October 6, Evening

C. H. Spurgeon · Modern retelling

"He had married an Ethiopian woman." — Numbers 12:1 · KJV

A strange choice of Moses — but how much stranger the choice of Him who is a prophet like Moses, and greater than he! Our Lord, who is fair as the lily, has entered into marriage union with one who confesses herself black, because the sun has looked upon her. It is the wonder of angels that the love of Jesus should be set on poor, lost, guilty men. Every believer, when filled with a sense of Jesus' love, must also be overwhelmed with astonishment that such love should be lavished on an object so utterly unworthy of it. Knowing, as we do, our secret guilt, unfaithfulness, and black-heartedness, we are melted in grateful wonder at the matchless freeness and sovereignty of grace. Jesus must have found the cause of His love in His own heart, for He could not have found it in us — it is not there. Even since our conversion we have been black, though grace has made us comely. Holy Rutherford said of himself what we must each own: "His relation to me is that I am sick, and He is the Physician of whom I stand in need. Alas, how often I play fast and loose with Christ! He binds, I loose; He builds, I cast down; I quarrel with Christ, and He agrees with me twenty times a day." Most tender and faithful Husband of our souls, carry on Your gracious work of conforming us to Your image, until You present even us poor Ethiopians to Yourself, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Moses met opposition because of his marriage, and both he and his wife were the objects of an evil eye. Can we wonder if this vain world opposes Jesus and His spouse, especially when great sinners are converted? For this is ever the Pharisee's ground of complaint: "This man receiveth sinners." Still the old quarrel is revived: "Because he had married an Ethiopian woman."