Good morning for good weather, Lord, that you have given us. Lord, for the breath in our nostrils that you've woken us up this morning and brought us all here to study your word. Again, such an amazing thing that you would give us your word, that you would reveal yourself to us. You have not left us in darkness. We're grateful for that, Lord, and help us now as we do go to your word to listen carefully, to be attentive, and to hear the things that you would have us hear. May my words be in accordance with this word. Let me pray this in Jesus' name, amen. All right, Numbers chapter 21. Numbers chapter 21. As we noted last time in Calvin's teaching, the 40 years of wandering is over. The last of the old generation is dying off, and in fact, I think to emphasize that, the last chapter was bookended by two very significant deaths, right? We had Miriam's death at the very beginning and Aaron's at the end, I think in a way signifying the passing of that old generation. And now Israel is on the march, heading towards the promised land, marching to Zion, as the old hymn says. Well, even though the people had been humbled and were now obeying the Lord, and heading to take the land, we saw last time that it wasn't without incident. The people still grumble, and they still rebel, really, I think, showing man's nature, that even at our best, we are still grumblers and complainers. It's a warning to us, I think, also, if you think you've got it all together, and that you aren't like those around you who aren't following the Lord. just as quick to fail and find yourself grumbling in the wilderness. Well, this chapter is no different, as we will see. However, we do see some victories here as well. But I think that, in a way, this chapter has those victories there to highlight that it's the Lord's victories versus the people's failing. And I think even the people see it. So let's begin just here, chapter 21. I'll start with the first three verses. The king of Arad, the Canaanite, who dwelt in the south, heard that Israel was coming on the road to Atharim, and he fought against Israel and took some of them prisoners. So Israel made a vow to the Lord and said, if you will indeed deliver this people into my hand, then I will utterly destroy their cities. and the Lord listened to the voice of Israel and delivered up the Canaanites, and they were utterly destroyed in their cities. So the name of that place was called Hormah." Well, now as we will see shortly, the Israelites are turning to the south, If you look at your map, they were up there at Kadesh Barna, and they turned south, and they go, they're turning south so that they can go around the land of the Edomites. Remember, they had asked to pass through, and Edom said no. And so they've gotta go south to get around that place. And in that area, there are Canaanites in the region, and they're led by this King of Arad, as it says there, the Canaanites who dwelt in the south. So this was a different group than those that you might find in what we later call the land of Canaan, but they were still considered to be Canaanites nonetheless. Well, this king of Arad, he ruled a fairly substantial area and was prosperous because of close ties with Egypt. He mined copper. And he actually expanded agriculture in the area because of the use of metalwork. And there was also a very extensive trade system that he developed of bitumen that would come from the Dead Sea. and they would send it off to Egypt, and Egypt would use it to seal their ships up. We know from, recognize that, that the Ark was patched up with bitumen, but so were the reed ships of Egypt. And then also storage jars were sealed up with bitumen, and interesting, also mummifying. So Egypt needed a lot of bitumen, and they found it there in the Dead Sea. Now, a lot of this comes from really interesting archaeological things. We'll talk about that in a bit here. But you can imagine that this King of Arad was probably long watching these people slowly wandering about in the wilderness, right? Because they're wandering around right next to his land. He's watching them, probably as he's growing up, maybe his father had seen them as well. But there they are, wandering around, and he has to know what had happened to the Egyptians, given that he's trading with them extensively. Words probably also come now from Edom, that they are now on the move towards Canaan. And he must have decided that now was the best time to attack while they were still so-called wandering in the desert. And so he does. He has a small victory. He takes a number of Israelites as captives. Notice how Israel responds to this. They don't shrink back. They don't cower in fear and say, oh no, woe is us, we're going to be taken over by the Canaanites and leave. No, rather, they turn to the Lord and then they ask Him to defeat their enemies. I find that really interesting, how they called on the Lord. It's not specified that it's Moses. It actually says that Israel called out to the Lord. And so this is a prayer coming from the people themselves. They don't go to Moses and say, pray to the Lord for us. They call on the Lord to have him defeat them, right? And the Lord does that, right? He gives them the Canaanites and they're utterly destroyed. just as he promised. And, of course, the people destroy all the cities as well. Archaeologists have found what they believe to be these cities in an area that's called Tel Arad. A tel, if we remember from previous lessons, is a mound in those regions. It's where you would have a city would get destroyed and then another city would get built on top of it and then that would get destroyed and then it would build on top of that and it would slowly build up a mound. And so there's tells all over in that region. One famous tell of Eve is one that we know from from the news and things, but there's tells everywhere. And most of them are like this, where they would be a place where you would go and dig and find things. So they find these cities that match up pretty closely to that time period and are all, have been destroyed. It's a far different outcome than the last time Israel went up against these people. If you turn back to Numbers 14, this was 40 years earlier. We've got Numbers 14. At the end of the chapter 39 through 45, then Moses told those words to all the children of Israel. This is after they had rebelled and refused to go into the land and the Lord said, you're all going to die in the desert. And it says, and the people mourned greatly, and they rose early in the morning and went up to the top of the mountain saying, here we are, and we will go up to the place which the Lord has promised, for we have sinned. And Moses said, now why do you transgress the command of the Lord? for this will not succeed. Do not go up lest you be defeated by your enemies, for the Lord is not among you. For the Amalekites and the Canaanites are there before you, and you shall fall by the sword. Because you have turned away from the Lord, the Lord will not be with you. but they presumed to go up to the mountain. Nevertheless, neither the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord nor Moses departed from the camp. Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who dwelt in that mountain came down and attacked them and drove them back as far as Horma. This may have been in, you know, still legends and songs being sung about the defeat of the Israelites by the Canaanites, and this may have also been why this king of Arad decided to go out. He said, well, we defeated them once 40 years ago, and they've only been in the desert this whole time, so we'll defeat them again, and he goes out against them. Again, far different outcome. And we have them, the people, celebrating this victory. Well, the song of victory is short-lived. Let's look at verses 4 through 9. Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea to go around the land of Edom, and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread. So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, and many of the people of Israel died. Therefore the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people, Then the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole and it shall be that everyone who is bitten when he looks at it shall live. So Moses made a bronze serpent and put it on a pole. And so it was if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived." Well, So the people are, as it says here, going back south towards the Red Sea. You look on our map here that we have, they head there all the way down from the K'nesh Baria and the Mount Hoar area, and they are heading down there to Mount Seir it has on our map. Some other maps and commentators might disagree with exactly how far down they went in this attempt to get around the land of Edom, but at least we can see that they're heading down south there. And it says that they became very discouraged on the way. And you would think that, yes, this may have seemed like a retreat after a victory. They had had this victory on their way to Canaan, and now they're turning around and going the opposite direction. Right? And what we have here, though, is an instead of turning to the Lord again, who had just answered their prayer for deliverance with a great victory, they fall back into their old ways and they complain. And their complaint is the same complaint that we keep hearing. Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There's no food and there's no water. We've heard this countless times. It seems to be the only complaint that they can come up with. Except they add here that says they look at this and just look at what they call manna, this worthless bread, and their souls loathe it. It's a very, very powerful statement there. The word they use is keel or kequel, and it can mean miserable or contemptible. What a way to speak of God's blessing on them, isn't that? To call it despicable or contemptible, to call it miserable. I think we're much the same, aren't we? The Lord blesses us and we're so quick to loathe it, always complaining with no gratitude. Well, so the Lord sends fiery serpents among the people, and the people begin to die. The word for fiery serpent is seraph, or seraphim. Isn't that fascinating? Of course, we recognize that name as being one kind of angelic being. It's actually the ones that are described as having six wings that Isaiah saw. Turn over to Isaiah 6. Isaiah 6, there in the first verses. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And another one cried to another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. and then down at verses six and seven. Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs from the altar, and he touched my mouth with it and said, behold, this has touched your lips, your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged. There's also reference to fiery serpents like this later in Isaiah. Isaiah 14. Verse 29, it says, do not rejoice, all you of Philistia, because the rod that struck you is broken. For out of the serpent's roots will come forth a viper, and its offspring will be a fiery flying serpent. And then again, in Isaiah 30, Isaiah 30, verse 6. the burden against the beasts of the south through a land of trouble and anguish from which came the lioness and lion, the viper and the fiery flying serpent." It's interesting to note that There are accounts, historical accounts of in this region there being fiery flying serpents. Herodotus is famous for giving an account how he had heard in this area between Egypt and Arabia there was a valley where these supposed flying venomous serpents would come and they would come down into Egypt and attack people. And they would bite them and people would die from these things. And there was a natural predator in this area, it was a type of bird, an ibis I think it was, that would attack them and kill them. And there was Herodotus had heard about this and went out to find them or to see this phenomena and found in this valley a whole bunch of the bones of these things and saw them coming and they would come in a sort of a migratory manner. And Herodotus is a pretty well-established or well-respected historian. He got a lot of things, biblical things, correct in his histories. And so what a lot of creation scientists will point out that is if you, there's a type of a flying dinosaur of sorts that matches this description. It had a very long tail, almost like a serpent. And Herodotus describes it that way, that it looked like a serpent, but it had wings that were not covered with feathers, but wings more like a bat. And I forget the name of the specific dinosaur that they think it might be, but it was known to be venomous. And so this may have been the fiery serpents that are being discussed here. Because if you think about it, you send just a bunch of snakes on the ground, people can get away from those, right? But you've got a bunch of flying serpents. You can't get away from those. And that would, I think that that may be very well what we're looking at here. But what we do see here is that, again, that these things are used in judgment. Perhaps we might even see the angelic beings that bear the similar name, seraphim, also being used as instruments of judgment as well. Well, the people immediately recognize that they've sinned. And this is important, okay? They're not just sorry that they're being judged. There's something different that happens here, right? The people recognize their sin immediately, and they truly repent. They see that what they've done is wicked, and so the Lord has Moses make the bronze serpent and raise it up, and those who looked upon it were saved. Now, we, of course, having the advantage of the New Testament, understand that this was picture of Christ, a foreshadowing of that, right? Jesus himself says, just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man also be lifted up. The picture, I think, that the Lord is giving the people by doing this, right? You might say, well, why would he make this serpent and lifting it up and all of that? That's such an odd way of doing these things, right? Well, it's a picture of faith. They looked to him in faith over the Arad situation, and he took care of them. But then they turned away, and now, almost with a bit of irony, they must literally now look at this bronze serpent to be saved. Before they were looking in faith to the Lord, now they're forced to actually look at an object. They're told, you must look at this. It's a way I think the Lord is hammering home this idea that there was nothing that they could do, right? They get bit, there was nothing. You couldn't get a medicine, you couldn't put a potus on it, heal yourself, you were gonna die, right? Unless you put your trust in the Lord, right? He told you, look at this and you will live, and so if you did that, you lived. It's a powerful picture, I think, of God's grace, powerful picture of the gospel, Sadly, we find out later that Israel had turned this bronze serpent into an idol, actually. We find that in 2 Kings, where we, in the middle of Hezekiah's reform, He breaks up this bronze serpent that they had kept. It had been probably kept as a memorial to remind the people of what the Lord had done for them. And, well, as man often does, he takes what God gives as a blessing and turns it into a curse. Well, we've got 2 Kings 18, verse 4. Hezekiah, he removed the high places and broke the sacred pillars, cut down the wooden image, and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made. For until those days, the children of Israel burned incense to it and called it Nehushtan. That name, Nehushtan, it actually means the bronze thing. So they just named it the bronze thing. odd, but that's a sad example of Israel's turning to idolatry so quickly. Well, let's look at more of this chapter here, unless there's comments or questions. Like, for $2,000 a month, there will work several companies trying to come out of it. I'm actually, I mean, when you take a drug history, there's more and more patients trying to get their insurance to pay for this. I mean, every one of us, I think, America would just be a picture of this. or we are utterly obsessing about what goes in our mouth, and yet we are the most well-fed nation, perhaps, that the world has ever known. And yet we are increasingly obsessive instead of being thankful. This is not, can't go in my mouth. I think that's one of the things that I would want to hammer home on all of these lessons that we look at here is that all of these things just simply remind us that we are just as wicked, just as rebellious, and We are no different. We can't look back on Israel and say, boy, look at those guys. Look at all that they had. Why would you? Boy, what an object lesson for us. No. It's to remind us of what man really is. That even when you have a pillar of fire in front of you, you rebel. Yes, I think that that's something for us to consider. Well, let's look at verses 10 through 31. Now the children of Israel moved on and camped in Oboth, and they journeyed from Oboth and camped at Ej Abrim in the wilderness, which is east of Moab, towards the sunrise. From there they moved and camped in the valley of Zered. From there they moved and camped on the other side of Arnon, which is in the wilderness that extends from the border of the Amorites. For the Arnon is the border of Moab between Moab and the Amorites. Therefore it is said in the Book of the Wars of the Lord, Wahab is Suphah, the brooks of the Arnon, and the slopes of the brooks that reaches to the dwelling of Ar and lies on the border of Moab. From there they went to Be'er, which is the well where the Lord said to Moses, gather the people together and I will give them water. Then Israel sang this song. Spring up, O well, all of you sing it. And well the leaders sank, dug by the nation's nobles, by the lawgiver with their staves. And from the wilderness they went to Matanah, from Matanah to Nahaliel, from Nahaliel to Bamoth, and from Bamoth in the valley that is in the country of Moab to the top of Pisgah, which looks down on the wasteland. Then Israel sent messengers to Sihon, king of the Amorites, saying, Let me pass through your land. We will not turn aside into fields or vineyards. We will not drink water from wells. We will go by the king's highway until we have passed through your territory. But Shayan would not allow Israel to pass through his territory. So Shayan gathered all of his people together and went out against Israel in the wilderness. And he came to Jahaz and fought against Israel. Then Israel defeated him with the edge of the sword and took possession of his land from the Arnon to Jabuk. As far as the people of Ammon, for the border of the people of Ammon was fortified. So Israel took all these cities and Israel dwelt in all the cities of the Amorites in Hezbon and in all its villages. For Hezbon was the city of Sihon, king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and had taken all his land from his hand as far as the Arnon. Therefore, those who speak in Proverbs say, come to Hezbon, let it be built, let the city of Cheyenne be repaired, for fire went out from Hezbon, a flame from the city of Cheyenne, it consumed our of Moab, the lords of the heights of the Arnon. Woe to you, Moab, you have perished, O people of Chemosh. He has given his sons as fugitives and his daughters into captivity to shy on king of the Amorites, but we have shot at them. Heshbon has perished as far as Dibbon. Then we laid waste as far as Nopa, which reaches to Medaba. Thus Israel dwelt in the land of the Amorites. Then Moses sent to spy out Jazar and took its villages and drove out the Amorites who were there. Well, there's quite a lot in that section there. We have a lot of moving around. A number of these places that are mentioned are just simply lost to history. You know, we don't have much in the way of records of where these places are or even who these people were. But they move from place to place. It's very detailed, giving us, you know, an understanding that these things are, are well documented. We'll see later that some of these things are very well documented in their movements later in Deuteronomy. So, Israel turns north, and they head around to the east of Edom, and they head towards the river Arnon. There is this reference to the Book of the Wars of the Lord. It's a fascinating thing. It's only mentioned here this once. Apparently, this was a collection of poems that recounted how the Lord brought the people through the wilderness and conquered their enemies. Now, most scholars that I looked at agree that this first section here that we have, this song of sorts that's written here, or poem, is from there. And also, this Proverbs that are written about up here in verses 27 through 30 are also from this same book. It's lost to history. We don't have it. It wasn't an inspired book. But it would be interesting if we were ever to find a copy just to see it for historical reasons and whatnot. But sadly, we don't have it. And when you think about that, it's It is actually, I think, in a way, a good thing, despite the fact that I'm curious as to find the Book of the Wars of the Lord. I mean, who wouldn't want to read that? But the fact that it's lost a history in many ancient writings are all gone, never really to be found, right? But here, we have God's word. Right, we have his word. It's preserved perfectly for thousands of years. When they found the Dead Sea Scrolls, they were expecting, when they opened them up, when they started looking, they were expecting to find vast contradictions, major changes having been made. Scholars were the liberal scholars, of course, the Bible scholars. We all knew what was going to happen. But those who would wish to discredit the scriptures were expecting these massive changes, and they were stunned to find nothing. For thousands of years, scripture has come down perfectly and has been preserved all the way along. And I think that this shows God's mercy and his grace on rebellious man. We pray every time we come to his word, we thank him that we have his word, that he's revealed himself to us. It is a great mercy that he has given us these scriptures and has preserved them all along. We should never take that for granted, recognizing, again, we don't deserve that. We do not deserve that. He should have left us in darkness, but he didn't. And I think that that's a picture. The fact that we have that little reference there, I think, it's just kind of a, there was a book, it's not important. What is important is this, right? I think that's fascinating. Well, anyway, so then we see the Lord gathers the people together, and once again he gives them water, and in, you see it here, it's It's like, he gives them water as a loving father, right? As a shepherd, right? As opposed to the previous times when they complained, right? Here they come to beer and a well springs up. And then it says here that the nobles of the tribes, they take their staves and they dig it out, right? Perhaps just widening it out so that everyone can come in and fill up their vessels and drink from it, right? And the people, they break out into song. Again, what a contrast to the incident back at Kadesh, or even with the fiery serpents, when they again complained about not having water. It's just, I think, a neat contrast that the Lord has there. He says, if you follow me, look, I'm merciful on you. I am your loving Father. Now, they go to, as I said, a number of places. They wander around, heading there towards the Arnon. They go through the land of the Amorites and through the land of the Moab, and they end up at Pisgah. Now, I think that the fact that Pisgah is mentioned here is a sad note for us who know the end of the story. It's from Pisgah that Moses looks down on all the land, and it's on Pisgah that Moses will die at the end of the book of Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy 34, for those who wish to read ahead. But there they are, on the heights, and they send a messenger, or messengers, to the Amorites. They send them asking if they might simply go through their land on their way to Canaan, just as they had done with Edom. After all, they had no quarrel with them. The Amorites were not in the Promised Land, or were they? Back at Exodus 3. back when God was promising to bring them into the land. What does it say here in Exodus 3, verses 16 and 17? Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared to me saying I have surely visited you and seen what is done to you in Egypt and I have said I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites to a land flowing with milk and honey." Well, we can't say for certain that If Israel was being weak, not going against the Amorites from the get-go or not, it's not laid out there in our text, but God had promised the land of the Amorites to them as well. And we see that fulfilled right here in this passage. Verses 24 and 25 says very clearly, And Israel defeated him with the edge of the sword and took possession of his land from the Arnon to Jabbok, as far as the people of Ammon, for the border of the people of Ammon was fortified. So Israel took all these cities and Israel dwelt in all the cities of the Amorites, in Hezbollah, in all its villages. And we have down there at the end, at the end of this little section down in verse 31, that Israel dwelt in the land of the Amorites. So you might say one of the first lands that they actually conquered was the land of the Amorites. So a fulfillment, again, of the Lord's promise to them. Now, we see in our passage, if you look carefully, that Moab had been defeated by Sion, the king of the Amorites, and he had taken all of their land, or at least most of it, as far as the River Arnon, and so there really was no need for Israel to go up against them at the moment. They were a conquered people. They simply took their land when they conquered the conqueror. But not all of it, of course, and we'll see this in the next chapter with Balaam and Balak, Lord willing, that we get there. And I think perhaps that's why the proverb in 29 sort of foreshadows saying, woe to you, Moab. There was something coming for Moab, right? They'd already been defeated, and in a way, when it says, woe to Moab, Yes, it's speaking primarily of their destruction at the hands of the Amorites, but it's also saying, if they've already been defeated, what hope could they have against the Lord who had just conquered the Amorites? There's truly woe to the Moabites. Verses 31 and 32 tell us that Israel takes over the land and they dwell there. And then from there, Moses launches a spy campaign on Jazzer. It seems that this was Moabite land, again, that had been taken over by the Amorites, and Israel takes it, drives them out, and when we get to chapter 32, we're going to see that this area is quite beautiful. much desired, Reuben and Gad actually want to stay there. Turn ahead a little bit of a spoiler alert, but we can look at verses 1 through 5, numbers 32. Now the children of Reuben and the children of Gad had a very great multitude of livestock. And when they saw the land of Jazzer and the land of Gilead, that indeed the region was a place for livestock. The children of Gad and the children of Reuben came and spoke to Moses, to Eleazar the priest, and to the leaders of the congregation, saying, Adaroth, Dibbon, Jazar, Nimrah, Hezban, Elilah, Shebem, Nebu, and Baon, the country which the Lord defeated before the congregation of the Israel, is a land for livestock, and your servants have livestock. Therefore, they said, if we have found favor in your sight, let this land be given to your servants as a possession. Do not take us over the Jordan." And if we look again at our map, we have the red line where they're heading up there past the River Arnon, if you see at the very top of your map. It's actually probably should have extended a little bit higher because the land of, it says here that they get to Gilead, they're able to see Gilead and Pisgah and all of that. That's a little bit more north, just a bit more. So they probably made up a little farther And if you look at a topographical map, if you go online and find one or in the back of your Bible, you'll see that there is a number of rivers in that region. They're all flowing down from the hills down into the Dead Sea and also into the Jordan. And so that land is very well watered, has plenty of kind of hilly pastures and whatnot it seems. Perfect, perfect for livestock as it says, right? It's a fertile land. So you can understand why they might have wanted that when they got there. And Moses, as we'll see, allows it as long as the men go over the Jordan with the rest of Israel and fight to take over the land on the other side of the Jordan. And, of course, Gad and Reuben agree, and they do this. Well, any thoughts or questions on that? It's interesting how Pisgah features a lot in older hymns. Yeah, it just goes to show the old hymn writers knew their scriptures far better than we do these days. All right, well, finally, we come to the last account of this chapter, verses 33 through 35, that says, and they turned and went up by the way of Bashan. So Og king of Bashan went out against them. He and all his people to battle at Adria. or Adraei, I'm not really sure how to pronounce that exactly, but then the Lord said to Moses, do not fear him, for I have delivered him into your hand with all his people and his land, and you shall do to him as you did to Shayan, the king of the Amorites who dwelt at Hezbon. So they defeated him, his sons, and all his people until there was no survivor left him, and they took possession of his land. Well, there is a more detailed account of this, if we have time. Here, turn over to Deuteronomy 3. Much more detailed account on what happened. Deuteronomy 3, 1 through 11. Then we turned and went up the road to Bashan, and Og, king of Bashan, came out against us, he and all his people, to battle at Driei. And the Lord said to me, do not fear him, for I have delivered him and all his people and his land into your hand, you shall do to him as you did to Sion, king of the Amorites, who dwelt in Heshbon. So the Lord our God also delivered into our hands Og, king of Bashan, with all his people, and we attacked him until he had no survivors remaining. And we took all his cities at that time. There was not a city which we did not take from them, 60 cities, all the region of Argab, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. All these cities were fortified with high walls, gates, and bars beside a great many rural towns, and we utterly destroyed them. And we did it to Sion, king of Heshbon, utterly destroying the men, women, and children of every city. But all the livestock and the spoil of the cities we took as booty for ourselves. And at that time we took the land from the hand of the two kings of the Amorites, who were on this side of the Jordan, from the River Arnon to Mount Hermon. The Sidonians called Hermon Syrian, and the Amorites call it Senir. all the cities of the plains of all Gilead and all Bashan, as far as Salka and Edre, cities of the kingdom of Og in Bashan. For only Og, king of Bashan, remained of the remnant of the giants. Indeed, his bedstead was an iron bedstead. Is it not in Rabah of the people of Ammon? Nine cubits is its length, and four cubits its width, according to the standard cubit. Well, so Og comes out with his army and is utterly defeated. And Israel goes after the cities that are left, fortified with high walls, gates and bars, 60 cities plus many small rural towns, and all of the people are destroyed. Only the livestock and the spoils are left. It says there that Og was a giant. He had an iron bed that was 9 cubits or 13 feet long. If Og was close to that tall, he was even taller than Goliath, who was 6 cubits or 9 feet 9 inches. As our passage says, though, the Lord told them not to fear Og. I think this is obviously a direct reference to the people earlier being afraid of the giants, and he says, be afraid of this giant king, right? And they ended up smiting him and his sons and his people, and they took the land of Bashan. The Lord is going before his people. I think it's fitting for this chapter to end this way, right? The people had been faithless over and over and over again, but God was still faithful. He said he was going to go before them and that he would do these things, and that's exactly what he did. I think it's a good reminder for us to consider well these things. I just would turn lastly to 2 Timothy 2. We were considering this in our study in Hebrews, which made us think of the same thing, where Israel was faithless, but God being faithful. Turn there, 2 Timothy 2, 11 through 13. This is a faithful saying, for if we died with him, we shall also live with him. If we endure, we shall also reign with him. If we deny him, he will also deny us. If we are faithless, he remains faithful. He cannot deny himself. God is faithful, not because of us, not because of anything that we have to offer, but because he cannot deny himself. He has made promises, and he will hold to those things. All right, well, let's close in prayer. Heavenly Father, we are so grateful, Lord, that you are a faithful God. that you brought your people through the wilderness, Lord. And so we ask that you will also bring us through the wilderness of this life, Lord, be with us. And now as we go to sing your praises, Lord, with lisping tongue, we ask that they would be a sweet offering to you. And Lord, we ask that Calvin's words would be in accordance with yours as well. And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen.