EPIPHANY 3
January 22/23, 2012
Pastor Timothy J. Spaude
Text: Numbers 25:1-13

“ZEALOUS FOR THE HONOR OF THE LORD!”
1. Because there is sin among God’s people.
2. Because there is a Savior among God’s people.

Numbers 25:1-13 (NIV 1984) “While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with Moabite women, 2 who invited them to the sacrifices to their gods. The people ate and bowed down before these gods. 3 So Israel joined in worshiping the Baal of Peor. And the LORD’s anger burned against them. 4 The LORD said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of these people, kill them and expose them in broad daylight before the LORD, so that the LORD’s fierce anger may turn away from Israel.” 5 So Moses said to Israel’s judges, “Each of you must put to death those of your men who have joined in worshiping the Baal of Peor.” 6 Then an Israelite man brought to his family a Midianite woman right before the eyes of Moses and the whole assembly of Israel while they were weeping at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. 7 When Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, saw this, he left the assembly, took a spear in his hand 8 and followed the Israelite into the tent. He drove the spear through both of them—through the Israelite and into the woman’s body. Then the plague against the Israelites was stopped; 9 but those who died in the plague numbered 24,000.
10 The LORD said to Moses, 11 “Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites; for he was as zealous as I am for my honor among them, so that in my zeal I did not put an end to them. 12 Therefore tell him I am making my covenant of peace with him. 13 He and his descendants will have a covenant of a lasting priesthood, because he was zealous for the honor of his God and made atonement for the Israelites.”

This is not the most appealing portion of God’s Word to deal with, is it? It’s X rated content is sadly PG 13 today. We have mass fornication, deadly plague and a graphically described double death of the two caught in the act. Yuck! And yet even this word of God is covered by the Holy Spirit’s promise that all Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. In the midst of the filth a man named Phineas, son of Eleazer, is called out by God as a light shining in a dark place, a man zealous for the honor of God. Let’s see how and why and what it means for us today.
We join what should be a spiritually matured people of God. This is after God rescued them from Egypt. After the giving of the law on Mt. Sinai, after water from the rock, 40 years of wandering and much more. These people have witnessed all kinds of demonstrations of God’s power and God’s mercy. They are now moving along the road to taking possession of the Promised Land. God gives their army victory after victory. The kings and kingdoms next in line are worried. The king of Moab had hired the mercenary prophet Balaam to curse God’s people but God would only let him bless. It seems that later Balaam must have given the Moabites an insider tip.”I can’t curse God’s people but they can curse themselves. Here’s what you do. Have your flirty women invite their men to a party. We’ll turn it into an idol worshipping fornicating party. That will get God’s attention.”
Boy did it ever! “So Israel joined in worshiping the Baal of Peor. And the LORD’s anger burned against them. 4 The LORD said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of these people, kill them and expose them in broad daylight before the LORD, so that the LORD’s fierce anger may turn away from Israel.” There was sin among God’s people, shameful sin as they did what everybody else was doing and followed their society’s immorality and idolatry. All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching and this certainly teaches us that God gets angry over sin, so angry He invoked the death penalty. But it got worse. After Moses delivered God’s death decree to the judges to carry out, this happened. “Then an Israelite man brought to his family a Midianite woman right before the eyes of Moses and the whole assembly of Israel while they were weeping at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.” Did he have no shame, flaunting this sin in front of God and His people? Soon he had no life for there was someone zealous for the honor of God. Phineas who took a spear and ended the offending of God. He was zealous for the honor of God because there was sin among God’s people.
That’s why there is still a need for someone to be zealous for the honor of God because there is still sin among God’s people today. We are the people of God. We don’t have exclusive right to that honor but we are the people of God. Wicked people like the Moabites surround us too, people who don’t have or want God’s morals. We can decry the porn industry and prostitution and drug dealing and political corruption and we should. But we must also admit that the Devil still sends seducers to try to get us to dishonor God’s name by joining ourselves to the idolatry and immorality of our society. Jesus lives in you. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. What have you been making Jesus watch on your TV’s and computers? What words do you make Him listen to? Drug use, drunkenness and fornication is happening in “good” WELS families. Why should God ever have to settle for second place in your weekly planner? But He does. There is sin among God’s people and a need for someone to be zealous for the honor of God. I am certainly not suggesting that any of us ought to pull out a spear and go hunting sinners down. I am certainly saying that we need to use the spear of God’s law and let it pierce through our hearts to expose sins we need to be ashamed of that do not honor God. We need to kill those attitudes that say certain sins are acceptable to us. Sin is never acceptable to those who are zealous for the honor of God.
Phineas was zealous for the honor of God and it was noticed. “Then the plague against the Israelites was stopped; 9 but those who died in the plague numbered 24,000. 10 The LORD said to Moses, 11 “Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites; for he was as zealous as I am for my honor among them, so that in my zeal I did not put an end to them.” Israel’s sins had brought God’s righteous wrath. Thankfully there was a Savior among God’s people. In a certain sense Phineas was a savior. His refusal to tolerate gross sin among God’s people blunted God’s anger. And yet that anger of God could only be turned away because there was the real Savior among God’s people. Do you remember why the physical nation of Israel was so important to God? It wasn’t because they were such great obedient people. Their history shows they were just like everybody else. They were important because God had promised to send a Savior for everyone’s sins and in God’s wisdom that real Savior would be born an Israelite. They were literally carrying the Savior with them in the bodies of Jesus’ ancestors. God’s righteous anger over the sin of people then and now was taken out in full on Jesus. He was punished for fornication, idolatry, drug use, drunkenness, porn peeking, potty mouths, using God’s name in vain, selfishness, giving God leftovers instead of firstfruits in time and money,…Shall I go on and on?
For every sin among God’s people there is the Savior Jesus. The Scriptures tell us, “With (God) there is forgiveness, therefore you are feared (Psalm 130:4). Here is our reason to be zealous for the honor of God. We have Savior! Phineas was zealous for the honor of God. He cared about the reputation the Savior God had and he did something about it. Will you? Is there a Phineas amongst us? Could we possibly have a church full of Phineas’s or is that Phineai? It is our prayer that we do. In coordination with the Elders and other leaders of our congregation your pastors will be directing a program for our congregation. At this time we don’t have a building program of brick and mortar. Rather we will direct a program that seeks to build the honor for God among us. We are going to focus on our attitudes with the hope it will affect actions. For this first year we will be emphasizing honoring God with word and worship. We pray that all of you will join us as willing participants to examine our attitudes and use of God’s Word personally and corporately. We pray that this zealousness for the honor of God will be seen. We look for God to be pleased and to bless us.
Phineas was zealous for the honor of God in attitude and action and God was pleased. He said, “Therefore tell him I am making my covenant of peace with him. 13 He and his descendants will have a covenant of a lasting priesthood, because he was zealous for the honor of his God and made atonement for the Israelites.” Wow! What an honor Phineas received. Wouldn’t it be nice to be honored by God as well? Wouldn’t it be nice to hear God say, “St. Jacobi, now those are people who are zealous for the honor of God?” Will you be? Amen.