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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
If you have a brother and/or a sister, or if you have raised two or more children, or if you know two or more children in the same immediate family, you likely know something about sibling rivalry, the jealousy, competition, and fighting between brothers and sisters that usually continues at least throughout childhood and can be very frustrating and stressful to parents (Sibling Rivalry), not to mention frustrating and stressful to others. More than sibling rivalry is involved with the brothers and sister Moses, Aaron, and Miriam in tonight’s Reading of Numbers chapter 12 (Numbers 12:1‑16), however. Tonight we consider that account of “Aaron and Miriam” as the second of five “More Snapshots of Repentance”, examples of both repentance and forgiveness, examples that are not only instructive but also comforting for us today, not only during this Lenten season of repentance and spiritual growth but always.
As the Divinely-inspired Moses reports, the people of Israel had just been complaining again (Numbers 11:1-15), and the Lord had ordained seventy elders to help Moses bear the burden of the people (Numbers 11:16-30), which act is said to have established more firmly Moses’s prestige among the people. Then, Miriam, probably Moses’s older sister who many years earlier had watched over her infant brother as he was placed into the Nile river (Exodus 2:1-10) and who was a prophetess in her own right (Exodus 15:20)—she instigated their, as we saw last Wednesday in Exodus chapter 32 (Exodus 32:1-35), “weak‑willed” middle brother Aaron, who served as Moses’s and God’s spokesman (Exodus 4:15)—she instigated him to join her in speaking against Moses. They ostensibly spoke against Moses because, apparently recently, Moses had married a Cushite (or Ethiopian) woman, probably after the death of his first wife Zipporah. But, Miriam and Aaron, wrongfully proud of what God had given and done through them instead of being meek as Moses was, really were envious of Moses, their younger brother and their vocational superior, and, in trying to make themselves equal to Moses, Miriam and Aaron not only questioned Moses’s leadership, but they also questioned God’s leadership, God’s authority and His honor.
As we heard in the Reading, God suddenly confronted Miriam and Aaron over their sin, and similarly God suddenly confronts us over our sin. Nothing is hidden from God! God confronts our petty sibling rivalries and collusions. God confronts our false witness against any and all of our neighbors. God confronts our envy of our vocational superiors and others. God confronts our sinful questioning of the spiritual authorities whom He puts over us instead of our listening to them. And, God confronts our questioning His leadership, His authority and His honor. Righteously angry with us, God confronts our sinful nature and all our actual sin, for which we deserve both death here and now and torment in hell for eternity, unless we repent, as He calls and so enables us to do.
As God was executing His righteous wrath against Miriam and Aaron, Aaron confessed their sin to Moses and interceded for Miriam, and Moses likewise cried to the Lord on Miriam’s behalf, and they were forgiven and she eventually was healed. When we confess our sin, either to our pastor or directly to God, then we also are forgiven and eventually healed. We are forgiven and eventually healed not because we have confessed, but we are forgiven and eventually healed because of God’s love, mercy, and grace for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.
As great of a prophet as Moses was, Jesus was and is a greater prophet—in fact the Greatest Prophet (confer Deuteronomy 18:15, 18). Moses was faithful over God’s house—His people, His Church—as a servant, but Jesus is faithful over God’s house—His people, His Church—as a Son (Hebrews 3:2, 5). God’s final and greatest revelation, Jesus is the Son of God, the heir of all things, the radiance of the glory of God, and the exact imprint of God’s nature (Hebrews 1:1-3). Jesus is the Son of God, and Jesus is the Son of the Virgin Mary, and so Jesus could and did die, and so His death was sufficient for the sins of the whole world, including your sins and my sins. Jesus’s perfect life and His obedient suffering and death all was for us and for our salvation. Jesus rose from the dead and lives to intercede for us with the Father, pointing to His own satisfaction of God’s righteous wrath over our sins (1 John 2:1-2). When we turn in sorrow from our sin and trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, then God forgives us. God forgives our sinful nature and all our actual sin, whatever our sin might be.
As we heard in the Reading, God was present with Moses and Aaron and Miriam in a pillar of cloud, and similarly God is present with us through His Word and Sacraments. God’s presence means either condemnation and death for unrepentant unbelievers or forgiveness and life for repentant believers. God’s read and preached law kills us, but His read and preached Gospel gives us life. God’s Word with water in Holy Baptism puts to death our sinful nature and gives life to our redeemed nature. God’s Word from our pastor’s exercising the Office of the Keys in excommunication binds the sins of the unrepentant and in Holy Absolution forgives the sins of the repentant. And, God’s Word with the bread and wine of the Sacrament of the Altar that are Christ’s Body and Blood are rightly kept from those who do not repent and believe, lest they eat and drink in an unworthy manner and be guilty concerning the Body and Blood, eating and drinking without discerning the Sacramental and ecclesial Body and so eating and drinking judgment on themselves (1 Corinthians 11:27-29), but that same Body and Blood are rightly given to those who do repent and believe and so also given is the forgiveness of sins and life and salvation.
Miriam and Aaron apparently had sinned publicly and so rightly were rebuked publicly. And, for a time there were public consequences both for Miriam and for the whole people of Israel as they waited for her to be brought into the camp again. God may have intended to punish only Miriam, either because she was the instigator, which is emphasized especially in the original Hebrew version of the Reading, or because, as is sometimes thought (Leviticus 21:17-23?), Aaron’s having leprosy would have kept him from serving as the High Priest, or God may have “intended” to punish both Miriam and Aaron, but both Aaron’s quick confession of sin and Moses’s quick intercession for Miriam may have made God “relent” from that “intention”. Regardless, both Miriam and Aaron apparently learned their lesson, since we do not hear any more about their issues with Moses’s leadership. Likewise, as we are forgiven of our sin, we at least try to keep God’s Commandments, including our honoring and listening to those spiritual authorities whom He puts over us, lest we risk God’s vengeance against us on their behalf (confer Hebrews 13:17). And, whatever temporal consequences we experience on account of even our forgiven sin, we know that, according to God’s will, those temporal consequences for our sin will cease. As the people of Israel at the end of the Reading were poised to enter the Promised Land of Canaan, so we are poised to enter the Promised Land of heaven, where we with glorified bodies will be free of sin, disease, and death forever.
Tonight “Aaron and Miriam” have served as one “More Snapshot of Repentance”, an example of repentance and forgiveness that is both instructive and comforting for us. Next week we will consider “Achan’s Sin”. Until then, may God bless our repentant walk in this season of Lent to the glory of His Holy Name.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +