The Seriousness of Sin
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I. Introduction
A. I wasn’t very “competitive.”
B. I never had respect for someone to lose their temper over a game
C. I like to play soccer and have fun.
D. A Church Leader played ultimate frisbee with us.
E. He yelled at me and lost his temper during a fun activity.
F. Why was he so serious about just a fun game?
G. This is reflected in today's culture.
H. Questions: When was the last time you took your sin seriously?
I. In this story, we see Phinases take matters into their own hands.
J. Jesus does the same for our sins but as a greater priest than any of the O.T. Priesthood.
K. Even though we sin, we have a savior who paid and died for our sins.
II. Historical Context
A. The Israelite generation that disobeyed God and decided not to go to the promised land is dying off.
B. We see that in this time, Aarron, the high priest, has passed away (Num: 20:22- 29)
C. Eleazar, his son, is named in his place.
D. Numbers 22-24 talk about the Moab king, Balak, and the “prophet Balaam.
E. Through 4 oracles, Balaam blesses Israel despite Balak's urge to curse them.
F. This insurance Balak went during the final set of oracles (3 & 4) to build a pagan altar near the Israelite encampment in Poer. (Num. 23:28)
G. God, through Balaam's oracles, praises and curses Balak’s country of Moab and his allies. (Numb. 24:15-25)
III. The Plague of Idolatry (v.1-3)
Numbers 25:1-3
While Israel was staying in the Acacia Grove, the people began to prostitute themselves with the women of Moab.
The women invited them to the sacrifices for their gods, and the people ate and bowed in worship to their gods.
So Israel aligned itself with Baal of Peor, and the Lord’s anger burned against Israel.
A. Verses 1
a. A Plague of Idolatry in the encampment.
b. Their camp is near the Acacia Grove, near the Trans-Jordan River.
c. Israel struggled with idolatry before the Golden Calf.
d. Why Did Israel struggle with Idolatry?
e. One Commentator notes:
1. Idols provided an assured, tangible access point to the divine.… Humans have a natural aversion to uncertainty; idols were a way of saying, “You can know you have access to the god.”
2. In Israel’s day, idolatry was normal (comparable to materialism in many Western cultures today). It would be easy to think, “How could something so normal for most people be wrong?”
3. The worship of more than one god was also regular. In ancient Mesopotamia, people could have a great god and also a personal god, who was often a lesser deity among the many. Israelites might naturally assume they could be faithful to the LORD, Israel's great god, and lesser gods.
4. Finally, whether the Israelites were eyeing the Canaanites’ good crops or the general success of neighboring superpowers (Egypt, Assyria), they would naturally link a nation’s success to its idols. It was a large step of faith for Israelites to pursue success by worshiping the LORD alone and not using idols to do so.
f. During this time, Ritual prostitution was done.
B. Verse 2
g. The “daughters of Moab” would be under Balak’s rule.
h. Being near Moab was only natural for engaging with these people.
i. This means they could have either prostituted themselves to the men or married them.
j. They tempted men to worship their pagan God.
k. They began to worship these gods while being with the Moabite women.
l. This is how Israel's relentless struggle with national apostasy started.
C. Verse 3
m. In verse 3, we see how they gave way to paganism.
n. Some translations say “yoked” or “aligned.
o. this means that some declared that Baal was their God.
p. The God who took them out of Egypt and who has provided for them despite their disobedience, Israel wants to switch alliances.
q. They had forgotten all that God had done for them. God has also previously warned about this issue (Exod 34:15; Lev 17:7).
r. This generation was corrupt and easily swindled—the same people who swore diligence to God due to their covenant rejected Him
IV. The Punishment for Sin (v.4-5)
Numbers 25:4-5
The Lord said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of the people and execute them in broad daylight before the Lord so that his burning anger may turn away from Israel.”
So Moses told Israel’s judges, “Kill each of the men who aligned themselves with Baal of Peor.”
A. Verse 4
a. God does not hold back on this betrayal.
b. The punishment was made to be severe.
c. The leaders of the tribes, or the leading elder, were to be executed.
d. What type of execution?
e. “That is, Moses must round up all the tribal leaders, those representatives of the people who presumably should have either prevented the idolatrous activities or carried out the punishment of the guilty members of their tribes, and execute them by impaling them on poles so that their bodies hang out in broad daylight
f. One commentator:
g. The method of execution is not specified, but their bodies were to be exposed—perhaps by hanging or impaling on a tree (cf. Deut 21:22–23)—“before the LORD” (Num 25:4), that is, like a public sacrifice before him.”
h. This was made to be public and humiliating.
i. This type of punishment was only used during this era against those who committed a crime so severe that it called for it.
j. Why the Elders?
k. They were the people who should have put a stop to this.
l. Their weak leadership allowed this to happen.
m. As Wenham states:
n. “Another reason for punishing the chiefs of the people was that they should have restrained their followers.”
B. Verse 5
a. Moses Israel tells Israel, or does he?
b. He changes what God commanded him to do.
c. He changes it to only people who aligned himself with Baal.
d. He did this because it could mean the leaders wouldn’t quickly agree.
e. This refusal leads to a plague placed on the community by God.
f. This is due not just to the disobedience of the Israelites but also to Moses.
V. Phinehas and the Wrath of God (v.6-9)
Numbers 25:6-9
An Israelite man came bringing a Midianite woman to his relatives in the sight of Moses and the whole Israelite community while they were weeping at the entrance to the tent of meeting.
When Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw this, he got up from the assembly, took a spear in his hand,
followed the Israelite man into the tent, and drove it through both the Israelite man and the woman—through her belly. Then the plague on the Israelites was stopped,
but those who died in the plague numbered twenty-four thousand.
A. Verses 6
a. Verses 6 flash-forwards the narrative in time.
b. The temporal difference between verses 1-5 shows us when the situation began.
c. 6-9 describes how far the issue has progressed.
d. We see that Israel still needs to solve the problem.
e. The men are cohabitating with the women.
f. According to verse 2, this was down outside; now, in verse 6, they are bringing them into the community.
g. In Moses’ sight, an Israelite has brought women into the community.
h. The fact that Moses does not act shows how Moses struggled to complete what God commanded.
i. The Israelite man brings the Midianite women near the Tabernacle, the various resting places for Yahweh.
j. Midianites were nomads and worshiped Baal.
k. The fact is that the Israelites didn’t care that he brought a pagan to the community and didn’t care about God’s law.
B. Verse 7
A. Enraged, we see this beacon of light for the community.
B. Phinehas, son of Eleazar the high priest (Num. 20:24-29).
C. The grandson of Aaron.
D. In Leviticus 21, we see the importance of the character of a priest.
E. In this scenario, we see how Phinehas displays God's character, wrath over sin.
F. With this anger over what is happening, he leaves his post in the assembly.
G. Grabs a spear
C. Verse 8
a. In his anger, Phinehas went into the tent that the two were in and stabbed them in the act.
b. B. This tent might have been bridal.
c. This would indicate that these two probably married in a non-Israelite ceremony.
d. This bridal tent would have been used for newlyweds to consummate the marriage.
e. Phinases could be described as interrupting this stage in intercourse and stabbing both and killing them.
D. Verse 9
a. We see that because of this act by Phinehas, God forgives Israel.
b. A plague God sent to Israel due to their disobedience is lifted.
c. We understand that the plague was very lethal, killing 24,000.
VI. Phinehas’ Blessing (v.10-13)
Numbers25:10-13
The Lord spoke to Moses,
“Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back my wrath from the Israelites because he was zealous among them with my zeal, so that I did not destroy the Israelites in my zeal.
Therefore declare: I grant him my covenant of peace.
It will be a covenant of perpetual priesthood for him and his future descendants, because he was zealous for his God and made atonement for the Israelites.”
A. We see that Good blesses Phinehas.
B. This blessing is because we were “zealous.”
C. This word could also be translated to “Jealousy.”
D. The words zealous and zeal are built on a Hebrew root (q-n-ʾ) that can also be translated with “jealous” (so ESV, NASB). While the word jealous often has negative connotations, there are contexts where jealousy, and even jealous anger, is not petty but proper.”
E. Phinehas' hatred of sin was identical to how God views it.
F. Because of this act, Phinehas' descent will represent God’s high priesthood.
G. Phinehas was recognized highly by people.
H. In ancient Jewish literature, the Sirach shows other noblemen of the faith and praises them. Phinehas is listed, like Moses and Aaron. (Sirach 45:23-26).
VII. Midian’s Curse (v.14-18)
Numbers 25:14-18
The name of the slain Israelite man, who was struck dead with the Midianite woman, was Zimri son of Salu, the leader of a Simeonite family.
The name of the slain Midianite woman was Cozbi, the daughter of Zur, a tribal head of a family in Midian.
The Lord told Moses,
“Attack the Midianites and strike them dead.
For they attacked you with the treachery that they used against you in the Peor incident. They did the same in the case involving their sister Cozbi, daughter of the Midianite leader who was killed the day the plague came at Peor.”
Then the whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night.
All the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, and the whole community told them, “If only we had died in the land of Egypt, or if only we had died in this wilderness!
Why is the Lord bringing us into this land to die by the sword? Our wives and children will become plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?”
So they said to one another, “Let’s appoint a leader and go back to Egypt.”
Then Moses and Aaron fell facedown in front of the whole assembly of the Israelite community.
Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who scouted out the land, tore their clothes
and said to the entire Israelite community, “The land we passed through and explored is an extremely good land.
If the Lord is pleased with us, he will bring us into this land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and give it to us.
Only don’t rebel against the Lord, and don’t be afraid of the people of the land, for we will devour them. Their protection has been removed from them, and the Lord is with us. Don’t be afraid of them!”
While the whole community threatened to stone them, the glory of the Lord appeared to all the Israelites at the tent of meeting.
The Lord said to Moses, “How long will these people despise me? How long will they not trust in me despite all the signs I have performed among them?
I will strike them with a plague and destroy them. Then I will make you into a greater and mightier nation than they are.”
But Moses replied to the Lord, “The Egyptians will hear about it, for by your strength you brought up this people from them.
They will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among these people, how you, Lord, are seen face to face, how your cloud stands over them, and how you go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and in a pillar of fire by night.
If you kill this people with a single blow, the nations that have heard of your fame will declare,
‘Since the Lord wasn’t able to bring this people into the land he swore to give them, he has slaughtered them in the wilderness.’
“So now, may my Lord’s power be magnified just as you have spoken:
The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in faithful love, forgiving iniquity and rebellion. But he will not leave the guilty unpunished, bringing the consequences of the fathers’ iniquity on the children to the third and fourth generation.
Please pardon the iniquity of this people, in keeping with the greatness of your faithful love, just as you have forgiven them from Egypt until now.”
The Lord responded, “I have pardoned them as you requested.
Yet as I live and as the whole earth is filled with the Lord’s glory,
none of the men who have seen my glory and the signs I performed in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tested me these ten times and did not obey me,
will ever see the land I swore to give their ancestors. None of those who have despised me will see it.
But since my servant Caleb has a different spirit and has remained loyal to me, I will bring him into the land where he has gone, and his descendants will inherit it.
Since the Amalekites and Canaanites are living in the lowlands, turn back tomorrow and head for the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea.”
Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron:
“How long must I endure this evil community that keeps complaining about me? I have heard the Israelites’ complaints that they make against me.
Tell them: As I live—this is the Lord’s declaration—I will do to you exactly as I heard you say.
Your corpses will fall in this wilderness—all of you who were registered in the census, the entire number of you twenty years old or more—because you have complained about me.
I swear that none of you will enter the land I promised to settle you in, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.
I will bring your children whom you said would become plunder into the land you rejected, and they will enjoy it.
But as for you, your corpses will fall in this wilderness.
Your children will be shepherds in the wilderness for forty years and bear the penalty for your acts of unfaithfulness until all your corpses lie scattered in the wilderness.
You will bear the consequences of your iniquities forty years based on the number of the forty days that you scouted the land, a year for each day. You will know my displeasure.
I, the Lord, have spoken. I swear that I will do this to the entire evil community that has conspired against me. They will come to an end in the wilderness, and there they will die.”
So the men Moses sent to scout out the land, and who returned and incited the entire community to complain about him by spreading a negative report about the land—
those men who spread the negative report about the land were struck down by the Lord.
Only Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh remained alive of those men who went to scout out the land.
When Moses reported these words to all the Israelites, the people were overcome with grief.
They got up early the next morning and went up the ridge of the hill country, saying, “Let’s go to the place the Lord promised, for we were wrong.”
But Moses responded, “Why are you going against the Lord’s command? It won’t succeed.
Don’t go, because the Lord is not among you and you will be defeated by your enemies.
The Amalekites and Canaanites are right in front of you, and you will fall by the sword. The Lord won’t be with you, since you have turned from following him.”
But they dared to go up the ridge of the hill country, even though the ark of the Lord’s covenant and Moses did not leave the camp.
Then the Amalekites and Canaanites who lived in that part of the hill country came down, attacked them, and routed them as far as Hormah.
The Lord instructed Moses,
“Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you enter the land I am giving you to settle in,
and you make a food offering to the Lord from the herd or flock—either a burnt offering or a sacrifice, to fulfill a vow, or as a freewill offering, or at your appointed festivals—to produce a pleasing aroma for the Lord,
the one presenting his offering to the Lord is also to present a grain offering of two quarts of fine flour mixed with a quart of oil.
Prepare a quart of wine as a drink offering with the burnt offering or sacrifice of each lamb.
“If you prepare a grain offering with a ram, it is to be four quarts of fine flour mixed with a third of a gallon of oil.
Also present a third of a gallon of wine for a drink offering as a pleasing aroma to the Lord.
“If you prepare a young bull as a burnt offering or as a sacrifice, to fulfill a vow, or as a fellowship offering to the Lord,
a grain offering of six quarts of fine flour mixed with two quarts of oil is to be presented with the bull.
Also present two quarts of wine as a drink offering. It is a food offering of pleasing aroma to the Lord.
This is to be done for each ox, ram, lamb, or goat.
This is how you are to prepare each of them, no matter how many.
“Every Israelite is to prepare these things in this way when he presents a food offering as a pleasing aroma to the Lord.
When an alien resides with you or someone else is among you and wants to prepare a food offering as a pleasing aroma to the Lord, he is to do exactly as you do throughout your generations.
The assembly is to have the same statute for both you and the resident alien as a permanent statute throughout your generations. You and the alien will be alike before the Lord.
The same law and the same ordinance will apply to both you and the alien who resides with you.”
The Lord instructed Moses,
“Speak to the Israelites and tell them: After you enter the land where I am bringing you,
you are to offer a contribution to the Lord when you eat from the food of the land.
You are to offer a loaf from your first batch of dough as a contribution; offer it just like a contribution from the threshing floor.
Throughout your generations, you are to give the Lord a contribution from the first batch of your dough.
“When you sin unintentionally and do not obey all these commands that the Lord spoke to Moses—
all that the Lord has commanded you through Moses, from the day the Lord issued the commands and onward throughout your generations—
and if it was done unintentionally without the community’s awareness, the entire community is to prepare one young bull for a burnt offering as a pleasing aroma to the Lord, with its grain offering and drink offering according to the regulation, and one male goat as a sin offering.
The priest will then make atonement for the entire Israelite community so that they may be forgiven, for the sin was unintentional. They are to bring their offering, a food offering to the Lord, and their sin offering before the Lord for their unintentional sin.
The entire Israelite community and the alien who resides among them will be forgiven, since it happened to all the people unintentionally.
“If one person sins unintentionally, he is to present a year-old female goat as a sin offering.
The priest will then make atonement before the Lord on behalf of the person who acts in error sinning unintentionally, and when he makes atonement for him, he will be forgiven.
You are to have the same law for the person who acts in error, whether he is an Israelite or an alien who resides among you.
“But the person who acts defiantly, whether native or resident alien, blasphemes the Lord. That person is to be cut off from his people.
He will certainly be cut off, because he has despised the Lord’s word and broken his command; his guilt remains on him.”
While the Israelites were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering wood on the Sabbath day.
Those who found him gathering wood brought him to Moses, Aaron, and the entire community.
They placed him in custody because it had not been decided what should be done to him.
Then the Lord told Moses, “The man is to be put to death. The entire community is to stone him outside the camp.”
So the entire community brought him outside the camp and stoned him to death, as the Lord had commanded Moses.
The Lord said to Moses,
“Speak to the Israelites and tell them that throughout their generations they are to make tassels for the corners of their garments, and put a blue cord on the tassel at each corner.
These will serve as tassels for you to look at, so that you may remember all the Lord’s commands and obey them and not prostitute yourselves by following your own heart and your own eyes.
This way you will remember and obey all my commands and be holy to your God.
I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God; I am the Lord your God.”
A. We see the two people in the act.
B. Zimri, Son of Salu
C. Salu was the leader of the Simeonite tribe (someone that Moses was ordered to kill)
D. Cozbi, Daughter of Zur
E. He was a tribal leader for Midian.
VIII. Verses 16-18
A. We see God command Moses to kill the Midianites due to this act.
B. They had caused the Israelites to lose faith in God
IX. Christ Connection
A. Why study this passage?
B. It is difficult to see how much hatred God has for sin.
C. But it's essential.
D. God took the sin of Israel seriously.
E. Like sin back then, there needed to be atonement.
F. in the book of Leviticus, the Israelites were given ritual offerings to amend their guilty sin.
G. For us, God came down and sacrificed himself.
H. Christ, the God of the Old Testament, came down to become the ultimate sacrifice.
I. As we look at the cross, remember that God takes sin seriously.
X. Conclusion
A. Why is this important today
B. Scholars and theologians have noted that this is a difficult passage.
C. The main concern is to remember how seriously we are taking sins.
D. How should we look at this passage?
E. First, We should look at our sin and see what temps us.
a. While we could look at Israel for idolatry examples, this sin is prevalent today.
b. We should be accountable for our sins
c. c. So, the motive to improve our awareness and mentality to defend sin can be done in some ways.
d. Finding accountability partners,
e. Friends, Relatives, or Spouses are excellent places to start.
d. They would be there to help us fight the good fight.
F. Second Is to be in the Word
a. If we are not in the Word, we cannot recognize sin.
b. This is what happened to Israel.
c. The same people who heard Moses at Sini didn’t remember what he taught them.
d. They forgot the word or didn’t care for it.
G. Finally, We must consistently be in prayer.
a. We need to be in constant communication with God.
b. Dr. Lawlass describes prayer “as an expression of our relationship with God and a confession of our dependence on him.” (The Potential and Power of Prayer, pg.25)
c. When we pray, we need to rely on God for our struggles because he is the only one who can help us conquer our sins.
