The Jealousy That Brings Peace Text: Numbers 25:10-15
Introduction: A Culture of High-Handed Contempt
We live in an age that has made a virtue of insolence. Our entire culture is structured around the high-handed sin, the defiant gesture, the proud rebellion. Men parade their perversions down Main Street and demand that you call it courage. Academics teach our children that objective truth is a tool of oppression and demand that you call it education. And a neutered, timid church often stands by, weeping quietly at the door of the tabernacle, hoping the whole mess will just blow over.
The spirit of our age is the spirit of Zimri. It is not the spirit of a man who sins in a moment of weakness and is ashamed. It is the spirit of a man who takes a foreign princess by the hand, in broad daylight, in the very sight of Moses and all the congregation, and marches her into his tent. This is not a private failure; it is a public, theological statement. It is a press conference. Zimri was saying, "Your God, your laws, your covenant, your weeping, your pathetic piety, mean nothing to me. I will do what I want, with whom I want, when I want. And I will do it in your faces." This is the very definition of a high-handed sin. It is sinning with a raised fist.
And what is God's response to such public, covenantal contempt? Our modern sensibilities, marinated in a sentimental therapeutic goo that we mistake for Christianity, would expect a gentle rebuke. Perhaps a task force on intercultural relations. But God's response is a spear. God's response is the righteous, zealous, violent action of a man named Phinehas. And for this act, which would have our modern evangelical leaders clutching their pearls and dialing their lawyers, God commends Phinehas, stops a plague that had killed twenty-four thousand people, and grants him a covenant of peace and a perpetual priesthood.
This is one of those passages that sorts men out. It is a filter. If your first reaction is to be embarrassed by Phinehas, to try and explain him away, then it is very likely that the spirit of Zimri has a much greater hold on you than you imagine. But if you want to understand God, and His holiness, and His wrath, and the nature of true atonement, and the kind of leadership that brings peace, then you must come to grips with what happened at Peor. You must understand the jealousy of Phinehas.
The Text
Then Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, "Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned away My wrath from the sons of Israel in that he was jealous with My jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the sons of Israel in My jealousy. Therefore say, 'Behold, I give him My covenant of peace; and it shall be for him and his seed after him, a covenant of a perpetual priesthood, because he was jealous for his God and made atonement for the sons of Israel.' " Now the name of the slain man of Israel who was slain with the Midianite woman, was Zimri the son of Salu, a leader of a father’s household among the Simeonites. And the name of the Midianite woman, who was struck down, was Cozbi the daughter of Zur, who was head of the people of a father’s household in Midian.
(Numbers 25:10-15 LSB)
God's Jealousy in a Man's Heart (vv. 10-11)
We begin with God's own commentary on the event. Notice that God is the one who interprets the action for us.
"Then Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, 'Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned away My wrath from the sons of Israel in that he was jealous with My jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the sons of Israel in My jealousy.'" (Numbers 25:10-11)
The first thing to see is that Phinehas's action was a wrath-turning action. A plague was raging through the camp because of the people's whoredom with the daughters of Moab and their idolatry with Baal of Peor. God's righteous anger was burning against His people. Phinehas, by executing the ringleaders of the public defiance, acted as a human lightning rod. He absorbed and deflected the wrath of God that was about to consume the entire nation. This is a profound picture of priestly, mediatorial work.
But why was this act so effective? God tells us plainly. It is because Phinehas "was jealous with My jealousy among them." This was not a personal vendetta. This was not a hot-headed tantrum. Phinehas was not acting out of his own frustration. God says that the jealousy that animated Phinehas was a divine jealousy. God's own zeal for His own glory was burning in the heart of His priest.
We have to get our minds straight about this word "jealousy." In our flabby therapeutic culture, jealousy is always a petty, sinful emotion. It is the green-eyed monster of insecurity. But biblical jealousy is altogether different. God is jealous for His own honor because He is the only one worthy of honor. For God not to be jealous for His own glory would be for Him to commit idolatry. God's jealousy is the white-hot, protective, covenantal love He has for His own name and for His own people. It is the fury of a loving husband against an adulterous rival who is seeking to defile his bride. When Israel went whoring after other gods, they were committing spiritual adultery, and this provoked God's holy jealousy (Deut. 32:16, 21).
Phinehas shared this passion. He loved what God loved, and he hated what God hated. He saw the public fornication of Zimri and Cozbi not as a lifestyle choice, but as a blasphemous act of cosmic treason. He saw it as God saw it. And because his heart was aligned with God's heart, his action was aligned with God's action. This is the essence of righteous zeal. It is not about our temperament; it is about our theology. It is about whose side you are on. Phinehas was on God's side, and so God was on his.
The Covenant of Peace and Priesthood (vv. 12-13)
For this act of holy jealousy, God gives Phinehas a remarkable, twofold reward.
"Therefore say, 'Behold, I give him My covenant of peace; and it shall be for him and his seed after him, a covenant of a perpetual priesthood, because he was jealous for his God and made atonement for the sons of Israel.' " (Numbers 25:12-13)
First, God gives him a "covenant of peace." This is a rich, covenantal term. It is not simply the absence of conflict. It is shalom. It is wholeness, well-being, flourishing, and security. It is ironic, is it not? The man who wielded a spear in a moment of righteous violence is given the covenant of peace. Our world thinks peace comes from tolerance, from blurring all distinctions, from letting everyone do what is right in his own eyes. The Bible teaches that true, lasting peace, true shalom, is only possible when sin is dealt with decisively. Peace is not the fruit of compromise; it is the fruit of righteousness. When holiness is defended and sin is judged, peace is the result. Phinehas brought peace to Israel by making war on sin in the camp.
Second, God gives him and his descendants "a covenant of a perpetual priesthood." Phinehas was already in the priestly line, but God here solidifies and guarantees that the high priesthood would remain in his family. Why? Because he acted like a true priest. The text says it was "because he was jealous for his God and made atonement for the sons of Israel." Notice that word: atonement. We tend to think of atonement only in terms of sacrifices on an altar. But here, the execution of defiant sinners is called an act of atonement. It covered the sin of the people. It satisfied the demands of God's justice. It cleansed the camp. This act was a liturgical act. It was a priestly act that restored fellowship between God and His people by removing the offense.
This points us straight to the Lord Jesus Christ. Phinehas is a type of Christ. Jesus is the ultimate man of zeal. "Zeal for your house will consume me" (John 2:17). He is the one who truly turns away the wrath of God. But He does it in a way that is profoundly different and infinitely more glorious. Phinehas took a spear and drove it through the guilty. Christ, our great High Priest, stood in the place of the guilty and had the spear of God's wrath driven through Himself. Phinehas made atonement by killing the sinners; Christ made atonement by being killed for the sinners. He is the fulfillment of this perpetual priesthood, a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. And He is the one who truly establishes the covenant of peace, having "made peace through the blood of His cross" (Col. 1:20).
The Naming of Names (vv. 14-15)
The passage concludes by giving us the names, ranks, and serial numbers of the two who were executed. This is not incidental detail.
"Now the name of the slain man of Israel who was slain with the Midianite woman, was Zimri the son of Salu, a leader of a father’s household among the Simeonites. And the name of the Midianite woman, who was struck down, was Cozbi the daughter of Zur, who was head of the people of a father’s household in Midian." (Numbers 25:14-15)
God wants their names recorded for all time as a memorial of high-handed rebellion. And notice their status. This was not some back-bencher, some nobody from the fringes of the camp. Zimri was a "leader," a prince in the tribe of Simeon. Cozbi was a princess, the daughter of a Midianite chief. This was an act of rebellion by the elites. This was a strategic, political, and religious alliance being flaunted in the face of God's covenant.
This is how covenantal decay always works. It is not the riff-raff who are the primary problem. The primary problem is always the leadership. When the princes of the people decide that God's law is optional, when they use their influence to mainstream rebellion, the nation is in mortal peril. Zimri was a man of influence, and he was using it to lead his people into idolatry and destruction. Cozbi was not some hapless victim; she was an agent of a foreign religion, a daughter of a people who were actively seeking to subvert Israel through seduction (cf. Num. 31:16).
God records their names to teach us that He sees. He knows who is responsible. Leadership carries a heavier weight of judgment. To whom much is given, much is required. And when those in authority lead others astray, their judgment is recorded in heaven and on earth as a warning to all who would follow in their footsteps.
Conclusion: Where Are the Men of Zeal?
So what are we to do with a story like this? We are not called to pick up literal spears. The new covenant administration is different from the old. We live in the time of the Spirit, not the sword, for the discipline of the church. But the principle of Phinehas's zeal is absolutely binding upon us. We are called to have the same heart, the same jealousy for the glory of God.
This means we must hate sin, especially public, defiant, high-handed sin. It means we must be willing to stand up and confront it, to call it what it is, without apology. When our culture parades its sin like Zimri, we cannot be the church that weeps quietly and hopes it goes away. We must be the church that stands in the breach and speaks the truth. Our spear is the Word of God, which is "sharper than any two-edged sword" (Heb. 4:12).
It means that fathers and elders in the church must exercise righteous discipline. When there is open, unrepentant sin in the camp, it must be dealt with. To fail to do so is to invite the plague of God's judgment. A church that tolerates a Zimri in its midst will soon find that the spirit of Zimri has become the spirit of the whole congregation. A little leaven leavens the whole lump.
And it means that we must look to Christ, the true Phinehas. He is the one who has truly made atonement. He is the one who gives us His covenant of peace. And it is only by being united to Him that we can have any share in this righteous zeal. Left to ourselves, our "zeal" is just a cover for our own pride and anger. But filled with His Spirit, we can be jealous with His jealousy. We can love what He loves, hate what He hates, and stand for His honor in a world that holds it in contempt. God is looking for a few good men of zeal. May He find them among us.