This Is Why Moses Not Allowed To Enter The Promised Land

This Is Why Moses Not Allowed To Enter The Promised Land

Moses is remembered as the exodus leader, the one through whom God delivered his people from Egyptian slavery. God entrusted the law to Moses. Moses demonstrated foreshadowed his own work as the Messiah. John 3:14-15 notes, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” Moses is mentioned as an example of faith in Hebrews 11. God himself buried Moses according to Deuteronomy 34. Deuteronomy 34 states that then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is across from Jericho, and the Lord showed him all the land of Gilead as far as Dan, all Naphtali and the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the western sea, the south, and the plain of the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees, as far as Zoar. Then the Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’ I have caused you to see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.

” So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord, and he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab opposite Beth Peor, but no one knows his grave to this day. Moses was 120 years old when he died; his eyes were not dim nor his natural vigor diminished, and the children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. So the days of weeping and mourning for Moses ended. Now Joshua the son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him; so the children of Israel heeded him and did as the Lord had commanded Moses. But since then there has not arisen in Israel a prophet like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face, in all the signs and wonders which the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, before Pharaoh, before all his servants, and in all his land, and by all that mighty power and all the great terror which Moses performed in the sight of all Israel. Since then no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face, for no one has ever shown the mighty power or performed the awesome deeds that Moses did in the sight of all Israel. We are told despite all of his blessings, Moses was not permitted to enter the promised land.

What is the harm? God explains why Moses was not allowed to enter the promised land in Deuteronomy 32:51-52: “This is because you broke faith with me in the presence of the Israelites at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the desert of Zin, and because you did not uphold my holiness among the Israelites. Because you trespassed against me among the children of Israel at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the wilderness of Zin, because you did not hallow me in the midst of the children of Israel, yet you shall see the land before you, though you shall not go there into the land which I am giving the children of Israel.” As a result, you will only see the land from afar; you will not enter the land I am giving to the people of Israel. God kept his end of the bargain; he showed Moses the promised land but forbade him from entering it. Numbers 20 records the incident at Meribah Kadesh’s waters: Then the children of Israel, the whole congregation, came into the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh, and Miriam died there and was buried there.

Now there was no water for the congregation, so they gathered together against Moses and Aaron, and the people contended with Moses and spoke, saying: “If only we had died when our brethren died before the Lord! Why have you brought up the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, that we and our animals should die here? And why have you made us come up out of Egypt, to bring us to this evil place? It is not a place of grain or figs or vines or pomegranates, nor is there any water to drink.” So Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the door of the tabernacle of meeting, and they fell on their faces, and the glory of the Lord appeared to them. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Take the rod; you and your brother Aaron gather the congregation together. Speak to the rock before their eyes, and it will yield its water; thus you shall bring water for them out of the rock, and give drink to the congregation and their animals.” So Moses took the rod from before the Lord as he commanded him, and Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock; and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring water for you out of this rock?” Then Moses lifted his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod, and water came out abundantly, and the congregation and their animals drank. Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe me, to hallow me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.” This was the water of Meribah, because the children of Israel contended with the Lord, and he was hallowed among them. Now Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom: “Thus says your brother Israel: You know all the hardship that has befallen us, how our fathers went down to the land of Egypt, and we dwelt in Egypt a long time, and the Egyptians afflicted us and our fathers. When we cried out to the Lord, he heard our voice and sent the angel and brought us up out of Egypt.

Now here we are in Kadesh, a city on the edge of your border. Please let us pass through your country. We will not pass through fields or vineyards, nor will we drink water from wells; we will go along the king’s highway; we will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory.” Then Edom said to him, “You shall not pass through my land, lest I come out against you with the sword.” So the children of Israel said to him, “We will go by the highway, and if I or my livestock drink any of your water, then I will pay for it; let me only pass through on foot, nothing more.” Then he said, “You shall not pass.” So Edom came out against them with many men and with a strong hand. Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory; so Israel turned away from him. Now the children of Israel, the whole congregation, journeyed from Kadesh and came to Mount Hor. And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron in Mount Hor by the border of the land of Edom, saying, “Aaron shall be gathered to his people, for he shall not enter the land which I have given to the children of Israel, because you rebelled against my word at the water of Meribah. Take Aaron and Eleazar his son, and bring them up to Mount Hor; and strip Aaron of his garments and put them on Eleazar his son, for Aaron shall be gathered to his people and die there.” So Moses did just as the Lord commanded, and they went up to Mount Hor in the sight of all the congregation. Moses stripped Aaron of his garments and put them on Eleazar his son, and Aaron died there on the top of the mountain. Then Moses and Eleazar came down from the mountain. Now when all the congregation saw that Aaron was dead, all the house of Israel mourned for Aaron thirty days. The Israelites arrived in the desert of Zin near the end of their forty-year journey; the community turned against Moses and Aaron because there was no water. Moses and Aaron went to the tent of meeting and knelt before God.

God instructed Moses and Aaron to assemble the people and speak to the rock, and water would flow out. Moses took the staff and gathered them around him, then seemingly enraged, Moses said to them, “Listen, you rebels! Do you want us to bring you water from this rock?” Then with his staff Moses struck the rock twice. Water gushed forth from the rock just as God had promised, but God immediately told Moses and Aaron that they would not be able to bring the children of Israel into the promised land because they did not trust him enough to honor him as holy. The punishment may appear harsh to us, but when we examine Moses’s actions closely, we notice several errors. Clearly, Moses disobeyed a direct command from God. God had given Moses the command to speak to the rock; Moses, on the other hand, struck the rock with his staff. Previously, when God brought water from a rock, he told Moses to strike it with a staff, as recorded in Exodus 17: Then all the congregation of the children of Israel set out on their journey from the wilderness of Sin, according to the commandment of the Lord, and camped in Rephidim; but there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore the people contended with Moses and said, “Give us water, that we may drink.” So Moses said to them, “Why do you contend with me? Why do you tempt the Lord?” And the people thirsted there for water, and the people complained against Moses and said, “Why is it you have brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” So Moses cried out to the Lord, saying, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me!” And the Lord said to Moses, “Go on before the people, and take with you some of the elders of Israel. Also take in your hand your rod with which you struck the river, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb; and you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. So he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the contention of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?” Now Amalek came and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said to Joshua, “Choose us some men and go out, fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand.” So Joshua did as Moses said to him, and fought with Amalek. And Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And so it was, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed; and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. But Moses’s hands became heavy; so they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it.

And Aaron and Hur supported his hands, one on one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. So Joshua defeated Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this for a memorial in the book and recount it in the hearing of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.” And Moses built an altar and called its name, The Lord Is My Banner; for he said, “Because the Lord has sworn: the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” However, God’s instructions were different in this case; God wanted Moses to trust him, especially after they had shared such a close relationship for so long. Moses didn’t need to use force; all he needed to do was obey God and trust that God would keep his promise. In addition, Moses claimed credit for bringing forth the water. “Must we bring you water from this rock?” he asks the people gathered at the rock. Moses appeared to be taking credit for the miracle along with Aaron, rather than attributing it to God, and Moses did it in public. God could not allow it to go unpunished and expect the Israelites to comprehend his holiness. In 1 Corinthians 10:4, the water-giving rock is used as a symbol of Christ. In Exodus 17:6, the rock was struck just as Christ was crucified. 1 Corinthians 10:1-5 states: “For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.” Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Hebrews 7:27 notes who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for his own sins and then for the people’s, for this he did once for all when he offered up himself. Moses’s conversation with the rock in Numbers 20 could have been interpreted as a metaphor for prayer. Jesus was once struck, and he continues to provide living water to those who pray to him in faith. When Moses struck the rock angrily, he destroyed the biblical typology and in effect crucified Christ once more.

Moses was barred from entering the promised land as a result of his disobedience, pride, and misrepresentation of Christ’s sacrifice. Despite this, we never see Moses complain about his punishment; instead, he continues to lead the people faithfully and to honor God. God is compassionate in his holiness; he summoned Moses to Mount Nebo, where he revealed the promised land to his beloved prophet before his death, according to Deuteronomy 34:4-5: “Then the Lord said to him, ‘This is the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob when I said, “I will give it to your descendants.” I have allowed you to see it with your own eyes, but you will never enter it.’ And Moses the servant of the Lord died there in Moab, just as the Lord had predicted.” Moses’s failure at the rock did not end his relationship with God; God used the prophet again and again, and he loved him tenderly. Moses’s disobedience by the rock reminds us of the human flaws that bedevil us all. First, reacting instead of leading, as seen in Numbers 20:10: “And Moses and Aaron assembled the congregation before the rock; and Moses said to them, ‘Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring you water out of this rock?'” Second, presuming that what worked before will work again, as seen in Numbers 20:11: “And Moses lifted up his hand and with his rod he smote the rock twice; and water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank and their livestock.” Third, compromising our obedience to God so we will look better. Fourth, failing to trust God to complete what he began, as noted in Numbers 20:12: “And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, ‘Because you did not believe in me, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.’

” It is not entirely clear why this one sin kept Moses from entering the promised land, especially considering that he had already put up with the innumerable complaints and rebellions of the ungrateful Israelites for forty years. It is probable that there are various reasons behind this. Number one, Moses’s personal belief may have wavered; it seems God indicted him because of his lack of trust, as we see in verse 12. Number two, Moses may have publicly displayed distrust, acting as though a mere word were not enough for God to provide water; this may have been what God meant when he said that Moses did not honor him as holy in the sight of the Israelites. Number three, Moses may have taken credit for providing the water, thus not honoring God as holy. Moses said, “Must we bring you water from this rock?” in verse 10. By including himself when speaking of the source of the water, he may have crossed a line by attempting to usurp God’s authority; it was intolerable for such a prominent leader as Moses to propagate confusion about his role. Number four, Moses may have blatantly disobeyed God’s precise instructions. God had said, “Gather the assembly; speak to that rock.” Instead, Moses spoke to the people and struck the rock. Whatever the exact reason for God’s harsh punishment of Moses, we must understand that whatever God’s instructions may be, he demands our complete obedience.