Shoulder To Shoulder #1260 -- 10/11/21 ---- "The Folly of Forgetting God -- Demise of a People: Part 3 -- Sacrificing To Molech (Part A)
Posted by: lifeunlimited <lifeunlimited@...>
SHOULDER TO SHOULDER is a weekly letter of encouragement Bob has written since 1997, covering many topics
selected to motivate people to be strong students of the Word and courageous witnesses of Jesus Christ.
It is a personal letter of encouragement to you, written solely to help "lift up hands that hang down".
"The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil,
but by those who watch them without doing anything." -- Albert Einstein
“There is a common, worldly kind of Christianity in this day,
which many have, and think they have -- a cheap Christianity
which offends nobody, and requires no sacrifice, which
costs nothing, -- and is worth nothing.” – J. C. Ryle
"Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica,
for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the
Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so." -- Dr. Luke (Acts 17:11)
Shoulder To Shoulder #1260 -- 10/11/21
Title: "The Folly of Forgetting God -- Demise of a People: Part 3 -- Sacrificing To Molech (Part A)
My Dear Friend and Fellow Kingdom Seeker:
My deepest apologies for being late again in my letter to you. Between our continued busy schedule trying to get settled into our "new" house and preparing for the upcoming season here, and the enormity of this letter's topic, I have felt overwhelmed and interrupted on many sides. Having said that, however, . . .
Greeting from Yuma, AZ, on a beautiful but very windy day in the desert. Although the skies have cleared up since the 25mph winds have died down, earlier in the day we could hardly see the mountains less than a mile east of us. Wind gusts were recorded as high as 41 mph. It was a good day to stay inside, but alas, we had to be out and about. This followed a wonderful, wonderful, one-hour Zoom video chat with one of our special young men, Kurt Wilson, who accompanied Jo Ann and me on our first two team trips to Ukraine in 2001 and 2002. What a thrill it was to actually see him and talk with him "face to face" for the first time in 18 years, and to learn of the amazing ministry God has given him in St. Louis, MO!
Some 34 years ago God put an excruciating burden on my heart for the town where I pastored at the time in Wisconsin. Out of that burden He began to teach me some principles about reaching a city after having read John Dawson's book, Taking Your City For God. From a subsequent dramatic life-altering vision God gave me for my town, I immediately drove to my close friend, an AG pastor named Clark Peterson (who still pastors that same church, BTW, after all these years), only discover, as he shared through his tears, that God had been speaking to him in exactly the same way. That was the beginning of learning and initiating certain valuable city-impacting principles.
From those years in that town of some 4,000 people at the time, God began to develop more precise concepts and principles about city reaching. The end result was a syllabus I wrote entitled, "Reaching Your City Through Prevailing Prayer and Strategic Ministry". When we took our first team to Kyiv, Jo Ann and I were to teach at St. James Bible College, founded several years earlier by Paul Ilyin. Jo Ann taught Henry Blackaby's Experiencing God to a Freshman class, and I taught two combined Senior classes my material on reaching cities.
I still vividly remember laying a map of Ukraine on a table and asking each student to find a city name on the map where they felt God might be leading them. Sergey Lyakhof, president of the Senior Class, wept as he drew an arrow off the map and into the margin and wrote the name of a Siberian city -- Ulan-Ude. Today Sergey remains in the city ministering to the Buryat people of the area -- with incomprehensible success, I might add.
Kurt and his friend, Chris, sat in on that class for two weeks filled with forty hours of teaching about those city reaching principles. His burden developed as a result of the riots and destruction around St. Louis in 2017, so he began prayer walking through those troubled areas like Ferguson. Today he still prayer walks in some 79 distinct communities throughout the city, and especially on two of the most dangerous streets in the city. He also quietly but diligently leads a growing prayer movement in those 79 communities in greater St. Louis. The movement has grown so significantly in the past few years that Charisma Magazine featured ministry in a recent edition.
You can read the article at https://www.charismamag.com/spirit/evangelism-missions/48775-revival-stirs-in-st-louis-during-pray-for-the-lou-missions-event?fbclid=IwAR0-Peefg5KOj29HaEf7IMBrIMFxmz-w-iZhiaPHQ0Ckmjnj_gUagIli9tg, and also hear the podcast interview that first caught Charisma's eye, leading them to write the article. Check it out at https://www.charismapodcastnetwork.com/show/presencepioneers/7113/Uniting-A-City-Through-Prayerwalking-with-Kurt-Wilson.
You can only imagine the joy and exhilaration Jo Ann and I felt this morning as we heard his story. It sounds very much like that of NYC layman Jeremiah Lamphier who had a burden to pray for NYC. Beginning with one man and a vision, it grew to the point that all businesses closed from Noon to 2:00 PM every day as 10,000+ people gathered in dozens of places across Manhattan Island and cried out to God. Famed editor Horace Greeley rode on horseback trying to tally the total, but could not keep up with the growth.
That move of God, later to be known as "The Prayer Meeting Revival", "The Laymen's Revival", and "The Second Great Awakening" spread across the nation to cities like Portland, San Francisco, Chicago ---- and St. Louis. Keep your eyes on St. Louis.
Today I want to continue our look at how a nation shows evidence that it has forgotten God -- and not only that it has forgotten Him, but has also forsaken Him. When I consider this thought, I always go back to the history of the ancient people of God, Israel. As I noted in my two earlier letters on the topic, Israel's track record of turning its back in God is shamefully clear. It was not an instantaneous act, but rather a slow steady downward spiral into an abyss of spiritual and moral darkness. It has been the same way with America.
In spite of a strong spiritual and moral beginning, we have utterly failed to maintain that discipline so that we can finish well. I don't know how long it will be before God tells us we are finished, but unless we change dramatically, it will not be well. So, today, we consider one of the ways in which we have turned our back on God -- right after you take a look at . . .
THIS 'N' THAT:
+ Archaeological Find of Jerusalem's Wealthy: The recent discovery of a private toilet from the "First Temple Period" in Jerusalem has archaeologists wondering if it was that of one of Judah's last kings before the Babylonian Captivity. Read this brief but interesting article at https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/a-toilet-fit-for-a-king/?fbclid=IwAR1j48k-Dm_8MgpuhYqQmND4uv09UAKk47Qyk8Istz1PF2moWEhPjH6wx9U
+ Highly Recommended Website: Here is an excellent Bible study website containing links to hundreds of articles and maps. If you love to know more than the surface of scripture, and value the background of biblical places and settings, then you'll love https://www.bible-history.com. It's an important enough resource to me that I've put an icon on my desktop so I can access it more quickly.
+ Powerful Video on Protecting Unborn: The Supreme Court takes up one of the most critical issues in America sometime during this current session -- the issue of the recent Texas Pro-Life bill which is being challenged in court. They will reportedly hear the case in December. Last week Ben Domenec, husband to Meagan McCain and Fox News personality, made one of the most powerful statements I've ever seen on the sanctity of life and the tragedy of rampant abortions. Part of his "The American Crisis" commentaries, I urge you to watch it and pass the link on to others. Go to https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/ben-domenech-us-extreme-abortion-regime-world-wakes-up-moral-reality .
QUOTES FOR THE WEEK:
> "there is no difference as to baby killing whether you do it as a sacred rite or just because you choose to do it. For us murder is once for all forbidden; so even the child in the womb, while yet the mother's blood is still being drawn on to form the human being, it is not lawful to destroy. To forbid birth is only quicker murder. It makes no difference whether one take away the life once born or destroy it as it comes to birth. He is a man, who is to be a man, the fruit is always present in the seed." -- Tertullian (155-220 AD), Early Christian theologian from Carthage
> "Whereas true religion and good morals are the only solid foundations of public liberty and happiness . . . it is hereby earnestly recommended to the several States to take the most effectual measures for the encouragement thereof." -- Benjamin Franklin, signer of Declaration of Independence, U.S. Ambassador to France (Address to Continental Congress, 1778)
> "If we continue to be a happy people, that happiness must be assured by the enacting and executing of reasonable and wise laws, expressed in the plainest language, and by establishing such modes of education as tend to inculcate in the minds of youth, the feelings and habits of "piety, religion and morality," and to lead them to the knowledge and love of those truly Republican principles upon which our civil institutions are founded." -- Sam Adams, signer of Declaration of Independence, member of Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention (in address to Massachusetts Legislature, Jan 16, 1795)
> "The foundations of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality, and the preeminence of free government be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its citizens, and command the respect of the world." -- George Washington, commanding General of Revolutionary Army, president of Constitutional Convention, first President of U.S. (in a speech on Sept 19, 1796)
> "Let’s not pretend that abortion isn’t about the mass slaughter of innocents." -- Michael Aston
> "Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime and pure (and) which insures to the good eternal happiness, are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments." -- Charles Carroll
> "[I]t seems to me as clear as daylight that abortion would be a crime." -- Mahatma Gandhi
> "Abortion and racism are both symptoms of a fundamental human error. The error is thinking that when someone stands in the way of our wants, we can justify getting that person out of our lives. Abortion and racism stem from the same poisonous root, selfishness." -- Alveda King
>
“For if a woman is quick with child, and by a potion, or otherwise kills it in her womb; or if any one beat her, whereby the child dies in her body, and she is delivered of a dead child; this, though not murder, was by the ancient law homicide or manslaughter. But at present it is not looked upon in quite so atrocious a light, though it remains a very heinous misdemeanor." -- William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England
COMPROMISE AND DISOBEDIENCE -- THE STARTING POINT:
This topic is so vitally important in my opinion that I dare not put into one letter everything I want to share. I see an equilateral triangulation between God's Word, Israel's example, and our national drift into a "Sodom-and-Gomorrah" cultural pattern. So, today, I want to "begin at the beginning" and then go from there for an additional one or two letters.
If we understand the way spiritual decay works, we know it is usually a prolonged process that sometimes begins with a simple innocent mistake. In Israel's case, it seems to me that it all began soon after God delivered the Children of Israel from Egyptian bondage. They repeatedly struggled with themselves and with God, even during the 40 years of deliverance itself. There were enough occasions of arguing with God, refusing to obey, and making compromise during the journey that when they actually got to the land God had promised their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it didn't take long for them to repeatedly disobey God after they had entered the land.
As early as the 7th chapter of Joshua we see the first evidence that at least some of them had yet to learn the lesson of total obedience to God. In direct violation to God's command, Achan and his family took some of the valuables from Jericho, and it cost Achan and his family -- and even their livestock -- their lives. More than that, it cost Israel a humiliating defeat at a city far less formidable than Jericho.
Ai should have been a breeze, but instead it was a disaster. At Jericho they had fully obeyed God and had destroyed all living beings in the city except for Rahab and her family. But, in Ai, it was the disobedience of one man and his family that led to a humiliating national defeat. Imagine what that did to the other Canaanites in the region -- suddenly realizing that this new nation was itself vulnerable and bearing the potential of being defeated -- if the right strategy could be implemented.
The Canaanites never forgot Jericho -- and neither did they forget Ai. It would be the topic of conversation for both present and coming generations that would fill their conversations with, "Remember when Ai happened and . . ." The place of defeat became known as "The Valley of Achor", meaning, "the depressed area of trouble, stumbling, and defeat." The Israelites knew the cost of sinning against God, and the Canaanites knew the Israelites were vulnerable. Revenge was on their annual calendar.
Chapter eight indicates that the Children of Israel ashamedly repented, God gave them a new strategy, and Ai then fell at the hands of Joshua and 30,000 Israelite soldiers. Obedience to God worked. Immediately after that, Joshua led the nation in a covenant renewal ceremony with God. Things would be different, and obedience would be the national motto. But again, the Israelites would back out on their new commitment.
In the ninth chapter we find the story of how the inhabitants of Gibeah heard what had happened at Jericho -- and at Ai, -- and crafted a plan that would take advantage of Israel's glaring weakness. Sending a delegation of so-called emissaries to meet Israel, the Gibeonites disguised themselves as a poverty-stricken travelers from a distant country and struck a deal with Joshua. Once the deception was discovered, rather than obeying God and killing them all, Joshua instead succumbed to their deception and assigned them to jobs as essential "utility workers" providing fuel and water for Israel.
The 10th and 11th chapters seem to indicate that something rang a bell in Joshua's mind about how Israel was to leave no godless pagan survivors -- you need to study Noah's son Canaan and his descendants in order to see why all of this was to be so "bloody" -- so they obeyed the command that there be "no survivors" that would 1) contaminate their culture, 2) create the potential for intermarriage between God-followers and unbelievers, and 3) introduce practices of false pagan religions into their worship of the One True God. In every city and region, they "fully obeyed the Lord God."
The conquest of the Canaanites, Hittites, and other pagan tribes didn't happen all at once. Sometimes we forget that victory sometimes comes in stages over a long period of time. Such was the case under Joshua so that, apparently after a number of years, he has become a weary old man. At that point, God instructed him to divide the land up among the tribes,commissioning each tribe to finish the task by totally eradicating godless paganism from the entire land. After all, God had given it all to Abraham hundreds of years earlier.
Chapter 12 gives a listing of the many kings and tribes that Israel conquered and destroyed, and chapters 13 through 15 briefly describe those campaigns. However, a tragic turn of events takes place in chapter 16 when the assignment was given to the descendants of Joseph's two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. In Joshua 16:10 we read, . . .
". . . they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer, so the Canaanites live in the midst of Ephraim to this day, and they became forced laborers" (Josh 16:10).
That little statement, ". . . they did not drive out the Canaanites . . ." tragically became the final sentence in chapter after chapter of Israel's life. A pattern that ultimately led to a national catastrophe of moral collapse and religious disobedience began with Ephraim and Manasseh, the two sons whose descendants had asked for preferential treatment because of their lineage and their size. Throughout the Old Testament, including the prophets and the Psalms, these two tribes are rarely seen as having fulfilled what was expected of them. They are frequently described as lazy oxen or, in one case, a "slack bow", a bow that was unstrung and entirely unprepared for battle.
This expose' of Israel's habitual disobedience is noted six different times, once in this verse in Joshua, -- and then five more times in the first chapter of the Book of Judges alone. A national pattern of idolatry was planted in Israel's moral DNA, and it haunted them for centuries. A careful examination of the many wars Israel had with the tribes around them shows that idolatry was often at the heart of the conflict.
So, what does this have to do with today's topic?
I'll get to that shortly, but first consider . . .
THE ULTIMATE AFFRONT:
If you were to identify the ultimate "spit-in-His-Face" insult toward God, what would you choose? What action would you consider to be the strongest possible offense toward Him?
Many things have gone through my mind today as I considered that subject. But, it didn't take me long to identify what I think is the most heinous insult toward the Creator of all things ---- I would try to destroy what He cherished most, more than all of His other creation combined. I would try to destroy the human species. I would destroy mankind. I would do everything within my power to destroy the family -- to destroy life.
So, I would stir people up to destroy families and their offspring. I would kill babies -- especially those still in the womb. I would employ the spirit of Molech.
You see, in almost every polytheistic pagan culture, you will find that their idolatry -- their worship of pagan gods -- almost always includes a human sacrifice, and in many of them that human sacrifice includes the murder of babies or toddlers. Whether it was throwing babies to crocodiles in the Nile, carrying a baby up the long steps of a Mayan pyramid and cutting its heart out in the Yucatan, dashing a baby to pieces in the Orient, driving a crude knife into a baby's chest in Africa, or offering up a baby to the outstretched arms of Molech in the Middle East, it was all the same.
From earliest human life it seems that child sacrifice was common. I yesterday I ran across an article entitled, 10 Civilizations That Sacrificed Human Children, written by Joe Duncan. In the article, Duncan lists ten major civilizations that practiced the sacrifice of children to their gods --
1. Babylon -- In describing the practice, Duncan wrote, . . .
"Finding itself dead center in the birthplace of civilization, Babylon was a megalithic settlement and one of the most powerful forces of the ancient world. They sacrificed human beings to their chief deity, Marduk, as well as others like Anu, a deity of the city Uruk, during the later years of the Babylonian Empire. Annual fire festivals were held where they would sacrifice children to Anu. It’s safe to say that human sacrifice was a staple during the entire existence of Babylon, with the first mention of the city’s existence in the 23rd century BC. It remained a powerful city and empire at times until it was taken by Alexander the Great in 331 BC. After that, it could never quite recover its former glory."
These names of ancient gods -- during which time, incidentally, Abram lived in Ur and Haran -- were the Babylonian equivalents to Molech of the Canaanites. Ur, as a matter of fact, was a major center of child sacrifice.
2. Aztec -- The Aztecs are probably the culture best known for human sacrifice, including babies, for religious reasons. Although, those who have studied ancient Canaanite religions would probably at least equate the worship of Molech with Aztec practice, or perhaps even classify it more significant. Four years ago, in October 2017, archaeologists unearthed a rare find in the heart of Mexico City, while excavating the ancient Aztec city of Tenochititlan. They found a cylindrical pit specifically dug and lined with volcanic rocks centuries ago at the foot of Templo Mayor, a "major" temple in the city. In it they found the skeleton of a small child they believe was used for a sacrifice to the gods of the Aztecs somewhere around 1400 A.D. This was during an era of Aztec expansion when thousands and thousands of young children were sacrificed to their gods in an attempt to appease the war god, Huitzilopochtli, hoping he would bring favor to those living there.
3. Canaan -- There has been an off-and-on debate as to whether or not the Canaanites actually practiced sacrificing their infant children to Molech. While the debate gets very little media coverage and many simply discount the topic as unimportant, it actually is important, especially if you believe the Bible exposes the fact that the Children of Israel themselves bought into the ritual not very long after they entered the land. You might like to check out this website. It shows archaeological and literary evidence that the worship of Molech indeed included offering up infants as sacrifices to the pagan god. Go to https://biblereadingarcheology.com/2016/05/13/did-the-canaanites-sacrifice-their-children/ .
In an earlier letter I described the idol to Molech as being an iron furnace in the shape of the god. A fire was built inside the idol and fueled into a heat so extreme that its outstretched hands would glow a fiery red. The Canaanites would place their babies and young children on those searing hands where the child would virtually cook to death. This is the primary god of the Canaanites and became one of the gods to which the Children of Israel bowed down in blatant rebellion to the God of the Bible. In the event that you've not seen an image of Molech before, here is one artist's rendering, acclaimed to be quite accurate:
The area known as Canaan covered the vast territory settled by the descendants of Noah's grandson, Canaan. The region incorporated what is now modern-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Israel. Few gods are mentioned in the Bible as frequently as is Molech, sometimes spelled "Moloch", and was even referred to at times as the “god of child sacrifice”. Tradition tells us that Molech was "very well pleased" with offerings that burned living people in a fire, and particularly please if they were children.
Both Canaan and Molech were so well known at the time of the Exodus while the Children of Israel were still several years from entering into the territory that God made it perfectly clear that the Israelites we to never -- NEVER -- offer their children as sacrifices to Molech. In Leviticus 18:21 God said, “Neither shall you give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the Lord.”
But, Molech was not the only god to which God's people offered child sacrifices. They also later began to worship Baal, a foreign god introduced into the culture when King Ahab married Jezebel. That worship also included offering babies up for death to this violent god.
Would it be, then, too much of a stretch to say that willfully killing babies profanes the name of the God Who led our founders in establishing this nation? I think that is a reasonable conclusion.
There are many other civilizations and cultures who practiced child sacrifices -- the Olmec, the Maya, the Toltec, the Inca, the Teotihuacan, the Chinese, the Carthaginians, and the Celts, to name but a few.
Now, notice this -- the primary recipient of baby and child sacrifice was always a god. But, it was NEVER the One True God. The only occasion in scripture to be found where God commanded someone to offer up a child as a sacrifice was when He commanded Abraham to offer up Isaac. It wasn't that God wanted Isaac life, but that God wanted Abraham's trust. When Abraham's faith caused his obedience, God provided a substitute -- the Ram.
God still today provides His own sacrifice -- He is called "The Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of the world."
So, when I see the act of killing babies linked to idolatry, that the god in question is almost always Molech (by one name or another), and that Molech accepts only babies, I can come to only two conclusions ---- killing babies is religious at its root, and that abortion is to bow at the alter of Molech.
In an article entitled, Abortion and Child Sacrifice, written in 2015 by creationist Ken Hamm, he stated, . . .
"If people today were found sacrificing children, as the Canaanites and others did in the Old Testament, I’m sure the public and its elected officials [alike] would be aghast. Such people would be prosecuted for brutality and murder. It is my contention that in essence abortion is another form of child sacrifice! But because killing children in the womb has been legalized in the US, [certain political leaders] and many other pro-abortionists condone this brutality and murder!"
If there is any one grievous sin that characterizes our national act of forgetting and forsaking God, I believe it to be the accepted practice of abortion. To be totally blunt, I believe that, in the spirit world unseen by human eyes but more real than what human eyes see, every Planned Parenthood clinic in America is a temple to Molech. And, the more I study the concept, the purpose, the motivation, and the history of abortion, the more convinced I am that, without exception, abortion is the most despicable and horrendous affront to God of anything we have ever done, save our contemporary blatant rejection of God's offer of forgiveness and redemption through His Son. In fact, . . .
THE BIBLE IS CRYSTAL CLEAR:
There is a 2012 article on the Associates For Biblical Research website by Dr. Andrew White, M.D., entitled "Abortion and the Ancient Practice of Child Sacrifice" in which Dr. White stated, . . .
"The most obvious parallel between the rite of child sacrifice and the practice of abortion is the sober fact that the parents actually kill their own offspring. There are however many other parallels. At Carthage the main reason for sacrificing a child was to avert potential dangers in a crisis or to gain success through fulfilling a vow.
"Today many times when a woman faces an unwanted pregnancy, abortion seems to be the only way to resolve the crisis she finds herself in. The potential danger to reputation, education, career, etc., become overwhelming. To avert the seemingly terrifying consequences of carrying a pregnancy to term, the woman may turn to abortion as a means of escape.
"Another woman may experience much less of the anxiety and fear that accompany a crisis. She may simply see the pregnancy as an intrusion into her self-serving lifestyle and an obstacle in the way of the road to her success. Sadly this woman's offspring must be sacrificed so that she can continue uninterrupted with her plans for the future."
There is no way possible that any person, -- infidel, pagan, or Christian, -- can find a single legitimate reason to give a child, whether born or pre-born, over to idolatrous worship, whether it is before an alter in the middle of a temple or a field, or on the alter of a surgical bed in a doctor's office or a Planned Parenthood clinic.
Quite to the contrary, all of sane thinking and moral standards describe such action as the murder of a child. Whether it is born or pre-born, it is a child. It is sacred; it is a gift from God; it deserves to live; it is worthy of life.
The following are representatives of the scores of scripture dealing with the sacrifice of infants to pagan gods, usually to Molech as the primary god of the Canaanite culture. The phrase, "pass through the fire" is a direct reference to sacrificing. The terms "child" and "children" in the Hebrew language are almost always used in the following scriptures as referring to very young babies. While this may become laborious reading to some, I must list a significant number of scriptures that reveal the sanctity of life and the blatant sinfulness of abortion -- in spite of risking losing some of my friends. May I simply remind them that their argument is with God, and not with me.
> Psalm 127:3-5: ---- Behold, children are a gift of the LORD, The fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one's youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them; They will not be ashamed When they speak with their enemies in the gate.
> Psalm 106:35–38: ---- But [God's people] mingled with the Gentiles and learned their works; they served their idols, which became a snare to them. They even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons, and shed innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with blood.
> Prov 6:16-17: ---- There are six things which the LORD hates, Yes, seven which are an abomination to Him:
Pro 6:17 Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, And hands that shed innocent blood, . . .
> Exod 22:29: ---- You shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the Lord.
> II Kings 3:17: ---- There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, . . .
> II Kings 16:3: ---- Then [Ahaz] took his oldest son who was to reign in his place, and offered him as a burnt offering on the wall. And there came great wrath against Israel, and they departed from him and returned to their own land.
> II Chron 28:3: ---- But [Ahaz] walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and even made his son pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord had driven out from before the sons of Israel.
> II Kings 17:7-8, 16-17: ---- Now this came about because the sons of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who had brought them up from the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and they had feared other gods and walked in the customs of the nations whom the LORD had driven out before the sons of Israel, and in the customs of the kings of Israel which they had introduced. . . . They forsook all the commandments of the LORD their God and made for themselves molten images, even two calves, and made an Asherah and worshiped all the host of heaven and served Baal.
Then they made their sons and their daughters pass through the fire, and practiced divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking Him.
> II Kings 21:6: ---- Then [Manasseh] made their sons and their daughters pass through the fire, and practiced divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking Him.
> II Chron 33:6: ---- [Manasseh] made his son pass through the fire, practiced witchcraft and used divination, and dealt with mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord provoking Him to anger.
> Jer 7:31: ---- [You sons of Judah] inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every luxuriant tree, [you] who slaughter (burn) the children in the ravines, under the clefts of the crags?
> Deut 12:29-31: ---- When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations which you are going in to dispossess, and you dispossess them and dwell in their land, beware that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, 'How do these nations serve their gods, that I also may do likewise?' You shall not behave thus toward the LORD your God, for every abominable act which the LORD hates they have done for their gods; for they even burn their sons and daughters in the fire to their gods.
> Lev 20:2-5: ---- You shall not behave thus toward the Lord your God, for every abominable act which the Lord hates they have done for their gods; for they even burn their sons and daughters in the fire to their gods.
> Jer 32:35: ---- But they mingled with the nations and learned their practices, and served their idols, which became a snare to them. They even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to the demons, . . .
> Hos 13:2: ---- They built the high places of Baal that are in the valley of Ben-hinnom to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech, which I had not commanded them nor had it entered My mind that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.
> Ezek 20:31: ---- . . . . and I pronounced them unclean because of their gifts, in that they caused all their firstborn to pass through the fire so that I might make them desolate, in order that they might know that I am the Lord.”’
> Ezek 23:37: ---- When you offer your gifts, when you cause your sons to pass through the fire, you are defiling yourselves with all your idols to this day. And shall I be inquired of by you, O house of Israel? As I live,” declares the Lord God, “I will not be inquired of by you.
> Ezek 16:20-21: ---- Because they have forsaken Me and have made this an alien place and have burned sacrifices in it to other gods, that neither they nor their forefathers nor the kings of Judah had ever known, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, a thing which I never commanded or spoke of, nor did it ever enter My mind;
> Gen 22:1-2 ---- “Moreover, you took your sons and daughters whom you had borne to Me and sacrificed them to idols to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter? You slaughtered My children and offered them up to idols by causing them to pass through the fire.
> II Kings 17:31: ---- You slaughtered My children and offered them up to idols by causing them to pass through the fire.
> Jer 19:5: ---- They built the high places of Baal in order to burn their sons in the fire as whole burnt offerings to Baal, something that I had not commanded or spoken of and that had never even come into my heart.
WHERE LIFE COMES FROM:
Most Christians, and Americans in general, acknowledge one of two things about life ---- 1) we don't know where life comes from or when it begins, and 2) life begins with and comes from God.
This is really at the heart of the abortion question. If nobody knows where life comes from and how it began, then it is easy to embrace abortion. After all, if life is an unknown, then it has no lasting value. When life ends and you die, it's all over. So, since life has no real purpose other than the "here and now" for a few years, it really doesn't matter whether that life ends in natural death or in a miscarriage before birth.
Likewise, it really doesn't matter whether that life is willfully taken by murder at age 25 in a shoot out or by murder in the womb on a surgical bed before it has a chance to be expressed by longevity. What's the difference? Not only is life cheap, but it is also unnecessary -- and unwanted.
If, on the other hand, one acknowledges that life comes from God, it's an entirely different story. Because, you see, if life comes from God, then we are responsible to care for it, and we are accountable for what we do with it. So, it's easier to simply convince one's self that what's in the womb isn't life yet, and it doesn't become life until it is extracted from the birth canal and starts breathing when it's whacked on the fanny.
Until then, it's only a cell . . . or maybe a blob . . . or perhaps even a fetus. But it's not life. It's nothing more than a mass of organic matter, much like a cyst or a tumor, that needs to be removed.
Once, however, a person acknowledges that both the Bible and science are right -- that life begins at conception, -- we are faced with a choice. The choice is actually NOT about economic hardship if the life is born, or about avoiding embarrassment if the life is born, or about the impact on career goals if the life is born, or even whether or not the birth mother will live or die if the life continues to grow and is born. The choice, rather, is -- what do you do with God's gift of life?
Have you ever taken time to see what scripture says about life?
It's pretty profound.
So, let me conclude today's letter by summarizing the nature of, origin of, and creator of life. Because I am already a full day behind in sending this letter, and because it is already too long, I'll leave it up to you to search the scriptures for yourself -- and hopefully, I can follow up with more specifics down the line.
So, here we go:
1. God is life -- the embodiment of, the essence of, the originator of, the creator of, and the giver of life.
2. Because God is eternal, His life is eternal -- having no beginning, and having no ending.
3. All of life is created by and comes from Him -- all of it.
4. His pre-existent life was expressed in time through His creation of the world and all that is in it.
5. God chose to exhibit the epitome of life by creating human beings as the ultimate containers of His life.
6. When He breathed into that lump of clay, He breathed Life into it, and it became a Living being.
7. Human life was created by Him, for Him, and to Him.
8. Tragically that life was attacked, marred, and stained, and the the perfect DNA by which it was created became corrupted and began to die.
9. The enemy of life has done everything possible to destroy and terminate the life that is so precious to God -- because that life was given honor, authority, and responsibility that had originally been given to the enemy (see Psalm 8).
10. Because God loved and cherished life that He had created, He provided a rescue plan to redeem that life.
11. It is God's intent that every expression of human life that is formed, is able to live and flourish until old age takes it.
12. Every life, no matter its gender, its health condition its skin color, or its abilities, is precious, valued, and worthy of saving, nurturing, and protecting.
13. God is a specialist in rescuing life when it is endangered, attacked, injured, diseased, or otherwise impaired.
14. Anything that attempts to willfully and intentionally terminate that life is not from God, is not acceptable to God, and is abhorrent to God.
15. Of severe and unthinkable offense to God is the act of taking life before it has had an opportunity to enter the world and experience the plan God has had for it from before time began.
You may or may not agree with what I have listed, but I believe there is no doubt that scripture clearly bears these fifteen things out in no uncertain terms. Hopefully we will look at some of them in more detail in the next few letters.
FINALLY:
"In the beginning was the Word; and the Word was with God; and the Word was God. In Him was Life, and that Life was the light of men." (Jn 1:1-2)
"And God said, 'let Us make man in our image; let us make him after our likeness; and let him rule . . ." (Gen 1:26)
"And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into him the breath of Life, and man became a living being." (Gen 2:7)
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.” (Jer 1:5)
In my next letter we will further explore the issue of abortion, how the founders tried to protect us against it, and the dire consequences it has on a culture.
In His Bond, By His Grace, and for His Kingdom,
Bob Tolliver -- Romans 1:11
Life Unlimited Ministries
LUMglobal
[email protected]
Copyright October, 2021
"A fire kept burning on the hearthstone of my heart, and I took up the burden of the day with fresh courage and hope." -- Charles F. McKoy
"If Jesus had preached the same message that many ministers preach today, He would never have been crucified." -- Leonard Ravenhill
"The time will come when instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the Church will have clowns entertaining the goats." -- Charles H. Spurgeon
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