Enjoy Christ and Hold Onto the Covenant of Saving Lives Every Day (Numbers 23:13-26)
Today we will share the grace of God’s Word from Numbers 23 to the first half of Numbers 24. The things we read are those things that happened a few weeks before the Israeltes go full forward into the land of Cannan after 40 years after the Exodus from Egypt. It was only by the covenant of the blood of the sacrificed Passover Lamb that they were liberated after 400 years of slavery in Egypt.
There was no method of mankind for them to escape from slavery, but the method was God’s Word. The methods of mankind may be able to accomplish something in the physical world, but they have no effect on the spiritual world. There’s no way for mankind to be liberated other than the way of God, which was given to us in Genesis 3:15, the covenant of the blood of the offspring of the woman.
People who are living in the world right now are bound by themselves, as a result, they are bound to be seized by the material things they see. They hold onto success to try to solve their problems. But because this cannot resolve that issue, they fall into shamanism, fortune telling, and idol worship, but the more they go in this direction, the more they will be ensnared. This is the state of the people living in America who do not know the covenant of God.
The fact that I have the covenant means that I must be able to distinguish what’s going on in the field. If I’m not able to see the field of the world properly, it means I lack the covenant. Though I may have received salvation by grace, I’m still living my life bound by my self-centeredness, and we can never escape from that. We have to quickly restore the covenant. He has finished everything.
The problems of my past, present, and future have been finished, but we have lost hold of that, so that’s why we keep looking for the method within ourselves, then you’ll always be deceived that there is potentially another answer, and we will fall deeper in. That’s the reason people live religious lives; we have to finish everything completely with the gospel. Because we’re not able to do that, we’re continuously falling deeper.
These Israelites who were liberated from Egypt were, without a doubt, led by God and His Word, but because they lost hold of God’s Word, they again fell into their self-centeredness. The Word of God was something they kept as a reference, but they were still centered on themselves as they lived. When will this be resolved? They will continue to wander until they return back to be centered on the covenant by faith, so they wandered for 38 years until they restored faith, it took them more than 38 years, it took them until they received faith.
Everyone in the first generation except for Moses, Joshua, and Caleb had gone to heaven. Now, we are reading this passage where the Israelites had already defeated the Amorites and now stand before the Moabites. The way the Israelites overcame was because God was with them. But we are often under the misconception, “If God is not with the Israelites, the Israelites will be swept up by everything,” but they only had victory because they held onto the promise of God’s Word.
Now, the Israelites stood near Moab and the king of Moab, King Balak, said, “These Israelites are going to fight into this country” and during these times, the battles were fought between the respective gods of the nations. Among the prophets, one very well known for prophesying the end results well was Balaam.
So, King Balak set up a scheme to bring Prophet Balaam to curse the Israelites. He sent the officials of Moab twice with great sums of money, and Numbers 23 talks about how Balaam finally gave in, so he goes to King Balak of Moab. Starting from Numbers 23, it talks about how Balaam set up seven altars with rams and bulls as a sacrifice. In Numbers 23:1-12, God gives His Word to Balaam. Is it true that God can establish His Word even unbelievers? Yes, God can do everything. God is someone who can even speak through a donkey; why would God not be able to speak to an unbeliever?
So the King of Moab is waiting for Prophet Balaam to curse the Israelites, but the words God continues to give are not words to curse Israel but to bless Israel but they are the words to bless Israel. Why does God continue to give the words to bless Israel? Do you think God gives those words because Israel did well? There was nothing the Israelites did well; the only thing they did was disbelieve and grumble and complain.
So, why is it that God doesn’t give them words of cursing but only words of blessing? Because that’s the covenantal relationship God has with the Israelites. Religion means trying to receive blessings through some of my actions, don‘t you think that’s the same of all religions? A religion is trying to receive some kind of payment for my actions and behaviors, but the gospel has nothing to do with my actions. It is impossible for us to be regarded as righteous by our actions according to the law; it is only possible by believing in Jesus Christ.
It is only possible if you believe in the covenant of God. All we do is hold onto and breve in the covenant, and we should be receiving the curses, but God keeps turning it into blessings. The first example of this happening is where King Balak keeps asking Prophet Balaam to curse them again, and that’s the main scripture we read today. They set up the seven altars and sacrificed the bull and ram the same way, and God gave His Word to Balaam again.
I’m going to share the Word of God to you from the second and third prophecies. God gives His Word through Balaam, and in the midst of that, we should look with interest on Numbers 23:19. “God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?” God is not a man, meaning He should not lie. Humans, on the other hand, do lie. Why do we lie? People have no choice but to lie because we don’t have the ability to fulfill everything. If humans were omnipotent, we would never lie, because we could fulfill everything we say, but that’s why we shouldn’t trust in ourselves. If you trust yourself, you’ll fall into confusion.
“He does not lie, and He does not change His mind,” this means that each human regrets and changes their mind. It doesn’t matter how someone lives their life, they’re bound to have regrets. Wisdom is to know in advance; therefore, knowing God is wisdom. If you graduate from a great school and you can rely on your brain, that is now wisdom, that is a little bit of wisdom to help you survive in the world. The truly regrettable thing is to live a life you’re bound to regret without knowing it.
“Does He promise and not fulfill?” This is who God is, without a doubt, God does fulfill what He says, and you must hold onto those Words of God. For us humans, we have no choice but to live a life we will regret and we have no choice but to lie, but God’s commandment tells us not to lie, so only with his covenant will our lives change into the opposite. You must not believe in people. This doesn’t mean you should hate people or that you should be cynical all the time, but you shouldn’t trust in them because otherwise you’d regret it. We must trust in God, and that means, we must trust in His covenant.
A lot of young adults will completely lose their mind when they find someone that they think is a suitable spouse. They think they’ve found someone they can rely on, and because you’re not looking from God’s Word but you’re looking centered on your physical nature and experiences, without a doubt, you will regret it. The promises you make to each other don’t matter; you’re bound to lie, but you’re so bloated with expectations and you think that you think there’s something to look forward to in life, so they’re rushing into a life they will regret.
If you don’t want to change your mind later on, you have to meet someone who has the covenant, because God’s Word is fulfilled according to His covenant. In order for us to live a life in 2021 that we will not regret, we must go forward, holding onto the covenant of the God-given Word every week. If we don’t do this, it means we believe in ourselves. That is a lie, that is the work of Satan. John 8:44 says, “Your father, the devil, he is a liar and the father of lies,” and you yourself are following his ways and when you face problems where your environments become difficult, don’t believe in what you see. Why would you look at that and be deceived? You need to hold onto God’s covenant. These are the people who will receive answers.
While God is giving the Word through Prophet Balaam, Numbers 23:21 says, “No misfortune is seen in Jacob, no misery obsessed in Israel. The LORD their God is with them; the shout of the King is among them.” It wasn’t that the Israelites were never in misfortune or misery, they were. But the fact that this isn’t seen is because God will cover this up. We call this God’s grace. Why was it covered up? Because they held onto the covenant of righteousness, everything they do is regarded as righteous.
Jesus Christ took all the curses, disasters, and death upon Himself for us. We call this “righteous” because He had no sin on His own, but He died for all sinners, and that’s what we call “righteous.” The righteousness of the world and of mankind is not true righteousness; all of that is just conditional, how much you’ve done for me vs. how much I’ve done for you, that’s not righteousness. We had nothing to do with Him, but He Who is righteous died for us sinners, so He is the righteous One.
The One Who is able to die on behalf of my sins, and the one who is able to overcome the curses of death, hell, and Satan. The one who believes in Christ is the one who is righteous. We do not become righteous by keeping the words of the law, but we become righteous because we believe in the One Who is Righteousness. Therefore, God doesn’t look at our actions, but He looks at our faith in Jesus Christ and covers up everything else.
Legalism is trying to do this or that before God with your actions, so that’s why your righteousness is what’s revealed, so you have no choice but to judge or criticize others. So, the difference between religion and the gospel is the difference between heaven and earth. There’s the story of the Prodigal Son who completely used up his father’s inheritance and returned home. Once the prodigal son returned, the father gave him rings,robes and a banquet, and the one who hated this the most was the first son who listened to all the commands of the father and never left the house. The reason he felt so bad about it was because he represents the legalistic Jews of Israel. All they had to do was enjoy the gospel, but instead of enjoying the life of the gospel, they focused on their own legalistic actions and they say, “My younger brother did worse things than me, but why is he being celebrated?” The gospel means that no matter how foul our actions become, if we simply hold on to the covenant again and come back to ask for God’s grace, then He will give us the blessings, grace, and life–that’s the covenant. Then, He will call us righteous. We know the words of Christ but we must enjoy the gospel. Christ is not something we should know legalistically, but we must know the gospel of Christ and enjoy it.
People keep continuously trying to return to legalism and actions, and it’s constantly a battle with ourselves like that. The religiosity of mankind is unspeakable, and that’s what prevents us from enjoying the gospel; we’re not able to enjoy the freedom of the gospel. We center ourselves on all the times we didn’t go outside of God’s Word or on our good actions. If people do not know the gospel and talk about repentance, they will repent about things pertaining to their actions. Most people repent and say things like, “Legally speaking, I shouldn’t have done this, but I did, so I repent and I won’t do it again,” but if you end it like that, that’s the same as unbelievers. Unbelievers who journal every day repent every day, it’s the same no matter where you go on earth; that’s what you call religiosity. But what is a gospel repentance? It transcends this. Yes, we have to remember the former repentance as well, but there is a more fundamental repentance. We have to repent about the fact we have forgotten that we are children of God. If you do not understand those words, then you’re constantly imprinting legalism and religion into your children even when you’re talking about Christ. You will constantly oppress people. Why is it that I’m oppressing people even as I talk about Jesus? You spoke about Jesus; you never spoke about the gospel.
Yes, it’s a problem that your child ended up this way, but the real problem is that they have lost hold of their status as children of God, but instead, we keep pointing our fingers at their actions. Yes, it’s a problem, but we have to keep uncovering the fundamental reason that left them no choice but to be this way. Don’t you think people sin because they’re sinners? But you’re a righteous one, you’re a child of God. As they remember their status as a child of God, their actions will change. That’s the gospel-centered repentance and healing. But someone who is legalistic or religious will not be able to bear that. Because they’re not able to enjoy the gospel, they can’t handle looking at that, that’s why their kids are never healed.
People think they talk about the gospel, but in reality, they’ve never talked about it once. When you talk about the gospel, it’s spiritual, so when you talk about it, there’s life in it. If you’ve never experienced this, try doing ministry with a kid who is demon-possessed. Nothing you say will go into them. It doesn’t matter what kind of Bible verses you throw at them, because they understand things spiritually, they are not understanding anything. Because they’re spiritually afflicted, you have to tell them the gospel. But instead of giving them the gospel, you’re only pretending to talk to them about the gospel but you are giving them religion and legalism, so you’re oppressing them more. If you have ministry with someone who is severely demon afflicted, then your inner state will be revealed. The only time they will keep wanting to hear more of what you say is when you are talking about the true gospel. It means their reaction will be immediate because they’re so spiritually thirsty.
Most kids who are not so spiritually afflicted will still endure it if you talk to them about the gospel plus legalism, but it won’t go deep inside of them. You have to completely talk about the gospel in order for their spirit to receive it, and they’ll want to hear it again because people who are spiritually afflicted will understand spiritual things immediately. The one who is realistically enjoying that gospel as life must be the one who is relaying the gospel.
Even so, you should still keep doing ministry because it reveals to you what kind of person you are. Later on, they’re going to ask you to stop and in which case, you’re not enjoying the gospel. “Oh, this is God’s time schedule for me.” If you relay the true gospel, then 100% of people will like that. There’s not a single person here who wouldn’t like to hear the gospel. It’s the same, you have to actually enjoy this when you go out into the field. But instead of that, you keep looking for methods and you’re lying to be religious and legalistic again.
Today it says in Numbers 23:21 that God is with them, why? Because they had a covenant made with God in Mount Sinai that they are God’s people, and all the Israelite people had to do was to hold firmly to that covenant in faith. That’s why God continues to give words of blessings to Balaam instead of words of curses.
Numbers 23:22 says, “God brought them out of Egypt, they have the strength of a wild ox.” The Israelites themselves did not have any strength, they are only strong because God is with them. In this age, it was a time where people were fighting war against ShamanismShamanism and Religion, but in Numbers 23:23, “There is no sorcery against Jacob, no divination against Israel. It will now be said of Jacob and of Israel, ‘See what God has done!” Nothing can bring you harm because God will fulfill His promise. This isn’t something that happened out of nowhere, but God is continuously fulfilling the promise he gave in Genesis 12 that God gave as an inheritance. When God told Abraham to leave Ur of the Chaldeans in Mesopotamia, He was telling him to leave from the curses, disaster and Satan. “Instead, go to the land I will show you,” the land where Christ would come. Now, go to the land of God’s covenant. “I will make you into a blessing,” what does “blessing” mean? It means “I have called you as the progenitor, the source of blessings to share this life of the gospel to all nations and all people.”
If you say, “I’m a blessing,” who cares? You are not a blessing; God is the blessing. God has simply made you into the start of blessings. There are people spread all around who are destined to receive this blessing of the gospel of life from you. He says, “I will make your name great,” you keep on struggling to exalt your own name, “but don’t worry about it, I will do it for you. I will make you into a great nation,” which means there are so many people who are bound to be saved through you.
This is where your business must be. Your business must come as an answer within this, but if you’re living like an unbeliever, “Should I go to worship even though I’m so busy?” Then you’re a slave, it means you don’t know this incredible blessing is here. If you’re in the covenant, God will take care of it, but you don’t understand these words because you cannot understand the gospel. “We still have to work hard, we have to do this,” you’re constantly falling into the law, your actions, and religion.
Please, do this with faith. Do it holding onto the covenant, but you can’t understand. So, what happens is they wandered in the wilderness for 38 years, they all heard these words but they were unable to understand because they weren’t changed by faith. God fulfills His work of the Word through the ones who held onto God’s covenant with faith.
Numbers 24:2 talks about the third time King Balak is trying to convince prophet Balaam to curse them. So again, Balaam sets up the seven altars with the ox and ram and God gives His Word again, and the content of the word is that Israel’s is so strong even though they’re not so strong at all. There are so many strong people in the world, they look at the people in the land of Canaan and they’re like giants. But for the people of the covenant, our strength is holding onto the covenant.
We tell the kids to study holding onto the covenant but they don’t hear those words, and we’re told to run our business holding onto the covenant but it’s so hard. All you do is hold onto the eh covenant, but the Bible says you’ll have strength like a wild ox. Numbers 24:8, “God brought them up out of Egypt that they have the strength as a wild ox. They devour hostile nations and break their bones pierced with their arrows, they pierce them,” this is what God said He would do; we have no strength by ourselves. In reality, it’s impossible for us to compete against the people of Satan who receive strength from the Nephilim to control the world.
In Matthew 4, Satan says, “Bow down to me and I will give all the power of the world,” and that means there are people in the world who succeed by this method. We live in this world, but if we lose hold of the covenant, we won’t have any strength. If there are any of you thinking, “I’m a little more earnest than everyone else and maybe I’m more capable,” I hope no one is making such childish thoughts. It means you’re saying those words without knowing the covenant, without knowing who your enemy is and without knowing the spiritual world on earth. You are only relying on your own strength because you don’t know who is controlling this world.
Numbers 24:9, “Like a lion they crouch and lie down,like a lioness who dares to rouse them?“May those who bless you be blessed and those who curse you be cursed!” It means that God will give all the strength to the people of the covenant. In all honesty, the Israelites don’t even know any of this is going on, the Moabites are freaking out on their own, but the Israelites are blissfully unaware. If you and I are truly holding onto the covenant, then God moves everything forward. If you’re truly holding onto God’s covenant of Canaan and world evangelization, God will give you strength and protect you against anyone who tries to block you.
That’s why Elisha asked Elijah for a double portion of the Holy Spirit, because he realized that unless it’s by the Holy Spirit, it’s impossible to break down the king and raise up disciples. Without a doubt, there are people in your field who are prepared to receive the gospel. You must believe in that covenant otherwise you will always disbelief and always want to go back to Egypt. You’ll always be wondering, “What will I eat?” And it’s not like you’ll always get your fill, but you’ll always be hungry. God did that on purpose, so quickly hold to the covenant.
Surely, around you, there have been people prepared to receive the covenant. You must believe in that in order for the works to arise; if you don’t believe in that, you’ll only have the works of unbelief. The people who will receive healing through God’s word have been prepared around you. But they are so diseased, lost in religion and idolatry. They go to church without any answers. We have to heal all the people who are going to church religiously, looking for blessings. There are people who are looking for abundance, but it’s an abundance that is not aligned with God’s direction. Then you have to change their life to be aligned with the correct mission.
There are people who are just naturally generous. You have to change them so they’re all aligned with the covenant of God’s direction. There are people who have been prepared in your field for this, and all I did was hold onto this and go forward and God does everything. All I did was hold onto this and go forward and God is my strength. The reason He does that is that He has to fulfill His covenant, because He has to save your region, because he has to save the multiethnic people. That’s the reason God is with you and gives you the work of the holy spirit.
If students are studying, holding to the covenant, then the works will arise. If you hold onto God’s covenant, then God’s works will carry everything forward. You and I are the scattered ones. God has sent us into this superpower nation. You must know that. God has commissioned me here. I may have run away here, I may have emigrated here to try and make something of myself, but it was actually God Who is sending me. God did not create this incident for no reason, but He called me to America to save the 237 nations.
If you hold onto the covenant of world evangelization in the land of Canaan like the Israelites did, look at what happened to the Israelites later on, once they came to the land of Canaan, they lived in houses they didn’t build and ate from vineyards they didn’t plant, take all the cattle and livestock of the people on behalf. That’s the economy of light God prepares for you. What did they do? All they did was follow God’s covenant. The Israelites never calculated that; God did it for them. They had tens of thousands of cattle, do you want to try raising that much cattle in the wilderness? It’s impossible to raise that many.
Do you want to go into the land of Canaan and build your own houses and farms? God chased everyone else out. To conquer, it all belongs to God to begin with, and because you’re children of God, of course you should take charge of it, but if you’re religious and legalistic, you’ll think, “How can we take that land?” God has prepared this for you for world evangelization. God has prepared Temple Construction for world evangelization as well.
People who don’t know this will only know legalism and religion and think, “How could I do something like this with my limited resources?” That person will continuously have answers in their disbelief. But it doesn’t matter how young somebody is, if they are joining with God in the direction he’s going in with faith, then God will give them the works of faith.
Conclusion
King Balak is trying to curse the Israelites through the prophet Balaam, but it doesn’t work out according to mankind, they’re the ones who were cursed instead because they cursed God’s people. How are you guys going to put this into practice? You must really embrace your region, because once the gospel is established in this region, it’s connected to the 237 nations.
You have to hold onto this convent with faith as you live in your region and do your work and your studies. You work as you are anticipating and eagerly waiting for the next person you’ll meet to relay this covenant. That’s someone who is aligned with the heart of God, but if your heart is somewhere else, you’re not aligned with God. You have the Word of God in your head but your heart is somewhere else.
But if you’re simply holding onto the covenant and as you’re simply doing what you always do, God works upon them incredibly, because this person truly believes, why? Because God gave his covenant and God works according to His covenant. You don’t relay this blessing through Bible studies, you relay this blessing and teach as a witness. This is the blessing we have. May you have victory for the remaining three days of the week.
Prayer
Let us pray holding onto the Word God has given to us today. Pray for the field God has given and entrusted to you, and pray for the people who will receive healing and the covenant of world evangelization through you. May we have that kind of ministry in our academics and businesses. Let us pray together.
What is your heart’s greatest desire? May this be changed today with the Word because your greatest desire will only breed regret. Because it’s a lie, you will end up regretting it. The words of people should just be kept as a reference; you shouldn’t trust it, but you must always believe in God’s Word and only put that in your heart. That’s how the diseases of your heart and brain will receive healing. That’s why your family line will receive healing. Until that point, we’ll never receive healing, it doesn’t matter how much we struggle. Through me, one person, may my family line, church and my region, be raised up and healed, how? All you have to do is believe in and hold onto the covenant, you have been given.
Let’s pray for our mission fields together. There’s a young adult in Nigeria who has been joining two of our regional church this week, and when I listened to his forum, I relaxed that I’m really glad he was able to join, he has ken training system there, and I understand why God brought him into this training system. He’s a great friend and we have to raise him up as an evangelist. Being “with” is not something that can be relayed simply with words. What this person truly has is relayed, so the spirit cannot be saved with just wordplay. The one who actually believes has to relay God’s Word for that person to be changed . If you just repeat what you’ve heard like a parrot, there’s nothing bad about it, but that person will not change> if you simply go to seminary, you can become like a parrot, but we must go together with the one who truly believes.
In every field, there are truly good workers prepared, and especially we must raise the remnants and multiethnic people who are here. That’s why we must hold onto the biblical way of making them established in the church so they may save their fields. Let us pray for our mission fields.
There are a lot of multiethnic people in the church who come to church on Sunday to worship, but we have to encourage them to come into the training movement in order for them to arise as missionaries. So, there are some of them who barely just come to church on Sundays, we have to help them come into the stream of training otherwise, they will not be able to have continuation in their own ministries.
I don’t want to speak too long about this, but we’ll talk about it more deeply at another time. Especially for the multiethnic people, if you say, “I want to raise them up by myself,” that’s not how it works and it wouldn’t work out that way anyways, but what we must do is to help them to come into the stream of the church’s training systems. I hope you will be aware of this and be led well in your ministries. If I’m within that training stream, I’m bound to speak about it as well. If I’m not within that stream, I’m bound to say words constantly centered on myself.
Every morning when you wake up, you have to restore your spiritual state heading towards the land of Canaan holding onto the word of promise God gave us for the week. Your day must begin once your spiritual state has changed so that it’s aligned with today’s Word, today’s prayer, and today’s evangelism to which God is guiding you; otherwise, it will be difficult for our future generations to conquer the field.
If you’re just trying to eat three meals a day and wander around for 38 years in the wilderness and just die, you can wake up whatever time you want, but if you really want to conquer and do world evangelization, you can’t live like that. You must receive this grace every single morning. Let us pray.
Benediction
Now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the unending love of God, and the indwelling, working, guidance, and communion of the Holy Spirit, be upon all the people of God, the multiethnic people, the remnants, their studies and business, be upon all the people who want to hold onto the covenant with faith, be with us from now until forevermore always, amen.