Scripture Daily

Context No. 3664 of 4322 · Numbers

Context · Reflection

Numbers 21:31-35: in context

31Thus Israel lived in the land of the Amorites. 32Moses sent to spy out Jazer. They took its villages, and drove out the Amorites who were there. 33They turned and went up by the way of Bashan. Og the king of Bashan went out against them, he and all his people, to battle at Edrei. 34The LORD said to Moses, “Don’t fear him, for I have delivered him into your hand, with all his people, and his land. You shall do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.” 35So they struck him, with his sons and all his people, until there were no survivors; and they possessed his land.

As Israel advances, Og the king of Bashan comes out against them with all his people. It is a fearful confrontation, but God speaks the word that steadies them: do not fear him, for I have given him into your hand, with all his people and his land. And so Israel prevails.

What is worth drawing out here, apart from the hard realities of ancient conquest, is the recurring word of God: do not fear. Again and again, when Israel faced a fearsome enemy, God's first word was do not fear, grounded in the promise that he had already given the victory. The battle was won in God's word before it was ever fought on the ground. This is the pattern of faith facing opposition. The enemy may be formidable, but God's do not fear, I have given him into your hand, is the ground of courage. We go into our own confrontations not on the strength of our own reckoning of the odds, but on the strength of God's promise.

When I face something fearsome, do I hear God's "do not fear, I have given it into your hand," and go forward on the strength of his promise rather than my own assessment of the odds?

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