Untitled - St.Francis Magazine

St Francis Magazine Vol 8, No 2 | April 2012 (chs 3:7-­‐4: 3 /11/13) pay very close attention to the precedents that were set by the children of Israel in their wilderness wanderings and apply them to the current situations of their respective congregations. In both cases they use an ‘a fortiori’ argument, or from less to greater. That is to say, if what happened to them is true, how much more will it be true for you. These will be examined later in greater detail. If one follows the “wandering people of God”—to borrow a term from Ernst Käsemann who suggested this was the controlling theme of the book of Hebrews as early as 1938—in the book of Numbers one observes two themes. One is movement: they... travelled to… stayed… left… encamped… arrived… stayed… traveled from…to go to…..moved on and camped…set out and camped…continued on….went from…..to… (cf. Nu. 33). Thus one can safely talk about a pilgrim movement. However, this movement is of a different genre because the sacred place—i.e. the place where God dwelled was not so much their destination, but part of the movement. This presence of YHWH is evident in the pillar of fire and cloud as well as the fact that He condescended to “dwell among” and “meet” his people in a portable structure—the tabernacle—among a people dwelling in tents. (Ex 25:8). Nehemiah recounts that YHWH had even given his “good Spirit to instruct them” (Neh 9:20 cf. Is Is. 63:10, 11, 14). Elsewhere in the Hebrew Testament we see evidences of this presence combined with the sojourning theme as for example in Lev 25:23 YHWH told the Israelites that they could not sell the land because “the land is mine, and you are strangers and sojourners with [literally ‘before’] me. The Psalmist picks up the same thought and writes “I am a stranger with Thee [O Lord], a sojourner like all my fathers,” (Ps 39:12) and David in I Chron 29:15 says, “We are sojourners before Thee [O Lord].” The prepositions are very telling: ‘with’/‘before’. That is to say, the liminal status of the 242