a moment because of their sin, that they were not faithful to the will and to the mind of God. The Lord specifically says that they were evil. They were wicked sons. Their behavior was ungodly, their behavior was vile, and so the Lord sent them into eternity when they were young. We're being reminded of God's judgment. But would you also look with me back in verse 12? I noted this while we were reading about the numbers, verse 12, the sons of Simeon. And look how many there were of the sons of Simeon. Verse 14, these are the families of the Simeonites, 20 and 2,000, not much bigger than Larn. They were significantly smaller than what they should have been. You see, the last time they were numbered way back in Numbers chapter one, do you know how many there were? Almost 40,000. They had lost a massive chunk of their family. Just gone, snuffed out. Why? Out of all the tribes, no one's tribe had become so small from being so big. What happened? Why did they lose so many? Well, go back to the previous chapter. Chapter 25. This is the passage where The children of Israel committed whoredom, you will remember, and Balaam led them into it. Now, what was the name of the man in verse six who brought this Midianite woman to the temple? Look at verse six of chapter 25. And behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought onto his brethren a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and all the people. Here was a man, he was boasting in his immorality and in his perceived liberty to do whatever he wanted, and he was boasting about it before the people of Israel. Now, keep that man in your mind and go to verse 14 now of chapter 25. It says in verse 14, Now the name of the Israelite that was slain, even that was slain with the Midianite woman, was Zimri, the son of Salu, a prince, a leader of a chief house among the Simeonites. God had wiped out a vast number of the Simeonites Because of their sin, one leader clearly led this tribe into immorality and sin. And I want you to see here the vast impact that one person can have on a whole tribe. But this man was a leader in that tribe. And there is no doubt to those in positions of responsibility, the consequence of their sin can be far, far more severe, and thus the judgment is more severe as well. That's why this man was pinned to the ground with a spear by Phinehas there and then at God's command and God's will. And so as the people numbered the tribes, they were reminded of Dathan and Abiram. They were reminded of Zimri, the Simeonite, and they were reminded of Judah's two sons who God judged. They were reminded, all these judgments of these chastenings. But furthermore, when they numbered the people, they were reminded of great blessings and great mercies. And the first mercy you have to see in this numbering was this, the fact that there were a people to number. These people had murmured and grumbled and complained and rebelled for decades. They had let the Lord down time without number. And the Lord had said on some occasions that he would wipe them out. But the Lord had Moses there to intercede and bring forth mercy instead of judgment. The very fact that the people are here to be numbered is a great grace. But another mercy you'll see with the children of Reuben here. Verse five, Reuben the eldest son, we have all his relatives, Dathan and Abiram mentioned, but also look at verse 10. And the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them up together with Korah. So when Dathan and Abiram, with Korah, they had that rebellion against Moses, They stood against Moses' authority. They had made fire in their altars and the Lord judged them and so on and so forth. But we read in verse 10, and the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them up together with Korah. When that company died, what time the fire devoured 250 men, and they became a sign. Notwithstanding, the children of Korah died not. God spared some of Korah's descendants, his family. That's remarkable. That's a mark of grace and mercy. And in fact, those sons of Korah that were saved, we just sang their psalm this morning. Psalm 88, as I said to you, was written by the sons of Korah. And here's where that is so encouraging. These sons, these family members were not destined to be dysfunctional because of their dad's rebellion. Isn't that encouraging? Their forefather may have been a wicked ungodly man, but it didn't mean they had to be. And we think about our little town of Lourdes, there are many men, many women, they have no time for God, who would live in sin, who would embrace iniquity. But we have the opportunity of witnessing to their children. And may they be like the sons and daughters of Cora, spared by the grace of God, to become workers in the house of God. That's a vast encouragement for us as a congregation. But even for us, all of us as parents. We make blunders. We falter and we feel that raising our children and we worry that our children will become dysfunctional because of our errors and our mistakes. We'll take this as an encouragement, Lord, in spite of my weaknesses and all my faults and failures, Lord, bless my children and their children and their children that they would be involved in the house of God and in the work of God for the glory of God. The sons of Korah became a great blessing to the church in that day. Well, time has gone, so thankfully I won't have to look at Moses who was set aside for Joshua. We'll look at that some other week in the will of God. Perhaps that's enough for today here. We leave it at this. We have considered just very simply the numbering. It is good, men and women, to number our blessings. It is beneficial to number our chastenings, to remind ourselves of how good God has been to us, but also to remind ourselves of how God has chastened sin. And I'm sure today there are occasions in your life that you can bring to mind where you were foolish. You did the wrong thing and God chastened you. Let that be a lesson that we have a God who is just, But you're still here, so he's merciful. Our sins should have taken us to hell a long time ago, but by God's grace, we remain here today to live and to glorify God. Well, next week, we'll look at the following chapter. We have a bold request by the daughters of Zelophehad. We will also see, well, Moses' end. As he comes to the end of his race, his journey in life, which comes to us all, we want to end well. We want to finish well this long and final street that God may have us on. Our Lord and our God, whatever stage we find ourselves in the providence of God in this race, Lord, help us indeed to, with joy and delight, carry the banner of the cross to proclaim that we are Christ's, that we are saved through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that we would remain faithful to thee, not ashamed of thee, Lord, not even tarnishing the family of God by our behavior, but Lord, help us to be those who carry the banner well for the glory of God. Thank you, Lord, for all of our blessings. And Lord, we must thank Thee for our chastenings as well, for they're meant for our good. And we're thankful for our loving Heavenly Father who will direct us when we need direction. Bless us now today. Thank you for this congregation. Thank you, Lord, for their immense encouragement and support to me and my family. And we pray, Lord, that you would make us a channel of blessing to them, that we might enjoy one another's fellowship as we journey homeward and heavenward. Do us good. In the Savior's name we pray. Amen. Amen.