This week’s Torah reading שְׁלַח Shelakh (“send,” Numbers 13–15) is a lesson in hope and human imagination. It is also a difficult lesson about how God often gives us a brief window of opportunity to take possession of what He wants for us. If we shirk away in unbelief (Heb. 10:26–31; Hab. 2:3–4), the opportunity and the blessing that goes with it are lost. God will give that blessing to someone who has the faith to receive them.
Numbers 12 shows us the consequences of Miriam and Aaron’s jealously of God’s special relationship with Moses. Since they could not openly complained about God’s special treatment of Moses, they struck out against Moses’s by attacking his Cushite wife. Numbers 13 shows us the story of the first spies who went out into the land of Israel to scout out the land. God told Moses to call out one leader from each tribe to be the spies of the land.
This section of Genesis introduces us to Abraham and his family. We start to see how God communicates His revelation through Abraham’s family (not just the men, but the women as well). We also rediscover how God calls, trains and corrects those He longs to call His sons and daughters.
This recap of Genesis 4–11 into what happened to mankind right after God had to throw Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and into the time of the flood and the post-flood period. We come to discover that unless we believe the Messiah’s own words that the book of Genesis is real history, we can lose our way. We also need to keep in mind what Messiah said about the book of Genesis (and the differences between people and angels) so we are not led astray by fanciful and even salacious interpretations of how mankind fell away so far that God had to destroy all of mankind (except for one righteous family). A Spirit-filled grounding in the Word of God will help us provide the right answers when those around us ask us about our confidence in God and His scriptures.