The Book of Numbers (in the Bible) tells a fascinating story. When the Hebrew people left Egypt they took a census of the people in order to get a sense of how many warriors, families, etc. were traveling with them. The results of the census can be found in Numbers chapter one.

The Hebrew people were only supposed to travel for a few weeks before settling in their new homeland, Canaan. However, as a result of their stubbornness and rebellion their entry into Canaan was delayed by 40 years, an entire generation.

During that 40 year delay the Hebrew people wandered the dessert. Some tribes fared better than others during that time of wandering. At the end of the 40 years of wandering they took another census in order to prepare to finally enter their new home, Canaan. The results of that census can be found in Numbers 26.

If you simply compare the results of the two censuses you can see a story in the numbers. The land allotments in their new homeland would actually be based on the size of each tribe (Num. 26.52-56). The bigger tribes would get more land and the smaller tribes would get less land, proportionate to the size of the tribe.

The second census revealed that while some tribes stayed about the same size during the 40 year wandering period, a few shrank and still others grew.

At extreme ends of the spectrum, the tribe of Simeon shrunk by 63%. They went from being the third largest tribe (out of 12 tribes) to the smallest tribe. This meant that they had forfeited 63% of their land allotment in the promised land of Canaan.

In contrast, the tribe of Manasseh grew by 63%. Not only did they now have more people, as a result of their growth they had increased the size of their land allotment in the promised land. They went from being the smallest of the 12 tribes to the sixth largest.

Simeon and Manasseh lived in the same place, ate the same food, spoke the same language, experienced the same weather and had the same national leadership, yet they dealt with delay and adversity differently. One tribe lost most of it's inheritance while another tribe increased the size of it's inheritance.

How we deal with times of adversity and delay will have an impact on our future.