February 4

Read Numbers 3, 7, 8.

Dealing with discrepancies in the Bible, here is one that we need to handle.

Numbers 4:3 Count all the men from thirty to fifty years of age who come to serve in the work in the Tent of Meeting. (Feb 6th reading)

Numbers 8:24 "This applies to the Levites: Men twenty-five years old or more shall come to take part in the work at the Tent of Meeting.

As we read through the Bible we will run into confusing issues like the age of those going into the priesthood. What is the age? Is it 25 or 30? These verses are only 4 chapters away from each other, either someone has made a tremendous mistake or there is another explanation. For those who are skeptics, they quickly point out the difference and say the Bible cannot be trusted. But I think there is a good explanation of the age difference. In the Jamison commentary he suggests: “They entered their work in the 25th year as pupils and probationers, under the superintendence and direction of their senior brethren; and at 30 they were admitted to the full discharge of their official functions.”
In other words this was a 5 year apprenticeship that preceded the actual service of the Levites. Is that too great leap of faith? I don’t think so.
If the skeptics are right and this is just a man-made book, even an elementary school child would have been able to point out the error in the text and correct it.
What is going on here is reading the Bible with a concrete literalness looking for things to be wrong and others reading it looking for reasonable explanations.

Another example ... Numbers 8:25 says that at the age of 50 the Levites must retire. That would mean I would be out of work today and I would be spending my days chasing a little white golf ball around a golf course. But the very next verse says “They may assist their brothers in performing their duties at the Tent of Meeting, but they themselves must not do the work. This, then, is how you are to assign the responsibilities of the Levites."
Just as there might be other duties after the age of 50, so there might be duties under the age of 30. The point for us is to read the scriptures to get the full picture – looking first for the obvious, then looking again for the not so obvious.

Isn’t this a lot of fun!!! Keep on track for the next 28 days. Do not even think of quitting the race now!!!

I would like to thank Steve, Galya and Apryl for their weekly insights. They are doing an awesome job.