Good evening. Please turn with me to Joshua chapter 21. Joshua 21.
Last week we discussed how God’s priority in the land of Canaan was for God’s people to have access to mercy. He set up cities of refuge to protect those that were potentially guilty of crimes, lest they fall into the hands of unjust avengers of blood.
And today we will see God’s second concern, which is to ensure that the Levites have their inheritance, which will permit the proper function of worship in the nation. The Levites were in charge of the proper functioning of worship among the people of God, and in chapter 21 we will see that they get their allotted cities too.
First the cities of refuge, then the cities for worship. It’s almost like God is saying “I desire mercy before sacrifice.” But that’s for another sermon.
Let’s start just by reading the first three verses, and then we’ll make our way further in the text as we walk through this sermon. Joshua 21, verses 1-3.
Then the heads of the fathers’ houses of the Levites came to Eleazar the priest and to Joshua the son of Nun and to the heads of the fathers’ houses of the tribes of the people of Israel. 2 And they said to them at Shiloh in the land of Canaan, “The Lord commanded through Moses that we be given cities to dwell in, along with their pasturelands for our livestock.” 3 So by command of the Lord the people of Israel gave to the Levites the following cities and pasturelands out of their inheritance.
I’d like for us to walk through these two chapters and see 5 lessons tonight. 5 lessons from the Levites. A Lesson in Prayer. A lesson in prayer.
You might wonder what prayer has to do with the first 3 verses we read, but it’s there I promise. Take note of the authority with which the Levites lay claim of their land in these verses.
Numbers 35 contains the story in which Moses was commanded by the Lord to give cities to the Levites. These cities would provide a place for them to live, provide pastures in which they could keep their livestock, provide protection for the tribe, provide for their material needs through the tithes of the nation, and so on.
And that promise made to them in Numbers 35 was not forgotten by the Levites. In our text they approach Eleazar the priest and Joshua and all the leaders of the tribes and request that they be given what God had promised to them.
We’ve seen this pattern several times already in this book. Recall Caleb in Chapter 14 who reminded the leaders of God’s promise of an inheritance of land for him, and they gave it to him. He laid claim to the Promise of God.
Or the daughters of Zelophedad in Chapter 17, who boldly approached the leaders and demonstrated great faith in the promise that God had made to them of an inheritance of land in Canaan.
Confidence in what God had promised, and courage to ask for the thing promised. That’s a pattern in this book, that’s where we can see a lesson for us in prayer.
You see, this ought to be the normal pattern for believers. We ought to approach the Lord in prayer to seek out the things promised to us. We should ask for our inheritance. He’s made promises to us, just like he promised something to Joshua and Caleb and the Levites and the entire nation of Israel.
And we should be diligent to seek out and ask for the things promised to us. Now, of course we aren’t promised a plot of land in Canaan, but we are very clearly given promises of other things, and we’re explicitly commanded to pray and seek after those things.
For example, Jesus taught us to pray for things.
Give us this day our daily bread.
That’s one of the things that Jesus said we should pray for. Pray for the basic provisions of life. Don’t fret and worry about the things you need to survive. God has already promised to give us everything we need to serve Him faithfully.
But he’s also called us to pray to him and ask, that the promised blessing might be received.
Do you worry about your daily needs? Are you worried about having enough money, or about clothes, or about where you live, or about your job? Then you need to ask God to deliver on the things promised to you.
Lord, Give me my daily bread.
You could do this with the rest of the Lord’s prayer: Lead us not into temptation.
God has already promised elsewhere that he will not tempt us beyond that which we can bear, and that he will provide a way of escape. The promises related to temptation are there in scripture.
And yet we are still called to pray daily for those promises to be given to us.
Lord, Lead us not into temptation.
So are you worried about failing, about falling into sin again? Does the temptation of Satan, or do the sinful inclinations within your own heart make you fearful, worried? Then you need to remember what God has promised you, and you need to ask him to deliver on those promises.
It’s not enough to simply know that those resources are promised, if we never actually reach out and lay hold of them.
One more. God promises in James 1:5 that he will give wisdom to those that ask for it. Heavenly wisdom, promised to you.
Are you in need of wisdom? Are you in a sticky situation, or you feel like you’re stuck and not sure what to do? Are you at a crossroads? We’ve all felt that way.
If that’s you, and you’re unsure of your next step, then you need to remember the promise of God that he will give heavenly wisdom to his children, but you also need to remember that we need to act on that promise, and ASK for the wisdom.
Great confidence should accompany the prayers of God’s children, because he has already given the promises, and he cannot lie. He comes through on every one of his promises.
Go down to verse 43
Thus the Lord gave to Israel all the land that he swore to give to their fathers. And they took possession of it, and they settled there. 44 And the Lord gave them rest on every side just as he had sworn to their fathers. Not one of all their enemies had withstood them, for the Lord had given all their enemies into their hands.45 Not one word of all the good promises that the Lord had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass.
God keeps his promises. He never drops the ball. So remember what he’s promised us in His word, because of the faithfulness of Christ and his sacrifice. Let us be reminded to be fervent in our prayers, and lay hold of the gifts that have been promised to us as an inheritance in Christ.
That’s our first lesson. Let’s go on to our next lesson, which is A lesson in Position. A lesson in Position.
Starting in verse 4 we have a description of the lots cast for the various sons of Levi. Levi had three sons: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, and each of their families’ allotments are listed in verses 4-8. And in these various families within the tribe of Levi we can see a lesson in position and service in the kingdom.
“Gershon, Kohath, and Merari teach us the meaning of faithful service to God. After the Israelites came out of Egypt, God gave detailed instructions for building a large, portable tent for worship.
He put the tribe of Levi in charge of this tabernacle, as it was called. Out of all the tribes of Israel, the Levites were set apart for God’s holy service. Since Gershon, Kohath, and Merari were sons of Levi, each of them had specific duties in the tabernacle, duties that were later shared by all their descendants.
The Levitical duties were all of a practical nature (see 1 Chron. 9:14–32; 23:28–32). The Gershonites were in charge of the curtains. As the book of Numbers explains, “At the Tent of Meeting the Gershonites were responsible for the care of the tabernacle and tent, its coverings, the curtain at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, the curtains of the courtyard, the curtain at the entrance to the courtyard surrounding the tabernacle and altar, and the ropes—and everything related to their use” (3:25, 26).
The Kohathites were the interior designers. God put them in charge of the furnishings and utensils inside the tabernacle: “They were responsible for the care of the ark, the table, the lampstand, the altars, the articles of the sanctuary used in ministering, the curtain, and everything related to their use” (Num. 3:31).
The sons of Merari were the structural engineers; they did the heavy lifting: “The Merarites were appointed to take care of the frames of the tabernacle, its crossbars, posts, bases, all its equipment, and everything related to their use, as well as the posts of the surrounding courtyard with their bases, tent pegs and ropes” (Num. 3:36, 37). Each family had its own clearly-defined duties.
These tasks may sound mundane, but they were all essential to the worship of God, and thus the Levites held a position of great honor in Israel. It was one of the Kohathites who wrote,
Better is one day in your courts
than a thousand elsewhere;
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
than dwell in the tents of the wicked. (Ps. 84:10)
Aaron’s family treasured its rich legacy of glorifying God through practical service.
Today the Gershonites, Kohathites, and Merarites would serve as ushers, or they would work on the support staff, or serve as members of the building committee.
On Saturday they would show up for the church work day, and on Sunday they would pass out the bulletins and prepare the elements for the Lord’s Supper. The church’s highest calling is to worship God, and the faithful servants who perform the practical tasks that enable the church to fulfill this high calling give great glory to God.
Many years later, when the Israelites folded up their tabernacle and began to worship at the temple, the Gershonites, Kohathites, and Merarites were still serving the Lord. They never stopped serving him in practical ways.
There were Levites at the temple worshiping God and helping others to worship all day and all night (see 1 Chron. 9:33). Pilgrims who traveled to Jerusalem for the great festivals would sing,
Praise the Lord, all you servants of the Lord
who minister by night in the house of the Lord.
Lift up your hands in the sanctuary
and praise the Lord. (Ps. 134:1, 2)
The example of the Levites trains us to be faithful in our service and constant in our worship day and night.[1]
And it reminds us that our calling is to serve the body, rather than seeking to be served. Humble service in in the household of faith often looks like mundane, boring, behind the scenes, nothing-special kind of work. But it is necessary work, and because it is done in service to God almighty, it is glorious work.
Don’t grow weary in doing good, in serving in quiet thankless ways. And if you’re not serving, then let the example of the sons of Levi stir you to find your place of service in God’s kingdom. There are countless ways to serve the Lord and His people, from public efforts to private prayers, and each is crucial for the proper functioning of the body.
Let the Levites teach us a lesson in faithfulness.
Next, let’s move on to our third lesson, which is A lesson in Provision. A lesson in Provision. This isn’t a major theme, so I won’t linger on this one, but it was here in the text and jumped out to me.
When the Levites request their cities, they are asking for the provision that they need. It wasn’t merely a place to lay their head, though it certainly was that. It was also a means of caring for their earthly needs. In one sense, their request was for their daily bread.
Though their priestly service is spiritual, their needs are material, and God’s people need to keep that in mind as well. There are ministers set apart to serve the people of God trusting in the Lord to provide for their material needs through the provision that comes through the people of God.
Of course, there are false shepherds out there seeking to line their pockets and get rich fleecing God’s people, and God speaks to them in other places like Ezekiel 34. But that’s not what we have here. We have the servants in God’s house seeking what is due to them, trusting in the Lord’s provision to come through the hands and the metaphorical pocketbooks of God’s people.
Sometimes churches forget that their ministers are real people too, people who have to pay for insurance, and bills, and tuition, and clothing for their kids, and everything else, and that forgetfulness can lead a church to unintentionally under-pay their ministers.
I’m thankful that that hasn’t been the case for me at Morningview, but the reminder is there all the same. The principle is relevant for us as we face staff transitions and potential for a church plant in another town.
Vocational Ministers do not live on bread alone, but they DO need their daily bread, which comes from the Lord, and normally comes from the Lord through the hands of the body of Christ.
So don’t muzzle an ox while he is treading grain, Paul would say. Indeed, “what is implicit here in Joshua 21 is clearly taught by the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 9.”[2]
The Lord loves a cheerful giver, and may we all grow to cheerfully give to the Lord, knowing that we pay a small portion of the inheritance that has been promised to the faithful servants in God’s house.
Let’s keep going. We’ve seen a lesson in prayer, in position, and in provision. Our fourth lesson is A lesson in Providence. A lesson in Providence.
Here I want us to zoom out and ask a question. Why are the Levites given cities at all? Why was THIS tribe, out of all the twelve, not given a chunk of land for themselves, and instead was scattered all across the land of Canaan?
Good question. To get an answer we need to remember back to the book of Genesis, in chapter 34. Jacob had a daughter through Leah, and that daughter was named Dinah. The text says that a man named Shechem, who was a Hivite prince, saw [Dinah], “he seized her and lay with her and humiliated her. 3 And his soul was drawn to Dinah the daughter of Jacob. He loved the young woman and spoke tenderly to her. 4 So Shechem spoke to his father Hamor, saying, “Get me this girl for my wife.””
So he sinned deeply against Dinah, but then fell in love with her, and seemed to want to make it right. And he came to Jacob and said I want Dinah to be my wife, tell me what the bride-price will be. “Name your price,” he said.
But Jacob’s sons were very angry about all this. And they came up with a plan. They told him, We can’t give one of our sisters to be married to an uncircumcised man.
15 Only on this condition will we agree with you—that you will become as we are by every male among you being circumcised. 16 Then we will give our daughters to you, and we will take your daughters to ourselves, and we will dwell with you and become one people.
Shechem and all the Hivites agree, thinking that they will not only get the girl, but also get wealthy trading with the Israelites. So they circumcise all the males in their tribes.
And three days later, the text says “when all the men were sore,” and they were recovering from the “diplomatic” procedure, Simeon and Levi spring into action. Verse 25:
Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s brothers, took their swords and came against the city while it felt secure and killed all the males. 26 They killed Hamor and his son Shechem with the sword and took Dinah out of Shechem’s house and went away. 27 The sons of Jacob came upon the slain and plundered the city, because they had defiled their sister. 28 They took their flocks and their herds, their donkeys, and whatever was in the city and in the field. 29 All their wealth, all their little ones and their wives, all that was in the houses, they captured and plundered.
Jacob isn’t happy, and says that his sons have made him a stink in the land. His sons committed terrible injustice, and even worse, they used a ceremonial act of worship, circumcision, and turned it into a means of wrathful vengeance and deception. Defiling the holy things of God, in the name of revenge.
Next, fast forward to the end of Genesis, when Jacob is about to die. He’s giving final blessings to each of his sons, and he says this about Simeon and Levi:
“Simeon and Levi are brothers;
weapons of violence are their swords.
6 Let my soul come not into their council;
O my glory, be not joined to their company.
For in their anger they killed men,
and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen.
7 Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce,
and their wrath, for it is cruel!
I will divide them in Jacob
and scatter them in Israel.
Levi’s sin meant that his tribe would not have an inheritance in the land like his brothers. He has no section within Canaan that belongs to him. Instead, he would be scattered among the inheritance of all his brothers. Judgement would mean no region to call his own.
That’s why the Levites are given cities. It’s an act of Judgment. Their father Levi blew it. He committed terrible sin, and used the holy things of God as a cover for his wicked vengeance.
And yet, in God’s providence, he turns terrible sin into a blessing, because the scattering of the Levites among the nation also brought blessing to the entire people of God. The presence of the Levites throughout the land meant that you had teachers to teach the law of God in each of the tribal regions.
It meant that you had priests to help with the purification of God’s people. Priests to rule about cleansings and washings. Priests to adjudicate between feuding parties and bring peace.
Priests to transcribe copies of the law so that it might be taught and spread. Priests to ensure that people didn’t violate the law and bring further judgment upon themselves, the land, and the nation.
God in his providence, turns the cursing and judgement of Levi, into a blessing to the entire nation.
And that reminds me of another time that God used terrible judgment to bring about the blessing of an entire nation.
God used the death of Jesus Christ, the most terrible act of judgment, to bring about blessing to a nation.
But unlike the judgment of Levi, Jesus never deserved it. Jesus never deceived, never acted in wrathful revenge, never acted unjustly, never dishonored his father.
And yet, he received the worst judgment, far greater than Levi. Christ died in the place of the sin of His people, and in that way, is serving as the fulfillment of everything for which the Levitical priesthood stood. He was the representative of a people, the meditator, allowing for sinners to be forgiven.
And because of this act of judgment, blessing is brought to a nation. Not a temporal blessing for ethnic jews in Canaan, but the blessing of eternal life and peace given to all who are circumcised, not in the flesh, but circumcised in heart. Spiritual jews, as Paul says in Romans 2.
Paul says:
For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter.
If you’re trusting in Christ, then you have been circumcised in heart, have been made a part of the people of God, and are united to Christ, and thus heir to all of his blessed inheritance.
And to go even further with the analogy, by Christ’s death on the cross, and our union to him by faith, we ourselves have become a kingdom of priests, and like the Levites, God’s people are scattered. Not scattered simply in Canaan, but scattered and sent around the world, to Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and the ends of the earth.
Like the Levites blessed the nation with their presence, the New Covenant Priests are called to be a blessing wherever they live on Earth, speaking truth, reminding people of God’s law, working to be salt and light in a dark and dying world.
All because God in his providence brings blessing from judgment. What a glorious God, what a glorious plan.
What some meant for Evil, God meant for Good, and he uses his sovereign power to providentially ordain every step of it along the way. Praise God for His mercy, his grace, and his providential ordering to bring mercy from judgment.
That’s our 4th lesson. Let’s move to our 5th and final lesson in chapter 22. We’ve seen a lesson on prayer, on position, on provision, on providence, and now A lesson in Perspective. A lesson in Perspective.
In chapter 22, the 2 and a half tribes that had their inheritance of land on the eastern side of the Jordan river, go back home. You remember that the tribes of Ruben and Gad and Half of Manasseh had their land on the other side of the Jordan.
Moses gave them that land before the people of God entered Canaan, on the condition that they must still come into the land and help all the other tribes fight and secure their inheritance. And then, once the land of Cannan was subdued and ALL the tribes had their land, only then would Ruben and Gad and the eastern half of Manasseh’s tribes we able to go back home.
And now that the land of Canaan was subdued and everybody had their inheritance, they go back home. They have fulfilled their vow, and now they want to get on back to their own home.
Joshua sends them home in verses 1-9. But let’s pick up in verse 10:
10 And when they came to the region of the Jordan that is in the land of Canaan, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh built there an altar by the Jordan, an altar of imposing size. 11 And the people of Israel heard it said, “Behold, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh have built the altar at the frontier of the land of Canaan, in the region about the Jordan, on the side that belongs to the people of Israel.” 12 And when the people of Israel heard of it, the whole assembly of the people of Israel gathered at Shiloh to make war against them.
So, the 2 and a half tribes head back home, back out east, they get to the Jordan river, which is the boarder of their land, and they decide to build an altar. It doesn’t yet say why, but they decide to build themselves an altar of their own.
And when the rest of the people of Israel heard of it, they were upset. Ready to go to war, ready to kill their brothers and sisters over this blatant act of rebellion. “They hadn’t even made it back across the Jordan, and they were already being unfaithful, they must die.”
So the rest of the tribes send out Phineas, who, if you know your biblical history, Phineas has no lack of zeal. He had already killed an adulterous Israelite brother and his Moabite lover with a spear in Numbers 25. And he’s the leader of this war party.
Phineas and 10 of the tribal chiefs. And they went down to see this altar. And they talk to the leaders of Ruben and Gad and Eastern Manasseh. They say, what are you doing? You’ve already abandoned God? Don’t your remember the judgment of Achan? Don’t you remember the valley of Peor when that great apostacy happened and the terrible judgment came?
You’re going to defile yourself and the entire land. Don’t do this.
Pick up in verse 21:
21 Then the people of Reuben, the people of Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh said in answer to the heads of the families of Israel, 22 “The Mighty One, God, the Lord! The Mighty One, God, the Lord! He knows; and let Israel itself know! If it was in rebellion or in breach of faith against the Lord, do not spare us today 23 for building an altar to turn away from following the Lord. Or if we did so to offer burnt offerings or grain offerings or peace offerings on it, may the Lord himself take vengeance.
24 No, but we did it from fear that in time to come your children might say to our children, ‘What have you to do with the Lord, the God of Israel? 25 For the Lord has made the Jordan a boundary between us and you, you people of Reuben and people of Gad. You have no portion in the Lord.’ So your children might make our children cease to worship the Lord.
26 Therefore we said, ‘Let us now build an altar, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice, 27 but to be a witness between us and you, and between our generations after us, that we do perform the service of the Lord in his presence with our burnt offerings and sacrifices and peace offerings, so your children will not say to our children in time to come, “You have no portion in the Lord.”’
28 And we thought, ‘If this should be said to us or to our descendants in time to come, we should say, “Behold, the copy of the altar of the Lord, which our fathers made, not for burnt offerings, nor for sacrifice, but to be a witness between us and you.”’ 29 Far be it from us that we should rebel against the Lord and turn away this day from following the Lord by building an altar for burnt offering, grain offering, or sacrifice, other than the altar of the Lord our God that stands before his tabernacle!”
Here we can see our lesson on Perspective. And it is actually a two-fold lesson.
The first is the perspective of the Rest of the tribes. They heard that an altar was being built by the eastern tribes, and they immediately assumed the worst. They assumed that Ruben, Gad, and Eastern Manasseh had already apostatized.
They did not believe the best of their brothers. They let their knee-jerk reaction fire them up and ready them for war. They were ready to kill someone in their zeal. They let their zeal boil over into rash judgment.
Have you ever done that? Jumped to conclusions? or assumed the worst of someone simply by a single report?
That’s not consistent with love. Love is patient and kind. It believes all things, 1 Corinthians 13 says. It assumes, in the absence of evidence, that the there must be a reasonable explanation of our brother or sisters behavior. I may not know what it is, but they certainly must have a reasonable explanation for their actions. That’s what love does.
But we also have another reminder here in the example of the eastern tribes. The leaders of Ruben and Gad and Eastern Manasseh should have anticipated how their actions might have been perceived.
The Lord has given explicit instructions that there is to be one central place of worship. One altar. They didn’t have permission to make an alternative place of worship. And so to build an altar would certainly have been perceived by others as sinful disregard for the Lord’s revealed pattern of worship.
We need to be aware that our public actions, while not necessarily sinful, might be perceived as such. And we should give thought to what our behavior might look like to others. It doesn’t mean that we are handcuffed by the perceptions of others, but it does remind us that Love is considerate, as 1 Corinthians 13 also teaches us.
Love is careful to consider the effect our actions might have on others. It is unloving to have no second thought to how our behavior might land on someone else nearby.
So, consider these two lessons on perspective from chapter 22: love believes the best and doesn’t jump to conclusions, but it also is considerate of how actions might impact others.
[1] Point slightly adapted from: Philip Graham Ryken and R. Kent Hughes, Exodus: Saved for God’s Glory (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2005), 180–191.
[2] Dale Ralph Davis, Joshua, No Fallen Words, page #___.
