Numbers 12 - Impure Heart

Now this is a very interesting passage to me. Yesterday we saw the people complaining and now we hear of Aaron and Miriam complaining, feeling like they are as important as Moses because the Lord has also used them:

¹ While they were at Hazeroth, Miriam and Aaron criticized Moses because he had married a Cushite woman. ² They said, “Has the Lord spoken only through Moses? Hasn’t he spoken through us, too?”

So the Lord brings them all together and gives Miriam leprosy and she had to be kept out of the city for seven days.

Two things that I find interesting about this. The first is that Aaron does not get the punishment that Miriam gets. It seems rather unfair to me. Although, it would have been problematic for the High Priest to become unclean, it seems that Aaron got really lucky. Of course having Miriam get leprosy as punishment probably caused guilt for Aaron as he knew he was to blame and also community shame as they were related and the people understood leprosy to be a punishment from God. So I am sure all three of them actually felt punished.

The second is that Aaron and Miriam make their hearts unclean through their criticism and God makes that uncleanness visible in the form of leprosy. If i think about that idea, I realize that all that is happened is that an inner condition has been made visible. Don't thoughts against others and words spoken in jealousy, anger, hatred, etc give us leprosy of the heart.

I think God is reminding us that we can look just fine on the outside and appear unclean, while still being unclean on the inside. We shouldn't allow our outward appearance to let us think we are fine and pure. Just because others may see a clean person, it is not necessarily true. God sees the truth of our hearts and we need to be focused on acting based on how God sees us, rather than the world. I think this something that Miriam and Aaron forgot. They got focused on an earthly picture of Moses and compared that to their earthly view of themselves. This is the reason for God's anger and punishment.

This passage is a reminder that we need to examine our hearts for sings of uncleanness and deal with them with the Lord's help and keep a clean heart. Have you examined your heart lately or are you relying on an exterior view of how you are doing in righteousness?