Live Carefully (Cities Of Refuge; Numbers 35:1-34; Joshua 20:1-9) Series

Sometimes in life, one will person will kill another. Sometimes, this is deliberate-- it's murder. Other times, it's an accident. Two people are out cutting down trees, and one person accidentally drops a tree onto the other. You kill him. You're out driving, and someone steps out into the road while you're distracted. You're out hunting, and accidentally shoot your hunting partner. Life is fragile. Bad things can happen very quickly. And suddenly, someone is dead.

Accidents like these happen every day. They aren't really very hypothetical. What happens next? In the U.S., the matter gets turned over to the police, and the legal system. Investigators look at what happened, they interrogate you, and they look at any video footage available. Then, they make a decision about whether to press charges against you-- is it murder? Is it manslaughter?

In ancient Israel, situations like this weren't handled at the state level, with very rare exceptions. They were handled by the elders of the local community. Imagine a town made up, mostly, of a handful of large extended families. There might be a clan of Carlsons, a clan of Martinsons, and a clan of Smiths. Each of these clans had elders who were responsible for exercising local authority in the case of disputes.

So if you have a dispute with someone else in your town, you'd go with the other party to the town gate where the elders would assemble. You'd both present your case to the elders, and they would make a binding decision. It was only when a case was difficult that it would be brought to a higher court (Deuteronomy 17:8-13).

So let's say you accidentally killed someone. You didn't mean to. It was legitimately an accident. What happens next?

Well, the next thing you're going to want to do, is very quickly pack a suitcase, and you're going to want to run.

Fast. You're not fleeing to become a fugitive from the law. You're not going to hide, exactly. What you're going to do is run to a place called a city of refuge. That's your goal.

There are four main passages that talk about these cities of refuge: Exodus 21:12-13, Numbers 35, Deuteronomy 21, and Joshua 20. This whole concept of cities of refuge is probably as new to you, as it is to me. I can't possibly get explain all of this in one week, especially if I'm going to talk about why these cities of refuge matter to us. So I think what I'm going to do is focus mostly on Numbers 35 this week, and use it as kind of a warm-up for Joshua 20. This will also let me kind of spread out the applications, and spend more time on each one.

So. Numbers 35:

(1) And Yahweh spoke to Moses in the desert plain of Moab at the Jordan, [across from] Jericho, saying,

(2) "Command the sons of Israel, so that they will give to the Levites from the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell,

while pasture land for the cities all around them you shall give to the Levites,

(3) and the cities shall be for them to dwell,

while their pasture land shall be for their domesticated animals and for their possessions and for all their beasts,

(4) while the pasture lands of the cities that you are giving to the Levites [shall be] from the wall of the city and outward 1,000 cubits all around,

(5) and you shall measure them from outside of the city on the side to the east a 2,000 by cubits, and on the south side a 2,000 by cubit, and the west side 2,000 by cubit, and the north side a 2,000 by cubit,

while the city is in the midst.

This shall be for them as the pasture land for the cities,

(6) while with the cities that you shall give to the Levites [are] six cities of refuge that you shall give to flee away to there [for] the manslayer,

while to them you shall give 42 cities.

Joshua 21 talks about the Levites, so I want to try to save something to talk about there. Here, I just want to say, it's not an accident that the cities of refuge are Levitical cities. These are the cities, if nowhere else in Israel, where the elders should understand what God wants from his people. These are cities, if no where else, where people are committing to serving God. These cities represent people's best shot at a fair trial, so God makes sure to use Levitical cities as the cities of refuge. Not only this, but no clan would dare attack a Levitical city to take vengeance on someone who killed one of their members, if they disagreed with the Levites' decision. The rest of the nation would wipe them off the map.