It’s pretty easy to wonder why in Numbers 4 we are reading this list of people and how each thing has to be covered in goatskin and in blue cloth. It’s repetitive. It doesn’t seem to matter. But here’s the thing: it was life or death.
From verse 15: They must not touch the holy things, lest they die.
We can see the life and death significance of following God in the Old Testament. We see the punishment of death. We see the destruction by enemies, by plagues, by wild beasts. It all comes from not following God’s laws. But today, we tend to forget the life-or-death urgency of God’s Word. God is good. God is love. So, we relax and don’t worry about getting the coverings right. We don’t worry about holy things.
Our perfection, our perfect righteousness comes from Christ. Death was always going to follow us around because we are human and therefore sinners. And the wages of sin is death. It’s what we deserve. It’s what we’ve earned.
Christ came to bring us life and life abundantly. That’s not a promise of riches. He is the way, the truth, and the life. He is the life. Abundant life is the abundance of Christ. Do you live in life? Do you live in abundant life? If sin is death, abundant life is a life of righteousness.
We are no longer slaves to sin. We are free to walk in righteousness, the righteousness God provides. Saying you are a slave to sin is unbelief, denying the cross of Christ and the Good News! You have been set free. Believe it and be set free.
The Spirit gives us abundant life. The Spirit gives us wisdom and understanding “so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” (Col. 1:10-14 NIV)
In Him we have abundant life.