I really admire the sequence of the arrangement of the chapters in the book of Numbers. Chapters one through four record the formation of the divine army, which fights for God and serves God. Immediately after this record, there is a chapter on dealing with defilement. Then there is a test of our chastity, to determine if we are single, pure, and chaste toward the One whom we love. Following this, there is a chapter on the Nazarites. In this message we will begin to consider this chapter on the Nazarites.
God desires that all of His people be Nazarites. To be a Nazarite is to be sanctified absolutely and ultimately to God. To be sanctified in this way is to be for nothing other than God.
The section on dealing with defilement shows us that God wants His people to be clean, righteous, and faithful. The test for chastity indicates that God wants us to love only Him, to love Him with our heart, with our mind, emotion, and will, and with our physical strength (Mark 12:30). He wants us to have no one else and nothing else other than Him as our first love and our unique love. Even if we love Him in such a way, we still may not be absolutely and ultimately for Him.
We may use married life as an illustration of loving the Lord without being absolutely for Him. God might have favored you with a wife who truly loves you. However, although she loves you and is altogether chaste toward you, she may not be utterly, absolutely, and ultimately for you. Even the most loving wife is still somewhat for herself in certain things.
The matter of the Nazarite is a test of our absoluteness. If we would be a Nazarite, we must be absolutely, utterly, and ultimately for God.
According to typology, among the human race the unique Nazarite is the Lord Jesus. Hence, a Nazarite is a type of Christ. A Nazarite signifies the Lord Jesus in His living for God in His humanity.
Numbers 6:2 speaks of a man or a woman making "a special vow, the vow of a Nazarite, to separate himself to Jehovah." Here we see that a Nazarite is sanctified by making a special vow to separate himself to God. At times we might have made a vow to the Lord, but it might not have been very strong or absolute, and we might not have kept it. Can you make a vow and be faithful to it for your whole life?