Leah, Rachel, Jochebed, Miriam: December 2019
Table of Contents
Leah, Rachel, Jochebed, Miriam
As one ponders over a list of Old Testament saints, one finds all classes and characters associated together and wonders what bond links them. They knew nothing clearly of the value of the blood of Christ, but they had this in common — they were all the children of faith. They all believed God—not about Him, but believed in Him as a person and what He said to them. Faith is the bridge over which they all passed from time to a glorious eternity. We would suggest as an interesting study that the grounds on which each is admitted into the list be searched out and classified. Those whose faith is recorded might be placed in one list, while those whose works or lives would indicate a new life in a second list. Such a study gives insight into the fundamental principles of godly character which always remain the same.
The following are a few women we have put in our two lists. Five that we have placed in our first list are Sarah, Jochebed, Rahab, Hannah and Huldah. We put the following twelve in our second list: Eve, Hagar, Rebekah, Rachel, Leah, Shiphrah, Puah, Miriam, Ruth, the wife of Phinehas, Abigail and Esther.
Bible Student, Volume 2, 1882 (adapted)
Rachel and Leah
Family Character and Grace
In a previous issue of The Christian (September 2019), we have considered the family character of Rebekah, which she passed on to her younger son Jacob. In looking chronologically further at women in Scripture, we come upon Rachel and Leah, who were part of the same family. They became the wives of Jacob, but they were actually his first cousins, daughters of Rebekah’s brother Laban. They too display this family character, and it is instructive to see how it is exhibited.
The story is well-known of how Jacob was compelled to leave his home to escape the wrath of his brother Esau, whom he had cheated out of the blessing belonging to him as the elder son. He flees to Haran, to his mother’s brother, and falls in love with his younger daughter Rachel. He strikes a bargain with Laban to work for him for seven years to obtain Rachel, of whom Scripture says that she was “of beautiful form and beautiful countenance” (Gen. 29:17 JND). Of her older sister Leah, Scripture says, “The eyes of Leah were tender [or weak]” (Gen. 29:17 JND).
Schemes and Deceptions
Here begins a sad history of scheming and deception on Laban’s part, but allowed on God’s part to teach Jacob a much-needed lesson. However, we are here dealing with Rachel and Leah. After working for seven years, Jacob claims Rachel as his wife, but in order to gain another seven years of “free” labor from Jacob, Laban gives Leah to Jacob — a trick that he does not discover until the morning after the wedding feast, because Leah would, no doubt, have been veiled at the wedding. While we allow for the obedience Leah might have felt was due to her father, yet she must have been party to this cruel scheme, and she could have alerted Jacob before the marriage had been consummated. All this bears sad fruit later on, as both she and her sister Rachel are evidently estranged from their father, again due to his avarice. Many years later, when Jacob proposes to them to leave Haran, they respond, “Are we not counted of him [Laban] strangers? for he hath sold us, and hath quite devoured our money” (Gen. 31:15). The normal relationship between their father and themselves had been soured by covetous dealings on Laban’s part.
Rachel
In the case of Rachel, her character is in some ways worse than that of Leah. Although she had captured Jacob’s heart with her physical beauty, there remained a sinful aspect of her character that displayed itself on more than one occasion. When the Lord blessed Leah with children, Rachel, overcome with envy, blamed her husband for her failure to conceive. Then, after giving Jacob her maid, Bilhah, who bore two sons, her comment was, “With great wrestling have I wrestled with my sister, and I have prevailed” (Gen. 30:8).
Later, she is guilty of a much greater sin, for when Jacob and his family secretly “stole away unawares” from Laban, she stole the heathen gods belonging to her father. Here were two serious sins — valuing heathen images instead of worshiping the true God and resorting to stealing them from her father, quite possibly in an attempt to “even the score” for Laban’s injustices toward her. But another sin was to come, for later, when Laban pursued after Jacob and accused him of stealing these gods, Rachel lied to him, having hidden them in the camel’s furniture and sat on them. Jacob had pronounced a death sentence on the one with whom these gods were found, not knowing that his beloved Rachel was the guilty one. No doubt they were discovered later, for we find Jacob getting before the Lord about the matter and eventually telling his family, “Put away the strange gods that are among you” (Gen. 35:2).
If there were any repentance on Rachel’s part, it is not recorded in Scripture, and we cannot help but feel that her subsequent dying in childbirth may well have been the government of God upon her. However, the event was evidently used of God to restore Jacob, for while Rachel called the son born to her Benoni (“son of my sorrow”), Jacob renames him Benjamin (“son of the right hand”).
Leah
In all this display of sinful family character, we also see God’s grace coming in. God had His eye not only on Jacob, but also on Leah and Rachel. Leah, the one who was part of Laban’s deception and who later desperately vies with Rachel for Jacob’s affection, is the mother of six of Jacob’s sons and also of his daughter Dinah. Among her sons is Judah, the father of the royal tribe, who exhibits to us an example of extreme sin, but then wonderful repentance and restoration. This only adds to Leah as a type of the church, which was not the first to be chosen of God (in time), but which is the first to be brought into blessing on the ground of grace. She does not have the natural appeal of Israel, for we read in 1 Corinthians 1:26, “Ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called.” No, for “God hath chosen ... the weak things of the world” and “base things” and “things which are despised” (vss. 27-28) to make up His church. But all this only abounds to God’s glory.
Types of Israel
However, God has not forgotten His earthly people. Rachel, a type of Israel, also comes into blessing on the ground of grace. Israel is not required to suffer the full penalty of her idolatry and lying, but rather is forgiven. Both of her sons are types of Christ. Joseph, her firstborn, is probably the most beautiful type of our Lord Jesus in the Old Testament, suffering wrongfully from both his own family and also from the Gentiles, but then raised up to the highest glory among the Gentiles. Benjamin is also a type of Christ, but in the character of the One who carries out judgment on the earth in a coming day. Thus, in the blessings of his sons, Jacob could say of Benjamin, “Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil” (Gen. 49:27). It is for this reason that Joseph and Benjamin are brought together in these blessings of Jacob, for jointly they complete the type of Christ. First He must suffer and then be exalted, but then He must carry out judgment before He can reign in righteousness.
Rachel, the first loved on earth, comes into blessing after Leah, a type of the church, but both are eventually blessed purely on the ground of grace. In this day of God’s grace, their sin is a warning for us not to allow a sinful family character to overshadow our lives, while in their blessing we see God’s grace overabounding, for “where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Rom. 5:20).
W. J. Prost
Leah's Sons
Israel, who was the betrothed of Jehovah (“Thy Maker is thine husband”; Isa. 54:5), fair through the comeliness that He had put upon her, proves herself barren and without fruit to God, and she is practically set aside. “Lo-ammi” (that is, “not My people”) is written upon her. This is typified in Rachel, one of Jacob’s wives.
Leah, the hated one — figure of the church in its aspect of being gathered from among the Gentiles — is then brought into blessing and fruitfulness; her reproach is taken away, and she who had not obtained mercy now has obtained mercy, so to speak. The result in the names of her children tells its own tale of sovereign grace.
Reuben
Her firstborn brings out an entirely new thing in God’s dealings: Reuben — “see” or “behold a son.” The day of bondage is now passed; the servants are no more to possess the house. “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God” (1 John 3:1). The servants slew the heir, and now the Son had come in and given the freedom of the house, with the title and privilege of sons, to all who received Him. We have no longer “the spirit of bondage again to fear,” but “a spirit of adoption” is ours, whereby we cry, “Abba, Father.” This is your place and mine, beloved, for the “fullness of time” has come. God has sent forth His Son, and we are no more servants but sons; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ (Gal. 4:4-7).
Simeon
How sweetly does her next son carry on the story of grace and tell us how we are brought into this privileged place. She bore another son and called his name “Simeon” — “hearing”; so Paul asks, Was it by works of law or by the hearing of faith (Gal. 3:2) that ye received the Spirit? By the “hearing of faith,” surely; so then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by God’s Word (Rom. 10:17). “He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life” (John 5:24). Simeon typifies God’s principle of action in this present dispensation — grace by the hearing of faith — for it is “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us” (Titus 3:5).
Levi
Leah bore another son and called his name “Levi” — “joined” — for she said, “Now... will my husband be joined unto me.” He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit — bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh. We are severed from our connections with the first man and united to a risen Christ in glory, made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Old things have passed away; all things have become new. We are of the new creation, vitally and eternally connected with the second Man, the Lord from heaven — a union which is now the portion of all God’s children, to be known and enjoyed as their proper privilege.
Judah
How fitly does her next born son, the fourth (completing the perfect fruit of God’s grace), bear the name of “Judah” — “praise!” It is our joy and privilege, as those who are sons of God by pure, sovereign grace, to offer up “the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name” (Heb. 13:15). Yes, it is meet that we should praise the Lord and call upon all that is within us to bless His holy name, since He has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. In seeking worshipers to worship Him in spirit and in truth, He has sought and found us. Let us, then, not forget that this is our holy privileged occupation. If in Levi we get the priesthood, and we are — though after another order — a holy priesthood, to offer up sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:5), still more we are a royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:7), and the kingdom is ours in joint heirship with Christ. He that loved us and has washed us from our sins in His own blood has made us a kingdom, even priests unto God and His Father (Rev. 1:5-6).
May we not, then, exclaim, as we enter into the blessed fact that we are sons — and sons by pure grace — in union with a risen Christ, privileged to praise our God as we wait for the kingdom to be manifested: “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!... For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen” (Rom. 11:33,36).
Christian Truth, Vol. 5 (adapted)
Rachel's Death
“They journeyed from Bethel; and there was yet but a little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor. And it came to pass when she had hard labor, that the midwife said to her, Fear not; thou shalt have this son also. And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing (for she died) that she called his name Benoni [son of my sorrow]: but his father called him Benjamin [son of right hand]. And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. And Jacob set a pillar upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel’s grave unto this day” (Gen. 35:16-20).
The Government of God
The moral government of God is as sure as His grace, from the beginning to the end. Rachel had greatly sinned and kept her husband in the dark, when he unconsciously said that the one guilty (of stealing Laban’s images) should not live. Her theft was not only a sin against her father, but in what she stole, it was a heinous insult to God. And we have no evidence that there was adequate self-judgment. It is plain that Jacob at length became aware of idols in his household, the sin of which God’s call to Bethel laid on his conscience. To take his beloved away was a chastening, not to her only but to him also.
First Corinthians 11:27-32 is a most instructive teaching on the application of this truth, in which we learn the security of grace on the one hand, and on the other the Lord’s dealing with the inconsistent ways of those that are His. The Lord was then judging by sickness and even death the faulty state and walk of the Corinthian saints, that they should not be condemned with the world, because they were His and to be kept from “damnation.” They were judged in this temporal way for the blessing of their souls. It is a universal principle of God, and it is present in both Old and New Testaments. Only the display of grace under the gospel brings out not only His sovereign grace, but also His moral government, with special clearness.
Sorrow and Hope
Rachel’s name for the newborn child expresses her sorrow; Jacob, whatever his natural feelings over the dying wife of his heart, looks forward in hope. But it is not a heavenly hope in Benjamin, as Abraham had in Isaac, received from death to resurrection in a parable; it is the pledge of Israel in power, when she that represented the former state passes away by death. Israel must at the close be brought through deep affliction before emerging into victory over all their foes on the earth, through their long-disowned Messiah.
“Fear not” from the attending midwife was well-meant, but the Lord was calling her away from a scene where she had failed in testimony to Him and compromised her husband too. How could she be trusted in training her offspring in His fear? God had added another son, as she had said in faith, when her firstborn was given. It was fitting that she should depart.
Rachel’s Descendants
Little did Jacob think, when he erected a pillar of thanksgiving at Bethel in the place where God talked with him, that he would so soon after erect another pillar — one of sorrow upon Rachel’s grave. But he bows to the hand of chastening: Whom the Lord loves, He chastises, and scourges every son whom He receives. Jacob could not know, as it was not yet revealed, that near this very Ephrath should be born David, the king of Israel, the pledge and type of his greater Son, whose goings forth are from of old — from everlasting. The smitten Judge of Israel, who gave up His guilty people, will one day restore them, so that they shall abide and He be great, unto the ends of the earth.
Rachel dies, but the pillar that records it stands in Israel’s land and history till the kingdom. Benjamin himself typifies Christ, not at all as head of the church, but as the conquering Son of might when the kingdom is established in the land and the enemies perish before Him. Thus the two wives of Jacob aptly represent the fruitful Leah, and mother of the nations, and Rachel, Jacob’s first loved, who typified Israel after the flesh. After her comes Joseph, the bright witness of Christ sold and separate from His brethren, at God’s right hand while the Jews are disowned. Rachel’s dying gives birth to the son of her sorrow, but son of his father’s right hand, who shall devour the prey in the morning and at even divide the spoil (Gen. 49:27). “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong” (Isa. 53:12).
W. Kelly (adapted)
Jochebed and her family
She crouches on the floor, a pot of pitch beside her, and carefully works on the basket she has spent the past few nights weaving. Her three-month-old baby boy is strapped snugly on her back, while three-year-old Aaron is watching closely and Miriam runs errands for her mother about the house. Both Amram and Jochebed would likely have spent their days in the extreme heat of the Egyptian sun, making bricks. Here is a godly young Hebrew family enduring very hard times.
Jochebed is a woman of faith and she is not about to have her young baby son drowned in the river Nile. Yes, she plans to put him into the river, but in safety. How far ahead is she looking in faith? I believe all the way to the redemption of her people. She must have known the part of the river where Pharaoh’s daughter bathed. It is here that the basket is placed and here that young sister Miriam waits, ready to make her mother’s proposal to the princess. How it must have strengthened Miriam’s childhood faith to see it all come to pass! All day while working for the Pharaoh, the young mother must have been pleading with God in whom she trusted for the well-being of her little son.
The Faith of Abraham
It reminds us of Abraham setting off with Isaac, a history that Jochebed must have known well. Could God spare and use her son as well? Would there be a deliverance for her as well? And a blessed and useful life for her son? Years later we see Hannah walking to Shiloh hand in hand with her little son. Only great faith in a loving and all-wise God could work in hearts this way.
Miriam does not have to wait long. Her beautiful little brother is discovered by a woman whose heart God has touched. She is the one who names the child Moses, and she agrees to the plan to have Jochebed nurse him for her.
What a precious few years the mother now has with her son. Mothers of today, make the most of those early, formative years with your child. Moses learned the love of his family. Miriam, Aaron and Moses were a close trio of siblings all their lives. He also learned to love his race, God’s chosen people, and to love and honor the one true God. Jochebed knew her time was limited before she must send Moses back into Pharaoh’s court to be learned in “all the wisdom of the Egyptians.” But I believe that she had peace through her faith in God that all would be well and would ultimately lead to the deliverance of God’s people. We do not read anything further of her in Scripture. We do not know if she experienced the joy of the exodus of her people, so many years later.
Jochebed’s Children
But Jochebed’s children and grandchildren come alive for us in the pages of Scripture. Moses, at the age of 80, is prepared and ready to do God’s bidding and approach Pharaoh. Aaron his brother steps in with help and support. After the final deliverance, on the far banks of the Red Sea, we see Miriam taking a timbrel in her hand and leading the women in singing and dancing for joy. “Sing ye to the Lord, for He hath triumphed gloriously” (Ex. 15:21). She must have been close to 90 years of age! She had waited a long time for this day, now far removed from the banks of the river Nile, with its reeds and rushes and little basket.
Faith Tested
Time moves on and all does not run smoothly through the generations. Aaron makes a golden calf. Two of Jochebed’s grandsons are consumed by fire for their disobedience. Her daughter is temporarily disciplined with leprosy. Her Moses is not allowed into that Promised Land. Was she a failure? What far-reaching blessing from her act of faith! Her people arrive in Canaan. Great-grandchildren fight to win and hold their inheritance.
What an encouragement Jochebed’s faith can be to mothers today! We walk through a sinful, idolatrous world, and our children are surrounded by it. Yet her faith in God also worked in her children’s hearts so that, in turn, they valued what she did (Heb. 11:24-25). It would seem that the Lord in His mercy and grace granted over and above what she was asking in faith as she worked on that little basket.
“Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompense of reward” (Heb. 10:35).
W. J. and C. P. Prost
Jochebed
It is a delight to consider Amram and Jochebed as parents, in the second chapter of Exodus. The wife seems to have been the moving spirit here, and perhaps this is hardly to be wondered at, as Jochebed was Amram’s aunt (Ex. 6:20). But there is no suggestion that Amram did not have his rightful place in that little home in Egypt. Hebrews 11:23 tells us, “By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid of the king’s commandment.” Those of us who have lived in a land dominated by a hostile foe can perhaps better appreciate the magnificent courage of this devoted couple, when they were not afraid of the king’s commandment. It was a trial of their faith, but we know that it was “much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire” (1 Peter 1:7). And how God honored their faith! Each of their three children became one of His own honored servants.
What a cheer to parents today to take a stand boldly on the Lord’s side for their children, to count on Him alone, and to fear no man! Surely He will still honor such faith today, just as He honored it in the days of Amram and Jochebed.
Obedience and Faith
But Jochebed teaches us another most lovely lesson. Pharaoh had charged all his people, saying, Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river. Jochebed obeys the king. She owns that the king’s command applies to her son, and she casts him into the river, but hidden in an ark, so that not one drop of those waters of death could touch him. And God richly honors her faith. You all know the story. The king’s daughter takes him up, and the baby’s sister runs to “call a nurse,” who is no other than the child’s own mother. With what joy she takes that little one from the arms of the king’s daughter, not now for herself, but for the one who had saved him. “Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages” (Ex. 2:9).
So is it with us. Every Christian parent has the privilege of owning that the child God has given them is under the sentence of death. He may put the child down into those waters of death, owning that this is where the child belongs, but another has passed through those waters first. Now, the One on whom we count to save our children gives the child back to us, saying, “Take this child away, and nurse it for Me, and I will give thee thy wages.” It is ours no longer. The One into whose hands we have placed it has accepted it, and now returns it to us to bring up for Himself, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. This does not mean that each child does not need a personal, saving faith for itself, but it does, in God’s own way, confess that the child is under the sentence of death. We have the privilege of counting on the Lord, who passed through those dark waters, to save it. We receive it back in a new way — no longer ours, but His to “nurse” for Him, and what rich wages He pays, if we truly seek to do this for Himself.
G. C. Willis (adapted)
Miriam the Girl
A carefully made, covered cradle of rushes, with a helpless baby in it, rocking among the reeds of the ancient Egyptian Nile, is the object of God’s deep interest and solicitude, of a mother’s steadfast faith, and of a sister’s watchfulness. God’s purposes with regard to the future of His chosen people, their release from bondage and their safe conduct to the land of promise are centered in that little three-month-old baby.
He was to be Israel’s deliverer and leader, and his mother Jochebed seems wonderfully taught of God when she accepts for her child what so vividly spoke of death, putting full confidence in the God of resurrection and power. In the dignity of faith she commits her little son to the waters of death and calmly waits for God to work. There is no nervous hurry, worry or excitement. Her trust is in Jehovah, and nothing seems to shake it.
Miriam, Moses’ elder sister, was standing “afar off” to see what would happen to her little brother. Although perhaps she possessed not the far-seeing faith of Jochebed that pierced the gloomy clouds of oppression and cruelty weighing so heavily upon God’s people at this time, she was not too far off for God to use her in the furtherance of His purposes, and she is ready when the moment comes for her to act.
Stand and Wait
It is a very great honor to be used of God in the carrying out of the smallest part of His all-wise plans, and for this we need to have His mind about things and to take stock of everything from the divine standpoint. By nature we have a warped, exaggerated vision. How much we need to be taught of God — even how to stand and wait.
Miriam stands and waits to some purpose. She watches the finding of her baby brother by the Egyptian princess, and then, with a God-given thought, she hastens to the royal lady’s side. May she find a nurse for the child among the Hebrew women? This is God’s ordering, and the hearts of all are in His hand, so a ready assent is given. Miriam’s heart directs her feet and she hastens to fetch her mother, which results in the fact that her dearly-loved babe is given back to her tender nurture and training, and with him the wages — that which will provide for every temporal need.
That is how God rewards faith — faith being His own gift. Oh! to have to do with such a God of love, for He is the same today: “Changeless through all the changing years.”
Miriam, having fulfilled her part, disappears from view, and many years elapse before we meet with her again. Doubtless all this time she was being taught by God for the part she had yet to fill, which was by no means an unimportant one.
Author unknown
Miriam
Those angels who have desired to look into the progress of earthly dispensations could hardly have had a more interesting sight than they had when, more than three thousand years ago, they watched little Miriam “minding the baby.” If they only could have known who the baby that lay in that rude cradle was to become and what stupendous work he was to accomplish! But poor little Miriam, the Hebrew slave-child, could have known nothing of all that. She probably felt only a horrible dread when the retinue of the princess of Egypt approached and a suffocating fright when the crying baby was drawn forth from his hiding-place by the people who had decreed his death. The baby was, it appears, a singularly attractive one. His parents, we read, considered him “a goodly child,” “a proper child,” “exceeding fair.” I am aware that this view of their progeny is rather common to parents, but Moses’ parents were godly people, and evidently they recognized God’s special grace in giving them this child. No doubt Miriam was quite gratified to observe that the princess was evidently pleased with the child and amiably disposed toward it. This is the moment which Miriam seizes to run forward and ask whether she would like her to fetch a Hebrew woman to nurse it for her. Do so, says the princess, and the girl hurries away to bring Jochebed — the baby’s own mother. This was one of the finest pieces of finesse ever known. The courage and resourcefulness shown by Miriam, together with her devotion to a task at once monotonous and dangerous, gives an impression of her which enables us to read without surprise later on that she is a prophetess and leads the choral worship of the entire redeemed nation on the banks of the Red Sea. It is gratifying to find that she has thrown in her lot with the oppressed and calumniated nation, the people of God.
Humble Duties
This was outwardly an extraordinary advance in occupation. She had been faithful in that which was least, that which appeared to be a humble and menial duty, and now she was set among those who led God’s host. We do not usually rate the services of a nursemaid very high, but still she may be, like this one whom we are considering, doing work of enormous importance in guarding the beginning of some God-inspired life. We learn that if we willingly and thoroughly perform the humble duty that lies near at hand, we shall always be doing right and may possibly be carrying out some work of stupendous and eternal importance. Yes, Miriam may have thought she was only “minding the baby,” when all the time she was watching over the destinies of the planet!
When the princess had received the infant in so friendly a fashion, most watchers would have quietly gone away home quite satisfied, but Miriam clinches the nail and makes it a rivet. Again when that mighty burst of national worship rose at the Red Sea bank, it was Miriam who closed the great and glorious anthem with its final note. Let us not consider any honest work mean or despicable. By doing it for the Lord we can make the action worthwhile. It does not lower one to do humble duty in the poorest circumstances, for David was a shepherd, Amos a herdsman, the apostles mostly fishermen, and their Master was called “the carpenter.”
Failure and Restoration
When Moses after many years had arrived at maturity, he married an Ethiopian bride. Miriam did not at all approve and went about “saying things,” which Aaron encouraged. Was Moses the only one by whom the Lord had spoken? Had he not also spoken by them? Moses, “meek above all the men that were upon the face of the earth,” does nothing to resent this, but Jehovah intervenes with a sudden and terrible chastisement. Aaron, the weak-natured and misled one, is leniently dealt with, but Miriam is of a different character and greater responsibility. They are both sternly rebuked, and Miriam is smitten with leprosy!
Then there arises to her brother an opportunity for returning some of her ancient care. “Moses cried unto the Lord, Heal her now, O God, I beseech thee” (Num. 12:13). If she can no longer expect his submission to her will, the love of those early years is not dead. His prayer is heard.
J. C. Bayley (adapted)
Miriam's Song
Miriam, having fulfilled her part in Moses’ adoption by Pharaoh’s daughter, disappears from view, and many years elapse before we meet with her again. Doubtless all this time she was being taught by God for the part she had yet to fill, which was by no means an unimportant one. She had evidently linked herself with the people of God in a marked way and was looked up to by them, for she is introduced to us in Exodus 15:20 as “the prophetess, the sister of Aaron.”
From this we gather that she was instructed in the Lord’s ways and used of Him to reveal His mind to the women of Israel, over whom she seemed to have influence.
When Moses and the children of Israel, exulting in their wonderful deliverance from Egypt and from their enemies the Egyptians, sing that beautiful song of triumph to the Lord, it is Miriam who, stirred by the glorious words, leads forth the women to join the wondrous song and swell the chorus, “Sing ye to the Lord, for He hath triumphed gloriously.” Thus, at the outset of the wilderness journey, in company with the Lord’s redeemed people, with their enemies dead behind them, the deep waters of the Red Sea between them and the land of their bondage, with the Lord’s presence with them in the visible pillar of the cloud to be their guide and protection, she can lead the Lord’s praises in notes of triumphant song. If we know what it is in our souls to be in Miriam’s position of victory, we too shall have to sing His praises, not with voice only, but from the depths of our adoring hearts.
The Voice Against Moses
The beautiful song itself we cannot here consider in detail, but the close of it is grand — the inheritance, the sanctuary and the Lord’s everlasting reign. Oh, that this might have been the closing act of Miriam’s life! But there is another picture, and a very sad one, portrayed for us in Numbers 12. Miriam and her brother Aaron speak against Moses for an act which they consider to be unseemly, throwing doubt on his God-given leadership, thus manifesting envy and insubordination in a very sad way. What a sad example to the congregation, and how their conduct added to the burden of their brother’s already strenuous life!
This was most displeasing to God, who would not allow this evil spirit to continue for a moment. It is very beautiful to see how the Lord comes in and vindicates Moses as His servant above reproach. As a mark of His deep displeasure, the Lord afflicted Miriam, the instigator of the evil speaking, with leprosy, thus showing her and all the congregation how sinful her action was in His sight. It was only upon Aaron’s confessing and judging the sin and Moses’ earnest prayer on her behalf that the Lord healed her. The solemn impress of the Lord’s hand of chastisement was felt by the whole congregation, for they “journeyed not” until Miriam was again restored to the camp in health. How deep and far-reaching is the effect of sin!
How careful we should be to have everything open to the sight of “Him with whom we have to do.” “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psa. 139:23-24).
Author unknown
Miriam's Sin
In Numbers 12 we have two different lessons to which we will do well to take heed. The one is to beware of spiritual pride and to bow to God’s will in the order of His house; the other, God’s intervention on behalf of His despised servant. “Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married.” Moses rejected by Israel (Acts 7:27) and in exile marrying a Gentile was the foreshadowing of the rejection of One greater than he, who during the time of His rejection calls His bride from among the Gentiles. But this marriage affords a specious opportunity for disputing the position of Moses whose meekness, so marked in wishing that all the Lord’s people were prophets, does not shelter him from envy and depreciation. Indeed it not infrequently happens that the most meek are the most exposed to the shafts of envy, to the disparaging statements of those who are greatly inferior. Here, not even the tie of nature prevented Miriam and Aaron from speaking against their brother. The pretense is his marriage with the Ethiopian woman, but it was only a peg on which to hang their envy.
Miriam and Aaron soon show their real thoughts and advance themselves as of equal importance with Moses. Not his marriage, but rather his position offends them. “Hath Jehovah indeed spoken only by Moses? Hath He not spoken also by us?” But there is a far more solemn thing than losing the esteem of man. “Jehovah heard it.” When the heart is under the influence of such bad feelings, it easily finds an excuse for speaking against God’s servants. But the Lord will soon bring every secret thing into the light, and the hidden spring will appear. Then each will receive according to the things done in the body.
The prominence given to Moses when God miraculously confirmed His word by him in providing flesh for the people seems that which so particularly stirred up the envy of Miriam and Aaron. But such an outbreak was the result of feelings which had been permitted to grow and take form in their heart. It is well to remember that if we allow and do not judge the root, God will make the fruit manifest, and to our shame. It is evident that the indulgence of evil in their hearts had rendered them both incapable of estimating the true position of Moses, but God confirms Moses in his place and asserts His own sovereignty as to whom He speaks and the manner of communication. He assigns to each his place in His house. Aaron would intrude into the office God had given to Moses. There was not merely envy and pride, but the spirit of disobedience against God.
The Meekness of Moses
It was a solemn moment when Jehovah said, “Come out, ye three, unto the tabernacle of the congregation.” What a lesson here for the servants of the Lord in the face of depreciation and criticism! What a testimony the Spirit gives of this man! “The man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.” Yet afterward he failed in meekness (Num. 20:10). There was but one perfect Man the earth ever saw, who never failed, and who could say of Himself, “I am meek and lowly in heart” (Matt. 11:29). Moses was only a man, and to have asserted his own meekness would have proved the contrary, but the Holy Spirit declares it. The question now apparently is between Moses on the one side and Miriam and Aaron on the other. He who was prompt to act and be foremost in separation, when the question was between Jehovah and idolatry, is now meek and silent in the presence of his depreciators. But as he formerly stood for God, now God appears for him. God takes the matter up as His own, and the two guilty ones are made to know that it is not so much against Moses as against God they have spoken. And mark how God puts honor upon His faithful and meek servant. Moses on the former occasion stood boldly for the honor of God; now God appears for him and puts honor upon him. None has such intimacy with God as he. “If there be a prophet among you, I Jehovah will make Myself known unto him in a vision and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all Mine house. With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently [visibly], and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of Jehovah shall he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against My servant Moses?”
Miriam Smitten
Miriam is smitten with leprosy and only restored at the intercession of the man she had depreciated. And Aaron also has to bow and acknowledge the superior place of Moses. “Alas, my lord, I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us wherein we have done foolishly, and wherein we have sinned.” “Moses cried unto Jehovah saying, Heal her now, O God, I beseech Thee,” and an immediate proof of his intimacy with God is given. After the necessary seclusion of seven days, Miriam was brought in again. And thus Moses necessarily stands higher than he did before. God knows how to bring down pride and provide for the honor of His servants when they are meek, and not less in this day than when Moses lived. Only let not servants attempt to vindicate themselves. The right way and the right time are known to God alone.
Consequences
The whole congregation feels the consequences of Miriam’s position; while she is shut up, the people do not journey. But the more prominent, the more responsible, and the more marked is the judgment. This is a principle that is always seen in God’s government. Miriam takes the lead in the sin.
Another consequence of the leprosy of Miriam is that the native energy of God in leading the people through the wilderness is suspended. God would show the people that it was no ordinary failure, nor was she an ordinary person. Such a sin as hers could only have been by one in her position. Neither she nor Aaron were novices, but they fell into the condemnation of the devil (1 Tim. 3:6). God resented their speaking against His servant; in no other case do we read of God’s challenge, “Were ye not afraid?” When a “leader” sins, the consequences for the congregation or for the assembly are far greater than if another fails. The influence of leaders in the assembly of God is a solemn reality, and their position is a weighty factor in the discipline which failure inevitably brings. The body suffers if the least member is injured, but much more if it is an important member. Individual members of the church of God may not through a leader’s failure lose communion with God, nor cease to grow in grace and in knowledge, even while bearing the common shame on their heart and being humbled on account of it. But the assembly as a whole is hindered in the path of public testimony for Christ, and there cannot be greater hindrances to corporate testimony than the spirit that actuated Miriam and Aaron — a spirit that has dared to intrude into the church of God. As a witness for Christ, the church of God is like Miriam shut up as a leper. Will the leprosy be healed? Yes, I am fully persuaded that God will bring the simple and faithful into closer intimacy with Himself, and that by a deeper feeling of dependence upon Him. Thus, though it is a narrower sphere and more manifest weakness, grace will produce a brighter and a clearer testimony.
R. Beacon (adapted)
Take This Child Away (Ex. 2:9)
What shall we ask for our little child?
Shall we ask for fame in this world defiled?
For the dear-bought wisdom of earthly springs,
Or a skillful hand in the use of things?
Oh, no, our wishes much higher go
Than the highest mount with its cap of snow;
And the heart’s desire must wider be
Than the utmost stretch of the boundless sea.
We ask for the blessing of God above
And an early sense of the Savior’s love,
An early share of His wondrous grace,
And an early start to seek His face;
A soul that is cleansed by the Savior’s blood,
A heart that is kept by the peace of God,
Where the very God of peace may dwell,
His holy secrets of love to tell.
Feet that shall walk in the path of life
And follow the Lamb through stress and strife,
That following on through pain and loss
It may learn the worth of the Savior’s cross,
A place in the heart for the words of truth
And Jesus for guide from the earliest youth;
Great things we ask for our little child,
A place in God’s universe undefiled,
A home in the place where His Son Supreme
And His wondrous cross are the dearest theme.
Anon.