Passed Through the Fire-Child Sacrifice and the People of God

Summarize this: The nations that surrounded ancient Israel worshipped terrible, blood thirsty gods. A constant issue in the OT is that Israel constantly followed the example of the surrounding nations, and worshipped their false gods. And terribly, part of this worship that Israel ended up embracing was the sacrificing of their own children on altars in front of the idols. Since the babies were then burned, the Hebrew Bible calls this terrible practice, passing children through the fire. We know that this practice of sacrificing children was wide-spread in the ancient world, so much so that in one city, they have found the cemetery were the ashes of the infants were buried. Archaeologists have counted more than 20,000 graves!

We condemn this as evil! And rightfully so, but I want you to hear from me that our culture’s practice of aborting infants is just as evil. Whether by sacrifice to the pagan god Molech or by forceps in a planned parenthood clinic or the abortion pill, the end result is the same, a dead child. And if we think that 20,000 dead children in a pagan cemetery are bad, then how bad is our country? When America has on average that many abortions every week!

We are going to be talking about the killing of children today, and it is going to be hard! But it is a truth that we as God people need to hear. We will have four points about Israel’s sacrifice of children, all four of which apply to the United States as well.

Our main idea today is: that Just as the Israelites should have rejected child sacrifice, Christians should reject abortion.

I ask that you stand with me, and read Psalm 106:37-38 with me and hear about the rebellion of Israel, and sadly, and to our shame, about the rebellion of the United States as well.

Now before we start, I have thirty minutes to cover a huge topic. I cannot possibly talk about every unique situation. I am painting quickly, with broad brush strokes here. If you want to discuss something in more detail, then please call the office and we will find a time to talk.

(Summarize) Psalm 106 is actually the second half of a pair that includes Psalm 105. These two Psalms together, present a complete picture of God’s relationship with Israel through his covenant. Psalm 105 is positive, because it describes in great detail God’s faithfulness to his people. According to Psalm 105, no matter what happens, God is righteous and loyal to his people. Psalm 106 however, is the opposite. In fact, this Psalm is probably a type of lament for all the wrong that Israel has done. It is actually quite depressing, because it details Israel’s unfaithfulness to the Lord. Psalm 106 is a long, and detailed list of the ways that Israel disobeyed God, and rejected his authority in their lives. Each sin listed in this Psalm is like a stair-step, with each step leading you lower into a dark basement away from the light. And as Israel turned their backs on the Lord, their sinful behavior escalated, getting worse and worse, until finally, Israel was killing their own infants.

Our first point is that

I. Child-sacrifice was the peak of Israel’s rebellion

vs. 37

I will summarize the steps of rebellion in this Psalm t lead up to our passage I am indebted to John Piper for this list here:

Verse 7 (near the end): “They rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea.”

Verse 14: “They had a wanton craving in the wilderness.” (They wanted the wrong things, things that God had not given them)

Verse 16: “They were jealous of Moses and Aaron.” (They want to be in charge)

Verse 19: “They made a calf at Horeb and worshipped a metal image.”

Verse 24: “They despised the pleasant land, having no faith in the promise.” (God had promised that he would give them the land, but they doubted)

Verse 28: “They yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor, and ate sacrifices offered to the dead.”

Verse 32: “They angered God at the waters of Meribah and made Moses spirit bitter.”

Verse 34: “They did not destroy the peoples, but mixed with the nations and learned to do as they did.”

Verse 36: “They served their idols.”

Verse 37: “They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons.”-

When a society moves to the stage when it is killing its own children, and it thinks this is normal, it has moved about as far beyond the Lord as can be imagined. At the end of the road of rejecting God, there was the ultimate act of rebellion, destroying that which was made in God’s image.

And this is an important point, because in preparation for this message, I was listening to a debate between the pro-life and pro-abortion positions. A lady holding the pro-abortion position could not understand why someone would see abortion as morally wrong. From her perspective, the baby in the womb is just a clump of cells, that can be disposed of whenever the mother would like. But this violates what the Bible teaches about humans, all humans, even little humans, being made in the image of God. And if they are made in his image, then they have value, and if they have value, then they must be protected, from the very moment of conception.

-And what does it mean to be made in the image of God, as Genesis 1: 27 states? It is a vast concept that we cannot study in depth today, but in summary, it means that all humans are uniquely valuable because they reflect the greatness of their Maker in a special way.

The Image of God means that we have consciousness, rationality, and language. But we also have unique creative capabilities like agriculture, architecture, medicine, art and music. Finally, we as the image of God, are wired uniquely for relationship, because we are created in the Image of the relational, Triune God. Because of this we have families and friends and the ability to fall in love and to form communities, as Image bearers we are wired for relationship, and most importantly, we are wired for relationship with him who made us. Augustine said that God has made us for himself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in him.

-This means that the child developing in the womb of its mother, from the moment of conception, is not a clump of cells. The child is a human being made in the Image of God, worthy of protection. It is not a potential human, it is a human with potential. And even our laws acknowledge this. This is why in our Federal Laws we punish a man who hurts a pregnant woman as if he has attacked two people, not just one.

-(Illustration)

My wife being pregnant with our first child has brought this home for me. Three months ago, when Kaity was five months into her pregnancy, we go to see our daughter Anna through ultra sound…I had always heard that this was a special moment but I had no idea how it would feel to see our baby! Anna turned to the side and we saw the profile of her face…and it was the face of a human being…She held up her hand and spread it apart and we could see her fingers…little feet that like to kick her mom. And at that point, she was well within the window to be aborted in half that states in our country (1). Looking at her, she was obviously human. There is no argument that you will make that excuse to me the murder of little Anna, or any other vulnerable child like her.

Our second point, that we also see in verse 37 is that

II. Child-sacrifice was connected to demons

vs. 37

We see in verse 37 that they were sacrificing children specifically to demons. What Israel thought they were worshipping gods like Baal or Molech, they were actually worshipping the servants of satan.

-Jesus teaches us in John 8 that Satan has been a murderer since the beginning. I firmly believe without qualification that according to God’s Word, If someone is participating in the killing of children, they are doing the works of satan.

And this contrasts totally with Jesus who wants little children to come to him that he might bless them and also contrasts with God who from the very beginning commanded Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply. Our God is a God of life, not of death.

Illustration-Now, because of the work of satan, It is thus no coincidence that the sacrifice of children has been found all over the world and in some places in Africa, is still known to be taking place. But a detail that I want to point out is that in the Roman world, even though at the time of Jesus, infants were no longer sacrificed, they were however, killed at an alarming rate through the practice of INFANTICIDE. This was when…

One of the ways that the Christian church showed that it was different from the pagan world surrounding it, was that Christians would save these abandoned infants and raise them as their own. So one of the many reasons we as Christians value life now, because Christians have always valued life. This issue is not something new with us.

But, speaking of Satan’s war on infant humans, the more I researched this week, the darker it got…

-Nazis-Jews and other races-As many abortions as possible. (7)

-Communists, deny that man is made in God’s Image, so they have always been in favor of abortion. Communist China has been a global leader in abortions for decades. In 2022 alone, it is estimated that they killed 13 million babies. (6)

-Modern Islamic societies-thousands of girls are aborted annually because of preference for sons. So many girls have been aborted that this has actually started to become an issue in countries like Pakistan because there are not enough women to marry. From 2017-2018, a charity in Pakistan found found 345 newborn babies dumped in garbage in Karachi. 99% of them were girls.

-These cultures have huge differences between them, but something they all share is a wicked disregard for life because they do not see babies as being made in the image of God.

-The fact that children were literally sacrificed to demonic forces demonstrates that the desire to kill infants is not motivated by heaven, but rather comes from hell. We as God’s people, the Church, should desire to do the works of God. And these are works of light and life. Not the works of satan, which bring darkness and death. We as God’s people need to be beacons of hope and defenders of all human life, especially lives that are vulnerable or not seen as valuable by the surrounding culture.

And, in fact, speaking of killing infants, when our Lord was an infant, Herod literally pursued him to murder him. And just to be as sure as possible, Herod ordered that all of the children of Bethlehem two years old or under should be exterminated. We look at Herod and rightly condemn him as wicked, but I think that we fail to see the connection between his satanic desire to slaughter the infant Lord and our own culture’s willingness to kill babies for the sake of the mother’s convenience. And if this was not enough, there was not an enemy of the nation of Israel more cruel than the Pharoah of Egypt in the days of Moses. And how did Pharoah, in Exodus chapter 1, scheme to oppress God’s people? Specifically by killing their infant boys. The more I thought about this topic, the more I began to see it as a theme throughout the Bible. The enemy and those who serve him want to kill children while God and those who follow him want to save as many children as possible.

III. Child-sacrifice involved the shedding of innocent blood

vs 38a

-Now we come to another idea from Psalm 106 that we we need to develop, that of innocence.

-John Piper teaches that relationally in so far as humans are concerned, though all of us are born sinful, no child has ever committed a crime that should mean it deserves the ultimate penalty, death. In this sense, they are innocent. Their innocence deserves protection!

-The injustice of child-sacrifice, in that the least deserving people in society, children, were the victims, is part of why to us it is so awful. And that is not just because we have well-developed morality in 2024. It is because the Law of God has been written on our hearts and our consciences implicitly know that the violence done to the underserving and the vulnerable is the worst thing that can be done.

-And Belmont, notice that the blood of these children was innocent. This means that they were not responsible for the conditions of their conception. Many people today, trying to be considerate to the mother, support abortion for situations like rape. But to support a policy like this means that you are supporting the spilling of innocent blood, that had NOTHING to do with the circumstances in which it was conceived. If a woman was raped or abused, then we as God’s people should be profoundly sympathetic and show love and support. But killing an innocent child will not take away the mother’s pain. It will instead create just one more victim.

-Speaking of the death of the innocent, Belmont, the deeper I went, the more discouraging this topic became. For example, it was reported years ago, that the nation of Iceland had effectively cured its society of Down Syndrome. And how did they do this, you ask? Was it through treatment or a new medication? No, it was through abortion. In Iceland, Downs children are aborted at a rate of 99%. They have almost totally eliminated Down Syndrome from Iceland by exterminating babies who are diagnosed with it in the wombs of their mothers. Thankfully, Belmont, in America, we are not like this. We are infinitely more enlightened than the country of Iceland. We only destroy 70% of our babies that are diagnosed with Down’s syndrome.

-African Americans are aborted at three times the rate of whites, and Hispanics are aborted at twice the rate.

-If the mother is poor the child is much more likely to be aborted in the womb.

What have we become as a nation where we kill babies who are disabled? Where we kill the babies of minorities at far higher rates than anyone else? Where we destroy the children of poor women? If I were to describe a country like this for you, you would say “Is that North Korea?” But I submit that this is the United States.

IV. Child-sacrifice polluted the entire nation

vs. 38b

-The Bible teaches that we are responsible for our own sins. But it also teaches that sin always has a communal impact. For example, in the Book of Joshua, a man named Achan steals items that belong to the Lord, and the entire nation of Israel is punished for his actions. This happens throughout the Old Testament.

-And if this was true of Israel, how could it not also be true of us? That sinful behavior, practiced widely and accepted by half of our population, will not negatively impact all of us.

-I want you to hear the scale of the abortion crisis in our country.

We fought for a decade in Vietnam and lost 58,000 young men. This war was devastating and damaged the fabric of our nation in such a way that America has never been the same again. But we have killed on average almost double that number, every month, month after month, for 612 months…Because since 1973, an estimated 63 million abortions have been carried out in the US. Put another way, in the US, we abort the entire population of Odessa, every month.

The Bible teaches that the path of obedience to God and his commands is the path to blessing. If our country willingly disregards the commands of the Lord, and commits mass murder of the innocent, how could we expect him to bless us? As a nation, we want to do whatever we want, and then we ask God why he lets bad stuff happen to us.

So how do we respond?

-We IDENTIFY as people who are pro-life. We should care about all people who live. This is why we feed the hungry as a church. This is why we donate to Soul Foods who help the Homeless in Odessa. To be Pro-Life is not just to resist abortion, it is to seek to help human life flourish. This does not mean that you suddenly have to support open borders and socialism. But it does mean that you should be an advocate for the weak in our society.

-We can SERVE-We show kindness to the vulnerable. The Life Center in town is incredible. Kaity and I are getting involved there, and we hope that you will join us. We are going to put up information for the Life Center and I want you to consider SERVING with them to help young girls who are making the hard decision to choose the lives of their babies over their own comfort.

We can VOTE

Unfortunately, neither of our candidates for President in 2024 are truly Pro-life. Though to be clear, that does not mean that their policies are equal.

In his third presidential campaign, Donald Trump has refused to take a firm Pro-Life position, seeking instead to send the decision about abortion down to each state. President Trump’s official position that I found buried deep on his own website, is that he is campaigning specifically against late term abortion, which going by statistics, would only stop 5% of total abortions, better than nothing but hardly making a dent in the million abortions that are performed in the US every year. I could barely find this policy position because the word abortion was only mentioned one time in his 16 page position document, and it comes up after issues like supporting active and healthy living for senior citizens. President Trump has even gone so far as to say that if there was a Federal ban on abortion, that he would veto it! I submit that this is not a strong, pro-life message. President Trump should care enough about the innocent victims of abortion to take a harder stand.

However, we should acknowledge that even if he has weakened his stance on this issue since 2020, the judges that President Trump appointed to the Supreme Court over-turned Roe vs. Wade, which for fifty years had ensured access to abortions at the Federal level.

Donald Trump is a flawed candidate for President, but his actions are directly responsible for the greatest victory for the pro life movement since 1973.

Even though Donald Trump fails to communicate a true, pro-life stance, Kamala Harris is aggressively pro-abortion. She has made expanding abortion rights the core of her presidential campaign. In all of the interviews for her campaign, and on her own website which I checked for this message, she has not indicated that she supports any restrictions on abortions whatsoever. She has instead spoken of getting Federal Legislation passed to ensure abortion access in all 50 states.

As a senator she fought against legislation to prevent late term abortions. (3)

She was the first Vice President to ever personally visit an abortion clinic.

This last week, in her NBC interview, she said that she is against any exceptions for healthcare workers who feel that their religious beliefs prevent them from participating in an abortion. This means that if a Christian Doctor or nurse, refused to participate in an abortion, they would at a minimum lose their jobs.(4)

On Friday of this week, she held a rally in Houston, that was entirely focused on abortion rights. I watched as much of this rally as necessary to confirm that speaker after speaker, including abortion doctors, took the stage for hours, all speaking about restoring and expanding abortion.

Belmont, as Christians in a Republic like ours, we have a right and a profound responsibility to participate in choosing who will govern us, who will make our laws, and who will set the course of our nation. To be clear, neither candidate in this Presidential election holds biblical views on life. But if we as Christians are not willing to choose the lesser of two evils in an election like this then we can guarantee that others will choose the greater of two evils. I firmly believe that we will be held responsible for not using our freedoms to advocate for the least of these, the absolute most vulnerable people in our society, infants in the wombs of their mothers. I urge you to vote for the candidate who will best protect life in the womb.

Now, if you are listening to this message and have participated in an abortion, or been impacted by one, then I want you to know that the Life Center a half mile from our building is a fantastic Christian organization that has counseling to help you come to grips with your past. Their information should be on the screen now and we have put out resources for you or anyone you know who would be blessed by them on the hall table.

Now, before we close, this has to to be said. If you have participated in abortion, either by having one yourself, or encouraging a mother to do so, then you have committed a terrible sin. But, the only way that the spilling of the innocent blood of a child can be atoned for, is by the spilling of the innocent blood of Jesus. And this was why Jesus came. There is no sin, even abortion, that is so great that the blood of Christ cannot cover it and bring forgiveness and restoration. If you have not believed in Jesus, then come talk with me today. I want nothing more than for you to know Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who died on the cross to save sinners. No matter how dark our sin and no matter how far we are separated from him, his mercy is enough to cover everything we have ever done if we will turn to him in belief.

WOULD YOU PRAY WITH ME?

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/national-international/where-is-abortion-legal-a-state-by-state-guide-to-current-laws/3259835/

https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/kamala-harriss-extreme-abortion-policies-hurt-women

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/interactive/2023/presidential-candidates-2024-policies-issues/kamala-harris-abortion/

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/transcript-president-kamala-harris-interview-nbc-news-hallie-jackson-rcna176330

https://www.ncregister.com/news/tim-walz-born-alive-abortion

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3182106/abortion-legal-china-how-common-it-and-why-it-controversial

https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/as-many-abortions-as-possible-12118