"The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Command the people of Israel, and say to them, When you enter the land of Canaan (this is the land that shall fall to you for an inheritance, the land of Canaan as defined by its borders), 3 your south side shall be from the wilderness of Zin alongside Edom, and your southern border shall run from the end of the Salt Sea on the east. 4 And your border shall turn south of the ascent of Akrabbim, and cross to Zin, and its limit shall be south of Kadesh-barnea. Then it shall go on to Hazar-addar, and pass along to Azmon. 5 And the border shall turn from Azmon to the Brook of Egypt, and its limit shall be at the sea.
6 “For the western border, you shall have the Great Sea and its coast. This shall be your western border.
7 “This shall be your northern border: from the Great Sea you shall draw a line to Mount Hor. 8 From Mount Hor you shall draw a line to Lebo-hamath, and the limit of the border shall be at Zedad. 9 Then the border shall extend to Ziphron, and its limit shall be at Hazar-enan. This shall be your northern border.
10 “You shall draw a line for your eastern border from Hazar-enan to Shepham. 11 And the border shall go down from Shepham to Riblah on the east side of Ain. And the border shall go down and reach to the shoulder of the Sea of Chinnereth on the east. 12 And the border shall go down to the Jordan, and its limit shall be at the Salt Sea. This shall be your land as defined by its borders all around.”
13 Moses commanded the people of Israel, saying, “This is the land that you shall inherit by lot, which the Lord has commanded to give to the nine tribes and to the half-tribe. 14 For the tribe of the people of Reuben by fathers' houses and the tribe of the people of Gad by their fathers' houses have received their inheritance, and also the half-tribe of Manasseh. 15 The two tribes and the half-tribe have received their inheritance beyond the Jordan east of Jericho, toward the sunrise."
Numbers 34:1-15
We come now to the second command given by God to Israel, to take possession of all He had given them in His promise. The tragedy is that by their failure to cast out and destroy the enemies He commanded them to destroy (33:51ff), Israel failed to make her own all that God had in store for them. It is a simple fact that Israel never entered into their full inheritance, because of their refusal to be thorough enough in dealing with their enemies, and be- cause they were content with small things (like Reuben, Gad and Manasseh. see chapter 32). They could have been a much greater nation than ever they were, with their borders extend- ing far beyond the furthest they ever did extend, if only they had risen to the challenge of God (cf Genesis 15:18, 'from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates'). The spiritual application of this is very plain, in both general and specific ways. In the specific application what must be said is this. When we allow things that are enemies of our souls to remain unmolested in our lives and hearts, make pacts with them, indulge them, they not only become 'pricks in our eyes and thorns in our sides', but much worse - they prevent us from possessing the true riches that God wills us to have. They prevent us from being what we could be, and what we were destined to be, for God. This is as true for unbelievers as for believers. Many a man has been beguiled by some worldly consideration that has become too dear for him to consider parting from without the greatest pain. He clings to it, thinking the loss of it would make life meaningless and dull, whereas by clinging to it he is preventing himself from entering the real riches of life. And he cannot see it. He is content with tawdry tinsel, when God is holding out pure gold to him. And as Jesus Himself said 'What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?'