teflon-aaron

so I’ve been reading through the first five books of the bible for a LONG time now, and something keeps coming up that bothers me to some extent: teflon-aaron.





(images from the brick testament)


this guy aaron does some crazy things, but with no consequences.
and then moses does something that seems to be a lesser crime and gets serious punishment.


let me explain:
aaron is moses’ brother.
when moses was too afraid to speak to pharaoh,
God told him that He would send aaron to do the talking.
aaron and moses lead the israelites out of egypt,
through a series of incredible miracles,
and then moses goes up mt. sinai to receive the law.
while he is up there, the people revolt
and who do they complain to? aaron.
they say that they want gods to worship,
so aaron has them get all of their jewlery together,
and he forges the golden calf.
aaron forged it!
and then lied about it!
he makes it sound like the calf just appeared out of the fire.


so when moses got down from the mountain,
he had the calf ground up into powder,
put into water, and made the idolaters drink it.
all the people were punished, but not aaron.
why?!
and what’s worse-
he was made a priest!
and his sons were made priests!


later on, miriam, moses’ sister, and aaron
have a problem with moses’ wife-
so they start talking bad about him.
God sticks up for moses
and temporarily gives miriam leprosy,
but not aaron!
why?!
he’s teflon-aaron! nothing sticks to him!


later on,
the people are thirsty.
God tells moses and aaron to talk to a rock,
and water will flow out of it.
instead of talking to the rock,
moses hit the rock.
and thanks to God, water still gushed out





God was so mad at the both of them,
that they were told that neither of them
would enter the promised land.
God gives an interesting reason for keeping them out:
part of it has to do with trust,
part of it has to do with a view of His holiness.
He says:
“because you did not trust in me enough
to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites,
you will not bring this community into the land I give them."
so aaron died of natural causes,
but moses had to go up to pisgah
and look down on the promised land.
he could see it, but not enter it.
he died a little while later.


now i understand aaron not getting in,
but moses?
after all that he endured?
doesn’t that count?
aaron led two rebellions!
one against God, and another against moses,
and no punishment.
instead, grace;
and the office of priest.


i don’t know why God didn’t react to aaron’s crimes.
but i do know that
if all of my mistakes were recorded in everlasting scripture,
then no one would think that i ought to be a servant of God.
future readers would wonder why i didn’t have it worse.
maybe i would be teflon-rob.
maybe i already am.


i guess God was the same way then the way He is now.
He doesn’t work on the system of karma:
He doesn’t bless me when I’m good
and curse me when I’m bad;
He loves and shows grace,
without compromising His own justice.
He doesn’t always give me what I think I deserve,
good or bad-
and just like in moses’ day,
He has His reasons for that,
and sometimes those reasons are hidden from me.


it reminds me of a lyric to a U2 song:
“grace, she's got the walk
not on a ramp or on chalk
she's got the time to talk
she travels outside of karma
she travels outside of karma
when she goes to work
you can hear her strings
grace finds beauty in everything…”


aaron didn’t get what he deserved-
its unfair.
but then again, grace always is;
its unfair in our favor.


one more line from U2:


“what once was hurt
what once was friction
what left a mark
no longer stings
because grace makes beauty
out of ugly things.”


“God demonstrates his own love for us in this:
while we were still sinners,
christ died for us.”
-romans 5