When you have an important choice to make, what do you do?  Some people give in to their impulses, and often live to regret rash decisions.  Others try to think things through, analyzing a situation from every angle.  Some are guided by the past, drawing on their personal experience or relying on the traditions that have been handed down to them.

None of these sources of truth would have led the people of God to do what they did in today’s passage.  Remember, Moses had promised them that the Lord would lead them out of slavery in Egypt into a rich and fertile land, (Exodus 3:8), the land where their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had lived (Exodus 6:8).  And Moses had brought them out of Egypt, all the way to Mt. Sinai, a journey which took them about three months (Exodus 19:1).

But they didn’t leave Mt. Sinai for almost a year (Numbers 10:11).  For almost a year, they waited while Moses got lots of detailed instructions from God, and while skilled craftsmen made the Tabernacle of God, and while the priests (Leviticus 8) and the Levites (Numbers 8) were consecrated for their duties.  It was only then that they set out for the Promised Land.

But neither passion nor reason, experience nor tradition could explain such a long wait.  Why couldn’t they have gone ahead into the Promised Land before making all these purely religious preparations?  Why couldn’t they have performed some of these rituals along the way?  Didn’t it make more sense to take care of the practical stuff first?

Maybe so.  And maybe it makes sense to us to put God and His priorities on the back burner of our lives at times.  But at least in this passage, the people allowed God to guide their steps and to manage their schedule.  They stayed in their camp as long as the pillar of cloud and fire rested over the Tabernacle of God.  And they set out whenever it moved on.  And they went wherever it led them, even though they had no idea where they were going or how long it would take them to get there.

So, how about us?  Will we keep on relying on our own feelings, on what makes sense to us?  Or will we trust in the Lord, obeying His Word and walking in His ways, whatever may come our way today?

Numbers 9:15-23 (ESV)

¹⁵ On the day that the tabernacle was set up, the cloud covered the tabernacle, the tent of the testimony. And at evening it was over the tabernacle like the appearance of fire until morning. ¹⁶ So it was always: the cloud covered it by day and the appearance of fire by night. ¹⁷ And whenever the cloud lifted from over the tent, after that the people of Israel set out, and in the place where the cloud settled down, there the people of Israel camped. ¹⁸ At the command of the LORD the people of Israel set out, and at the command of the LORD they camped. As long as the cloud rested over the tabernacle, they remained in camp. ¹⁹ Even when the cloud continued over the tabernacle many days, the people of Israel kept the charge of the LORD and did not set out. ²⁰ Sometimes the cloud was a few days over the tabernacle, and according to the command of the LORD they remained in camp; then according to the command of the LORD they set out. ²¹ And sometimes the cloud remained from evening until morning. And when the cloud lifted in the morning, they set out, or if it continued for a day and a night, when the cloud lifted they set out. ²² Whether it was two days, or a month, or a longer time, that the cloud continued over the tabernacle, abiding there, the people of Israel remained in camp and did not set out, but when it lifted they set out. ²³ At the command of the LORD they camped, and at the command of the LORD they set out. They kept the charge of the LORD, at the command of the LORD by Moses.