What's Going On In Your Church?

Numbers 2:1-9 Organization for Israel’s Camp

1 Then the LORD gave these instructions to Moses and Aaron: 2 “When the Israelites set up camp, each tribe will be assigned its own area. The tribal divisions will camp beneath their family banners on all four sides of the Tabernacle, but at some distance from it.

3-4 “The divisions of Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun are to camp toward the sunrise on the east side of the Tabernacle, beneath their family banners. These are the names of the tribes, their leaders, and the numbers of their registered troops:

Tribe Leader Number

Judah Nahshon son of Amminadab 74,600

5-6 Issachar

Nethanel son of Zuar 54,400

7-8 Zebulun

Eliab son of Helon 57,400

9 So the total of all the troops on Judah’s side of the camp is 186,400. These three tribes are to lead the way whenever the Israelites travel to a new campsite.

What’s going on in your church? –

Great thing about the Old Testament – it gives a history on the creation of the framework for our Christian faith – Here in the book of Numbers, the writer Moses gives a break down on how these tribes of people are to move forward in the dessert. A quick background, the nation of Israel had been slaves to the Egyptians and God broke them out of that situation – if you ever saw the movie the Prince of Egypt, you will remember that story – God had to unleash 10 plagues on Pharaoh before he would let God’s people go – and once they got their freedom they wandered the dessert for 40 years before they came to the place that God promised them. The sad thing is that the entire journey should have only taken 11 days but because the people we disobedient it took much longer than that – and isn’t that how we are sometimes – God is trying to do something for us, but because we refuse to believe it to be so, it takes longer to get to the promise….

Well. While this group of people was wandering around the dessert, God showed their leader Moses how move this group of people forward with purpose and direction. God showed him how to create a portable church so when they found a place to stay for a bit they could have church services. Each group of people or tribe was responsible for something in the movement of this tribe of people and for the placement of the things in the church.

In their journey the Lord have Moses instructions to set up the movement of the people in a specific manner – we read in this Second chapter of the book of Numbers that each tribe will be assigned its own areas- and that the first division would include Judah, Issachar and Zebulon – they are to camp toward sunrise on the east side of the Tabernacle and when it was time to move they would break camp first or they would be the first to move out.

Every time I read this chapter in the bible, I am reminded of what God is trying to show us in the church – although we no longer have to have a portable tabernacle we have lovely buildings to meet and fellowship in – but the church should still be on the move because there are things to get done = so I ask you what’s going on in your church?

All too often we find ourselves complaining about the bad things or the things someone else is doing, but the real question is what’s going on in your church?

Here we see God tells Moses when movement in the church is to happen it must start out with the Praise and worship section of the church – holla! Here in Numbers God says the tribes of Judah, Issachar and Zebulun must set themselves towards the sunrise and when it’s time to move, they must move first –

Of course we all know that Judah means praise – That was the name given to the third son of Jacob and Leah, their fourth son’s name was Issachar, which meaning reward or wages and their fifth son’s name was Zebulun which means dwelling --- at this point in the book of Numbers these are not just the names of men but the name of tribes/groups of people and it was their job to make sure the church was moving in the right direction

Judah meaning praise – Issachar meaning reward and Zebulun meaning dwelling – shows me there is a perfect relationship between praise and worship and the movement of the church. We praise God for who He is and as we praise Him He rewards us with His presence by dwelling or living in our praises and that causes us to praise Him even them the more – moving us up higher in the Lord – the more we praise Him the more we love to praise Him --- when there is a fresh movement in the church it is generally started by those who have committed themselves to living in the tribe of Judah – who have decided that is better to praise rather than to criticize – that it the rewards of the blessing the Lord is much greater than breaking someone down that there is no better place to be than in the presence of the Lord – for in His presence there is fullness of joy and pleasures for ever more