Setting up a sentry

[JohnC2]

I read through Numbers 9 and was struck very strongly by 1 particular thing:

Numbers 9:19 and 9:23.
They set up a sentry to keep watch over the Kavod - the pillar of smoke/fire of The Lord.......

And whenever The Lord moved The Glory - Israel packed up camp and left with Him.... Day or night - they maintained a readiness to leave immediately whenever The Glory left....

Jesus challenges us to do this... To be watchful. To set up a sentry.... For what? John 3:8. The Spirit goes where he wishes..... it’s our job to discern and follow...

Now think about what was going on in Acts 2:1-4... The Glory of The Lord descending on those men... Time for Israel to pack up and follow.... but nobody but a few thousand visitors even notices.... Even worse in Luke 2 - The Glory of The Lord descends and nobody even notices except a few night shift shepherds. They had stopped keeping watch....

And what about us? Are we discerning when God’s Glory leaves a place and moves some place else (like Ezekiel 10-11)? Do we hang around for another 20 years hoping for a revival when God’s Glory is long gone.... Leviticus 25:23 - we are wanderers with Him...

 

[JohnC2]

The second part I was thinking about that ties into this is..... Community and Communication....

When Israel set up a sentry to watch The Glory of The Lord - it wasn’t one guy.. The typical strategy is to assign duty for a shift..... The duty rotates.. Then - you pass it along to the next assigned person.... It wasn’t expected that the entire 2-3 million people in The Camp would maintain perpetual watchfulness day and night. What was expected is that they would maintain a state of readiness to RESPOND when the sentry sounds the alarm. That meant they knew what to do when the time came - they had practiced their procedures for what to do including breaking down the camp and moving out on short notice..

This brings us back to the the whole Community aspect... One of the important aspects of community is that the “Community” can be alert without each individual driving himself to distraction worrying about what happens if I pass out from sleep deprivation or miss something when I am in the bathroom. . That’s the part that requires communication to ensure the “Signal” can overcome the noise of the world... And it requires trust that the source is telling the truth....

I feel like this is very important to us... I am not so confident that we are paying attention... I am not confident that we know what to pay attention for.... I am not confident that we properly understand the action expected or that anybody would even agree that action is needed....

Remember - Jesus calls us to be watchful and ready...

 

[chunkofcoal]

Interesting thoughts.
You mentioned Luke 2, but Moses was also keeping a flock when he saw the flame of fire in the bush. Moses noticed and went to take a look. So the message would be that the shepherds are supposed to be keeping watch?
Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.
(Exo 3:1-4)

 

[Hoshiyya]

And what about us? Are we discerning when God’s Glory leaves a place and moves some place else (like Ezekiel 10-11)? Do we hang around for another 20 years hoping for a revival when God’s Glory is long gone.... Leviticus 25:23 - we are wanderers with Him...

Yeah if you choose where to live based on "where God is", that is you know a big problem. You either would have to live everywhere at once, or you'd have to live in the spiritual world we call heaven.

 

[JohnC2]

Not so much.... That’s part of what happened at Pentecost.... God putting His Glory upon multiple people.... Ezekiel 11:16. I will be as a little Holy place to them in all the countries I have scattered them into.... So God authorizes multiple communities of faith...

What I do see as a follow on that worries me is Numbers 10. God commanded them to set up an orderly process within their community that included a set of clear, defined, understood, and practiced alarms.... Included in this was a specific notification that God was on the move and their action was required.

Yet what are we doing now? Noise noise noise or nothing nothing nothing. There is no organized, clear, understood plan.... If we figure out that God is up to something important that needs the attention of the community - this is how we will send the notification out so it will be unambiguous...

 

[chunkofcoal]

Are you feeling there is going to be a movement?

Judah moves first, so you might be watching the wrong community.

 

[JohnC2]

I think it has already started....

For example - the most powerful message I have heard about Hearing God, loving God, and answering his call - The Shema - was in a liberal Reform Jewish synagogue preached by a female rabbi... Not in a Christian Church..

That’s when God opened up The Shema to me.....