WHAT COULD ISRAEL HAVE BEEN
When God brought Israel out from the land of Egypt, He wanted them to be His special nation.
He wanted them to be a show case nation to all the other nations.
God had planned for them fabulous wealth, security, health, abundance in water and food, cattle and sheep with enormous growth, rain in due season. They would be in charge of the other nations.
Let’s look at some of the wonderful things God wanted to give to Israel.
Deu 28:1 “Now it shall come to pass, if you diligently obey the voice of the LORD your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the LORD your God will set you high above all nations of the earth.
Deu 28:2 And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the LORD your God:
Deu 28:3 “Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the country.
Deu 28:4 “Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, the produce of your ground and the increase of your herds, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flocks.
Deu 28:5 “Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
Deu 28:6 “Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
Deu 28:7 “The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before your face; they shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.
Deu 28:8 “The LORD will command the blessing on you in your storehouses and in all to which you set your hand, and He will bless you in the land which the LORD your God is giving you.
Deu 28:9 “The LORD will establish you as a holy people to Himself, just as He has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the LORD your God and walk in His ways.
Deu 28:10 Then all peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they shall be afraid of you.
Deu 28:11 And the LORD will grant you plenty of goods, in the fruit of your body, in the increase of your livestock, and in the produce of your ground, in the land of which the LORD swore to your fathers to give you.
Deu 28:12 The LORD will open to you His good treasure, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the work of your hand. You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.
Deu 28:13 And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be above only, and not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, and are careful to observe them.
Deu 28:14 So you shall not turn aside from any of the words which I command you this day, to the right or the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
Notice particularly what God called Israel. A peculiar treasure, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
Exo 19:1 In the third month after the children of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on the same day, they came to the Wilderness of Sinai.
Exo 19:2 For they had departed from Rephidim, had come to the Wilderness of Sinai, and camped in the wilderness. So Israel camped there before the mountain.
Exo 19:3 And Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him from the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel:
Exo 19:4 ‘You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Myself.
Exo 19:5 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine.
Exo 19:6 And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.”
Let’s look at the things God was going to give Israel if they obeyed Him.
God would set them high above all the nations on earth. That means Israel would have ruled over the other nations.
They would be blessed in the city and blessed in the field. That means that the city workers would have had great success and the farm people would have bumper crops.
Their children would have been blessed, no disease, no miscarriage, no deformities, no illness, just happy healthy children in mind and body. Happy loving families.
The increase of produce and livestock would have been blessed, no disease or pests, no disasters like crops and livestock wiped out by flood fire or famine. The crops would be bumper with fabulous food, no imperfections, no insects attacking the produce, the livestock, would be strong and healthy and produce offspring in due season.
The harvest would be blessed, and the food kept in storage would remain in good order ready to eat, not like today as it gets old dusty and infected with mildew.
When enemies rise up against Israel the enemies would be afraid and run off in different directions.
Whatever the Israelites put their hands to do God would have blessed it.
God wanted to make the Israelites a holy nation to Himself.
God would send the rain in due season, and the land would prosper, lending to the other nations, but would not need to borrow at all.
Israel was to be the head and not the tail, always the nation above all the other nations in every way.
Israel would have been given all they needed, there would be no need for any worries, all their needs would have been provided.
All the Israelites had to do was obey God. But they would not do it.
Deu 11:13 ‘And it shall be that if you earnestly obey My commandments which I command you today, to love the LORD your God and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul,
Deu 11:22 “For if you carefully keep all these commandments which I command you to do to love the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways, and to hold fast to Him
Let’s notice how the Israelites did not obey.
This is before they left Egypt they stated plainly they wanted to remain in Egypt.
Exo 14:12 Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, ‘Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.”
Only three days after crossing the Red Sea and the fantastic miracle which God performed, the opening of the Red Sea, the Israelites were offered eternal life by God the Father. But they rejected God the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Exo 15:24 And the people complained against Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?”
Exo 15:25 So he cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a tree. When he cast it into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There He made a statute and an ordinance for them, and there He tested them,
Exo 15:26 and said, “If you diligently heed the voice of the LORD your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the LORD who heals you.”
Jer 2:12 Be astonished, O heavens, at this, And be horribly afraid; Be very desolate,” says the LORD.
Jer 2:13 “For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, And hewn themselves cisterns broken cisterns that can hold no water.
Four weeks after leaving Egypt the Israelites complained about food.
Exo 16:3 And the children of Israel said to them, “Oh, that we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat and when we ate bread to the full! For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.”
Then they complained about water.
Exo 17:3 And the people thirsted there for water, and the people complained against Moses, and said, “Why is it you have brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”
They also doubted if God was with them or not.
Exo 17:7 So he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the contention of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Then they wanted meat.
Num 11:18 Then you shall say to the people, ‘Consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, and you shall eat meat; for you have wept in the hearing of the LORD, saying, “Who will give us meat to eat? For it was well with us in Egypt.” Therefore the LORD will give you meat, and you shall eat.
They also thought God could not provide for them, they denied His powers.
Psa 78:17 But they sinned even more against Him By rebelling against the Most High in the wilderness.
Psa 78:18 And they tested God in their heart By asking for the food of their fancy.
Psa 78:19 Yes, they spoke against God: They said, “Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?
Psa 78:20 Behold, He struck the rock, So that the waters gushed out, And the streams overflowed. Can He give bread also? Can He provide meat for His people?”
They did not believe in Him.
Psa 78:22 Because they did not believe in God, And did not trust in His salvation.
Then we see the golden calf incident, notice that they denied God had brought them out of Egypt, giving the credit to idols, and false gods.
Exo 32:4 And he received the gold from their hand, and he fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made a molded calf. Then they said, “This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!”
Exo 32:5 So when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow is a feast to the LORD.”
They wanted to return to Egypt.
Num 14:3 Why has the LORD brought us to this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and children should become victims? Would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?”
Num 14:4 So they said to one another, “Let us select a leader and return to Egypt.”
God wanted 12 men, leaders of the tribes of Israel to spy out the beautiful Promised Land, but 10 of the spies brought back an evil report of the Promised Land.
Num 13:32 And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature.
Only Joshua and Caleb thought the Promised Land was fabulous, they could see what a wonderful place it was, they saw God in the picture and knew they could easily possess this great land because God wanted them to go in and make it their home.
Num 14:6 But Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes;
Num 14:7 and they spoke to all the congregation of the children of Israel, saying: “The land we passed through to spy out is an exceedingly good land.
Num 14:8 If the LORD delights in us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us, ‘a land which flows with milk and honey.’
Num 14:9 Only do not rebel against the LORD, nor fear the people of the land, for they are our bread; their protection has departed from them, and the LORD is with us. Do not fear them.”
Then there was the rebellion of Korah, notice he had a number of 250 men all leaders in Israel.
Num 16:1 Now Korah the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, with Dathan and Abiram the sons of Eliab, and On the son of Peleth, sons of Reuben, took men;
Num 16:2 and they rose up before Moses with some of the children of Israel, two hundred and fifty leaders of the congregation, representatives of the congregation, men of renown.
Notice what the leaders said, they said why should Moses be in charge over them.
What they did not realise was that God decides who will lead His people, not man. Moses was the chosen leader not those people.
Num 16:3 They gathered together against Moses and Aaron, and said to them, “You take too much upon yourselves, for all the congregation is holy, every one of them, and the LORD is among them. Why then do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the LORD?”
God showed the Israelites that He wanted Moses in charge by destroying Korah and his rebellious group.
Num 16:31 Now it came to pass, as he finished speaking all these words, that the ground split apart under them,
Num 16:32 and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up, with their households and all the men with Korah, with all their goods.
God wanted Israel to be a showcase nation, one that obeyed Him, loved Him, believed Him. The Israelites just could not do it. They had seen the fabulous miracles of leaving Egypt the place of slavery, they had seen the Red Sea part, and many other miracles.
The Israelites just could not be the showcase nation God intended them to be without the Holy Spirit in them, guiding, leading and helping them to become what God wanted of them.
They rejected God and the Holy Spirit just days after crossing the Red Sea.
It seems impossible to believe that a nation could witness such miracles and still doubt that God was worthy of worship.
Israel could have been a healthy, wealthy, happy, prosperous, giving nation, a show piece to all other nations on the face of the earth, a special treasure loved by the Holy one of Israel. A kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
Israel would have taught the entire world how to live, how to worship God, how to truly find peace and happiness, the way to prosperity, they would have shown the way of give, and love to mankind.
Exo 19:5 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine.
Exo 19:6 And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.”
Unfortunately, Israel has not lived up to the expectations of the Holy one of Israel, and instead of being a showcase to the world we see that they have rejected God, His laws, His statutes and judgements, the nation is full of hate, strife, cruelty, want, disease, poverty and every kind of evil, wickedness, and total rebellion against everything that is good.
We all have a choice in this life, God wants us to choose life that we may live, so let’s heed the mistakes that the chosen nation of Israel has made. Let’s make sure we follow God, love Him, obey Him, believe Him and fear Him.
The result will be the exact opposite of what happened to the nation of Israel.