“You have become a bridegroom of blood to me,” said Zipporah as she threw Gershom’s bloody foreskin at Moses’ feet. (Exodus 4:24-26) She must have been very angry. You can imagine her shrieking, hair disheveled and uncovered, Gershom sobbing from his mother’s act of holy violence. The situation was out of control.
Zipporah challenged Moses, even acting in that challenge.
“Has the Lord only spoken through Moses? Has he not spoken through us also?” So charged Miriam about Moses’ new Cushite, which is to say African, but no doubt God-fearing, wife. (Moses’ first wife, Zipporah was likely deceased by the time of these words). Miriam and Aaron both challenge Moses. But from what transpires next, we understand that Miriam was the ringleader. You can imagine her being very cool and reasonable when she spoke. She was not necessarily yelling.
Both women challenged Moses. Zipporah showed more daring, yet it was Zipporah whose unconventional action received God’s approval. Because she performed the circumcision that Moses had neglected, the angel of death was averted, and a life was saved. God struck Miriam with leprosy. Moses had to pray for her to be healed.
Why did God approve one challenge against Moses and punish the other? I can think of three reasons.
- Miriam and Zipporah challenged Moses in a different manner. Zipporah’s bitter explosion against her busy husband occurred in a travel lodging. It is unlikely she did this in public. Miriam was speaking against Moses, so this was in front of one or more other people.
- They challenged Moses for a different reason. Zipporah was challenging Moses to keep a covenant ordinance that was really his job. Miriam was challenging the right of a foreign woman to be engrafted into the people of God and be accepted as the wife of Moses. Miriam was being racist church lady. She withheld God’s grace.
- Ultimately Miriam and Zipporah challenged Moses from different heart postures. Zipporah, although she might have looked liked the unhinged one, was forced to perform a lifesaving surgery for her son and a lifesaving rebuke to her husband. Her message: ”You did not do your job! This is a matter of life and death, so I had to do it for you. A mother should not be charged with circumcising her own son. Be a man! Be the priest of the home! Don’t make me do this again. It’s not my job. You need to be a father in the ways that hurt!”
Miriam had a beautiful calling from God as a prophetic woman. Having preserved the life of Moses, she encouraged others to follow him, becoming a leader of praise and dance. She should have acted as a mature Lady Wisdom from Proverbs, teaching the younger women and exhorting everyone to faithfulness. But at this point, she is envious of the calling of Moses, claiming the right to do what Moses had been chosen to do. “Has He not spoken through us also?” she said.
Zipporah’s message was, “You have failed to do your job.” Miriam’s message was, “I could do your job.” It is not a small sin to envy the gifts and position that God has given to someone else.
Why did Miriam respond this way? Did she not appreciate the job of being a prophetess, one who danced before the Lord? What if Miriam had been content to be the John the Baptist: “He must grow greater, and I must grow lesser?” What if she had said, “What is God’s mission? What is God doing,” instead of “How can I use my gifts and talents?”
Zipporah understood the mission: to preserve her people and exhort them to keep covenant with God. She and her godly father and brother were key in rescuing immature refugee Moses, giving him a home and the wisdom that he needed for his role as leader of a bedouin horde. Just as Miriam saved baby Moses through a watery ordeal, Zipporah saved Moses, or his son, by allowing the shedding the blood of her firstborn, prefiguring the sacrifice of Mary.
We talk about helping a woman find her voice. I speak as a woman: This is well and good. But God will not bless actions motivated by envy. Sometimes, you find your voice with a challenge. Like Zipporah, call on your husband or your pastor to do their jobs. Shriek if you need to. Or break plates, as Kathy Keller famously (in a safe manner) did to get the attention of her pastor husband, Timothy.
Fight for the survival of the people and for God’s plan of redemption. That’s the challenge.