"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
What was said in the previous Note about unbelievers, is also true of believers who be- come beguiled from the simplicity that is in Christ by some forbidden, unhallowed thing, which has become so much part of their lives that the very thought of having to lose it is un- bearable. And by clinging desperately to it, they are frustrating the wonderful purpose of God for their lives He has something far grander and more glorious lined up for them and, poor, silly souls, they are blind to the very possibility, and can only think of the pain they would experience if they were really to put their lives right with God. There is also, however, a more general application of this passage, which also has a message for us. There is far, far more for us in the gift of Christ than ever we have yet appropriated or made our own. We are too easily satisfied. The biblical testimony is that God has made us kings and priests unto Him (Revelation 1:5). Do we live like sons and daughters of a King?' Do we have a royal mien? Have we made the resources of His royal treasure-house our own? Ah, we have not stretched God by our demands on Him. We are not straitened in Him: He is straitened in us. The challenge in these verses is well expressed in the words of the well-known hymn:
Take, my soul, thy full salvation; Rise o'er sin and fear and care: Joy, to find in every station Something still to do or bear. Think what Spirit dwells within thee, What a Father's smile is thine, What thy Saviour died to win thee: Child of heaven, shouldst thou repine?