only 5 to go!

i stepped on the scale this morning and saw that i had gained 147 pounds. :|

just kidding.

kind of.

our scale has a memory setting. i use number 1, jason uses number 2. once in a while when the kids are playing with it they time it just right and mess up our settings. we dont always notice until after the reading shows our current weight- it then shows a gain or loss of whatever the difference is from the previous setting. todays difference was 147.0 pounds. yikes.

so i did some math. last week i weighed 156.4 pounds (after gaining almost 2 pounds), and this morning i weigh 153.2 pounds- a real loss of 3.2 pounds. that feels pretty good. this week i ran again, i lost some weight again... there is a lot going on in our little corner, so it really is nice to have a couple things working in my favor today.

on another note-

i have been reading numbers. if you remember, i started in 1 corinthians and have worked my way to the end of the new testament and back around the beginning. numbers isnt just the story of how many fighting men are in the people if israel, its also the story of the deaths of the people God has trusted to lead the people to the promised land.

i didnt know that God told aaron to go to the top of a particular mountain and there he would die. people talk about what it might be like to know the place and the time... im pretty sure i wouldnt enjoy it. aaron was the high priest (i think) and as such, must remain ceremonially clean at all times. if he were to become unclean, his priestly garments would also be unclean. thats not allowed. his clothes were specially made of fine materials and adorned and could not be discarded or washed like other clothes that were made unclean. my point: aaron couldnt die while wearing his priestly garments or they would be made unclean having touched a dead body.

so moses, aaron, and aarons son all go up the mountain together. aaron removes his clothes and moses places them on eleazer, aarons son, the new high priest. and then aaron dies.

just like that?

im not sure how i feel about that. and even more, once he is dead, moses and especially eleazar cant touch him (or carry his body down the mountain to be buried) or they would become unclean. did they even cover his body with stones? i dont know. but its really interesting to think about the details, and im sure God had it all figured out.

a similar story is that of moses. God told him it was his time to die- to go to a certain place (i dont remember if it was the top of a mountain, or over the jordan... cant remember where) but to go there, and look at all the land that he had given to the israelites and once he had seen it all, he would die.

i talked to jason about that last night. his comment, how slowly or quickly do you think moses scanned the land? knowing that when he had seen it all, he would die. he had been with God on a regular basis, i wonder if it was kind of no big deal to him?

so yeah, numbers. give it a read some time. get through the counting of troops and some sacrifices and there is a lot of good stuff in there.