Complaints of the People

Well, good morning, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions, where every week together, you and I, we get together, we have a little bit of... Coffee! Coffee. Hold on, hold on, there's my coffee. Let me have it. I'll give you some.
We get into God's Word and we grow in our love for the Lord. And we grow in our love for the Lord together in this year, 2024, Lord willing. We get through the books of Numbers, Deuteronomy, and... Judges. Hebrews. Hebrews. Let's have some coffee. We'll pray and get into God's Word.
Just a sip. Just a sip. No, you can't drink all my coffee. Just a sip. That's good. Okay. Let's pray. Well, I like it. Well, Lord, we thank you so much for this day and we thank you for your word. Father, we pray that as we read your word now that you would teach us. Please bless us as we read your word. Help us to understand it. Please apply it to our lives in Jesus's name. Amen.
OK, so Numbers chapter 16, buddy. Can you open your Bible to the book of Numbers? Okay Numbers Chapter 16 can we get there almost? Number 7 almost 10 keep going 13 17 oh one page too far There we go. Right there, right here. OK, well, let's go ahead and you can read verse 41 down here.
On the next day, all the congregation of the children of Israel Aim up. Nope. Complained against Moses and Aaron. Hey, you have I killed the people of the law. Now, uh, it happened. And when the ch-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i- against Moses and Aaron, that they turned toward the tabernacle of meeting. And suddenly the cloud covered it, and the glory of the Lord appeared. Then Moses and Aaron came before the tabernacle of meeting. Good job.
And the Lord spoke to Moses saying, Get away from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment. And they fell on their faces. So Moses said to Aaron, take a censer and put fire in it from the altar. Put incense on it and take it quickly to the congregation and make atonement for them.
For wrath has gone out from the Lord. The plague has begun. Then Aaron took it, as Moses commanded, and ran into the midst of the assembly. And already the plague had begun among the people. So he put in the incense and made atonement for the people. And he stood between the dead and the living. So the plague was stopped. Now those who died in the plague were 14,700, besides those who died in the Korah incident. So Aaron returned to Moses at the door of the tabernacle of meeting, for the plague had stopped.
All right, so we need to ask ourselves three questions, right? A, what is this? A bath. B, what's the best? The best was to summarize. Good, and C, what are we? called to do. So what is this about right well just before this is when Korah he was a Levite and he told Aaron and Moses you're not supposed to be leading us right God's made us a kingdom of priests a royal nation so we want to have leadership you're being Yeah. You're being stupid. Come on. Yeah. And so the Lord opened up the ground. Opened up the ground.
And Quorra and all his family and those people with him who supported him, guess what? fell down, the earth enclosed them, and then, they were a bunch, yeah, they died. Then there was a bunch of other people who had censors, because they wanted to be priests too, even though God had told them that they weren't supposed to be.
And so the fire of the Lord went out and killed them too. No, all of them. Well, we're talking about all the people who had the censors, right? Killed all of them. And so now that's where we, on the next day, On the next day the children of Israel come and what do they say? They say, come on! Yeah, they think that Moses killed all these people. I think this is grief in their heart, right? Because they're sad because some of these were their friends or their family, right? So they're sad, but What do they do with their grief? What do they immediately do? Who do they blame?
Moses. Yeah. Yeah. You've killed them. Right. And as soon as they do that, what happens? They go into the tabernacle. Well, before they go into the tabernacle, what happens? They get mad. Well, they get mad. But what happens? Did you catch it? Oh, OK. Here's here's the part, right?
It's verse 42 and it happened when the congregation had gathered against Moses and Aaron that they turned towards the tabernacle of meeting and suddenly Suddenly what happened? The cloud covered it Moses and Aaron fall on their faces and start crying out to God and the glory of the Lord appears and Moses Did he say go get him Lord kill all of them. They're evil That's right Wouldn't you think Moses would want to like forget it Lord. Just go ahead and kill all of them He wants to show most now Moses is is acting as a mediator showing mercy, right?
Are there still people who died because of this plague? Yeah, what was the number of right? There was a lot. It was like a thousand It was a lot of them. Fourteen thousand seven hundred people die. It's a lot of people. That's like almost the entire town of Burlington. But still some. Well, there's still a lot left, right?
So the Lord executes judgment because these are disbelieving people, right? They don't believe that the Lord's the one that did this, even though the ground opened up and swallowed them. Even though the fire from the incense consumed them, right? They act like that's Moses is doing. Moses, you're wrong! You're bad!
But what does it show they don't believe? They don't believe that Moses wants it to stop. Well, more than that, they don't believe that the Lord himself was the one doing it. And so this is a process of the Lord who's purging the congregation from the people who don't believe. But Moses can't. Yeah, it's the Lord's doing, right? Yeah, so they're mad at Moses, but who's doing this? It's God who's doing it, right? So if you had to just tell me, right? Mommy comes home in a little bit and she says, well, Dandian, what did you learn in the Bible? What would you tell her? One short sentence or phrase.
I would say I learned that mostly the whole Burlington town got killed. Okay. Why? Because God killed them. Hmm. Can you think of anybody else in the Bible who, even though people deserve wrath, steps in and keeps God from executing that judgment? Jesus. Jesus did that? Did I deserve wrath? Sometimes do I act like I don't believe God? Sometimes do I get too angry and kind of bark like I should be quiet? Right. But is there any hope for someone like me? Have you ever sinned? Is there any hope for you? What's the hope for you?
Jesus Christ died on the cross. That's right. Jesus died on the cross. My spot is right here. So Aaron went and made atonement for them to stop the wrath of God. But we know that Jesus is the one who really took the wrath of God on the cross. Pretty good news, huh? What do you think is the good news? That Jesus died on the cross. Yeah, I think it's pretty good news. I hope that you'll hold on to that your whole life. Yeah. Yeah. OK. Are you ready to pray now?
God, we confess to you that we are sinful people. Lord, sometimes we want things in places that aren't ours. We can be covetous of what other people have. We can be sinful in our words and in our actions and with our thoughts. God, please forgive us.
Remember the atonement that you have made in the blood of Jesus Christ. Lord, thank you for the hope we have in his redemption. Please, Lord, bury these words and this truth in our hearts. That we would have hope all of our lives in Jesus's name. Amen. Well, may the Lord bless you as you look to Jesus Christ. May you have his light shine in your heart. As he calls you to walk in the lightness in the light, as he is in the light. See you next time. I'm going to say bye.
Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural Southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. we'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.