UM 5-6{Mamma. In our chapter (Num. 5-6) tonight we read that the Lord commanded the children of Israel to put out of the camp every leper and every one that seas unclean, for He said: You must not make your camps unclean, because I dwell in the midst of them. We have learned in the book of Leviticus how the people might approach. God, who had His throne in the tabernacle.
Now we are going to learn how God was d welling in the midst of His camp while it was traveling through the wilderness, and we shall see how God took notice of everything that did not suit His holiness. Every unclean person was to be put outside the camp, and any one who did any wrong or unkindness to another, was to make amends for it by giving him something. And if the wrong was hidden, so that other people did not know of it, God would bring it to light, and would judge the guilty person.
Sophy. I think the children of Israel could never forget that God was with them in the wilderness, because He showed them that He saw everything they did.
M. No; they could not forget that His presence went with them, according to Moses' prayer on the mount when he said Let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin; and so the Lord was going with them as the merciful and long-suffering God and now He spoke to Moses about those who wished to separate themselves to Him: if either men or women did so they were called Nazarites, which means separated or devoted ones.
S. Did some of the people separate themselves to God of their own accord?
M. Yes. God does not command any one to be devoted to Him, but here He gave Moses a lovely description of what He considered devotedness to Him.
The Nazarite was to separate himself from wine and strong drink, and he was not to eat grapes or drink the juice of grapes, nor even to eat dried grapes. All the days of his separation he was to eat nothing that was made of the vine tree, from the kernels even to the husks.
S. Was that for the same reason that God told Aaron not to drink wine when he went into the holy place?
M. Yes. It was a figure of separation from the excitement of nature—the Nazarite was to find all his joy in God. The second mark of the devoted one was that he was to let his hair grow. This was to show that he was not thinking of himself, or of his appearance before men. He was to be separated from everything to God. The third thing was that he was not to come near a dead body; he must not make himself unclean for his father or his mother, his brother, or his sister, if they died. He was to be separated from natural sorrow as well as from natural joy, for all the days of his separation he was holy to the Lord.
S. How long was he to be separated to God?
M. As long as he liked. It was entirely his own choice, and the Lord said, If a man or woman wishes to be separated to me, these are the marks of a separated person. I daresay the people did not understand the Nazarite, and wondered why he never drank any vine, or shared in the things that they enjoyed. But God understood him, and took notice of his separation to Himself.
But God knew what an evil world His people had to pass through, and He knew that, however true to Him their hearts might be, yet that temptation and death might touch the Nazarite, and spoil his separation to God. So He told Moses what to do, if any one died very suddenly by the Nazarite, and thus made him unclean.
S. What was he to do?
M. He was to begin all over again. He was to shave his head, and to bring an offering on the eighth day of two turtles or two young pigeons to the priest to the door of the tabernacle, and the priest should offer one for a sin-offering and the other for a burnt-offering, to make atonement for him. And the days that went before were lost, be-cause his separation was defiled.
S. It was very kind of God to let him be a Nazarite again.
M. Yes, it reminds us of the way that every child of God, if he goes wrong, must begin over again with God. Like Jacob, when he vent back to Bethel, the place where he had seen God at first, and where he had vowed a vow to the Lord. But when the days of his separation were fulfilled, the Nazarite was brought to the door of the tabernacle, and he offered to the Lord a burnt-offering, a sin-offering and peace-offering, and meat-offering, and drink-offering, and the Nazarite shaved his head, and put his hair in the fire under the peace-offering, and the priest put a wave-offering into his hands, and then waved it before the Lord. And after that the Nazarite might drink wine.
S. Why did he put his hair under the peace offering?
M. Because his hair showed the strength and power of the Nazarite; and now that the days of his separation were over, he expressed his communion with God in the sacrifice, by thus burning with it that which was the mark of his own separation to God.
S. He would not cut his hair at all while he was a Nazarite, and when the time was over he cut it all off.
M. Yes; in both cases it showed his devotedness.
And now the Lord gave Moses a blessing for His people, and said: Thus shall Aaron and his sons bless the children of Israel, saying to them: The Lord bless thee, and keep thee: The Lord make His face shine upon thee, and be gracious to thee: The Lord lift up the light of His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. And He said: They shall put my name upon the children of Israel; and I will bless them,