So listen carefully to it. The Lord spoke to Moses saying, Speak to the people of Israel and get from them staffs, one for each father's house, from all their chiefs according to their father's houses, 12 staffs. Write each man's name on a staff and write Aaron's name on the staff of Levi. for there shall be one staff for the head of each father's house. Then you shall deposit them in the tent of meeting before the testimony where I meet with you. And the staff of the man whom I choose shall sprout. Thus I will make to cease from me the grumblings of the people of Israel, which they grumble against you. Moses spoke to the people of Israel and all their chiefs gave him staffs, one for each chief according to their father's houses, 12 staffs. And the staff of Aaron was among their staffs. And Moses deposited the staffs before the Lord in the tent of the testimony. On the next day, Moses went into the tent of the testimony and behold, the staff of Aaron for the house of Levi had sprouted and put forth buds and produced blossoms and it bore ripe almonds. Then Moses brought out all the staffs from before the Lord to all the people of Israel. And they looked, and each man took his staff. And the Lord said to Moses, put back the staff of Aaron before the testimony, to be kept as a sign for the rebels, that you may make an end of their grumblings against me, lest they die. Thus did Moses as the Lord commanded him, so he did. And the people of Israel said to Moses, behold, we perish, we are undone, we are all undone. Everyone who comes near, who comes near to the tabernacle of the Lord shall die. Are we all to perish?" So the Lord said to Aaron, you and your sons and your father's houses with you shall bear iniquity connected with the sanctuary and you and your sons with you shall bear iniquity connected with your priesthood. And with you bring your brothers also the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father, that they may join you and minister to you while you and your sons with you are before the tent of the testimony. They shall keep guard over you and over the whole tent, but shall not come near to the vessels of the sanctuary or to the altar, lest they and you die. That's far we'll read God's word this morning. This is the way it is and it's good for you. This is the way it is and it's good for you. A parent might say that to their kids when they're doing their chores, right? You have these chores to do. It's the way it is and it's good for you because it'll teach you about working as you grow. Or taking driver's ed. This is the way that it is. You have to take driver's ed if you want to drive, and it's good for you. So you can learn, actually, how to drive well and decently. This is the way it is, and it's good for you. You could use that phrase for a lot of different things. Wearing hearing protection on a gun range, that's a law. That's the way it is, and it's good for you. Or wearing a helmet when you're working with heavy construction. This is the way it is, and it's good for you. And the list goes on. Now, we could use that phrase even of the story that we read this morning in Numbers. Aaron is, for sure, God's chosen high priest, and the priests and the Levites have a special and important role. That's the way it is, and it's good for God's people. That's God's order and His way, and it's for the people's good. And so, we can kind of generalize that for our theme this morning in these two chapters. God has a certain order or way for His people to live before Him, and it's for our good. God's way, God's order is for our good. That's kind of the theme this morning. So what we're going to do as we look at this text, first of all, I'll just summarize 17, then I'll summarize chapter 18, then I'll kind of bring them together at the end. So first of all, chapter 17 is what I'm calling God's sign. Okay, that word sign is used, we'll point it out here in a moment. So let's look at chapter 17 first. Okay, we have to remember the context as we get into chapter 17. Right before this, there was a plague on the people for their grumbling and sinning, and Aaron ran out in the midst of them with a censer and he stopped the plague. That's what we talked about last week, and a lot of Israelites died, around 15,000. So right after that, God speaks to Moses, it says in chapter 17, and he says to him, Now, remember the 12 tribes? We talked about these earlier numbers, chapter 1 and 2, the order and the marching and everything like that. You know the 12 tribes a little bit, right? Judah and Dan and Reuben and Asher and so forth. So Moses was to get the leaders of each tribe's staff. Now, do you guys know what a staff is? It's kind of like a walking stick. Not exactly, but we might think of a wooden stick like that. But back then, it wasn't just for walking. A staff, in this case, symbolized authority. It's kind of like a policeman wears a badge, right? Because that symbolizes his authority to, you know, enforce the law. So a staff of these leaders of the 12 tribes would symbolize authority, when they would hold it and have it. And God tells Moses to write the names of each leader on the staff. Okay, so again, you can go back in Numbers chapter 1, for example, and you can read the names of the leaders. I'm not going to read all 12 of them, but Nashon and Nathanael and Eliab. These would be the 12 men that brought the 12 offerings in chapter 7 that we went through some time ago. Now, just by way of a side note, it says write the names of the tribes on the staffs. This is just a good reminder that Israel, you know, they weren't cavemen who communicated with grunts, right? They had an alphabet and language. And I have to note that because some scholars, you know, talk about Old Testament Israel as being, you know, very unintelligent and can't read and write, but they can. They had an alphabet and they could read and write. So they have to write the name of the 12 leaders on these 12 staffs. But in verse 3, God says to Moses, also write Aaron's name on the staff of Levi. Now I'm not going to give you all the history here, but remember the 12 tribes include Manasseh and Ephraim. And Levi wasn't numbered, so this would be the 13th staff. Most likely it would be 13 staffs, the 12 tribes and then Levi who wasn't numbered usually. So Aaron's name was to be written on Levi's staff. Now you saw what they were supposed to do with them, right? Look in verse 4. Put them in the tent of meeting before the testimony. Now, testimony, you could also translate that maybe in a different word, covenant. And this was just the Ark of the Covenant. It's a short way to say the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark of the Testimony, it's called in the Bible. So, they're going to take these 13 staffs and put them in front of the Ark of the Testimony. And God says, whichever one sprouts and grows, that's essentially the man whom I've chosen. Then Israel will stop grumbling because that's my sign that this man is the one I chose. And don't grumble against him because he's my appointed leader and high priest. So that's what Moses does, right? He gets all the staffs and he writes the names on them. And in verse seven, he deposits the staff before the Lord in the tent of the testimony. Now, fast forward a day in verse 8, the next day, okay? So he puts him in there, whatever, in the afternoon. He goes into the holy place the next day, Moses does, and sure enough, one of them is growing. And it says there in verse 8, there's four words to describe the growing. Sprouted, buds, blossoms, and almonds. So that's very interesting, right? There's these 13 dead sticks in the most holy place. Moses comes in there the next day and one of them is growing big time. Not just little buds like you see in the spring, but flowers and even almonds. Ripe almonds that you could probably eat. So this is an unmistakable sign, right? You can't miss this. If there was one or two little buds on there, you know, that's a little subjective. Well, you know, maybe it wasn't all the way dead and maybe those buds were there before. But they knew for sure when that bud or when the staff sprouted and produced flowers and almonds that this is God's chosen one. And of course, it's Aaron's. Aaron's name was on it. It kind of reminds me of that, you remember the contest of Elijah and the Baal prophets on Mount Carmel? Whoever's God brings fire down is the true God. And remember when Yahweh, God, the true God brought fire down, he didn't just consume the animal on top or the logs. But remember the fire? It burned the stones and it even licked up some of the dust. Unmistakable sign. That's what's going on here. You can't miss this. God is behind it. Aaron is God's chosen one. And he shows it to people in verse 9. He brought out all the staffs from before the Lord to all the people of Israel. And they looked, they saw it, and each man took a staff. So the leaders of Israel would have seen it with their own eyes, and all the Israelites who could have seen it. This would show the leaders that Aaron is the appointed high priest and leader, and they are not at this point to be doing what Aaron does, because other leaders before this had done that. So the leaders saw the staffs. And God tells Moses to, in verse 10, put the staff of Aaron before the testimony, before the ark, to keep it as a sign to essentially end the grumbling so that they don't die again. Remember, grumbling leads to death. So it's a sign. The word sign in the Bible is pretty important, usually. The rainbow was a sign, remember, of what? That God would never send a worldwide flood. Circumcision was a sign of the covenant God made with Abraham and his children. So this growing staff is a sign that Aaron is the chosen high priest. That's a sign. A visible reminder. That's great, right? God takes this ordinary dead stick and makes it grow. God takes an ordinary man like Aaron and makes him the priest. And it's also, I think, symbolic that this staff was put back into the holy place, most holy place. Because only Aaron, the high priest, was the one to go in there. It symbolized that Aaron was the right and true priest of God. It doesn't matter what Israel says. It doesn't matter if Israel takes a vote. It doesn't matter what the leaders of Israel feel. This is true. Aaron is the one to go into the holy place, the priest. There's a sign that's clear. Now, in verse 12, Israel's response is kind of surprising. Look in verse 12 and 13. Behold, we perish, we're undone, we're all undone. Everyone who comes near, who comes near to the tabernacle will die. Are we all gonna die? Six times the word die comes up there. Die, we're gonna die. There's panic in their voices, right? Nobody then can come before God. We're dead meat. It's kind of like earlier, right? Have you brought us to the wilderness to die? Now they say nobody can come. Maybe they're thinking of the plague, maybe they're thinking of the fire that burned up those men offering unauthorized incense. Now they're not exactly right, are they? They're thinking nobody can come before God, we're all gonna die, we're all dead. You know, for some reason they thought that from the sign. They're not exactly right, but they are starting to learn, aren't they? That not all roads lead to God. They think no roads lead to God at this point, but at least they understand that God is a consuming fire if you come before him in a wrong way. Now, we'll get back to this in a moment, but you know, these lines of Israel in verses 12 and 13 is really how a sinful person should think on his own apart from a mediator and apart from a priest. If I come before God without a mediator or priest, I will die. So that's God's sign. The staff that buds is a sign that Aaron is God's chosen priest and leader. Now, in chapter 18, there's a lot going on. We're not going to do all the work in it, but in chapter 18, God changes the subject and says to Aaron now, you and your sons and the Levites have a role. That's, you know, a shortened version. So this is interesting. So you've got to think of the context now. So Israel says, we're all going to die. Nobody can come into God's presence. And God says, let's talk about the priests and the Levites. I used a minefield illustration last week. Use that illustration again. It's kind of like if you're in war and you come up to a minefield and you're afraid, right, of the minefield. What are we going to do? We're all going to die if we go through that minefield. But then the commander comes over, the captain comes over and says, hey, let's talk about army engineers. Right? Meaning they can make a path through there for us. That's kind of what God is doing here. Hey, let's talk about the Levites and the priests. There is a way. There are engineers, as it were. Aaron and the Levites and the priests are God's engineers to make a way, as it were, to God's presence so you won't die. So that's what God is doing in chapter 18. We get all these details about the priests and the Levites in chapter 18, but you've got to think of the big picture. God is saying, no, no, you're not all going to die if you use this appointed way and order of mine. You'll live. Now, it is true that if you approach God any old way you want, you will die. And four times in chapter 18 in verse 3, 7, 22, and 23, there's a reminder. Yes, you'll die if you come the wrong way. There is such a thing as coming the wrong way and you'll die. But chapter 18 is kind of a big picture reminder that there are priests and Levites, and if you utilize that, you'll live. There is a way. So again, I'm not going to go through all the details in chapter 18, but I'm going to give a couple general aspects. And just kind of another little side note, when I was reading chapter 18 this week, it is pretty tough. This is one of the difficult chapters in the Old Testament. And so what I did was I used a little easier translation. I use the New Living Translation sometimes, and it kind of helps you make a little more sense of it than some of the other translations. So if you're going to read this this week, maybe use a different translation and go through it, and you'll see what's going on. So I'm going to just summarize in three different ways, very briefly here. Verses 1 through 7 in chapter 18, God gives one of the duties of the priests and Levites. Verses 1 through 7, and that is to guard the holy presence of God. We even read that in verse 3, they shall keep guard. Verse 4, they shall keep guard. And we already went over this in chapter 3. Remember, the Levites and the priests, Aaron and his sons, were like God's bodyguards to protect people from coming into God's presence the wrong way, or those people would die. So that's the first seven verses. And this would be a big responsibility. That's what God is saying here. Look, you'll bear iniquity concerning the sanctuary and the priesthood. It's your fault if people come illegally into the presence of God. This would be a big responsibility for Aaron and his sons and the Levites. It's kind of like an air traffic controller. An air traffic controller has to be on the ball and know exactly what's going on and be in control of the situation and pay careful attention or a lot of people will die if they mess up. It's the same thing for the priests and the Levites. They have to guard God's presence carefully. And this is for Israel's good, isn't it? In the end of verse 5 it says, "...lest they die." Or, I'm sorry, right around there it says something about, "...lest they die." If something bad happens, the people will die. But if the Levites and the priests do their job guarding the temple, people will live. So that's the first part. There's the duty of the priests and the Levites to guard God's presence. Now, secondly, in verses 8 through 19, the second chunk of chapter 18 gives some of the benefits of being a Levite and a priest. Okay, so in verse 8, it talks about Aaron and the Levites being in charge of the sacrifices. And Aaron and the Levites can actually eat part of the sacrifices for their own food. Again, there's a lot of details going on there, but that's basically what God is saying. It's like the end of verse 8 says, it's a perpetual share or your due. The Levites and the priests can eat of the offerings and the sacrifices, the grain and the fruits and the oil and the wine. The Levites actually are allowed and the priest can take some of those things. And so think about it this way, right? If a Levite was going to offer an animal, he could take part of that offering. There's more rules than this, but this is general. He could take part of that offering and eat it for his own food. So again, it's kind of like Aaron and the priests are the full-time workers in the Levites, and their pay is some of the offerings that God's people would bring. That's what's going on here. God is the great king, and the Israelites tithe, and the priests and the Levites get some of the tithes. Now just briefly, there's a New Testament principle here too. Paul talks about it in 1 Corinthians 9, Paul says, those who serve in the temple got food from the temple, so also those who preach receive their living from preaching. So basically, in the Old Testament, these priests and Levites who would serve God would kind of get paid for that by taking from the food and the grain and stuff, and even some financial money. It's the same thing in the New Testament. That a gospel preacher makes a living from preaching the gospel. And obviously I'm not up here saying that I need more money or anything like that, but this is why we pay ministers. Paul says it in 1 Corinthians 9, and there's an Old Testament principle as well. Okay, so the last part of chapter 18 talks about tithing. Okay, so a summary again. First of all, there's a duty of the priest to guard. Then there's a benefit that they get some of the food and money. And then the third part of chapter 18, there's tithing. Because like verse 20 says, Aaron and the Levites don't have an inheritance in the land, they will get some of the tithes. Okay, so if you go on to read in Bible history, the Levites and Aaron and his sons and so forth, they don't have land that they can farm and grow crops on. So they'll have to take from the Israelites, but they also have to tithe what they take from the Israelites. That's what's going on here. That's kind of a summary of the last part of chapter 18. And that's how God has ordained it. So again, if let's say you're from a tribe, the tribe of Reuben would bring an offering and one of the Levites then would take that offering and he would give a tenth of that to the Lord as his own tithe. That's how the order was. So basically, the Levites then would also, it says, offer the best of the best. In verse 26b, it says, a tithe of the tithe. And then later on, it says in verse 29, from each, the best part is to be dedicated. Okay, so the tithing in Israel, you know, each Israelite would give a tenth. That's what tithe means. The Levites and the priests would take a tenth of the tenth, and the best of that, and give it to God. They also had to tithe. Now, again, in the New Testament, the Bible doesn't really talk about tithing as a tenth, but it does talk about giving, right, quite a bit. God loves a cheerful giver. Early in Acts, the church gives to support the other apostles and the people who needed it. So we don't really have a tenth principle. Some Christians follow that as a kind of a guideline to start out with. But we do still give. We still tithe in a New Covenant way. Actually, I have a friend on the West Coast who kind of follows this first fruits, this best of the best principle. When he gets his paycheck, he'll immediately, you know, mark some of that for giving to the offering, right, in church or to a missionary or something like that, the first of the first. So that's one way to think about it, I guess. It's not necessarily a law, but it's maybe a decent pattern to follow. So, chapter 18, when it talks about the duty of the priests guarding the temple, the benefits of the priests and the Levites of getting to eat, and the tithing of the priests and the Levites, it's God's order. He's provided for his people, the Levites and the priests, and it's for their good. Now, looking at chapter 17 and 18, there's a lot of different things we could do here by way of application. Now, of course, we're not under Moses' law. We don't have priests and Levites. We don't have altars and sacrifices and staffs in the Ark of the Covenant. But there's two principles that I want to use for application this morning. And the one that is one I've been saying, God's order is for his people's good. Even all those details in chapter 18, that order is for the good of his people. And you can go beyond or before this, right, in creation, right? The order of creation, right? Man and women are different, right? Or the commandments, or the leadership God has put in the old covenant, or the marching order and the camping orders that we talked about. This order is good for us. When it comes to serving God, it's not a free-for-all. It's not like we can just come to God and serve him and live before him any way that we want. Some of you maybe have read Kelvin and Hobbes or heard of the game in Kelvin and Hobbes called Kelvin Ball, right? Where Kelvin and Hobbes are playing the game and they make up the rules and they change it as they go to get ahead and win. Serving and worshiping God is not like that. We can't change things. God has order and structure and laws and leaders and such, and that's for the good of his people. And it's also important for us to think that living in the presence of God and serving and worshiping God is not based first on how we feel about it. A lot of people are driven by their feelings today. I feel like I can follow God this way. I feel like God, you know, wants this and that. But God has an order that comes before feelings and preferences. Israel couldn't say, you know, I know we're supposed to tithe and the Levites are supposed to tithe a tenth, but I'd prefer actually if it would be more like 8% because then I could, you know, structure things differently. That's not how things go in the Old Testament or in worshiping God. Now, if we feel like it, we can customize our phones, right, however we prefer. If we feel like it, we can rearrange our kitchen to make life a little easier. That's fine. But God has an order when it comes to living before him. And it's not up to our preference or feelings. And in the New Testament church too, there's order, isn't there? When we follow Jesus, we follow a certain way and we obey him. We don't all just choose how we want to follow Jesus. No, he's given us a way to follow him and his word. And we're also called to honor those in authority over us. There's still order that way. whether in the state or in the church. And we submit to one another as Christians, there's order. And we've talked about order in worship. God has given us biblical principles that should structure our worship. And there's even order in the New Testament church in church discipline. We can't just have everybody doing anything they want, living any way they want, however they want, right? There's discipline, there's order in the New Testament church. Now, a lot more could be said here. I'm not going to go through all the different discussions of order in the New Testament Church, but there is definitely order for us as Christians in the New Covenant. I know I've mentioned this before, but this is such a good reminder today, in our day where people think they have the right to do anything they want, anytime they want, anywhere they want. People think, well, I can do what I want. It's a free country. If you have that approach when you're serving God, it's not going to go well. We're not free to reinvent the church and structure the Christian life our own way, or follow Jesus and God however we want. I think I told somebody this story. I met a man this past week, and he came up to me and said he had something to share, and sometimes, you know, that's an open door to who knows what. But he said God used him to do good to other people. Okay, that's not so bad. But then he went on to say that God used him to help other people because he was good and pure, because this man said he was good and pure, so God chose him to help other people. He'd never sinned, he said. So I, of course, told him that arrogance is a sin and bragging is a sin, and told him the gospel, right, there's forgiveness. But then I told him to go to the Bible. If you don't believe what I say, just go to the Bible. And he said, I don't need the Bible. I can't understand it anyway. So he was thinking of God and serving God, maybe with a small g, not a capital G, in his own way. And it was the wrong way. It felt right to him. He was sincere and he thought he was doing the best thing. But because he wasn't following God's order in the word, He was dead wrong. And if the man doesn't repent, he will suffer in hell for the wrong belief that he had. So it's important to think about God's order and God's teachings in Scripture and to follow those. We want to do things God's way, how he says. And it's for our good. And that leads us to the final point of application here. God's order, which is for our good, includes a way into his presence and a way where we can be accepted before him, where we won't die. We've talked about this before. Not everyone who comes near to God will die. If you take the right way to approach God's presence, you will live and be blessed for it. So the Old Testament, like Aaron and the priests and the Levites here, and the offerings and the sacrifices and stuff, you can't talk about these things without talking about the true way Jesus. All of these Old Testament ways into God's presence, where he accepts you, points us to Christ, who is the truth and the way, the way, the truth, and the life. And Jesus, like Aaron, didn't make himself a priest, did he? But he was called by God. Hebrews 5 says this. You are a priest forever, God says to his son, Jesus. And think about in Jesus' life, too. God used signs to show that Jesus was the chosen one, just like God used a sign to show Aaron was. Jesus' signs, right, were miracles and even being raised from the dead. Signs that Jesus is the chosen one. And just like Aaron and the Levites were authorized to serve in the presence of God, so Jesus was authorized and approved and appointed to come and minister before God. But Jesus is much greater than Aaron and the Levites because he was pure and perfect in every way. He was blameless and holy and he has an endless life. And because Jesus didn't offer a lamb or a goat or incense, but himself. Jesus was the priest and the sacrifice at the same time. And as he died on the cross, that was a sacrifice for his people. And as he ascended into heaven, as it were, he brought his sacrifice into the presence of God. And now anyone who trusts in Jesus has access into the presence of God, into the loving presence of God. So if a person doesn't believe in Jesus, who is the way, the only way to God's presence, then that person has to say with Israel in the end of verse 17, if I come near, I will die. Martin Luther said this so well during the Reformation. There were a lot of Roman Catholic theologians who were talking about glory and works and things like that. But Luther said, you can't get to God if you go around Jesus. If you try to get to God by going around Jesus, you know what you'll find? A consuming fire. And that's why Luther said, he pointed everyone to the suffering Christ, the Messiah. That's where you'll find God. That's how you can get into God's presence in such a way that he'll love you and accept you and welcome you and bless you. You can come before God, but you have to do it through Christ, through faith in him. And Hebrews says this well. Since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain that is his body, And since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and full assurance of faith. So if you trust in Jesus Christ, that is God's way, and you're doing it right. And you don't have to worry about God's consuming fire, you know, destroying you, because Jesus, as it were, already bore that wrath. and He welcomes you into His presence. He's pleased with you, He cares for you, and He loves you. Now again, I know that many of you know this, right? Christ alone, one of the five souls of the Reformation, but it's something that we have to hold so dear. In our world where people say, you can be saved any way you want, you can think anything you want and do anything you want, and God will accept that. Well, that's not true. But if you trust in Christ and come to God, he will accept you through Jesus. So God has a certain order and way for us to live before him. And it's for our good and ultimately his glory. Let's pray. Dear Father, we know that our minds are so quick to think of different ways to come to you or please you or be accepted by you. Forgive us, Lord, when our minds are idle factories like that. And we pray, Lord, that we would understand what the Bible teaches about coming to you only through Jesus, the appointed way. And we pray, Lord, that you would teach us through the scripture, too, to follow you and to trust you and to live before you in the way that you've approved. If we have wrong practices, Lord, please change our minds and our hearts and our practices. If we have wrong beliefs, Lord, please change our beliefs according to scripture. And where we're believing truly and accurately, O Lord, confirm us in that, too, we pray, by your Holy Spirit. And we ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.