I want to tell you a Bible story that will illustrate clearly how God feels about abortion. Consider this: America has really not retracted from its views on abortion; the hope is still just a hope that we will end that killing. To prove it, a quote from a believable news source: "In the first three months of 2024, the average number of abortions in the United States was 98,990 per month, which is about 14% higher than the same period in 2023. The number of abortions in the US has been increasing, despite bans in over a dozen states since the US Supreme Court's Dobbs decision in June 2022." We still allow around one million babies to be killed in the womb in the U.S. every year. We tinker with abortion by not allowing it in later weeks or trimesters, etc, by putting up delay obstacles, but we do not believe that it is a soul that we kill, despite Scripture telling us so. I read about how Asians around the world are still memorializing the 2004 earthquake and tsunami that killed 228,000 people. An astounding number. But: If you do 260 more just like it, you finally get close to the number of babies murdered through abortion in the U.S. since Roe (1973) was enacted, through today. That’s 62 million little lives lost. Where is our outrage?
Well, here is the rlevant Scripture story I want to tell: It begins with how evil the ancient Canaanites were (you can read about them in the book of Genesis, Joshua, and several more). Just as a sidelight, one of their worship practices was called the teraphim. Teraphim is ancestor-worship. When they wanted to zealously follow it, they would take the first-born male of their family and cut off his head! The hair of the head would be removed, and then the head would be salted and oiled, thus preserving the son's features. The dessicated head was supposed to retain contact with the departed spirit. So, with the proper ritual, the head could serve as a conduit to the spirit world, passing information between a family and their ancestor gods. The book of Jasher (a reliable book, mentioned in Joshua 10:13) records the following steps:
…taking a small tablet of copper…and writing the name of the person you desire to contact on it, and placing the tablet under his tongue and putting the skull in the house, and lighting up lights before it and bowing down to it. And at the time when they bow down to it, it spoke to them in all matters that they ask of it…
This, by the way, changed my opinion of ancestor worship, from neutral to worse. This is demonology. It also strengthens my understanding of why God would initiate such a severe judgment on the Canaanites—He is a holy God, and never tolerates killing the innocents without passing severe judgment.
Let’s take another look at another unspeakable “religious” practice of the Canaanites. Ahab, a Jewish king, was also involved. When we think of Ahab, we think of his wife Jezebel. But he has his own tale of evil. He adopted many religious practices from the Canaanites. The Canaanites were so evil that God told Israel to attack them and not leave a single soul breathing. That may seem unjust--but look at the previous paragraph for the reason why. And here's their second horrible offense: killing children as a sacrifice offering. This was in honor of the god Molech, a god of Baal. This is where Ahab got involved. Here is II Chronicles 28:3 about his “religious” worship copied from the Canaanites:
He (Ahab) burned incense in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and burned his children in the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before the children of Israel.
This horrific act seems beyond understanding. Why did Ahab do it? Well, maybe it was due to some other sexual “benefits” of worshipping Baal and Molech that might outweigh losing a son. (It helped if you had many wives and many sons; the pain of losing one was lessened). The religion, after all, included sex rituals such as, would you believe, sodomy and prostitution in religious liturgy, and adultery with swapping wives and fornication with other men’s virgin daughters. An accessible trade-off, I guess, for sacrificing your son.
Unfortunately a later Jewish king, Manasseh, did the same shocking thing. But he did even worse: he promoted it among the people! Many Israelites followed his lead. From II Kings 21:11:
“Because Manasseh king of Judah (a Jewish country) has done these abominations (he has acted more wickedly than all the Amorites who were before him, and has also made Judah sin with his idols)...
More on Manasseh’s sin, II Chronicles 33:2-3, 6-7:
But he did evil in the sight of the LORD, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before the children of Israel. 3 For he rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had broken down; he raised up altars for the Baals, and made wooden images; and he worshiped all the host of heaven and served them...6 Also he caused his sons to pass through the fire in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom; he practiced soothsaying, used witchcraft and sorcery, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke Him to anger. 7 He even set a carved image, the idol which he had made, in the house of God…
The sorcery, too, was forbidden by God. He did much more than Ahab in sorcery. And it was unbelievable that he would set an image in God’s house. And don't forget; he publicized this in Israel.
God is also totally against mediums and spiritists, as you see in Deuteronomy 18:9-14:
“When you come into the land which the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. 10 There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, 11 or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. 12 For all who do these things are an abomination to the LORD, and because of these abominations the LORD your God drives them out from before you. 13 You shall be blameless before the LORD your God. 14 For these nations which you will dispossess listened to soothsayers and diviners; but as for you, the LORD your God has not appointed such for you.
As you can see, making your children “pass through the fire,” a sacrificial murder of your own child (similar to aborting an innocent baby, my main point), was mentioned as early as Deuteronomy. This practice, and God’s hatred of it, had been known a long time. So these two kings, Ahab and Manasseh, were in direct violation of a plain command of God.
But let’s get back to our story. Manasseh’s sin (promoting it to the people, and doing it in God's house) was so great in the eyes of God that God promised His anger could not be quenched. The sad words are in II Kings 21:12-15, right next to verses on Manasseh above:
… therefore thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘Behold, I am bringing such calamity upon Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears will tingle. 13 … I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down. 14 So I will forsake the remnant of My inheritance and deliver them into the hand of their enemies; and they shall become victims of plunder to all their enemies, 15 because they have done evil in My sight, and have provoked Me to anger since the day their fathers came out of Egypt, even to this day.
’”
Manasseh’s specific sin, again? In the next verse:
Moreover Manasseh shed very much innocent blood, till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another, besides his sin by which he made Judah sin, in doing evil in the sight of the LORD.
It was the innocent blood. Blood of little children. "From one end" of Jerusalem "to another" meant lots of people followed his lead. Now Jesus loves little children. Manasseh’s sin, being publicized, the murder of the innocents was that much greater. (But it doesn’t hold a candle to America’s sin thus far, 62 million souls!)
Now you expect judgment on this, and--perchance, if there is repentance, God is OK again, right? Well, now you’re going to see a part of God you don’t want to see. To do that, we switch stories:
We’ve all heard about how Jonah, after being burped out of a big fish, preached to the vicious Assyrians, you heard about their repentance—and how God changed His mind of His promise of judgment on them. Great story about God’s mercy. Yes, we’ve all heard of the Jonah story, and there are many kids’ books about it. But did you know that Manasseh repented, and had a great reformation? Have you ever heard what happened after that? Doubtful. Well, did you ever hear about how his grandson Josiah had an even greater revival, the greatest in human history? What, you’ve never heard that one either? Not surprising, considering God’s reaction to this wonderful repentance is “unexpected.” Let me warn you: We all just need to know more about God. We have imagined His mercy is unending— but for a nation, that might not be a true image. Kind of important since He has the keys to every nation's judgment.
First, Manasseh’s judgment and repentance. From II Chronicles 33:11-16:
And the LORD spoke to Manasseh and his people, but they would not listen. 11 Therefore the LORD brought upon them the captains of the army of the king of Assyria, who took Manasseh with hooks, bound him with bronze fetters, and carried him off to Babylon. 12 Now when he was in affliction, he implored the LORD his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers, 13 and prayed to Him; and He received his entreaty, heard his supplication, and brought him back to Jerusalem into his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the LORD was God. 14 After this he (Manasseh)…took away the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the LORD, and all the altars that he had built in the mount of the house of the LORD and in Jerusalem; and he cast them out of the city. 16 He also repaired the altar of the LORD, sacrificed peace offerings and thank offerings on it, and commanded Judah to serve the LORD God of Israel.
So, you say, the land was forgiven, right? Jerusalem was saved, right? Uh, no... Manasseh died right after that. Then there was a short reign of his son, who was killed. Then his grandson Josiah comes to power. During his reign, the priests find the buried Book of the Law, blew the dust off, and read it to Josiah. He tore his clothes in distress. II Kings 22:13 records Josiah's great words:
“Go, inquire of the LORD for me, for the people and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found; for great is the wrath of the LORD that is aroused against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.”
Later, he does a “clean-up” operation like his grandfather, only better; and this is what joyous Scriptures record, from II Kings 23:1-10:
Now the king (Josiah) sent them to gather all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem to him. 2 The king went up to the house of the LORD with all the men of Judah, and with him all the inhabitants of Jerusalem—the priests and the prophets and all the people, both small and great. And he read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant which had been found in the house of the LORD. 3 Then the king stood by a pillar and made a covenant before the LORD, to follow the LORD and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people took a stand for the covenant.4 And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, the priests of the second order, and the doorkeepers, to bring out of the temple of the LORD all the articles that were made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven; and he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried their ashes to Bethel. 5 Then he removed the idolatrous priests whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense on the high places in the cities of Judah and in the places all around Jerusalem, and those who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, to the moon, to the constellations, and to all the host of heaven.6 And he brought out the wooden image from the house of the LORD, to the Brook Kidron outside Jerusalem, burned it at the Brook Kidron and ground it to ashes, and threw its ashes on the graves of the common people. 7 Then he tore down the ritual booths of the perverted persons that were in the house of the LORD, where the women wove hangings for the wooden image. 8 And he brought all the priests from the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had burned incense, from Geba to Beersheba; also he broke down the high places at the gates which were at the entrance of the Gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were to the left of the city gate… 10 And he defiled Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter pass through the fire to Molech.
The “high places” that he tore down, in case you’re wondering, based on other Scriptures, seem to be where the religious prostitutes were. He eliminated that practice. He executed the priests of the high places, by the way. And he removed those who consulted mediums and spiritists. Josiah goes farther than his repentant grandfather, and he goes out of his way to defile the worship places of false gods—and he gets the populace involved with making a covenant to God. The main thing is that he stopped the sacrifice killing of children.
He goes even further yet. In honor of religious holidays that he’d just heard about, he institutes a Passover festival (memorializing God’s miracles which saved them from Egypt). We read this joyous event in II Chronicles 35:18:
There had been no Passover kept in Israel like that since the days of Samuel the prophet; and none of the kings of Israel had kept such a Passover as Josiah kept, with the priests and the Levites, all Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
All in all, he was praised as a wonderful king—he gets higher praise than King David. Think about that! From II Kings 23:25:
Now before him there was no king like him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the Law of Moses; nor after him did any arise like him.
So, you say, God forgave the land, right? Jerusalem was saved, right? If God could give the vicious Assyrians a break with Jonah, He could give His favorites, the “apple of His eye,” a break, right? I mean, two repentances, two reforms. Uh….no. Only five verses after the great Passover festival, only four verses after the verses recording the reformation above, Josiah was simply…dead. Explanation? From II Kings 23:26:
Nevertheless the LORD did not turn from the fierceness of His great wrath, with which His anger was aroused against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked Him.
So, great reformation and the greatest revival in history could not bring forgiveness. I remind you, what were the “provocations” that were unable to save Jerusalem? Killing the innocents.
Immediately after Josiah, it turns out that the Israeli kings, and soon the land, too, after bloody defeats in battles, are in the hand of their enemies. You can see why this story is not in kids’ books, and not well-known. We don’t like stories with a bad ending. But if you kill the innocent--your country is eventually wiped off the map. Shouldn’t we expect the same for the U.S.--or even worse, since we have not even repented? A country who seems to lack the spiritual power to slow down or stop the status quo of killing a million innocents a year? America could be another great power in the dust--which seems to have happened to every great power in the past.
Now if any of my readers out there had an abortion, or encouraged one, that's a different subject than a country. Now we’re talking about your individual soul. You will have different consequences than Israel if you repent. Murder will, indeed, get you to hell—unless you repent and begin living your life for Christ, who came to die to pay for your sin. Become a “living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God,” as Romans 12:1 puts it. It’s never too late to confess and begin to have guilt-free living.
Acknowledgement: Ancient Paganism, Ken Johnson
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