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Numbers 11 Journey Through the Bible Numbers 13
King James Version
The Book of Numbers
Chapter 12
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Commentary
Numbers 12
In the 12th Chapter of Numbers we see to what extent the People did weep and murmur and complain against God’s Divine Provisions. In verse one jealousy is born into the hearts of the two closest people in Moses’ life. How often it is true that the closer we become to others, the more prone we are to disappointment and even to the extent of retrogression. Miriam and Aaron even accused Moses as if he were not permitted to marry the Ethiopian woman.
Verse 2: In the 12th Chapter of Numbers we see to what extent the People did weep and murmur and complain against God's Divine Provisions. In verse one jealousy is born into the hearts of the two closest people in Moses' life.
Verse 7: Moses was not a prophet as was the standard for what a prophet was thought to be. Moses' level of obedience was his great strength, insomuch that God did speak through Moses "mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches" as do the prophets.
Verse 8:
Similitude:
8544 temuwnah (tem-oo-naw');
or temunah (tem-oo-naw'); from 4327; something portioned (i.e. fashioned) out, as a shape, i.e. (indefinitely) phantom, or (specifically) embodiment, or (figuratively) manifestation (of favor):
KJV-- image, likeness, similitude.
“The embodiment of the Lord shall Moses behold.” A man of such high stature ought never to be disrespected. Imagine deliberately slandering the name of the president of the United States, deliberately, publicly, and in hostility. So much more so do we revile the Lord of Deliverance and Provision! We must be as Moses' meekness. We must be as Moses' obedience. We must reach a level of relationship with God that He may draw nigh to us without a veil of sin separating us from His face.
Verse 14: Here we see that God did declare how light a sentence He cast upon Miriam when he compared it to a spit in the face. Oh how far, far worse a consequence it could have been!
Verse 15: It is clear that division in and rebellion to God's will brings upon the Lord a great wrath. Proverbs 6:16 through 19 tells us what God hates. What He hates above all, to the extent that it is an abomination is what mankind purposes in his heart to sow discord among brethren. Miriam was banished from without the camp for a whole week of solitude and in great illness of leprosy.
We seem to have things as did the Israelites did in all of their wanderings. The whole thing, all of the story, from the very exodus from Egypt is a detailed parallel to our individual lives today. We seek after the things that which the heathens do. We purpose to “test it out”, to “try it on for size”, or “sample the goods” knowing that it is NOT good and that the wrath of God kindled is the farthest thing from our minds.
If it were so that the People never did intermingle among the heathen nations to learn of their ways, it might also be so that we were not tempted by those things. God did not provide those temptations. However, He is faithful to provide for us a way of Redemption. If only we will turn away from our sinful indulgence; if only we turn not our foot again to the ways of the worldly people, the people of darkness and in them is not light, maybe then we can see clearly in the Light of Life, the Light of Love, of Wisdom and Power. I hope for us all that we find our individual way to a oneness with God, and not just in theory. My hope is real. My hope is in You, Lord. This is my prayer, and I pray it in Jesus’ Name, amen.
