SPEAKER_00 0:08

Welcome, I'm Cliff Hedges. This is Pastor Cliff's Notes. This is a podcast where we are studying the Bible. We're working our way through the book of Numbers. Today is episode 1631, and we're looking at Numbers chapter 16, verses 15 through 35. So the Israelites were at the edge of the promised land, but they rebelled against the Lord. So God has sent them back into the wilderness to remain until the faithless generation dies off. We don't know how long the passage we're looking at now is after the event there at Kadesh Barnea, but they're probably back out into the wilderness of Peron. Now Korah, a Levite from the clan of the Kohathites, along with three men from the tribe of Reuben, rallied two hundred and fifty prominent men in the Israelite community and challenged the leadership of Moses and Aaron. Moses said that all these men would offer incense to the Lord the next day and see how God responds. That brings us to Numbers 16, verse 15. Then Moses became angry and said to the Lord, Don't respect their offering. I have not taken one donkey from them or mistreated a single one of them. So we've just seen the scene where he was speaking to Korah and the 250 prominent men that he sends for the men from the tribe of Reuben, and they say, We refuse to even come talk to you. And then we have this response from Moses. Moses has said, You guys are going to offer incense to the Lord. And now he's saying, Lord, please don't accept the offering that they bring of incense. Moses doesn't try and justify himself to the challengers. He speaks directly to God, and he pours out his heart to God as a human. He's hurt. He's crying out to God here. Verse 16. So Moses told Korah, You and your followers are to appear before the Lord tomorrow. You, they and Aaron. Each of you is to take his fire pan, place incense on it, and present his firepan before the Lord. Two hundred and fifty fire pans. You and Aaron are each to present your fire pan also. So this is the way it's going to be decided. I'm going to let God decide. Going to have everybody, Aaron and Korah, and the 250 prominent men are all going to present incense to the Lord and see how the Lord responds to this. Now notice that the men from Reuben, specifically, Dathan and Abiram, are not part of this because they wouldn't come even speak to Moses. So the others are going to come and present incense to the Lord in the morning. Verse 18, it's the morning now. Each man took his fire pan, placed fire in it, put incense on it, and stood at the entrance to the tent of meeting, along with Moses and Aaron. After Korah assembled the whole community against them at the entrance to the tent of meeting, the glory of the Lord appeared to the whole community. So it seems that Korah had a lot of support from the people at large. It says in verse 19, Korah assembled the whole community against them. So every last person, no, but I think a large number of people. It seems like a lot of people from the Israelite community are there to see what happens, thereby somewhat lending support to it. And maybe their thinking is they're under a death sentence. Moses told us we're going to be in the wilderness and die here in the wilderness. Maybe, maybe things would be better with Korah in charge of things. But then the glory of the Lord appears. It appears to everyone. Verse 20. Now the whole community is acting much like they did at Kennish Barnia. They're not as wild and crazy, it seems, but they're supporting Korah rather than calling him out for his actions. So they're to see, well, maybe Korah can pull this off and he can replace Aaron as the high priest, and uh then he could basically fire Moses, and maybe we could get a better deal from God. So the response though from God is, hey, I'm going to destroy them all, and they deserve it. They are all either actively supporting this rebellion or by not doing anything, tacitly supporting the rebellion. And so they do deserve to be destroyed, just as they deserved it at Kedish Barnea. Verse 22. But Moses and Aaron fell face down and said, God, God who gives breath to all, when one man sins, will you vent your wrath on the whole community? So Moses and Aaron fall face down before the Lord and intercede, act as mediators for the community. And again, it's where it seems like they're talking God out of what he wants to do. But I see it much as I saw it at Kedish Barnia as God providing them the opportunity now to act as mediators. And this will help lift up their status in the view of people of God wanted to kill us all, but Moses and Aaron stood between us and God and asked God to have mercy. And their lee to God is basically, will you punish everyone for the sin of one? Now everyone's guilty to a certain degree here in that they're allowing this to go on, but Moses and Aaron are still asking for mercy. Verse 23. So seems like God does shift gears here, but it's where he's, I think, purposely allowing Moses and Aaron to act as mediators, intercessors, and the Lord says, I am going to destroy Korah, Dathan, and Ebiram. So tell everyone to get away from them because they're about to get it. Now, the word here that gets translated dwelling in verse 23, it's the same word as tabernacle. And some wonder is there a play on words here in that he specifically says, They want to offer incense at my tabernacle. Well, tell everyone to get away from their tabernacles. And tabernacle just means dwelling. The tabernacles, the dwelling place of God, but there's about to be some bad going down at their tabernacles. Verse 25. Moses got up and went to Dathan and Abiram and the elders of Israel followed him. So remember, Dathan and Abiram said, We're not participating, we're not coming to talk to you, we're not justifying ourselves because you lie. Everything you say is leading people into error. And so apparently they weren't at the incense offering showdown. And so Moses goes to them. And the elders of Israel go with him too. So apparently they're not part of the 250 prominent people. And the question is, are they still supporting Moses actively? Or did Moses basically command them to come? I assume they're supporting Moses. They've been jointly working with Moses and leading the people. I would assume they're in support of Moses and Aaron. So they all go to the dwelling places of Dathan and Abiram. Verse 26. He warned the community, get away now from the tents of these wicked men. Don't touch anything that belongs to them, or you will be swept away because of their sins. So they got away from the dwellings of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. Meanwhile Dathan and Abiram came out and stood at the entrance of their tents, with their wives, children, and infants. Verse 28. Then Moses said, This is how you will know that the Lord sent me to do all these things, and that it was not of my own will. If these men die naturally as all people would, and suffer the fate of all, then the Lord has not sent me. But if the Lord brings about something unprecedented, and the ground opens up its mouth and swallows them along with all that belongs to them, so that they go down alive in a shield, then you will know that these men have despised the Lord. So Moses announces it's up to God to show what's going on here. If nothing happens, then apparently Korah is right. God has not set me apart. But if God steps in in a very supernatural, very unusual act here, something that's never been seen before, in fact, it'll probably be like the earth opening its mouth and swallowing these men up. Well, then you know that God is the one in charge and he has placed me here in this position. It says that they would go down alive into Sheol. Now, Sheol, some translations say grave, but the Hebrew word is Sheol. A lot of translations just use the Hebrew word because it's hard to say what their understanding of Sheol was. It seems to have changed over time somewhat. It's the place of the dead. Everybody understands that, and that's true, but what's that really mean? Do they just mean grave or do they mean some kind of afterlife? Most think that it is that, it's some kind of afterlife, some nebulous description of a dark afterlife experience. And in some later descriptions in the Bible, we see even the idea that there's two segments of Sheol, that for the unrighteous, those awaiting God's judgment, and the area for the righteous, those awaiting God's resurrection. Sometimes it's called Abraham's bosom. But the idea here is definitely the abode of the dead. What Moses is saying is going to happen here is the earth is going to open, and these people will be swallowed by the earth. Verse 31. Just as he finished speaking all these words, the ground beneath them split open. The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and their households, all Korah's people and all their possessions. They went down alive in a shield with all that belonged to them. The earth closed over them, and they vanished from the assembly. At their cries all the people of Israel who were around them fled because they were thought the earth may swallow us too. Fire also came out from the Lord, it consumed the two hundred and fifty men who were presenting the incense. We saw that back at the beginning of Leviticus with Aaron's two older sons, Nabib and Abehu, when they offered unauthorized fire for the incense, the fire of the Lord consumed them. So we see here, God has made his opinion very clear on this. How many times has God said, if unauthorized people approach me in the wrong way, they will be killed? Even the Levites who carry the articles can only carry them after the priests have wrapped them up, and we're told that if they touch them or if they actually see them uncovered, they will die. And so we've seen this again and again and again, even the warning to the priests if you don't do it right, you will die. And now Korah and his followers are challenged God, said, We don't believe you. Well, God's proven you should believe him. Now, an interesting thing, all of Korah's family did not die. If we look ahead in the book of Numbers to chapter 26, and this will be the second census. After the first generation dies off, there will be a new census taken of those in the second generation who will now form the army to take the promised land. And in Numbers 26, starting in verse 9, the sons of Eliab were Nemuel, Dathan, and Abiram. It was Dathan and Abiram chosen by the community who fought against Moses and Aaron, and they and Korah's followers fought against the Lord. The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them with Korah when his followers died, and the fire consumed 250 men. They serve as a warning sign. The sons of Korah, however, did not die. Now the sons of Korah would not be in this census, because this is a census for the army. The sons of Korah or Levites, but that comments included in this census, talking about Dathan and Abiram, they died. It says the sons of Korah did not die. We don't know how old the sons of Korah were, but they obviously separated themselves from Korah and did not participate in Korah's rebellion, and that's why they survived. And in fact, we'll see them crop up later many of the psalms. Say they are songs of the sons of Korah, or psalms of the sons of Korah, and they're mentioned in First Chronicles as being chosen to be singers in the assembly. And so even as children of Korah and his wickedness and his rebellion, the sons who did not follow him go on to do well in service to the Lord. Now we see whole families die here because of the sins of the fathers. Yeah, we do. Innocent people are often hurt by sin. Now it wasn't every family of the two hundred and fifty prominent men, just those men were the ones killed by the fire from the Lord. Their families were not swallowed by the earth. It was the leaders of the rebellion and their families who were swallowed up by the earth. Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. They were guilty of the more serious sin, so more innocent people were killed in their sin. And seeing, well, that doesn't seem fair that families would be punished for the sins of the father. Well, it's the way responsibility works and covenant relationships. And conversely, many whole families were saved because of the faithfulness of their fathers. So all this is to just show the seriousness of rebelling against God. And it shows a lack of faith. It had been very clearly said how the structure had been set up. McCorrah decided he could do better than Moses. Thanks for joining me. Join me again next time as we continue working through numbers.