Day 36: October 15, 2025: Numbers 20-23 and I Corinthians 5-6

It has been a few days since I last blogged on this site. Without a doubt the death of my mother has hit me pretty hard, but like all things, we persevere and do not despair. Both of those things seem to be the case in my own situation. We begin Numbers with the death of Miriam, Moses’ sister. It is very matter of fact and not a whole lot of words goes into her death. We then move to the death of Aaron which has a whole sequence of events and the mourning of the community for 30 days. Seems a bit unfair that both of them die but only one of them is mentioned as affecting the community in the way that is significant.

We also see the banning of Moses from entering the promised land. Again, previously I had thought that this was where God had banned all of Israel, but that happened earlier. Here God only bans Moses, and Aaron and Miriam don’t enter because they die. So now we see the people of Israel wander with snakes to contend with and with other nations to contend with. God remains by their side and protects them even as they go from one place to the other for no particular reason. They are not in the promised land, just wasting time in the waste land.

Paul underscores two topics in these two chapters and we’ll address them backwards. In 6 he addresses sexual immorality and describes it as being more than just superficial, on the outside. He states that sexual immorality affects the heart and the spirit of the individual involved and so is more pernicious than other sins in which we may find ourselves. This is a strong warning to all. In chapter 5 he speaks of casting out the one who continue in his sin, which again, happens to be sexual sin. All of this is within the context of the Corinthian church which seemed to be rife with problems.