We’re going to take a hiatus from Mark for a few months in order to lay down some groundwork from Isaiah starting next week, but first I want to cover the very misunderstood and abused virtue of zealousness. Who in Scripture has it and who simply suffers from a profound lack of self-control or a lack of understanding of what God wants from us? And how does it all relate to how we are called to live boldly for God while still loving others?
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Note: This is a transcript and so it is not edited, as that takes a long time on a document this size. Unless I said something profane, just ignore all mistakes.
Hey there, we’re going to be diving into the Gospel of Mark in a few weeks but there are a few bits of housework I want to get taken care of first—some concepts that I want to lay down to make it easier to understand the second Gospel. The first concept I want to cover is the very misunderstood character trait of zeal and in order to explore it we’re going to talk about Phineas, David, Daniel and of course Yeshua/Jesus. Each one of these men were very zealous, but their zeal shows up in different ways. Phineas, of course, was forced to show his zeal through a desperate act of violence in order to save the lives of many. David showed his zeal through both courageous acts of daring but also through restraint. Daniel was zealous, shockingly enough, through surprising acts of mercy. Yeshua embodied all forms of zeal—even though when people look at His ministry they tend to confine his zeal to one particular event in the Temple. To be fair, I could also include Elijah’s bold preaching but we will be talking about that in later lessons. Isaiah, and the Greater Exodus he preached, was very much one of the main templates for the Gospel of Mark.
I am Tyler Dawn Rosenquist and welcome to Character in Context, where I teach the historical and ancient sociological context of Scripture with an eye to developing the character of Messiah. If you prefer written material, I have five years-worth of blog at theancientbridge.com as well as my six books available on amazon—including a four volume curriculum series dedicated to teaching Scriptural context in a way that even kids can understand it, called Context for Kids—and I have two video channels on youtube with free Bible teachings for both adults and kids. You can find the link for those on my website. Past broadcasts of this program can be found at characterincontext.podbean.com.
There are so many zealous men and women in Scripture but it is an unfortunate fact that most people tend to associate zeal with violence or kinda being a jerk in God’s name. Zeal absolutely can be violent in our modern world, as we see in Islamic jihad, but it can also be relatively peaceful, as evidenced by Ghandi and Dr Martin Luther King, Jr in the arena of civil rights and one of my personal heroes, his niece Alveda Celeste King who has courageously championed unborn rights since the early 80’s. But today I want to talk about the Biblical accounts of zeal and how different zeal can look from person to person depending on their calling and the direness of the situation. We will be starting with the most dire situation with Phineas, the son of Aaron the High Priest.
So, let’s read a bit from Numbers 25, out of the Tree of Life version—this is a Messianic translation, really the only Messianic translation that I like as it doesn’t just substitute words here and there. It is actually a legitimate and very responsible translation by some very serious scholars, even down to reflecting the proper Greek verb tenses, which few Bibles actually do.
“While Israel was staying in Shittim, the people began to have immoral sexual relations with women from Moab. 2 Then they invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, so the people were eating, and bowing down before their gods. 3 When Israel became bound to Baal of Peor, the anger of Adonai grew hot against Israel.
4 Adonai said to Moses, “Seize all the ringleaders and hang them before Adonai facing the sun, so that Adonai’s fierce anger may be turned away from Israel.”
5 So Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Each of you, kill your men who have been joining themselves to Baal of Peor.” 6 Then behold, a man from Bnei-Yisrael came and brought a Midianite woman to his brothers before the eyes of Moses and of the whole assembly of Bnei-Yisrael, while they were weeping at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting!
7 When Phinehas son of Eleazar son of Aaron the kohen saw it, he arose from the midst of the assembly, took a spear in his hand, 8 and went after the man of Israel into the tent and pierced them through—both the Israelite man and the woman’s belly. Then the plague among Bnei-Yisrael was stopped. 9 However, 24,000 were dead because of the plague!
10 Then Adonai spoke to Moses saying, 11 “Phinehas son of Eleazar son of Aaron the kohen has turned away My anger from Bnei-Yisrael because he was very zealous for Me among them, so that I did not put an end to Bnei-Yisrael in My zeal. 12 So now say: See, I am making with him a covenant of shalom! 13 It will be for him and his descendants after him a covenant of an everlasting priesthood—because he was zealous for his God and atoned for Bnei-Yisrael.”
We see here that Phineas, in his zeal, was responding to a dire situation. The ringleaders of a massive and abominable act of wanton idolatry—literally worshiping another god, with knowledge, and through forbidden sexual relations (I mean, when these guys decided to go big, they went BIG) right in God’s face with His cloud/flame over the Tabernacle and everything—well, they were already commanded to be slaughtered and hung—facing the sun, which means that they were not only hung outside the camp, but with their faces away from God as a symbol of God absolutely rejecting them. But then, bold as you like, in comes Zimri son of Salu, a prince of the tribe of Simeon (meaning a leader) with his new gf in tow. I like to imagine him pointing at her and winking and giving the weeping Moses and Aaron the thumbs up in defiance as he brings her into his tent south of the Tabernacle, probably in the front since he was a leader, and then gets busy.
Can you imagine their dropped jaws? This was nothing short of willful disobedient sin, right in God’s face. This isn’t the “I’m ashamed of what I am doing but I am allowing myself to be overcome by lust after I was stupid enough to go over there in the first place.” This is contempt. Very few people, when they sin, sin with abject contempt for God. A lot of folks just don’t know any better, or they have been taught that good is evil and evil is good, or they are overcome by temptation. Not this guy. There was a plague in the camp because of this idolatry, and he is hooking up with a front row view of the southern tent wall of the tabernacle. Seriously, this guy does deserve death, no question about it. And he needs to die because he is a prince, a leader. If he will do something like this within a stone’s throw of the Shekinah, the presence of God, then what would he lead people to do when they get their inheritance and no longer have the visual reminder of God’s presence. This guy who had been fed manna everyday went and ate from another god’s feast table. It’s beyond disgusting. You’ve probably never even tried sinning this badly even before you were a believer.
So Phineas, the son of Aaron, sees the plague progressing, thousands of God’s people are dying (24,000 to be exact) and he went right into that tent with a speak and shish-kebabed both of them in the act. He was on top of her, they weren’t pretending, not having a joke at God’s expense, they were straight up having sexual relations and he speared Zimri through the back and the spear went right through her belly as well. Plague ended.
God recognized the zeal of Phineas in saving the lives of His people by making a special covenant with him, a covenant of peace—giving his descendants an everlasting priesthood. Phineas wasn’t just a violent guy, he was a guy who used violence when there was no alternative and lives were being lost all around him. And he was only violent to the actual person who was in God’s face. This wasn’t a casual sort of violence masquerading as zeal like we see with ISIS. He actually reminds me of Sargent Alvin York, a WWI conscientious objector who only killed in response to seeing people being mowed down all around him. He was zealous for God too—zealous people don’t enjoy killing, but they do it when it must be done.
Our next example is David, and I am going to show good zeal as well as bad fake zeal with him.
Good zeal with David—David and Goliath, obviously—he was infuriated that Goliath was slandering God. How about the fact that even when David was on the run from Saul, he quietly and consistently risked his own life to fight the enemies of Israel? How about a zeal that shows up in trusting God to take King Saul out of the way and refusing to kill him not once but twice? That’s a true zeal for God’s kingdom—shown in not taking matters into his own hands. Perhaps David’s zeal shows up best, however, in his dancing vigorously before the Ark of the Covenant as it finally enters Jerusalem.
What did David do that might have looked like zealousness but wasn’t? His encounter with Nabal, who refused to feed his men at the time of the shearing, despite David and his men having protected his shepherds for free? Nabal dishonors David and refuses to give him anything—when David hears about it, he rashly vows that not one man from Nabal’s household will be alive by morning. Now, this wasn’t zeal on David’s part because when David was zealous, it resulted in God’s honor and the deliverance of God’s people—just like Phineas—this was personal offense. Yes, he had an absolute right to be offended, absolutely—especially in terms of ancient honor/shame societies. Nabal knew darned well who David was—he king’s own son in law, slayer of Goliath, champion of Israel. And the time of the shearing is a time of celebration of wealth in the provision of wool from God—David wasn’t asking a poor man for a meal, but instead a wealthy man. And he backhanded David as though he was nothing. David’s ego was badly bruised—and he was responding with a violence that had nothing to do with his normal patient and wise zeal for God to work out His own justice in His own time.
So who was zealous in this story? Why, Nabal’s wife Abigail who went out to face a wrathful army of 400 dishonored, angry men.
23 When Abigail saw David, she quickly dismounted from her donkey, fell before David on her face and bowed down to the ground. 24 As she fell at his feet, she pleaded, “On me, only me, my lord, be the punishment! But please, let your maidservant speak in your ears, and listen to the words of your maidservant. 25 Please my lord, pay no attention to this worthless fellow, Nabal, for as his name is, so is he—Nabal[a] is his name and disgraceful folly is with him. But I, your maidservant, did not see the young men of my lord whom you sent.
26 “So now my lord, as Adonai lives and as your soul lives, since Adonai has restrained you from shedding blood and from avenging yourself with your own hand, now therefore let your enemies and those who are seeking to harm my lord be as Nabal. 27 Now let this blessing, which your maidservant has brought to my lord, be given to the young men who are accompanying my lord. 28 Please, forgive the trespass of your maidservant. For Adonai will certainly make an enduring house for my lord, because my lord is fighting the battles of Adonai. So let no wrongdoing be found in you all your days. 29 If anyone rises to pursue you and seek your life, then let my lord’s life be bound up in the bundle of the living—with Adonai your God. But let the soul of your enemies be hurled away as from the hollow of a sling.
30 “So when Adonai has fulfilled for my lord all the good things that He had spoken concerning you, and has appointed you ruler over Israel, 31 then this will not be a stumbling-block for you, or offense of heart to my lord, or needless bloodshed by my lord avenging himself. So, when Adonai has dealt graciously with my lord, then remember your handmaid.”
Now, that’s zeal. She put herself at the mercy of an angry army for the sake of the men in her household—including a husband whom she clearly was not fond of. She appealed to David’s forgotten zeal—the zeal that had previously led him to seek the Lord and wait on Him. Abigail’s zeal reminded David of his own. Zeal doesn’t have to be violent. It can be directed at allaying violence that would be harmful to the Kingdom.
What about Daniel? He and Shadrach, Mischach, and Abednego were all zealous for God’s laws—refusing to eat defiled foods in Babylon, and we all remember how the latter three refused to bow before the golden statue of Nebuchadnezzar, and Daniel in the lion’s den because he refused to follow the prohibition against praying to anyone but Darius for a whole month. Those are the obvious cases of zeal—but how about a less obvious but far more stunning case of zeal? Daniel 2:
In the second year of his reign, Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams. His spirit was troubled and sleep escaped him. 2 So the king issued an order to summon the magicians, astrologers, sorcerers and Chaldeans in order to explain to the king his dreams. When they came and stood before the king, 3 he said to them, “I have dreamed a dream, and my spirit is anxious to understand the dream.”
4 Then the Chaldeans spoke to the king in Aramaic, “May the king live forever! Tell your servants the dream, and we will declare the interpretation.”
5 The king answered the Chaldeans saying, “I firmly decree: If you do not make the dream and its meaning known to me, you will be torn limb from limb and your houses reduced to rubble. 6 But if you tell the dream and its meaning, you will receive from me gifts and rewards and great honor. So tell me the dream and its meaning!”
7 They responded a second time, saying, “Let the king tell his servants the dream and we will declare the interpretation.”
8 The king replied saying, “I know for sure that you are buying time since you see that I have firmly decreed 9 that if you do not reveal the dream to me, there is only one verdict[b] for you. You have conspired to say something false and fraudulent, until such a time as things might change. So then, tell me the dream and I will know that you can tell me its meaning.”
10 The Chaldeans answered the king saying, “There is no man on earth who can meet the king’s demand. For no great king, however great or mighty, has ever asked such a thing from any magician, astrologer or Chaldean. 11 What the king asks is too difficult. There is no one who could declare it to the king, except the gods whose dwelling is not with mortals!”
12 Because of this, the king became furiously angry and gave orders to execute all the wise men of Babylon. 13 So the decree went out that the wise men were about to be slaughtered. They also sought Daniel and his companions to execute them. 14 Then Daniel spoke with tact and discretion to Arioch, who was captain of the king’s guard and who had set out to execute the wise men of Babylon. 15 He spoke up and said to Arioch, the king’s captain, “Why is the king’s decree so urgent?” Then Arioch informed Daniel about the matter.
16 So Daniel went in and asked the king to grant him time, so that he might disclose the interpretation to the king. 17 Then Daniel went to his house and informed his friends Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah (aka Shadrach, Mischach and Abednego) about the matter 18 so they would request mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his friends would not perish along with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
19 During the night the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision….(skipping the prayer) 24 Then Daniel went in to Arioch, whom the king had appointed to destroy the wise men of Babylon and said to him, “Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon. Bring me in before the king and I will declare the interpretation to the king.”
Okay, so what did Daniel’s zeal lead him to do? It led him to save the lives of a bunch of magicians and astrologers…did you ever catch that before? He could very easily have made it so that only he and his three friends would remain standing to advise the king after the dust settled, but no, Daniel’s zeal was full of mercy. I can’t even begin to tell you how many believers I have met over the years who would consider themselves duty-bound to have all those pagan advisers slaughtered and wouldn’t have lost a moment’s sleep over it. But Daniel, who kept God’s laws when it was dangerous to do so, he spared their lives. He made sure that their lives would be spared. That’s a stunning display of zeal for God, showing the pagan king how merciful the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is—certainly the pagan priests would probably not have been eager to do the same if the positions were reversed.
You know who else had the wrong kind of zeal? The disciples! They had a zeal for a kingdom that would look the way they thought it should.
Peter rebuked Yeshua when Yeshua said he was going to Jerusalem to be killed.
James and John’s zeal included slaughtering a whole town full of Samaritans for daring to disagree with them. (which reminds me of the misplaced zeal of Jonah in the face of Ninevah’s repentance)
The disciples were really angry when someone who “wasn’t one of them” was casting out demons in their Master’s Name.
I am going to read a passage from the very excellent book, The Victory According to Mark by Mark Horne based on the explanation of the Parable of the Sower (aka the Parable of the Four Soils) found in Mark 4:16-17
16 “These are the ones sown on rocky ground. When they hear the word, immediately they receive it with joy. 17 And they have no root in themselves but last only a short while. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, immediately they fall away.
Horne points out that the rocky soil very much describes the disciples before the Cross.
“When Jesus was seized, one of his followers attacked the mob with his sword and only succeeded in cutting the ear off the High Priest’s servant (in Mk 14:47). Jesus’s parable actually addresses this sort of hot-headed zeal: “And other seed fell on the rocky ground where it did not have much soil and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of soil (Mk 4:5). The same condition of the soil, which causes it to wither under persecution is also the reason why there is such a sudden and visible response to the message of the Kingdom. Why is persecution associated with this group? Because they seek out trouble.”
In summary of what Horne is saying, they are immature so they seek out trouble and then they fall away. It’s exactly what happened to the disciples that terrible night. They (well, all but one) went looking for a fight and they found one and it didn’t go well and their Master rebuked them and they all got hauled off and instead of dying with Him as they all assured Him they would—they took off running. This is why an appearance of zeal, while impressive, is not the same as a person living with endurance.
This all has been leading up to talking about the surprising zeal of Yeshua/Jesus. Now, when people think of His zeal, they think of the one (maybe two) instances of overturning tables and the cattle drive he conducted off of the Temple Mount. Or they might think of the Matthew 23 rebuke of the Scribes and Pharisees that I did a long teaching series on earlier this year. But truth be told, everything Yeshua did was out of zeal—from His resisting temptation in the wilderness, to healing the daughter of the syro-phonecian woman, to battling against demons (which we will see a lot of in Mark), to the healing of the crippled and ill on the Sabbath, to the Cross. Everything He did was zealous—including His acts of mercy.
Yeshua’s zeal led Him to dine with tax collectors and other sinners—putting Himself in the crosshairs of the religious elites.
His zeal led him to call a tax collector, a Roman collaborating social outcast, as a disciple.
He delivered people from the power of demons, sickness, and disability whenever it was necessary—regardless of what day it was.
He suffered extreme hunger and thirst, exposed to the elements and wild animals, in the desert.
He washed the feet of the man who would betray Him. In fact, He taught and treated him like everyone else for the duration of their ministry together.
He butted heads with the religious elite because it needed to be done, without constantly complaining about how picked on he was.
He elevated the downtrodden and demanded mercy, justice, and equity as a qualification for discipleship.
He healed lepers, raised the dead, and tossed out demons and often asked the recipients of His miracles not to tell everyone.
He preached in places where they rejected Him. He worshiped in the Temple whose leadership rejected Him. He even went outside the boundaries of Israel to Tyre and Sidon and the Decapolis and to, *gasp* Samaria.
He spoke with a woman, alone–unthinkable. A Samaritan woman—even worse. A Samaritan woman who was shacking up—somebody get my smelling salts.
His zealous love for the Father and for His people led Him silently to an unimaginably horrible death.
He was more controversial than we can imagine, but everything in His life and ministry was the result of appropriate zeal—it is wrong for us to see all zeal as manifesting itself in some outburst—then it wouldn’t be zeal, it would be a lack of self-control. Yeshua was either always zealous, or he lost control sometimes and got in people’s faces. No, when we look at the lists of virtues in Paul’s writings, we must always see them as related to zeal, and not separate. Humility and meekness are at the heart of true zeal. We MUST know our place with respect to God and others or our zeal will go very wrong. One of the themes we will be seeing throughout Mark is the “Messianic secret” where Yeshua was not fully revealing Himself to anyone, with good reason—and we can’t imagine the humility that would take. Just look at the people in the world claiming to be the Messiah—are any of them really very humble? No. And they are oftentimes using their claim to Messiahship to gather harems about them, and always to control.
And what about the incident with the overturning of tables? There are memes out there that make Him look out of control—but the Temple authorities were always looking for cause against Him. If he were out of control, if He was using that whip on people instead of as a way to herd the livestock off the Mount, wouldn’t they have sent a contingent of guards with the full blessing of the gathered pilgrims? He certainly would not have risked shedding blood in sacred space, thus defiling it. We must not allow artwork that is often ignorant of Jewish Laws regulating behavior on the Temple Mount to determine our understanding of what happened there. Yeshua was fully in control of Himself—His zeal never got away from Him or out of hand. Notice that at His trial they didn’t bring it up—they could have had Him outright killed if what He had done atop the Temple Mount was against, instead of enforcing, Jewish Law (as opposed to Torah Laws). You don’t mess with sacred space or go nuts—everything had to be very much on the up and up. It is so important to know the historical context and really question how much we accept from medieval and renaissance painters and modern meme-makers who often have an agenda of zeal being whatever bad behavior they want to justify.
Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think that you automatically have the right or calling to overturn tables unless you are willing to die for the people sitting at them, wash the feet of those betraying you, and be silent in the face of persecution. As I get older and gain much-needed perspective, the overturning of the tables looks far less zealous to me than the Cross, washing Judas’s feet, and calmly enduring a mock trial.
But…but…overturning the tables is the only thing on that list that I actually WANT to do.
Exactly! If you want to do it then it isn’t zeal–it’s just nothing but playtime masquerading as righteousness.
