Tues.’s Devo - Cities of Refuge

Read: Num. 35-36
I find the cities of refuge so interesting. One day I was talking to God about what happened to the righteous people in the Old Testament who died. I asked God where they went. The next morning I woke up to a resounding “cities of refuge” in my head. I asked God what that was about since I hadn’t been studying about them or even thinking about them. He told me it was the answer to the question I had asked him the night before. I had to think to remember my question about where the righteous people in the OT went when they died. So I got up and started studying this passage.
These cities were set up for anyone, Israelite or not who killed a person on purpose or not. This person stands for anyone who has sinned which is all of us. The revenger of blood is the one who would want to get revenge on the sinner. That person stands for the law. If the person killed another man on accident then he would be the person who sins without knowing the law. That person is allowed to go to the city of refuge and plead his case with the judges at the gate. If they believe he is innocent then he is allowed to stay safely in the city. They were to stay in this city until the death of the High Priest. Some examples of these people are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph…who were all buried in the land that later became a city of refuge. When Jesus, our High Priest, died he went to these cities and set the occupants free and they ascended with him to heaven. Ephesians 4: 8-10 explains it. “Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)”
So there were cities under the earth in Sheol where they stayed until Jesus died. That is why Joseph and Moses were so adamant about where their bones were buried because that would be the place they rested.
In Numbers 36, the men of the tribe of Manasseh wanted to maintain the inheritance of their tribe. Since the daughters of Zelophehad got an inheritance, they wanted to make sure they didn’t marry out of their tribe and lose the land to another tribe. This was a legitimate concern so they decided that tribes must not intermarry and mix up the boundary lines.
Lord, thank you for your provision for those who died before Christ and thank you for our provision through Christ.