It was credited to him as righteousness for endless generations to come. Sermons
(See Numbers 25:11-13.) "Phinehas, himself perhaps a judge in authority, became the type of a righteous zeal, exercising summary vengeance, informal and unbidden, against outrage on decency and on reverence for God" (Dr. Barry). "It is a picture of the one zealous man rising up from the midst of the inactive multitude, who sit still and make no effort." The incident occurred toward the close of the wanderings, when the Israelites were in the neighbourhood of Moab. Unable to gain the right to curse Israel - as Balsam wished, and as it would have paid him well to do - Balsam persuaded King Balak to allow free intercourse between his people and them. "Let the Israelites fall into immorality and sin, and then their God will destroy them, and your end will be accomplished." The scheme succeeded. The vice and iniquity of Israel was full in God's sight, and the immediate execution of the Divine judgment was commanded. Some great public act of vindication was called for; such a manifest upholding of the Divine authority and holiness as would make a sin-cover, occupy the Divine attention, gain the Divine approval, and be a basis on which judgment might be stayed. Phinehas was the man to do it. A flagrant case of unlawful intercourse had occurred, and when he saw the wicked couple he "rose up from among the congregation, and took a javelin in his hand, and he went after the man of Israel into the tent, and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel and the woman. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel." I. PHINEHAS WAS ZEALOUS FOR THE HONOUR OF JEHOVAH. II. HIS PUBLIC ACT OF VINDICATION MADE A SIN-COVER. III. BECAUSE OF THAT SIN-COVER, JEHOVAH'S JUDGMENT MIGHT BE STAYED. See, then, what we must look for in the great atonement, made for us by the Son of God, is some fitting vindication of the outraged honour of God our Father, and so restored relations. Reconciliation can only come with solemn honouring of God's authority and claim by some public act of loyalty. Scripture presents to us different things that made atonement. A man's prayer made atonement (case of Moses). An act of official duty made atonement (case of Aaron). An act of judgment made atonement (case of Phinehas). We are left to think what act of Christ's made atonement for us all. - R.T. Yea, they despised the pleasant land. Homilist. I. THE AWFUL PERSISTENCY OF SIN (vers. 24, 25, 28). You may reason with the sinner, convince him both of the folly and wrongness of his conduct. Trial after trial may come down upon him in consequence of his wicked conduct. You may threaten him with the terrors of death and the terrible retribution of the life beyond, still he continues blindly, and madly he pursues his course ( Jeremiah 13:23). II. THE FEARFUL RETRIBUTION OF GOD (ver. 29). 1. It was justly deserved. How great the provocation! The conscience of every sufferer will attest the justice of his fate. 2. It was a warning to others. The punishment that befalls one sinner says to every sinner, "Take care." God punishes, not for the sake of inflicting pain, but for the sake of doing good. It is to arrest the progress of sin, which is a curse to the universe. III. THE SOCIAL INFLUENCE OF SAINTS (ver. 30). Phinehas interposed as a magistrate to suppress sin and check its progress. This act of his was approved of God as a righteous act. It was rewarded by God by a perpetual priesthood (Numbers 25:10). It is said that "one sinner destroyeth much good," but one saint may destroy more evil. Not until the last day, if then, shall we know the enormous amount of good that one good man may render to his age and even to his race. () Take the text as descriptive of the feeling of too many Christians towards that in which we all profess our faith as the life everlasting or the life of the world to come. "They thought scorn of that pleasant land." Ours is a freethinking and it is an outspoken generation. It is by no means uncommon to hear men say now, Give me earth and I will give you heaven. I cannot realize, and I see no beauty in, the life of that world. You tell me that it has streets of gold and gates of pearl. It is an orientalism of exaggeration which conveys to me no meaning at all. If it did convey a meaning, it would be an unattractive one. I greatly prefer the Old Testament phraseology. I can understand a land of wheat and barley, of fountains and streams, which God cares for, and upon which His eyes are open from the beginning to the end of the year. Such a land, with the addition of a wiping away of tears from all eyes and a cessation of pain and grief and death, speaks for itself. But you have made it so figurative, so metaphorical, so grotesque, that I cannot admire and I cannot long for it. "They thought scorn of that pleasant land." I can see many things to account for this. I can suggest perhaps a few things in correction of it. Theologians and mystics have so described that land as to make it unlovely. They have painted it to the manly and the vigorous, to the large-hearted and the active-minded, as a world of absolute repose, of perpetual quiescence. They have painted it to the feeble and the invalid and the languid and the weary as a scene of perpetual devotions, of a day never clouded and a night as bright as the day — of a praise never silent, a sabbath never ending, a congregation never breaking up. The one kind of men demanded an activity which is absolutely refused them; the other a repose, spiritual as well as physical, which is resolutely shut out. All these descriptions are quite conjectural. Scripture tells of a new heaven and a new earth, and expressly adds in explanation this particular — "wherein dwelleth righteousness." How can righteousness dwell in a land of mere inertion, mere torpor, or even unintermitted praise and song? Does not the very choice of the word suggest to us, though without detailing, a multitude of relationships, old perhaps as well as new, which shall give full scope to all the energies and all the activities which have here been coerced and counteracted alike by the weakness of the flesh and by the unwillingness of the spirit? Amongst all negatives and all conjectures, expanding the vision of the great future without stint or limit, we have one certainty and one positive — and with it we conclude. "His servants shall serve Him — they shall see His face — His name shall be in their foreheads." Whose servants? whose face? whose name? Look above — you will find the answer in that great combination — "God and the Lamb." Yet not their servants but His servants — not their faces but His face — nob their names but His name. Who now shall dare to think scorn of that pleasant land? God is there — there in a sense in which He is not here. "Thine eyes shall see the King in His beauty," as He can only be seen in "the land that is very far off." Who shall speak of that land in a tone half of condescension — "Yes, if I must go hence, I will consent to go thither"? Shall any one indeed find entrance there who can only say, I will not refuse — I have no objection? () II. CONTEMPT OF THE PLEASANT LAND. "Every gift of God is good and nothing to be despised." Nay, not only are manifest mercies to be gratefully acknowledged, but we are forbidden to despise the chastening of the Lord, and enjoined to count it all joy when we fall into manifold temptations or trials. And how, then, can God look upon our conduct without anger when we treat with contempt a promised inheritance? As to the liability to this sin, it might appear that our inheritance being more valuable than that of the ancient and literal Canaan, it would be less readily and less probably disparaged. But alas! the things of God are not so appreciable to natural and unaided perception. The eye sees not their beauty, the ear hears not their melody, the nostrils smell not their odour, the tongue tastes not their deliciousness. We have had samples of heaven itself; its righteousness has come down to us; its celestial truth has been proclaimed to our guilty and perishing world; and humanity has discredited and disrelished all. III. THE SOURCE OF THE ISRAELITES' CONTEMPT. "They believed not His word." If we had only full confidence in the Saviour, if we but eyed Him with a completion and constancy of trust at all commensurate with His trustworthiness, what distressing apprehensions of Him would vanish, what ravishing views of Him would succeed! How sure would heaven become! We should feel as secure of it as if we were already there, and something like as happy. () The Israelites in the wilderness are a recognized illustration of the Christian's walk through the world. The promised land is a type of heaven. Is it not true, then, of thousands who have set their faces towards a better home, that, after a time, they think scorn of that pleasant land, and give no credence unto God's Word? Why?1. Because the land is hard to reach. Yes, it is hard, and it is easy: hard if the heart is absorbed by the world, the flesh, and the devil; easy, if the world has once been despised, the flesh once crucified, the devil put to scorn. 2. Others think scorn of that pleasant land because they cannot see it, and therefore hardly believe that it exists at all. If we are only to believe in what we see, there will be but little to believe in. We cannot see the Father or the Son or the Holy Ghost with the human eye; we cannot see the soul; we cannot see that the dead are living: but Jesus taught us, and our conscience teaches us to believe these things; and Jesus taught us also to believe in heaven. () There can be no greater slight and dishonour to a giver than to have his gifts neglected. You give something that has perhaps cost you much, or which, at any rate, has your heart in it, to your child, or other dear one; would it not wound you, if a day or two after you found it tossing about among a heap of unregarded trifles? Suppose that some of those Rajahs that received presents on the recent royal visit to India had gone out from the durbar and flung them into the kennel, that would have been an insult and disaffection, would it not? But these illustrations are trivial by the side of our treatment of the "giving God."()
People Aaron, Abiram, Baalpeor, Dathan, Ham, Phinehas, PsalmistPlaces JerusalemTopics Age, Counted, Credited, Endless, Evermore, Forever, Generation, Generations, Kept, Memory, Reckoned, RighteousnessOutline 1. The psalmist exhorts to praise God
4. He prays for pardon of sin, as God pardoned the fathers
7. The story of the people's rebellion, and God's mercy
47. He concludes with prayer and praise
Dictionary of Bible Themes Psalm 106:31 5274 credit Psalm 106:13-39 8705 apostasy, in OT Psalm 106:28-31 4843 plague Psalm 106:30-31 1350 covenant, with Israel's priests Library June the Twelfth Waiting for the Spectacular
"The waves covered their enemies.... Then believed they His words." --PSALM cvi. 1-12. Their faith was born in a great emergency. A spectacular deliverance was needed to implant their trust in the Lord. They found no witness in the quiet daily providence; the unobtrusive miracle of daily mercy did not awake their song. They dwelt upon the "special" blessing, when all the time the really special blessing was to be found in the sleepless care which watched over them in their ordinary and commonplace …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling YearIsrael at the Red Sea
"A few more rolling years at most, Will land me on fair Canaan's coast.' And then I shall have no more warfare, no more fighting, no more disturbance; but I shall be at peace." "Not quite as thou desirest," says God. "Oh! thou little one; I have more to teach thee ere thou art prepared for my palace." Then he commences to lead us about, and bring us into straits and perils. The sins which we thought had utterly left us are hunting us behind, while impassible floods block up the way. Even trembling …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 2: 1856 Why are Men Saved?
"The hand that made us is Divine." If we listen to the rippling of the freshet at the mountain side, to the tumbling of the avalanche, to the lowing of the cattle, to the singing of the birds, to every voice and sound of nature, we shall hear this answer to the question, "God is our maker; he hath made us, and not we ourselves." The next question, as to design--Why were these things made?--is not so easy to answer, apart from Scripture; but when we look at Scripture we discover this fact--that as …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 3: 1857 Sin: Its Spring-Head, Stream, and Sea
It may help us to escape out of the meshes of our natural depravity, if we look back and see the causes of our fathers' sins. To confess our personal sin will tend to keep us humble; and in view of the Lord's mercy, which has spared and pardoned us, a sense of our guilt will make us grateful. The less we think of ourselves the more we shall think of him whose "mercy endureth for ever"; and if we see where our fathers' sins began, and how they grew, and what they came to, we may hope that the Spirit …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891 The Waters of Meribah
'Then came the children of Israel, even the whole congregation, into the desert of Zin in the first month: and the people abode in Kadesh; and Miriam died there, and was buried there. 2. And there was no water for the congregation: and they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. 3. And the people chode with Moses, and spake, saying, Would God that we had died when our brethren died before the Lord! 4. And why have ye brought up the congregation of the Lord into this wilderness, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture Fourteenth Day. The Holy one of God.
Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.'--Luke i. 35. 'We have believed and know that Thou art the Holy One of God.'--John vi. 69. 'The holy one of the Lord'--only once (Ps. cvi. 16) the expression is found in the Old Testament. It is spoken of Aaron, in whom holiness, as far as it could then be revealed, had found its most complete embodiment. The title waited for its fulfilment in Him who alone, in His own person, could perfectly show forth …
Andrew Murray—Holy in Christ Man's Misery by the Fall
Q-19: WHAT IS THE MISERY OF THAT ESTATE WHEREINTO MAN FELL? A: All mankind by their fall lost communion with God, are under his wrath and curse, and so made liable to all the miseries in this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell for ever. 'And were by nature children of wrath.' Eph 2:2. Adam left an unhappy portion to his posterity, Sin and Misery. Having considered the first of these, original sin, we shall now advert to the misery of that state. In the first, we have seen mankind offending; …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity Our Status.
"And he believed in the Lord: and he counted it to him for righteousness." --Gen. xv. 6. The right touches a man's status. So long as the law has not proven him guilty, has not convicted and sentenced him, his legal status is that of a free and law-abiding citizen. But as soon as his guilt is proven in court and the jury has convicted him, he passes from that into the status of the bound and law-breaking citizen. The same applies to our relation to God. Our status before God is that either of the …
Abraham Kuyper—The Work of the Holy Spirit Twenty Second Sunday after Trinity Paul's Thanks and Prayers for Churches.
Text: Philippians 1, 3-11. 3 I thank my God upon all my remembrance of you, 4 always in every supplication of mine on behalf of you all making my supplication with joy, 5 for your fellowship in furtherance of the gospel from the first day until now; 6 being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ: 7 even as it is right for me to be thus minded on behalf of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as, both in my bonds …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. III Elucidations.
I. (Deadly Sins, cap. ix., p. 356.) To maintain a modern and wholly uncatholic system of Penitence, the schoolmen invented a technical scheme of sins mortal and sins venial, which must not be read into the Fathers, who had no such technicalities in mind. By "deadly sins" they meant all such as St. John recognizes (1 John v. 16-17) and none other; that is to say sins of surprise and infirmity, sins having in them no malice or wilful disobedience, such as an impatient word, or a momentary neglect of …
Tertullian—The Five Books Against Marcion Rest for the Weary
Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. W hich shall we admire most -- the majesty, or the grace, conspicuous in this invitation? How soon would the greatest earthly monarch be impoverished, and his treasures utterly exhausted, if all, that are poor and miserable, had encouragement to apply freely to him, with a promise of relief, fully answerable to their wants and wishes! But the riches of Christ are unsearchable and inexhaustible. If millions and millions …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1 The Second Commandment
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am o jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of then that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments.' Exod 20: 4-6. I. Thou shalt not …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners:
A BRIEF AND FAITHFUL RELATION OF THE EXCEEDING MERCY OF GOD IN CHRIST TO HIS POOR SERVANT, JOHN BUNYAN; WHEREIN IS PARTICULARLY SHOWED THE MANNER OF HIS CONVERSION, HIS SIGHT AND TROUBLE FOR SIN, HIS DREADFUL TEMPTATIONS, ALSO HOW HE DESPAIRED OF GOD'S MERCY, AND HOW THE LORD AT LENGTH THROUGH CHRIST DID DELIVER HIM FROM ALL THE GUILT AND TERROR THAT LAY UPON HIM. Whereunto is added a brief relation of his call to the work of the ministry, of his temptations therein, as also what he hath met with …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3 Obedience
Take heed, and hearken, O Israel; this day thou art become the people of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt therefore obey the voice of the Lord thy God, and do his commandments.' Deut 27: 9, 10. What is the duty which God requireth of man? Obedience to his revealed will. It is not enough to hear God's voice, but we must obey. Obedience is a part of the honour we owe to God. If then I be a Father, where is my honour?' Mal 1: 6. Obedience carries in it the life-blood of religion. Obey the voice of the Lord …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments Psalms
The piety of the Old Testament Church is reflected with more clearness and variety in the Psalter than in any other book of the Old Testament. It constitutes the response of the Church to the divine demands of prophecy, and, in a less degree, of law; or, rather, it expresses those emotions and aspirations of the universal heart which lie deeper than any formal demand. It is the speech of the soul face to face with God. Its words are as simple and unaffected as human words can be, for it is the genius …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament Links Psalm 106:31 NIV
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