“... Upon the fringe... a ribband of blue” (Num. 15:37-4137And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 38Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue: 39And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the Lord, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring: 40That ye may remember, and do all my commandments, and be holy unto your God. 41I am the Lord your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am the Lord your God. (Numbers 15:37‑41)).
The ordinance which now comes before us, in this remarkable book, is found in a parenthetic chapter, lying in the midst of the history of Israel’s conduct in the Wilderness; and is peculiar to the Book of Numbers alone (ch. 15). This chapter contains certain directions to Moses relating to things to be observed when they be come into the Land, which the Lord had given them. (We may of course except the verses from 32 to 36, where an instance had occurred of presumptuous sin in the Wilderness; and yet this incident was connected with the directions about sins of ignorance, and sins of presumption there given.)
The very position of the chapter has marvelous beauty for our souls. Israel had been sentenced to wander for forty years in the desert, until the carcasses had fallen there of those who had “despised the pleasant land,” and who said, “Would God we had died in this wilderness.” Some amongst them had sought to go up against the Amalekites and the Canaanites without the Ark, and were discomfited unto Hormah. This was told us in Num. 14. The rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, which was in reality apostasy, was then about to manifest itself. Just before this took place, this lovely chapter drops in, with its streams of refreshment for our souls -detailing the unchanging faithfulness of the Lord! He speaks to Moses in all the calm dignity of one who could not change, though Israel might destroy himself. God was faithful, and He had given them the Land. Nothing then could alter His purposes and promises to Abraham’s seed.
Moses was to speak unto the Children of Israel, and say unto them, “When ye be come into the land of your habitations, which I give unto you!” (Num. 15:22Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land of your habitations, which I give unto you, (Numbers 15:2)). Just as if nothing had occurred, and Israel was as faithful as He, those words are uttered; irrespective of all that had passed!
But it is always thus. Man may fail: the saints too may turn aside. The servant’s heart may be wrenched as he beholds their ways; but God is the refuge of their heart and their portion forever! It reminds us of the Corinthians, when in such a state that Paul had to turn aside on his way there, having heard of their sins. But before he ever touches upon this, his heart turns to God. He thinks of Him. Of his abiding faithfulness, spite of all; and he says, "... Who shall confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son (1 Cor. 1:8, 98Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:8‑9))."
Thus it is here (Num. 15): He would bring His people in; and would teach them in the Wilderness their practice for the Land! This is striking and remarkable indeed. It is something at which we may challenge our hearts and ask—Are we too sensible of the fact that we are taught in the Wilderness our practice for the glory? I have no doubt that our walk here determines our place in that glory. Yet on the other hand—I am sure “it will be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father”—as the Lord has said. But this does not alter the other fact in any wise. If we recall the scene of the Supper which they made for Jesus in Bethany, before He entered upon His passion in Jerusalem (John 12), we see three souls there -the dead man, Lazarus raised from the dead, seated with Him at the feast: the Martha who had served Him at her own board, and loved her Savior, still serving there: and the Mary who sat at His feet and heard His word; who fell at His feet in her sorrow now worshiping at His feet, in this typical scene of glory. We are taught by this that as each one had learned of Him and walked with Him in the sorrows of the eleventh of John, each took their place at the feast in Bethany with Him: Lazarus sat; and Martha served; and Mary, with her spikenard poured forth, worshiped!
So with His people now: they are being fitted here, slowly but surely, by His hand, for the place and service they shall occupy in His glory. What an incentive is this for diligence of soul!
How this reminds us of David’s men of old, who came to him, a sorry lot indeed; but served and abode with him till his kingdom came, and then what glorious men surrounded, and ministered to his glory! What characters were theirs: what deeds had they wrought long perhaps forgotten; but remembered, and recalled and detailed in their value to him, in the day when he “wrote up the people” (2 Sam. 23).
There is a touching significance too in this “Fringe” which was to be placed on the bottom of their garments; and the “Ribband of blue,” coming in here, in the midst of instructions, which have to do with Canaan, and their practice there. Nothing could be plainer than the fact that this “Ribband of blue” was an ordinance for the Wilderness path; though not for it alone. It was that which was abstract and general, without having reference to place or circumstances. Yet here it is, in the midst of instructions for the Land. Why was this?
It is plain (and the more so when we apprehend its import), that this heavenly border, was to serve, to connect their earthly path with things of another scene! That while here below the heavenly blue was to link their practice with things above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God!
Thus is the unchanging faithfulness of the Lord, linked with the heavenly walk of His own, as they are instructed in “things above,” where their hearts, and their affections are also.
Let us remark too, that this fringe, with its border of blue, was not placed on those parts of their garments, which were conspicuous to the eye. They were placed on the border of the robe: “the hem” which came nearest to the ground. They were to “look upon it and remember all the commandments of the Lord, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart, and your own eyes.”
The smallest detail of life: that which was connected with the pathway, and came down to the common things of every day, were to be heavenly in their character. It was to call to their mind each day and hour, by its heavenly blue—that they belonged to Him who is heavenly “as is the heavenly, so are they” (1 Cor. 15:4848As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. (1 Corinthians 15:48)). They were to “remember,” and to “do” -to be obedient in all details.
It was not enough that they should themselves decide what was heavenly, and follow the dictates of their own heart. All was faulty unless done in obedience too: obedience to the commandments of the Lord. But there was more than this. Its result was seen in a holy and separate walk; “and be holy unto your God.”
And here it is when the NT in its antitypes reflects the types of the Old with such marvelous beauty. When we come to look at the practical directions which are found there, how the details enter on the smallest things of life, and are founded on the fact that the saints are connected with heaven and Christ.
Time would fail us to recount the thousand precepts which fill its pages: the commandments addressed to direct the life possessed. The directions given to the life bestowed upon the children of God. How different is this from the commandments of the Law. They were prohibitions to the flesh, out of which nothing but evil could come. They forbid its actions and its lusts. They required righteousness from an unrighteous man, and visited their curse upon all who did not answer to them. But the commandments of the New, are addressed to a new life given, which needs to be directed through an evil world. They are called commandments, because if we did everything right without obedience, it was worthless. This was the path of Christ.
This heavenly character comes out very strikingly in the Colossians: as in other places in the Word. But there, where the saints are not themselves {looked at as} seated in heavenly places in Christ, it is largely seen; though not less seen in the other epistles. The saint in Colossians, “risen with Christ,” is practically walking in a character suited to heaven where Christ sits at God’s right hand.
Remark, beloved reader, how all those relations of life which Christianity owns, are here addressed. Wives and husbands; children and parents; servants and masters; ministers and those ministered to, in their heavenly paths: the subject one always coming first.
We do not find in the NT, directions for kings, or rulers; statesmen or soldiers; or the great ones of the earth. There may be, and there have been saints in these relations, but God does not recognize them as such there. To be so but falsifies what Christianity is. It instructs the lowly, the subject ones of the earth, in their heavenly path; but great in the sight of God. Some of the relations it exhorts came in through sin (as servants and masters, &c.). It does not disturb them. It does not undertake to set the world to rights. It leaves all things as it found them for the present time; but it comes from heaven to sanctify the heart in these relations, that it may be “heavenly” and “obedient” and “holy” to the Lord. The servant to his master, though an unbeliever. The master to his servant though a slave. And this while gathering out of the world a people for the Lord.
How sad and solemn it is, when heavenly truth has but little power with the saints, when clearness of doctrine, held in the mind, has never sanctified the heart; when worldliness marks those who hold the highest truths which God has been pleased to reveal. When the conscience alas, is deadened by the very truths which should produce a separate, holy, obedient, heavenly path.
But I speak of nothing new in this. It brought forth those terrible “woes” from the lips of Christ. Those warnings which came forth with scathing distinctness against those who taught the precepts of scripture, and pretended to walk therein, but whose desire was to be “seen of men,” and not of God. Hearken to those denunciations of Christ in Matt. 23 against the formalists and religionists of that day. Woe after woe is heard; and this touching rite of the “Ribband of Blue” is referred to with those words:
But all their works they do to be seen of men, they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments; they love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.
Is there not the spirit of this around us now, rather than the lowly heavenly grace of our Lord? Had they not changed by their formalism, that which was the expression of this—in the “border” of blue, into an emblem for self-exaltation and spiritual pride? That which God had given to produce a lowly walk, was used only to gain place and honor from man.
But Jesus is the same. And virtue comes out of Him now as then, when a lowly soul would touch the border of His garment by faith, whether for healing, or for fresh supplies of grace.
May the Lord apply these several Wilderness lessons on which we have meditated, to our souls; binding them all together, as one said to me once, with a true “Ribband of Blue,” that His name—the name of our heavenly Savior and Lord, may be glorified in His people, while they are waiting for Him here below.
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