The Pentateuch ends outside the land, and it is the story of a landless people. While there are references to some institutions that landed people have, the rules governing the People are rules appropriate to Exodus-ing / Exiled people.
Christians, in a sense are called to be Exodus-ing people, too. We are the Kingdom, and yet the Kingdom is still ahead of us. That is, we are called to live as God’s people but not yet in God’s Land. We must therefore live in and around other peoples and nations - in the middle of other social orders - while living differently from these. In that sense the theology of the Pentateuch is amazingly relevant to the church.
While we may not be offering sacrifices, we still have to cope with the urge to cry out, “Why have you lead us out to this wilderness to die? Life in egypt was much better!” For, truly we are people of the wilderness, and we must attend carefully to the words of God and to obeying them if we are to enter His rest.
Archive for February 24th, 2007Here is a short list of notes taken while reading Numbers: 1. (chapter 6): What are the vows of the Nazarite for? We get a exhaustive explanation of what they are, and what to do if they are broken, but to what end would someone take these vows? 2. (chapter 16): b. at the end of Koran’s rebellion, a plague of the Lord is spreading among the people. Aaron runs out with the incense to make atonement for them: “He stood between the dead and the living; and the plague was stopped.” What a great picture of priesthood! It also reminds me of Camus’ The Plague. 3. (chapter 18): The priests have “no allotment in their land” but the Lord was to be their “share” and “possession.” We are called, by Paul, “a kingdom of priests.” Ponder. 4. (chapter 33): A long list of names both familiar and unfamiliar creates a sense of a long, arduous journey. |
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