“AND MOSES sent messengers from Kadesh unto the king of Edom, Thus saith thy brother Israel,.. Let us pass, I pray thee, through thy country...”
Edom stood between Israel and their promised land, and Moses makes a very touching appeal to the king of Moab to let them pass through. He speaks of their sufferings and trials in Egypt and of how the Lord delivered them. Now they were at Kadesh, the border of his land. They would not cross his fields or vineyards, but travel by the king’s highway, and would pay for the water they and their cattle drank.
All they got from the king of Edom was an outright refusal and a threat, so Israel turned away from him.
In the king of Edom we have another instrument of Satan’s por against those whom God is leading through this world. We see that same power in different forms, opposing the purposes of God — as in Pharaoh in Egypt, and in Amalek in the wilderness. But Satan does not always raise up enemies from without. Sometimes it serves his purpose best if he can corrupt the people of God or bring out the evil and rebellion of their natural hearts so as to rouse the anger of the Lord and bring down His judgment on them. However, Satan only defeats himself, for these occasions only bring out the grace of God which rises above all the failings of His people.
In an earlier day Jacob, on his way back from Padan-Aram, had encountered Esau, but God interposed and would not allow Esau to harm his brother. The old hatred still remained, however, and we see it again coming out in Edom’s refusal to let Israel pass through his land. Often, when a young Christian gives up the world and seeks to follow the Lord, Satan raises up opposition and his own unsaved and worldly relatives are his worst opposers and prove the most hostile. Many have experienced the truth of the Lord’s words, “A man’s foes shall be they of his own household.”
But God was in all these circumstances and Israel’s wilderness joey was not yet completed. God had more lessons for them to learn and more wonderful types of Christ were yet to come.
There are many difficulties in the Christian’s pathway, but often God allows us to feel through the enmity of the world that “we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.” Acts 14:2222Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God. (Acts 14:22). Sometimes we are called to enter into actual spiritual conflict, while at other times, like Israel with the king of Edom, we are just to turn away. The Lord will give wisdom for each case if we look to Him.
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