Phineas' Decisive Action

‘Phineas, son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest has turned my anger away from the Israelites. Since he was zealous for my honour among them as I am …’ Numbers 25:11

Baalam the sorcerer (witch) was so firmly disciplined by the Lord that when he tried to utter curses over the Lord’s people, he could only bless them and speak out revelation about the Lord’s eternal purposes for them.

Nevertheless, Baalam did succeed in enticing the Lord’s people to commit immorality with the Moabite women, which led directly to them worshipping the Moabite idol-god Baal of Peor; Numbers 25:3.

Moses responded by commanding that all the leaders who did this must be put to death. But something changes at this point, because for the very first time in the whole exodus story, the people wept in repentance before the Lord.

And in this context, as the people are weeping before the tent of meeting, the leader of the Simeonite family takes the daughter of a Moabite leader into his tent right in front of everyone. Phineas, the grandson of Aaron the High Priest, sees what is happening and takes his spear and drives it through them both right then, while they were at it in the tent!

Now we would not do what Phineas did - we would be guilty of murder if we did, but the entire narrative of Numbers changes at this point. At this very moment, Numbers switches from being a narrative of failure to a journey into success.

As strange and unusual as this story is, it illustrates the profound truth that none of us shall ever enter into and participate fully in our inheritance in the kingdom until we make a decisive break with sin.

Something about what Phineas did reversed the endless cycle of failure of God’s people. This isn’t about being perfect or living a sinless life, but it is about following through on a public renunciation of evil.

And from this point on, not one thing went wrong. No one dies, there are no failures or rebellions and the new generation of Israelites comes into their inheritance.

There comes a point in our lives where we need to make a decisive stand with Christ, where we ‘deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him’.

That is the turning point.

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