Binding the Nation Together through the Priesthood

Synopsis     Joshua 20:8-21:9     05/19/2018

The Levite families approached Joshua, Eleazar the priest and the heads of the tribes. They reminded them of Moses’ command. Although the Levites were to receive no territory, they were to receive cities distributed throughout the nation where they could live. The tribes headed their requests.

The tribes of Judah, Simeon and Benjamin gave cities to the priests. Ephraim, Dan and Manasseh gave cities to the Kohathites. The tribes of Asher, Issachar and Manasseh gave cities to the Gershonites. And the tribes of Reuben, Gad and Zebulun gave cities to the Merarites.

Binding the Nation Together Through the Priesthood

Besides their ancestry, the thing that all of the tribes had in common was that the Levites lived among them. Every tribe hosted the men in specially designated cities who performed ritual services before the Lord at Shiloh. As a result, everyone was connected back the tabernacle and the common faith tradition in this way.

You Are the Salt of the Earth

Distributing the priests throughout the nation reinforced the visible institution that most gave the people their national sense of identity. The diaspora had a similar effect in that it spread Judaism and the knowledge of God abroad through other nations without the Jews losing their identity. As Christianity grew, it had a similar effect. Over the course of history, Christians have sometimes been both repressed and accepted. However, to the extent that Christians lived in a faith-filled way, they were almost always a light to others. The Authentic Community is a stabilizing influence and a challenge to the moral standards of the day.

Our role, in this respect, remains unchanged. My calling is to be salt and light to a people who have lived in an utter darkness concerning God. Not only in ignorance of God, but in the charred-over fallacy that there is no God.

I have fallen short. Too often my life doesn’t challenge – it doesn’t contradict the values of the world. And yet, even as I discovered in my own tortuously long return to the faith, there is a steadiness in the body of believers that beguiles critique and engenders a need to make sense of what it is that drives people to worship God.

This is all God needs to speak into a life. All He needs from me – faithfulness.

Because you have kept my message of endurance, I will keep you safe in the time of trial that is going to come to the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth. Rev 3:10