I want to tell you a Bible story
that will illustrate how God feels about abortion.
First, consider this: America has
really not retracted from the assault on the unborn, despite the great praises
given to our Supreme Court for ruling against Roe v. Wade. It simply rolled
back the decision to the individual states. For example, Virginia and Minnesota recently
passed laws about permitting abortion up till birth. About half the states (unfortunately some of
the more-populated ones) will keep abortion mills running. Second, if
you're in the "wrong" state and want an abortion, it's now estimated
that 50% of employers will pay for your travel so you can get that
abortion. Third, there will be also be extreme pressure to make the
abortifacient pills (formerly called "RU-486") an over-the-counter
drug. Killing the infant by chemistry, applied by the prospective mother.
Even in "safe" states, you
can still kill the infant as a zygote, when you can't hear a heartbeat, or
whatever the politicians choose as a restriction to ease their
conscience. They have to pay attention to the voting public; and the latest
poll indicates 57% of America is willing to kill that new life "under
limited circumstances." But the fact is, a fertilized egg, no matter
how small, is a human life. You're still killing it, no matter how little
it is, and will earn God's wrath. Because, as Scripture says, we are all
made in the image of God. That's a fact that is not known by many, and
ignored by many more, Ignorance is not an effective excuse in heaven, just
like ignorance will not "get you off" in traffic court.
We will still kill a horrifying
number of innocent babies in the womb in the U.S. every year. We defy the polls
that say 65% of Americans are "Christians." No real Christian
does this. But for over 50 years we have allowed this bloody massacre to
continue on our watch. We all share guilt, for not doing enough to stop
it.
I read about how Asians around the
world are still memorializing the 2004 earthquake and tsunami that killed
228,000 people in the Orient. An astounding number, don't you think? 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 60 million little lives lost, and more to come.
Let's get to the Biblical story that
relates to our subject. Start with a “religious” practice of the
Canaanites—namely, they killed their children as a sacrifice offering to their
god, Baal, whose title was Prince, Lord of the Earth.
Can you believe that Ahab, a Jewish
king, also got hooked on this practice? Since God had already condemned
it many times in Scripture, you would think he was smarter. Every king
had scribes, but Ahab was not interested in them repeating God's laws. It
wasn't caused by his notorious wife Jezebel, but he had his own tale of evil
when he hooked up with the Canaanites in doing this. The Canaanites were so
evil that God told Israel to attack them and not leave a single soul
breathing. Here is II Chronicles 28:3:
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.
The horrific pain of a death by fire
on a baby seems beyond understanding. Why did Ahab do it? Well, Baal was a god
of fertility, which meant the religion included ritual orgies, sodomy and
prostitution, and adultery with swapping wives and fornication with other men’s
virgin daughters. So maybe the sexual “benefits” were worth killing a son
for. (It helped if you had many wives and many sons, which kings typically had;
the pain of losing one was “lessened”).
Later, a reform king tore down all
the "high places" where this ritual went on. But these were erected
again by a still later Jewish king--Manasseh. He did the same shocking
thing as Ahab, sacrificing his child. 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 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…
Unbelievable that he would do a
carved image in God’s house. That’s blasphemy, and a break of the second
Commandment. God is also against killing innocents and out-of-marriage sex--and
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 their
children “pass through the fire,” a sacrifice murder of their own child, was
mentioned as early as Deuteronomy. This practice, and God’s hatred of it, had
been known a long time by the Jews. So these two kings, Ahab and Manasseh, were
in direct violation of an earlier 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 He promised His anger could not be quenched.
The sad words are in II Kings 21:12-15, right next to verses 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.’”
The key is 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. Jesus loves little children. How was
Manasseh’s sin greater than Ahab, so that Ahab wasn’t threatened?” He
publicized it, and lots of people followed. So the murder of the innocents was
that much greater. (But it doesn’t total America’s sin thus far, over 60
million souls!)
Israel should expect judgment,
but--perchance, if there is widespread repentance, and sorrow for offending
God, He would be OK again, right? Well, now you’re going to see a part of God
you don’t want to see.
We’ve all heard about how Jonah,
after being burped out of a big fish, preached to the vicious Assyrians-- you probably
also heard about their repentance—and how God changed His mind of His promise
of judgment on the Assyrians and rolled it back. 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 of his sin, and had a great
reformation? Have you ever heard what happened after that? I suspect not. Well,
did you ever also hear about how his grandson Josiah had the greatest
revival in human history? What, you’ve never heard that one either? Not
surprising, considering God’s reaction to these wonderful repentances 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. Despite his reforms. 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, based on this
contrition, the land was forgiven, right? Jerusalem was saved, right? Uh, no…He
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 him. Josiah tore his
clothes in distress, and urged his aides to seek a prophetess (not the same as
a medium, this person was touched by God and 100% of her prophecies came true).
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)...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.
Josiah goes farther in reform than
his repentant grandfather, because he goes out of his way to defile the worship
places of false gods—and because 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 slavery in 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, godless
Assyrians a break when they heard Jonah, then He could give His favorites, the
“apple of His eye,” a break, right? 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, despite two
stupendous reforms? Killing the innocents. Immediately after Josiah, it
turns out that the Israeli kings, and soon the land, too, are in the hand of
their enemies. They are captives, slaves, for life.
You can see why this story is not in
books, not in sermons, and not well-known. We don’t like stories with a bad
ending. But God is a God of Judgement, as well as a God of Grace. Kill the
innocent—by government fiat--and a country gets a bad ending.
So shouldn't we expect the same for the U.S.--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 nearly a million innocents a year?
Now a qualifying word: if any
of my readers out there had an abortion, or encouraged one, that's a different
subject than judging a country. We’re talking about your individual soul. You
will have different consequences than Israel if you repent. Murder will get you
to hell—unless you repent and begin living your life for Christ, who came to
die to pay for your sin. Become, in your life, 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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