The Lord Comes Down – September 29, 2021

[God said] “Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” The anger of the LORD burned against them, and he left them. When the cloud lifted from above the tent, Miriam’s skin was leprous—it became as white as snow. . . . So Moses cried out to the LORD, “Please, God, heal her!”
Numbers 12:8-10,13

The Lord Comes Down

God was rightfully angry at Miriam. She had spoken against his chosen leader–Moses. He demonstrated his anger by allowing her to suffer a skin disease. He wanted her to realize how serious her sin was.

What’s remarkable is the way Moses reacted. He didn’t shake his head and say, “See, Miriam, see—this is what you get.” He couldn’t possibly have forgotten the verbal knives that were used to stab him in the back, the axes that were used to chop down his reputation and good name. His wounds were still as open and festering as Miriam’s. But when he saw his sister in pain and panicking, he wasted no time. “O God, please heal her.”

That is selfless ambition, Moses standing up for his sister, pleading for his sister, forgiving his sister not when he decided he was good and ready, but when she needed him.

And that reminds us of another time when the Lord came down—not in a pillar of cloud, but in barn rags in a manger in Bethlehem. There God came down once again, not in anger to reproach, but in love to save. God came down once again, not to accuse of sin and condemn of sin, but to take away the sin of the world. In his bitter dying, in his glorious rising, Jesus cried out, “O God, please heal them!” And so we hold this gem in our hands and hearts, and we marvel with wide-eyed wonder when the writer to the Hebrews says, “Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters” (Hebrews 2:11).

Prayer:
I give you my endless praise, Lord Jesus, for coming to heal me. May my praise and thanksgiving be evident in all that I do. Amen.