Numbers 31:1-12 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying,… This is a very remarkable passage. The Lord says to Moses, "Avenge the children of Israel of the Midianites." And Moses says to Israel, "Avenge the Lord of Midian." The people had been ensnared by the wiles of the daughters of Midian, through the evil influence of Balaam the son of Peer; and they are now called upon to clear themselves thoroughly from all the defilement which, through want of watchfulness, they had contracted. The sword is to be brought upon the Midianites; and all the spoil is to be made to pass either through the fire of judgment or through the water of purification. Not one jot or tittle of the evil thing is to be suffered to pass unjudged. Now, this war was what we may call abnormal. By right the people ought not to have had any occasion to encounter it at all. It was not one of the wars of Canaan. It was simply the result of their own unfaithfulness — the fruit of their own unhallowed commerce with the uncircumcised. Hence, although Joshua, the son of Nun, had been duly appointed to succeed Moses as leader of the congregation, we find no mention whatever of him in connection with this war. On the contrary, it is to Phinehas, the son of Eleazar the priest, that the conduct of this expedition is committed; and he enters upon it "with the holy instruments and the trumpets." All this is strongly marked. The priest is the prominent person; and the holy instruments, the prominent instrumentality. It is a question of wiping away the stain caused by their unholy association with the enemy; and, therefore, instead of a general officer with sword and spear, it is a priest with holy instruments that appears in the foreground. True, the sword is here; but it is not the prominent thing. It is the priest with the vessels of the sanctuary; and that priest the selfsame man who first executed judgment upon that very evil which has here to be avenged. The moral of all this is, at once, plain and practical. The Midianites furnish a type of that peculiar kind of influence which the world exerts over the hearts of the people of God — the fascinating and ensnaring power of the world used by Satan to hinder our entrance upon our proper heavenly portion. Israel should have had nothing to do with these Midianites; but having, in an evil hour, been betrayed into association with them, nothing remains but war and utter extermination. So with us, as Christians. Our proper business is to pass through the world as pilgrims and strangers; having nothing to do with it save to be the patient witnesses of the grace of Christ, and thus shine as lights in the midst of the surrounding moral gloom. But, alas! we fail to maintain this rigid separation; we suffer ourselves to be betrayed into alliance with the world, and, in consequence, we get involved in trouble and conflict which does not properly belong to us at all. War with Midian formed no part of Israel's proper work. They had to thank themselves for it. But God is gracious; and hence, through a special application of priestly ministry, they were enabled, not only to conquer the Midianites, but to carry away much spoil. God, in His infinite goodness, brings good out of evil. (C. H. Mackintosh.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, |
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