[Numbers 8] The Forward-Looking Word of God. In this chapter, God gives Moses specific instructions about adjusting the lamps on the lampstand in the Holy Place. They had to face FORWARD and not BACKWARD. God wants us to be FORWARD looking and base our expectations on the word and not on circumstances we may see brewing in our lives. There are protocols for blessing and divine health and healing revealed in this chapter that explain why we don’t see more miracles today. There are adjustments we can make in our thinking and doing that will bring us into a New Testament expectation of the miraculous today.
[Num 8:1-26 KJV] 1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2 Speak unto Aaron, and say unto him, When thou lightest the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light over against the candlestick. 3 And Aaron did so; he lighted the lamps thereof over against the candlestick, as the LORD commanded Moses. 4 And this work of the candlestick [was of] beaten gold, unto the shaft thereof, unto the flowers thereof, [was] beaten work: according unto the pattern which the LORD had shewed Moses, so he made the candlestick. 5 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 6 Take the Levites from among the children of Israel, and cleanse them. 7 And thus shalt thou do unto them, to cleanse them: Sprinkle water of purifying upon them, and let them shave all their flesh, and let them wash their clothes, and [so] make themselves clean. 8 Then let them take a young bullock with his meat offering, [even] fine flour mingled with oil, and another young bullock shalt thou take for a sin offering. 9 And thou shalt bring the Levites before the Tabernacle of the congregation: and thou shalt gather the whole assembly of the children of Israel together: 10 And thou shalt bring the Levites before the LORD: and the children of Israel shall put their hands upon the Levites: 11 And Aaron shall offer the Levites before the LORD [for] an offering of the children of Israel, that they may execute the service of the LORD. 12 And the Levites shall lay their hands upon the heads of the bullocks: and thou shalt offer the one [for] a sin offering, and the other [for] a burnt offering, unto the LORD, to make an atonement for the Levites. 13 And thou shalt set the Levites before Aaron, and before his sons, and offer them [for] an offering unto the LORD. 14 Thus shalt thou separate the Levites from among the children of Israel: and the Levites shall be mine. 15 And after that shall the Levites go in to do the service of the Tabernacle of the congregation: and thou shalt cleanse them, and offer them [for] an offering. 16 For they [are] wholly given unto me from among the children of Israel; instead of such as open every womb, [even instead of] the firstborn of all the children of Israel, have I taken them unto me. 17 For all the firstborn of the children of Israel [are] mine, [both] man and beast: on the day that I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt I sanctified them for myself. 18 And I have taken the Levites for all the firstborn of the children of Israel. 19 And I have given the Levites [as] a gift to Aaron and to his sons from among the children of Israel, to do the service of the children of Israel in the Tabernacle of the congregation, and to make an atonement for the children of Israel: that there be no plague among the children of Israel, when the children of Israel come nigh unto the sanctuary. 20 And Moses, and Aaron, and all the congregation of the children of Israel, did to the Levites according unto all that the LORD commanded Moses concerning the Levites, so did the children of Israel unto them. 21 And the Levites were purified, and they washed their clothes; and Aaron offered them [as] an offering before the LORD; and Aaron made an atonement for them to cleanse them. 22 And after that went the Levites in to do their service in the Tabernacle of the congregation before Aaron, and before his sons: as the LORD had commanded Moses concerning the Levites, so did they unto them. 23 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 24 This [is it] that [belongeth] unto the Levites: from twenty and five years old and upward they shall go in to wait upon the service of the Tabernacle of the congregation: 25 And from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting upon the service [thereof], and shall serve no more: 26 But shall minister with their brethren in the Tabernacle of the congregation, to keep the charge, and shall do no service. Thus shalt thou do unto the Levites touching their charge.
The lampstand in the Tabernacle represents the WORD of GOD, and it also REPRESENTS the church of the living God. As He is the word, so we are each one of us epistles known and read of all men as Paul said in 2 Cor. 3:2. He is the word OF God, and our lives are testimonies of the truth of that word. If you read this passage in other translations, you will find the adjustment of these lamps on the lampstand was to make sure they were FORWARD looking and not backward-looking. God’s word is forward-looking. It is predictive. It is about going forward and not looking back because Heb. 10:38 says that God takes no pleasure in those that look back. God’s word is the prognostication of the Holy Spirit over your life. God wants you to be PRESENT/FUTURE minded, not PAST/PRESENT minded. He doesn’t want you to look at circumstances around you to base your expectations of tomorrow on – He wants you to get your expectations regarding your tomorrows from the promise of His word.
In vs. 5-6, we see after instructing Moses regarding the lampstand; he was to separate the Levites from the rest of the twelve tribes and cleans them by sprinkling the water of purifying over them. The sprinkling of the water is the cleansing of the word of God. Jesus said in John 15:3 that we are clean through the word that He speaks. This is the RHEMA prophetic word (Rev. 19:10) and the LOGOS of the scriptures. The word of God is intended to release us from every illegitimate authority and deliver us from the false burdens of men and religious mentality and legalism. In Hebrews 10:22, we read:
[Heb 10:22 KJV] 22 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.
God wants our conscience oriented not to our own thinking about right or wrong or the dictates of society’s norms but rather the clear testimony of scripture.
After the cleansing of the water of purifying, the Father instructed Moses to then have the people draw near and put their hands on each of the Levites’ heads. Laying on of hands was very important both to the Old Testament saints and the New Testament believers. This is an act of identification. God prepares His leaders and then moves upon the people to identify with them.
After the Levites were cleansed and shaved, the people laid their hands in identification upon them. The next thing (v. 11) was for the Levites to lay their hands upon the bullock of the sin offering and the burnt offering. So the people identified themselves with the Levites by laying on of hands and then the Levites in the people’s place as their representatives laid hands on the bullock of the consecration offering and the bullock of the sin offering. The bullocks represented Jesus and His sacrifice upon the cross. This was the Levites’ way of saying, “yes I know you are identifying with us as God’s servants, but we want you to remember it isn’t about US; it is about Jesus”! Paul confirms this in 2 Cor. 4:5:
[2Co 4:5 KJV] 5 For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake.
This is a nuance that many leaders miss. They take more upon themselves than is appropriate for servants of God. They allow the people to place dependence upon THEM rather than upon who Jesus is on the inside of them.
In v. 19, we see the point of this cleansing and identification protocol: “that there be no plague among the children of Israel.” The promise of God is Ex. 15:26 that He would not put on us the things we see the world suffering because of His name “Jehovah-Raphe – Our Healer.” This gives an answer as to why we don’t see more miracles and more healing provision among God’s people. Are the leaders cleansing themselves in the cleansing of the word of God before they stand before the people? Or are they just preaching? Are the people choosing to identify with cleansed and anointed leaders or with charismatic and entertaining leaders? Are the leaders pointing the people to Christ, or are they allowing them to look to them in ways they should only be looking to the Lord who bought them? An error here results in sickness and death and a profile of ill health among God’s people that is no different than what the world experiences despite the promise of God in 1 Peter 2:24 that “by his stripes, we are healed.
When we look around us and wonder why (if God is our Healer) that more people do not walk in healing? Let scripture answer scripture. Let the word of God be the discerner:
[Heb 4:12 KJV] 12 For the word of God [is] quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and [is] a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
The church falls back on theologies of unbelief to explain away the absence of miracles rather than look back at ourselves and say, “we are at fault we need to change our thinking and our acting that there “be no plague” in our midst.”
It has been said that God always answers prayer, but sometimes He says no. I submit to you that God will never say no to what the cross says yes to. I further suggest that when we don’t experience what God’s word promises, the fault lies in US and not in some inconsistent and unreliable idea of God that justifies us in our unbelief with the false assumption that we did all we could in believing but God decided not to come through for us according to the promise of His word.
Things are the way they are because of what we are doing. If we want something different, we have to do something different. How many die unnecessarily because we are caught up in a religious culture of self-justification rather than humbling ourselves and aligning ourselves to the heart of God so we can once again experience a New Testament environment of breakthrough and blessing?
