Day 603: New direction - Deuteronomy 33 vs 8 - 11

8 And of Levi, Moses said, “Give to Levi your Thummim, and your Urim to your godly one whom you tested at Massah, with whom you quarrelled at the waters of Meribah; 9 who said of his father and mother, ‘I regard them not’; he disowned his brothers and ignored his children. For they observed your word and kept your covenant. 10 They shall teach Jacob your rules  and Israel your law; they shall put incense before you and whole burnt offerings on your altar. 11 Bless, O Lord, his substance, and accept the work of his hands; crush the loins of his adversaries, of those who hate him, that they rise not again.” Deuteronomy 33:8-12 (English Standard Version)

The tribe called Levi descended from the third son born to Jacob 500 years earlier. During that time Levi's sister, Dinah, was raped by a man from the city near where Jacob and his sons were camped. Levi and his older brother Simeon devised a plan in which they attacked and killed a large number of the men of that city. So near the end of his life Jacob said of them: “Simeon and Levi are brothers; weapons of violence are their swords. Let my soul come not into their council . . . be not joined to their company, for in their anger they killed men . . . I will scatter them in Israel.” (Genesis 49:5-7) Does this makes the blessing Moses gives to the tribe in vs 8 and vs 10 surprising?

The Levites were going to be given the role of spiritual care for the nation. The High Priest would be from that tribe and many of them would serve in the place where sacrifices for sin would be offered up. We don't know exactly what the Thummin and Urim were, but we know the High Priest used them in seeking God's will in important decisions for the people. More importantly, they would not be given a region of their own but would be scattered among the other tribes to be teachers of God's wonderful law.

So how is it that God was giving such honour to a tribe whose forefather was criticized for being violent and angry? And not only that. Moses and Aaron were from this tribe and they had failed the test God gave them at a place called Masseh. Instead of speaking to a rock to cause water to flow out of it as the Lord told them to do, Moses, in a temper, had struck the rock.

I think it had to do with what happened very early in the journey out of Egypt? When Moses went up Mount Sinai to receive God's commandments for Israel he was missing for forty days. They thought he wasn't coming back so they demanded that Aaron make them a golden idol to be their god. Aaron gave in and did so. When Moses got back he was very angry, and we read: “Moses saw that Aaron had let the people get completely out of control . . . so he stood at the entrance to the camp and shouted, 'All of you who are on the Lord’s side, come here and join me.' And all the Levites gathered around him. Moses told them, 'This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Each of you, take your swords and go back and forth from one end of the camp to the other. Kill everyone - even your brothers, friends, and neighbours.' The Levites obeyed Moses’ command, and about 3,000 people died that day. Then Moses told the Levites, 'Today you have ordained yourselves for the service of the Lord, for you obeyed him even though it meant killing your own sons and brothers. Today you have earned a blessing.'” (Exodus 32:25-29)

Their zeal for God resulted in the tribe being set apart to serve in the manner Moses blessed them with before he died. And in vs 11 we see how he prayed that God would accept the work of their hands. The thought struck me as I read these things of how God is able to take a flaw in a person's life and put it to a better end. He did that with the apostle Paul. He'd been a man who was so zealous for his faith that he was willing to hound Christians to death. Yet when God touched his life, his zeal was turned to serving the Lord Jesus Christ and his fellow Christians. An old hymn by James Orr puts this well when it says: “I praise you, Lord, for cleansing me from sin. Fulfil your word, and make me pure within. Fill me with fire, where once I burned with shame - grant my desire to magnify your name.” God directs our passions in new ways.