Daily Meditations

Psalm 106:33 They rebelled against the Spirit of God The Spirit of God is rarely mentioned in the Old Testament. God is Elohim or Adonai or the Lord (YAWEH), He has many other names but all of them describe a singular Being who is the Most High, in contrast to the many lesser gods of the pagan nations. God speaks, God acts, God chooses, God provides but, on every occasion, it is the mystical, divine Being who is in view. Of course, the people of Old Testament times knew that God was a spiritual Being, and they also knew that He sent spiritual representatives in human form, they knew that on occasions He appeared in clouds and glory to a select few, but the concept of the Spirit of God is not often mentioned. In the same way that Messiah remained mystical and distant, God as the Holy Spirit seemed to be an enigma clouded by anonymity! Maybe, this rebellion at Meribah is a warning to us as much as to the Israelites. The Psalm writer is led to explain that when we may behave and speak reb...

Psalm 106:32 By the waters of Meribah We saw, in Psalm 105, that there were two incidents when the Lord miraculously provided water from a rock. One of these took place shortly after the Israelites left Egypt, now 40 years later, they have arrived back at Kadesh Barnea and once again they are faced by the challenges of conquering the land. Once again, we find them moaning and groaning at their lot and, once again, the Lord provides water from a rock. 40 years earlier, as recorded in Exodus 17, Moses was ordered to strike the rock at Horeb. This time he is commanded by the Lord to speak to it, but instead, he strikes it. That was enough to prohibit Moses and Aaron from leading the people into the Promised Land! This second place of divine provision was called Meribah, the place of quarrelling. The account in Numbers 20 tells us exactly how Moses and Aaron were feeling at this point in their long, tedious journey. The people had been moaning and complaining and comparing the rigors of th...

Psalm 106:31 Credited to him as righteousness The phrase  “credited to him as righteousness”  is not an unfamiliar one in Scripture. In Genesis 15:6 we read,  “Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousnes s.” Abram is the father of all who believe, his example tells us that God graciously responds to faith by crediting righteousness to anyone who truly believes in Him. Phinehas’s zeal for the Lord and for godly justice was a credit to him, so much so that the Lord noted it and gave credit it to the man. He also conferred on him the blessing of the priesthood for all time, this was done by a covenant that could not be broken. Abraham also received covenant promises from the Lord God after his faith had been credited to him as righteousness. God’s covenants with other prominent men, like Noah and David, also followed on from His testimony to their righteousness.  This arrangement has continued. We take a step of faith and declare our allegiance to...

Psalm 106:30 Well done Phineas! As we saw in the previous verses, it was Phinehas, the grandson of Aaron the High Priest, who intervened and brought God’s wrath upon the couple who brazenly had a sexual liaison in an Israelite’s tent. The judgement of Phinehas was brutal, he rammed a spear through both bodies and brought instant death upon them. But his actions stemmed the wrath of God, the plague that had killed 24,000 Israelites ended and peace and normality returned to the Camp. The Lord said to Moses that  “Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites.”  (Numbers 25:11) The Lord then vindicated Phinehas for his actions.  “Since he was as zealous for my honour among them as I am, I did not put an end to them in my zeal. Therefore tell him I am making my covenant of peace with him. He and his descendants will have a covenant of lasting priesthood, because he was zealous for the honour of his God and made atonement f...

Psalm 106:28-29 Baal of Peor The clock has been brought forward 40 years and the Israelites are once again camped close to the borders of Canaan. This time they are further north in an area called Shittim which was inhabited by the Moabites, today this is part of Jordan.  They camped on the east side of the River Jordan directly in line with the city of Jericho which was situated about 15 miles away inside the Promised Land. Peor is the name of a mountain peak (mentioned in Numbers 23:28) to which Balak, king of Moab, led Balaam, in his fourth and final attempt to induce Balaam to pronounce a curse upon the Israelites as they were passing through Balak's Land to the Promised Land. Whilst they were camped in this area, some of the Israelite men indulged themselves with Moabite women and were invited to attend the sacrificial rituals associated with the Moabite gods. “Worship” often involved sexual acts because the gods associated with Baal were fertility gods. The men shar...

Psalm 106:27 Scattered throughout the lands What was it that kept a whole generation of Israelites from entering the Promised Land? Why, these were the ones who had been delivered from Egypt and who had only recently experienced the mighty hand of God’s salvation and deliverance. Surely, they of all a people would be ready and willing to trust Him now that their goal was in sight. But no, the news about giants and fortified cities put them off progressing any further, they dug their heels in and refused to follow Moses and Aaron into Canaan. How did God view this? He saw their rebellion as disobedience, and He knew that their disobedience was rooted in a lack of faith in Him. They could not bring themselves to believe that their God would go with them and help them to overcome the pagan Canaanites. It grieved Him and angered Him and thus He made the declaration that a whole generation would miss out on the blessings of entering the land.  The land of promise is a place of rest but ...

Psalm 106:26 The "Rest" of dependency and faith The Israelites’ rebellion and lack of faith in the Lord was their downfall. They were camped so close to the Land of Promise, God had delivered them from Pharaoh and the Egyptians, brought them through the wilderness, and provided for their every need. All that was required was simple trust, anything was possible with this God, but the Israelites simply did not believe, and their God was both heartbroken and furious,  “How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me, in spite of all the signs I have performed among them?”  The Lord threatens to strike them all down and Moses pleads for leniency, not least for the sake of God’s name and His reputation amongst the surrounding nations. The Lord’s response is damning! “No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see the land i promised on oath to their ancestors ….. in this wilderness your bodies will fall – every one of you twenty...