With all the talk about the economy in recent days, many people’s minds are firmly on what they may or may not have in the future. Dwindling retirement accounts and diminishing potential inheritance bequests have stimulated no small amount of angst among many in our culture.
Which makes you wonder what the Levites thought when they kept hearing what Moses said —
- Num. 18:20 Then the LORD said to Aaron, “You shall have no inheritance in their land nor own any portion among them…
- Num. 18:23 “Only the Levites shall perform the service of the tent of meeting, and they shall bear their iniquity; it shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations, and among the sons of Israel they shall have no inheritance.
- Num. 18:24 “For the tithe of the sons of Israel, which they offer as an offering to the LORD, I have given to the Levites for an inheritance; therefore I have said concerning them, ‘They shall have no inheritance among the sons of Israel.’”
- Num. 26:62 Those who were numbered of them [the Levites] were 23,000, every male from a month old and upward, for they were not numbered among the sons of Israel since no inheritance was given to them among the sons of Israel.
Add to that the instruction in Numbers 34-35 about how the land would be divided when it was conquered and the fact that the Levites were given a few cities among each of the other tribes, while all the other tribes received large land areas, and they had to wonder something like “what about us???”
Maybe some of them thought, “Maybe God will relent when we get there — maybe we’ll get some land after all.” It was not so. Joshua notes, “But to the tribe of Levi, Moses did not give an inheritance…” (13:33).
Four hundred years of oppression in Egypt, forty years of wandering and death in the wilderness waiting for an entire disobedient generation to die, months of fighting to conquer the land of Canaan, and the Levites were left with — nothing.
Or were they? It may seem that way in the 20th century. It probably did not to the Israelites in 1400 B. C. You see, they did not receive land as an inheritance; they received something better:
- Num. 18:20 Then the LORD said to Aaron, “You shall have no inheritance in their land nor own any portion among them; I am your portion and your inheritance among the sons of Israel.”
- Josh. 13:33 But to the tribe of Levi, Moses did not give an inheritance; the LORD, the God of Israel, is their inheritance, as He had promised to them.
They may have received no land, but that was of no concern — ownership of acreage tends to fluctuate over time. The one estate that can be left to a man and never removed is a relationship with God.
With the simple words, “the Lord, the God of Israel, is their inheritance” the Levites were made wealthiest among all the tribes. As Tozer has said, “The man who has God for his treasure has all things in One. . . . Whatever he may lose he has actually lost nothing for he now has it all in One, and he has it purely, legitimately and forever.”
The inheritance for the believer in Jesus Christ is similar. He has what may never be taken away. He has forgiveness. And the Holy Spirit. And eternal redemption. And reconciliation to God. And every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies. And access to the throne of God. And he is called the son of God. His earthly possessions may be few, but his eternal inheritance is great.
So in a time when many are bemoaning the loss (or potential loss) of physical possessions and financial stability, the believer — whether he has many possessions or few — has a wondrous opportunity to exclaim that in Christ, He has all he needs. Christ is joy to his own heart, and the circumstance is an opportunity for the gospel.
Words of Grace 