No where does the patience and longsuffering of God appear greater than in His dealings with Israel in the wilderness. Nothing like it had ever been seen before. The antediluvian world, the cities of the plain, and Egypt bore witness to the judgment of God; the wilderness to His mercy. Why is this? Because those who went through it were sprinkled with blood before they entered it. Mercy, even though the people put themselves under law, thus became a necessary feature in God's righteous dealing. Yet this is not the deeper thing. God would display Christ, and the various victims offered upon the altar, the incense upon the golden altar in the holy place, the varied duties and functions of Aaron, all declare Him, and are for the instruction of the church of God. The New Testament alone unfolds their meaning; a book which Israel never had, but which is laid open to the church of God. Nevertheless we do not find all we need in the wilderness; for the saints of the church are not only contemplated as pilgrims passing through a wilderness, but as dwellers in a land, i.e. blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies. Not yet in heaven, still on earth, in the body, in the midst of enemies but warring a good warfare with blessed victory.
So when Israel enters the land, a new scene altogether different from the wilderness is presented for our learning; where new energies are called forth to meet different trials and testings, as seen in the conflicts of Israel under the leadership of Joshua with the inhabitants of the land.
How different too the character of the failure and sins in the wilderness to those in the land which are recorded in the book of Joshua. It is the same flesh, and the sin in the land is the complement of the sin in the wilderness. There, the main feature is distrust of God, in the land it is rather vain confidence in man—in his strength as at Ai, in his wisdom as in the matter of the Gibeonites. Whatever the contrariety in appearance and working, whether the despondency that would make a king and return to Egypt, or the confidence apart from God that would meet the power and the wiles of the enemy, it is the same old nature that never learns, never submits, never seeks the wisdom and grace of God.
Christians as being in the wilderness, and seated in heavenly places, are liable to both these sins. They may not be manifested in the same believer at the same time, but, looking at the whole church these two aspects of the church are always visible. How prone we are to doubt and fail in confidence in God, to repine at His dealings, to murmur because of sorrows and difficulties, to long for the things of the world, and then to rebel in heart. These are the experiences of the wilderness, and are far from being uncommon. Other dangers characterize the land. A believer who has in any way known the power of God in believing, or in service, may forget the source whence victory came, and take glory to himself; forgetting that not his ram's horn, but God made the walls to fall. He forgets himself as well as God, his flesh is puffed up, and confident in himself he despises the enemy. God makes him feel his powerlessness, and puts him to shame. This is the experience of the land. Not despairing of God, but confidence in self. Our true place is where we put the sentence of death upon ourselves, and have full confidence in God.
The wilderness condition is not one endowed with power, as in the land. The great lessons in the wilderness were the varied aspects but complete work of Christ; and it was necessary that He should thus be set forth that when they—Israel—possessed the land, they might see how their blessing all centered in Him. The nation has not yet learned it, nor can they till the new heart is given them. It was absolutely necessary that we should have all these details, that we might learn how to judge and deal with our own old nature. And when grace has taught us that Christ, made in the likeness of sinful flesh, died bearing its full judgment, and that we in Him have died to sin, then do we as believers receive power to maintain conflict with the world. It is vain to attempt battle with the enemy without, before the enemy within is judged.
The change in the typical presentation of Christ, i.e. from Moses to Joshua, corresponds to the growing of the believer when he first apprehends the truth of being in heavenly places in Christ. Both Moses and Joshua are types of Christ. The former led Israel through the wilderness, and Christ is the power that leads us through the world, and while believers look to Him, there may not be consciousness of the Holy Spirit's presence and power. Blessed it is, when, not realizing power over the flesh, we are able, burdened and sorrowing, to turn to Him. But to be delivered from the burden, to rise above the sorrow is something more, and this is when we know Him not only as the Captain of our salvation—our Joshua—but also as our High Priest in heaven, and the Holy Spirit sent down as the connecting link between the Head in heaven and His members on the earth. But Christ is also with us here, not bodily, but by the Spirit. The Holy Spirit leads us through Priesthood to look to Him as seated on the throne. So that He is with us here, and in heaven, and Priesthood connects these two, so that we have direct and immediate access to God. Joshua has to stand before Eleazar the priest who shall inquire of Jehovah for him. It is Christ by the Spirit leading us to approach Him as our High Priest above, and to God, through Him revealed as our Father. “For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.” We must be in the land to know this fully. But to be in the land—seated in Him in the heavenlies, does not take us out of the wilderness as to the body. On the other hand, only those who by grace know their standing in Christ can bear without murmuring the trials of the wilderness. And thus it is that the Christian as to circumstances, is yet in the wilderness; and as to his standing, in the heavenly places, with and in Christ. A riddle to the world, a divine reality for us.
Turning to Israel, before they enter the land, through the claim of the daughters of Zelophehad to their father's inheritance, God proves the sovereignty of grace, and makes provision in a case where the law made none. We get the families of Manasseh, and the children known by the name of the head of the family. But Zelophehad had no sons, and none to perpetuate the family name. There were only four daughters (Num. 26:33). By the law only sons could inherit. Is this inheritance to be lost, swallowed up by others? Nay, grace gives to these daughters the inheritance of their father, and grace made it a “statute of judgment.” Already is given, in shadow, the great truth that in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female; all believers are sons, heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ.
We note, in passing, how absorbed Moses is here in the welfare of Israel. Elsewhere we read his pleading to be allowed to enter the good land, until God told him to speak no more of this matter. Here when Jehovah bids him ascend Mount Abarim to see the land, and then die, he immediately prays, not for himself, but that “Jehovah the God of the spirits of all flesh” may “set a man over the congregation.” This is very beautiful, it is nearly the same abnegation of self as when on a previous occasion he said, “Blot me...out of Thy book which Thou hast written” (Ex. 32:32). Moses knew the people, how necessary that there should be a leader who should go out before them, and go in before them, one who would never lose sight of them, so that they might not wander and be as sheep which have no shepherd.
The Lord Jesus when He was here said, He was this good Shepherd. Joshua led them out of the wilderness and in to the promised inheritance. The Lord led His own sheep out of Judaism (which had then become a wilderness) into the green pastures of grace. Not personally while on the earth but by His Spirit after He had ascended. And is not this way and purpose of God seen—enough but darkly—in that Moses dies before Joshua leads Israel into the land? But it is the Spirit, the Comforter, the Servant of Christ, Who now leads us, acting in Christ's name, into all truth, and takes of the things of Christ and reveals them unto us. The Jew out of his Judaism, the Gentile out of his degradation into the richer fields of Christianity. The Spirit of Christ in the Psalm (23.) puts the song of faith in the mouth of the redeemed of Israel, and in a more blessed way, in our hearts now, in this day of reproach and misrepresentation. “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth me beside the still waters.”
The people were numbered before Joshua was appointed. He was appointed for their sake, just as the good Shepherd came to seek the lost sheep. How the numbering of the people, and the record of the name of each family, and the allotted inheritance for each, prove the care and love of God, entering—so to say—into the details of their life, so that place and quality of their possessions are appointed by Him. There was due preparation made, the order of their march was determined. It was God's army going to take the promised inheritance; the rank and file, as well as each officer, knew their place, and the march did not begin till all was ready.
There is the same loving care watching over us, not such order as the world may see, nor to such possessions as the world may take away. Our possessions are heavenly. But neither are we left as orphans now; all that we have now is appointed by His wisdom and goodness. To most of God's children now in this world, it is poverty, suffering, to not a few; but the best to all. This challenges our faith. Is suffering with its varied aspects the best for us? Ought we to doubt it, seeing that, having given us Christ, God will with Him surely give us all things? Oh, for more confidence in the supreme love of our Father and God! Our portion is not here but above, our city is one made without hands eternal in the heavens. But if the people who are to have the less glorious portion are recorded by name, why is it that the names of the first-born ones are not given? Yea, they are all recorded where our inheritance is. It was right and proper that the names of Israel's families should be known here, for here is their inheritance, and their title-deeds are in God's book for the earth. It is equally right and proper that our names should not be given. How, if by name declared before the world, could it be said of us— “as unknown?” Known we should be by the moral traits which the Lord taught, but not by name as the families of Israel. Yet we are known by name to God; and in the Lamb's book of life not the family name, but the name of each individual is written.
Directions as to the feasts are given, but in reference to the land. And a conditional provision of mercy for the man-slayer. These all look onward to the future of Israel. Though well we know how the gospel appears in the institution of the cities of refuge. Neither the feasts, nor the cities can apply to the wilderness. Yet we have the best share in each. Our portion is not the earthly and material, but the spiritual and the heavenly. The feasts are not for us to be observed respectively at different seasons, but all are in one, One which combines all, where, though there is the material bread and wine, yet the spiritual and the heavenly overshadow all as we in remembrance of Him “show the Lord's death till He come.” For these two words contain the worth, and dignity, and the sacrifice, that were ever-prefigured in the types of old, whether of High Priest or of Victim.