Numbers 5

Numbers 5 is a mix of voodoo and Jerry Springer... all that's missing is a bald security guard!

The majority of this chapter is God's plan for dealing with an unfaithful wife. If she is suspected of being unfaithful she must come to the priests and drink "bitter water". If she has been unfaithful then she will be cursed, but if she has not been unfaithful then she will be fine.

And what is the curse? (I think I had a curse put on me once when I was thrown out of a voodoo museum in New Orleans... I just asked if there would be any sacrifices while we were there. I thought it was a pretty fair question, but apparently it was offensive. I think my friends Jenny, Leah and Jake were afraid to stand next to me for the next few hours.)

In Numbers, the curse is this: her womb will swell and she will be unable to have children. If a woman was unable to have children she was accused of being unfaithful.

I hope that God didn't allow an innocent woman to be convicted of adultery. Many women are unable to have children, they are born that way. Abraham's wife Sarah was born that way. It wasn't until she was old that God performed a miracle and she was able to give birth. And Abraham and Sarah were around long before Moses, they knew that some women couldn't give birth.

Seems unfair to me. But then again, God didn't deal in fairness, and still doesn't.

But the God we worship and preach at Abiding Grace is unfair not in punishment but in love. Because grace, by its very nature is unfair. Grace means we don't get what we deserve.

Because of a sacrifice.