Then they yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor, and ate sacrifices offered to the dead. They provoked the Lord to anger with their deeds, and a plague broke out among them. Then Phineas stood up and intervened, and the plague was stayed. And that was counted to him as righteousness from generation to generation forever...They did not destroy the peoples, as the Lord commanded them, but they mixed with the nations and learned to do as they did. They served their idols, which became a snare to them. They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons. They poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan, and the land was polluted with blood. Thus they became unclean in their acts, and played the whore with their deeds. (Verses 28-31; 34-39)
While Israel lived in Shittim, the people began to whore with the daughters of Moab. These invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. Numbers 25
How brutal does God want us to be with our sin?
Shittim was the last stop before the Israelites crossed the Jordan. Approximately ten miles east of Jericho and the promised land. So close. Almost there. And sex trumped all. The Moabite women wooed the men of Israel not only to their beds, but to their gods. This was no little sin. The men were taking their sons and daughters and slaughtering them as a religious rite. The bloody bodies of His children's children presented to a pagan. The giving of their hearts to wanton urges separated them from not only their destiny, but the Holy God Who was leading them. God isn't simply jealous over His people because He's a mean spirited and malevolent God. Our God isn't interested in our living like the world. Because? We go "whoring" after everything that we think will satisfy our appetites and end up doing things like killing our kids. Think that's just ancient history? Millions of little bodies in abortion clinics around the world might tell a different story. Sacrificed to the god of self.
But this isn't about abortion so much as about what we who know better to do with our sins. The ones we know keep us from God. From adulterous relationships to alcohol, from drugs to porn, from grasping for power to lying to our friends and family. The consequences of adoration of things unholy are dire. Even if you discount God. Addiction is slavery--a fatal one. But there is God. And He does care what we do with our lives. And He has the right to judge that. And punish it.
"Take all the chiefs of the people and hang them in the sun before the Lord, that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel!" God ordered Moses. God also sent a deadly plague that sickened the people. Sin will do that. Sicken us.
To the judges of Israel, Moses said: "Each of you kill those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor."
A dire sentence. No doubt. There was a great deal of wailing at the entrance to the meeting tent. They didn't want any consequences for turning their backs on God. Suddenly, when He finally had had enough, they lay on the ground crying their pain. No matter the lost babies. No matter the crushed heart of the God Who loved them even as He watched them prostrate themselves before a stupid idol. The sin had to be purged in order for it to cease. Killed. Destroyed brutally. God chose to deal with sin for what it is: a life destroying cancer.
Into this scene comes a man trouncing up to his family tribe with his Midianite woman on his arm. Defying God to do anything to him. Laughing in the face of all the repentant wailing, seeing it as senseless. "She's my woman. I'm not bowing to this cacophony of misery. It's my choice!" His attitude.
Something in Phineas, Aaron's grandson, caught the absolute insolence of the moment--the complete disregard for what a Holy God had just pronounced. He stepped away from the group, went to his tent to retrieve a spear, and found the haughty adulterer in a temple chamber. Phineas stabbed both the man and the woman in their bellies. Killing them. And the plague stopped. But not before it killed off twenty-four thousand people.
"One man felt about this what I do," cried God. "He's turned back my wrath because he was jealous with my jealousy. Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace. Because he was jealous with my jealousy and made atonement for the people of Israel."
Jesus, of course, is our atoning sacrifice now. But what do we do with the "sin that so easily besets us?" What does God want me to do with my addictions? With my deeply sickened heart? With anger, hate, lying and offense? From this story, I will tell you: Brutal death. Intentional killing of the things that keep us from our relationship with God. Yes, God is a God of grace. But we must be about putting to death the unholy practices and idols of our lives. We used to be controlled by such things, when we were dying. When we didn't know better. But we can't bring them into life with Christ. We must choose to die to sin and live to Christ instead of parading our sinfulness around in church as if God doesn't care. As if, since He's a God of grace, He won't deal with it. Prancing about with our self-righteousness while in our closets we reek of sin. It's true. We do this. And God isn't pleased. Not only that, it will ultimately kill us. We will look and act so much like the rest of the world that the rest of the world won't be able to tell the difference. If we don't purge it from ourselves, God will do it for us. Because our sins cause us to look away from Him and go whoring after the world. His words, not mine. We kill sin before it kills us. Just as Phineas did. Outraged by the pompous exploitation of disobedience in the face of our God.
Set your mind on things above, not on things of the earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God...Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. In these you once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk form your mouth. Do not lie to each other, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator. Colossians 3
While Israel lived in Shittim, the people began to whore with the daughters of Moab. These invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. Numbers 25
How brutal does God want us to be with our sin?
Shittim was the last stop before the Israelites crossed the Jordan. Approximately ten miles east of Jericho and the promised land. So close. Almost there. And sex trumped all. The Moabite women wooed the men of Israel not only to their beds, but to their gods. This was no little sin. The men were taking their sons and daughters and slaughtering them as a religious rite. The bloody bodies of His children's children presented to a pagan. The giving of their hearts to wanton urges separated them from not only their destiny, but the Holy God Who was leading them. God isn't simply jealous over His people because He's a mean spirited and malevolent God. Our God isn't interested in our living like the world. Because? We go "whoring" after everything that we think will satisfy our appetites and end up doing things like killing our kids. Think that's just ancient history? Millions of little bodies in abortion clinics around the world might tell a different story. Sacrificed to the god of self.
But this isn't about abortion so much as about what we who know better to do with our sins. The ones we know keep us from God. From adulterous relationships to alcohol, from drugs to porn, from grasping for power to lying to our friends and family. The consequences of adoration of things unholy are dire. Even if you discount God. Addiction is slavery--a fatal one. But there is God. And He does care what we do with our lives. And He has the right to judge that. And punish it.
"Take all the chiefs of the people and hang them in the sun before the Lord, that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel!" God ordered Moses. God also sent a deadly plague that sickened the people. Sin will do that. Sicken us.
To the judges of Israel, Moses said: "Each of you kill those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor."
A dire sentence. No doubt. There was a great deal of wailing at the entrance to the meeting tent. They didn't want any consequences for turning their backs on God. Suddenly, when He finally had had enough, they lay on the ground crying their pain. No matter the lost babies. No matter the crushed heart of the God Who loved them even as He watched them prostrate themselves before a stupid idol. The sin had to be purged in order for it to cease. Killed. Destroyed brutally. God chose to deal with sin for what it is: a life destroying cancer.
Into this scene comes a man trouncing up to his family tribe with his Midianite woman on his arm. Defying God to do anything to him. Laughing in the face of all the repentant wailing, seeing it as senseless. "She's my woman. I'm not bowing to this cacophony of misery. It's my choice!" His attitude.
Something in Phineas, Aaron's grandson, caught the absolute insolence of the moment--the complete disregard for what a Holy God had just pronounced. He stepped away from the group, went to his tent to retrieve a spear, and found the haughty adulterer in a temple chamber. Phineas stabbed both the man and the woman in their bellies. Killing them. And the plague stopped. But not before it killed off twenty-four thousand people.
"One man felt about this what I do," cried God. "He's turned back my wrath because he was jealous with my jealousy. Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace. Because he was jealous with my jealousy and made atonement for the people of Israel."
Jesus, of course, is our atoning sacrifice now. But what do we do with the "sin that so easily besets us?" What does God want me to do with my addictions? With my deeply sickened heart? With anger, hate, lying and offense? From this story, I will tell you: Brutal death. Intentional killing of the things that keep us from our relationship with God. Yes, God is a God of grace. But we must be about putting to death the unholy practices and idols of our lives. We used to be controlled by such things, when we were dying. When we didn't know better. But we can't bring them into life with Christ. We must choose to die to sin and live to Christ instead of parading our sinfulness around in church as if God doesn't care. As if, since He's a God of grace, He won't deal with it. Prancing about with our self-righteousness while in our closets we reek of sin. It's true. We do this. And God isn't pleased. Not only that, it will ultimately kill us. We will look and act so much like the rest of the world that the rest of the world won't be able to tell the difference. If we don't purge it from ourselves, God will do it for us. Because our sins cause us to look away from Him and go whoring after the world. His words, not mine. We kill sin before it kills us. Just as Phineas did. Outraged by the pompous exploitation of disobedience in the face of our God.
Set your mind on things above, not on things of the earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God...Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. In these you once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk form your mouth. Do not lie to each other, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator. Colossians 3
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