The first thing that caught my eye was the story in Numbers 25 that tells about God starting to destroy the Israelites because some of the men starting sleeping around with the Moabite women and then worshipping their gods. One Israelite was bold enough to bring one of those women right into camp and into his tent. When Phinehas saw him do this he took his spear, rushed into the tent and ran his spear through both the man and the woman, killing them both. Here is how God responded:
10 Then the Lord said to Moses, 11 “Phinehas son of Eleazar and grandson of Aaron the priest has turned my anger away from the Israelites by displaying passionate zeal among them on my behalf. So I stopped destroying all Israel as I had intended to do in my zealous anger. 12 Now tell him that I am making my special covenant of peace with him. 13 In this covenant, I give him and his descendants a permanent right to the priesthood, for in his zeal for me, his God, he purified the people of Israel, making them right with me.”
Displaying passionate zeal for God - that is what I would like to do.
Here are a couple more highlighted verses:
11 ‘Of all those I rescued from Egypt, no one who is twenty years old or older will ever see the land I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, for they have not obeyed me wholeheartedly. 12 The only exceptions are Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite and Joshua son of Nun, for they have wholeheartedly followed the Lord.’
When we have the zeal for God, we will often have to forcefully point out sin. I don't recommend a spear, but zeal is hard to have and God rewards it.
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