Numbers 16:36-18:1
The Lord then told Moses that the censers of the rebels, who had been consumed in judgment, were to be taken and made into broad plates for the brazen altar. These were to be a warning to any in the future who were not priests, who might attempt to approach God to offer incense. The Lord said that these men were “sinners against their own souls,” for His Word tells us that “He that sinneth against Me wrongeth his own soul.” Proverbs 8:36. We may think we wrong others by naughty things we do, and we may wrong them in a measure, but we wrong ourselves most of all, as these men who were destroyed, surely did. To despise the priesthood, God’s only way of leading the people through the wilderness, was solemn indeed.
The rest of the people seemed to only harden their hearts in the face of this awful judgment, and the very next day they said to Moses, “Ye have killed the people of the Lord.” God then had to speak again, causing a plague to fall upon them. Moses, who still sought the blessing of the people, acted on their behalf and told Aaron to fill his censer with fire from the altar, and go in quickly among them. Aaron did so, and ran into the camp with his censer, and stood between the living and the dead. God then stopped the plague, and in His grace preserved them by this means, even though they had despised it. Oh, how great is His goodness! How necessary, too, the priesthood of Christ for us now as believers, for He ever lives to make intercession for us. (Heb. 7:25.)
God told Moses to take twelve dry sticks, one for each tribe, and each man was to write his name on his stick, but Aaron’s name was to be written on the one for the tribe of Levi. God then said that He would make the stick of the tribe which He had chosen to blossom. The twelve sticks were taken, as the Lord laid up before the Lord, where they remained all night. In the morning Moses brought them out to the people, and they saw that Aaron’s dry stick had budded, blossomed, and brought forth almonds during the night. What a wonderful testimony to the power and goodness of God through the priesthood! What a testimony of grace, too, for this was after all their rebellion. God’s purpose in blessing had not changed at all; but the people were slow indeed to apprehend them. They could not lay hold of this display of the grace of God, any more than they could understand His righteousness in judgment upon the rebels. How blind man is to God’s character, whether as light or love!
The Lord then told Moses to lay up Aaron’s rod before Him, and so Moses put it in the ark, typical of Christ the true Great High Priest, who alone can bring the promised blessings to Israel, or to us in this dispensation. All is made sure in and through Him, the One who truly “budded, blossomed, and brought forth almonds” by His perfect obedience even unto death, for God’s glory and our eternal blessing. Now He still lives for His own above, and for Israel too, that they be not consumed.
This is emphasized in the next chapter where Aaron is told, “Thou and thy sons and the father’s house with thee shall bear the iniquity of the sanctuary.” If blessings were to come to Israel according to God’s purposes in grace, it could only be through the priesthood, for grace is never the passing over of sin.
ML 11/04/1951