Departing From Sinai

Minister:
Date: PM
Text: Numbers 10:33-35
Psalters: 179, 238, 290, 367
  1. The great and terrible wilderness.
    1. The time of Israel’s departure was 20th day of the 2nd month of the 2nd year after they left Egypt.
    2. The distance from Sinai to Kadesh-Barnea, the southern border of Canaan, was a journey of 11 days.
      1. It was a massive group of people, with both families and cattle.
      2. The formation of the march was set (chapter 2).
      3. The princes of the 12 tribes had given six covered wagons for the tabernacle (7:1-3).
    3. The immediate path from Sinai (Horeb) was most forbidding (Deut. 1:19).
      1. Re. the geography, it is mostly plain of sand and gravel, but it is broken by some valleys.
      2. Also, this put them among enemies: were hedged between the Edomites and Amalekites and before them the Amorites.
  2. God’s provision for them.
    1. First, He continued all the other provisions:
    2. There was the message of care given in the silver trumpets (10;5,6).
      1. The trumpets had various functions:
      2. The sound of the trumpet meant that “ye shall be remembered before Jehovah your God” (9b, 10b).
    3. God provided Hobab, Moses’ brother-in-law, as a guide (29-32).
    4. There was the special words Joses was to speak whenever they began and ended a day of marching.
      1. When they stopped, Moses would said, “Rise up, Jehovah, and let Their enemies be scattered; and let them that hate Thee flee before Thee (35; Ps. 68:1).
      2. As they stopped Moses again called God to return to the thousands of Israel (36; Ps. 132:8).