Big Idea: Fellowship with God and defiant sinning are incompatible.
Understanding the Text
Numbers goes from a narrative about scouts (Num. 13–14) to a seemingly unrelated chapter of laws concerning sacrifices, unintentional sins, Sabbath breaking, and tassels. Why this material is placed here rather than with similar material in Leviticus has mystified interpreters.
Numbers 15 does contribute one thing to the previous story. In Numbers 14 Israel is told that the adults will not enter the land (Num. 14:20–38), but Numbers 15 gives laws for “after/when you enter the land” (Num. 15:2, 18). These laws thus reassure Israelites who in the previous narrative have just been condemned not to enter the land that at least their children will enter.
Historical and Cultural Background
Observant J…