The March Into Darkness And Death

In a couple weeks I will join a congregation I helped to found in Minnesota as they celebrate their 50th anniversary. All this has caused me to look back on how much things have changed since I served that congregation in the early 1960's. I will focus particularly on how we Americans, in the name of freedom, are radically altering our views on sex, marriage, family and home. In the USA several states have changed the very definition of marriage . Since 2004 six have legalized same-sex marriages. Nine still prohibit same-sex marriage in statute and thirty prohibit it in their constitution. But prominent politicians insist that gay marriage must become legal everywhere, because "marriage equality is the next big step in America's long march of freedom."

Is this "long march of freedom" truly a march toward the Light or rather a headlong plunge into the bondage of darkness?

Yesterday I called attention to Jesus' claim to be the Light of the world and his promise that those who follow him will not walk in darkness (John 8:12). What does he mean by darkness and how is he even now freeing us who follow him from it? Listen to what He says to us in his Word:

"The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. - Jhn 12:35 ESV

John comments about this further in his letter.

Whoever says "I know him" (Jesus) but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes. - 1Jo 2:4-11 ESV

And where are we going when we throw away the Biblical definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman for life (Gen. 2:23; Eph. 5:21-30)? Jesus says that those who adopt this position do not indeed know where they are going. Israel's clash with Midian is a case in point—given for our learning. Isaiah's prophecy about the Messiah bringing light points back to it.

For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. - Isa 9:4 ESV

Listen to John in the Bible's final book as he also looks back on that part of Israel's history. Of the church in Pergamum he writes:

"And to the angel of the church in Pergamum write: 'The words of him who has the sharp two-edged sword. ... But I have a few things against you: you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality. - Rev 2:12, 14 ESV

Balaam was a false prophet commissioned by Balak, the king of Moab, and the elders of Midian (countries east of the Jordan river) to call down a curse from God upon Israel as they approached the Land of Promise. But Balaam was unable to do so when the Spirit of God came upon him, forcing him to speak a blessing instead (Num. 22:1-24:25). The story seems to end as Balaam and Balak go their separate ways in frustration. They could not prevent Israel from conquering the land, nor could they call God's curse down upon them. But was there another way to destroy the nation? Yes, said Balaam. Tempt them with sex! Tempt them to worship Baal and his goddess (Num. 31:16).

A few chapters further into Numbers we read about how Israel fell into that temptation and forced God's curse to come down them.

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. So Israel yoked himself to Baal of Peor. And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel. And the LORD said to Moses, "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." And Moses said to the judges of Israel, "Each of you kill those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor." - Num 25:1-5 ESV

The whoring Moses writes about was committed with cult prostitutes. The worship of their supreme god Baal and his consort, the fertility sex-goddess Asherah, was celebrated by having sex with such cultic prostitutes. Everything about loving only the LORD and being faithful in marriage was out the window. The very foundation of their faith in the LORD and of home and family was being destroyed by such acts. This is why Moses commanded drastic measures by the judges of Israel, "Each of you kill those of his men who have yoked themselves to Baal of Peor."

But this darkness did not go away. The temptations persisted. Finally, before Moses died, the LORD gave this command:

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Avenge the people of Israel on the Midianites. Afterward you shall be gathered to your people." So Moses spoke to the people, saying, "Arm men from among you for the war, that they may go against Midian to execute the LORD's vengeance on Midian." - cf. all of Num 31:1-3 ESV

Thus Midian was wiped out. The men, boys and mature women were slaughtered. Only virgins and little girls were spared. And so, for a time the darkness was dispelled.

America is well on the road back to Midian. So much of our life is a worship of false gods. The worship of the same sex goddess and her cultic prostitutes not only persists but is promoted in all of the media. Samples:

• Music continues to be a major source of sexual suggestiveness. In one study, 40% of lyric lines contained sexual material, and only 6% contained healthy sexual messages.14 An analysis of the 279 most popular songs in 2005 revealed that 37% contained sexual references and that degrading sexual references were common.15

• Virtually every R-rated teen movie since the 1980s has contained at least one nude scene and, often, several instances of sexual intercourse (e.g. the American Pie movie series).16 Teen movies also contain distorted views of romance and normal adolescent sexuality.16,–,18

To walk in such darkness is hate your brother, your sister, your children, your family and your community. This is not the road to freedom. It is the road to slavery and death. The warnings from God's Word are clear. The road to sexual freedom leads to chaos, confusion and death on all levels of community and family life. We must pray for and encourage those who make our laws—and those of us who vote for or against them—to realize this.

Many of us have a story to tell about such darkness and how it has brought pain and suffering into our marriages and families.

Seven Days of the Week and the Seventh Day—Chp.3

The Day of Rest
Biblical Teaching About Time
—An online book about rest and worship—
By Dr. Al Franzmeier

Chapter 3 

The Seventh Day Is Holy

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We move now to the study of the Biblical concept of time and rest, an understanding largely lost to our post-modern world.

Perhaps you have asked, as I have, why we have a week of seven days rather than, say, eight or five or twelve.  Why is a seven-day week recognized around the world?  There is no mathematical or scientific reason for it.  Seven does not divide equally into 365.25 days to give us twelve months with an equal number of days.  In fact, the whole business of developing a calendar is very complex.

In ancient days, when most pagans believed that the earth was the center of the universe, many believed that each day was ruled by one of the seven known planets (sun, moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter). The word planet is derived from the Greek  planês, and the Latin planeta, meaning wanderer. The ancients reasoned that since these seven heavenly bodies wandered or revolved about the sky, each must have significance. And since they were heavenly bodies they further concluded that planets represented certain gods and were so named. As a result, each day was named for one of the seven planets and the gods behind them. Currently, the names for our days are a combination of Greek gods (e.g. Saturn-day) and Norse gods (e.g. Sunna's-day, Mani’s-day, Tiu’s-day, Woden’s-day, Thor’s-day, Freya’s-day. Saturday was simply called wash or bath day among the early Norse).

We are not concerned here with a history of these pagans and their worship practices. Our focus is upon our spiritual ancestors, the Israelites. Why did they decide to observe a seven-day week and why did they observe every seventh day as a Sabbath day of rest?

Some scholars have tried to find the roots of the Biblical Sabbath in the myths of the ancient Babylonians living along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.  That was the region from which Abraham came and Abraham is the father of the Hebrews. So, they suggest we can discover the roots of the seventh day Sabbath among those people. Of course, they do not have any way to tell us how the Babylonians came to their conclusions.

The Babylonians, these scholars tell us, divided each week into seven days and each day into six parts of two hours duration.  In turn, they divided the year into twelve lunar months of twenty-eight days. That meant that an extra month had to be added from time to time to catch up.

These people had a day of rest called “Shappatu,” a word mentioned in some ritual texts and sounding very much like the Hebrew word “Shabbath.”  Some have speculated that the Biblical Sabbath finds its roots in Shappatu.  That is a natural conclusion, because the Babylonian language is related to Hebrew.  Shappatu was celebrated on the seventh, fourteenth, nineteenth and twenty-first days of each month.  On those days the king was forbidden to eat certain foods, ride in his chariot and make sacrifices.  However, Babylonian tablets indicate that on Shappatu work was not interrupted for the general populace.

Whatever Shappatu meant, the contrast between that day and the Biblical Sabbath is obvious.  Most probably, the presence of cyclical days of rest in ancient Middle Eastern societies were what had survived of the original Sabbath keeping as commanded by God to Noah and his sons.  Their descendents may have kept the Sabbath for generations until transformations in meaning and approach took place with the introduction of superstition and the worship of false gods. 

By the Seventh Day God had finished His work.

The seventh day Sabbath preserved among the Hebrews was always a day of celebrating the Creator’s blessings, a day to cease from work in order to remember God’s creative work and to give thanks.

We learn from the Scriptures that God created the week and decreed that His people should rest on the seventh day.  God created the universe and all that is in it in six days and rested on the seventh: “By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing” (Genesis 2:2).

Some Rabbis asked if God did anything before he rested on the seventh day.  Yes, they replied, he had one more thing to do before he rested.  Before he could step back to exult and delight in his work, he created peace, joy and happiness, for he wanted his children to celebrate with him the perfect balance and marvelous wonder of all he has created.  He wanted to bless them with an entire day in which to rejoice and be happy as they celebrated his wisdom and goodness. 

God blessed the seventh day.

To understand the meaning of this blessing we must turn to the original Hebrew.  In Hebrew there are two verbs translated to bless: Ashar and Barak.  Ashar is never used to speak of what God does.  It always refers to what man does or desires.  Ashar speaks of man’s congratulations.  Barak speaks of God’s benediction.  Barak is used in Genesis 2 to speak of God blessing the Sabbath.  Therefore, when a man speaks a blessing, he is really praising God for all that God has done and praying that God will pour his blessings upon the one to be blessed.  To bless is to remember that all true blessings come from God.  Consider some Biblical examples.

•“The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.  So they (Aaron and sons) will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them” (see ESV - Numbers 6:23-27).

This Aaronic blessing spoken by God’s chosen priests put God’s ‘name’ upon the Israelites.  To put his ‘name’ upon them meant that the Lord claimed these people as his children; they carried his name.  Therefore he would protect and bring them prosperity and peace.  The full meaning of this blessing is now coming to pass in the Lord Jesus Christ, who came to bless all people. For this reason the Aaronic blessing is still spoken when God’s chosen people gather to worship in the ‘name’ of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

•Samuel bestows God’s blessing upon Saul, making him king: “the Spirit of God came upon him in power, and he joined in their (prophets) prophesying”  (see ESV - 1 Samuel  9:13-10:ll).

In order to lead God’s people Saul needed the blessing of God’s Spirit, enabling him to proclaim God’s Word to Israel and to fulfill his duties as Israel’s king.  When Saul rejected that blessing it was passed on to David and his descendants, ultimately it rested upon Jesus, the Son of David.  All who are baptized into Christ have the blessing of the same Spirit, enabling them to believe in him and empowering them as members of his Body to proclaim the Gospel.

•God controls all blessings and curses.  Balaam could not curse Israel.  He could only bless her (see ESV -Numbers 22-24, especially 23:8,20).

The king of Moab was frightened.  Convinced that Israel would come like an ox to lick up every blade of grass, he sought out the pagan prophet Balaam to curse these invaders.  In this strange story God appeared to Balaam to say, “You must not put a curse on this people, because they are blessed.” Try as he would, Balaam was unable to speak a curse from God upon Israel.  “How can I curse those whom God has not cursed?” he asked.  “There is no sorcery against Jacob, no divination against Israel,” he continued. Balaam even foresaw the coming of the Messianic King from these people.  “A star will come out of Jacob; a scepter will rise out of Israel,” he prophesied. Thus, we see that no man can remove a blessing given by the Lord.  This is especially evident in this next blessing.

•God blessed Abram, promising to make of this childless man a great nation, with offspring as numerous as the stars (see ESV - Genesis 12:2-3; Genesis 15).

Notice the seven-fold structure of God’s blessing.  Seven is the number for the week, the number of completion.  This blessing brings God’s full blessings to his people who trust in him, as did Abram.  Here is God’s seven-fold promise:

1.  I will make you into a great nation
2. I will bless you
3. I will make your name great
4. You will be a blessing
5. I will bless those who bless you
6. Whoever curses you I will curse
7. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

God’s original blessing upon all mankind, a blessing to be remembered on the Sabbath, was now to be restored and fulfilled through Abram and his descendants.  These promises were reaffirmed in various ways to Abram, his sons and those descended from him. After healing a man crippled from birth before Solomon’s Colonnade, the Apostle Peter quoted the seventh promise in his sermon (Acts 3). His sermon led to the conversion of thousands.  For this he was dragged before the Jewish High Council, the Sanhedrin.  Filled with the Holy Spirit, he claimed the power of Jesus’ name and declared that “salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”  As the church continues to proclaim this Gospel, God still blesses all who hear the Word and believe it.

•To turn away from the Lord is to invite His curse (see ESV - Deuteronomy 29:16-21).

The Lord brought Israel out of slavery in Egypt, led and fed them in the wilderness for forty years.  Now as they stood before the Promised Land, the Lord called upon them to follow carefully the terms of his covenant.  If anyone fails to do this, said the Lord, “All the curses written in this book will fall upon him, and the Lord will blot out his name from under heaven.”

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Next time Chapter Three continues with a discussion of God declaring the seventh day holy and the implications of that command.