We Still Sacrifice to Molech

This morning we continue our study in God's law in the book of Leviticus chapter 20.

Leviticus chapter 20. And as we once again recognize our need for God's assistance, let us ask him to gather together with us by his spirit this day.

Indeed, our gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you once again for this opportunity. And as we open your word, as we look into your law, we would ask that by your spirit you would gather together with us.

Lord, we need your spirit to give us not only understanding of your word, but application in our day.

We live in a very dark, dark day. And so, Lord, we need the light of your word more than ever before.

May our hearts be filled with faith. May our minds be flooded with the light of your spirit.

And Lord, we would ask that you would indeed meet with us at this time to make us better servants of yours, we pray in Christ's name.

Those of you who were here the last time we engaged in the subject of the study of God's law, the holiness code, which will take us beyond just the limits of the book of Leviticus, will be taking us into Deuteronomy fairly quickly, will have to testify that I did not leave the text,

I did not decide to jump out of the study and go somewhere else for this morning's text.

You may be asking, well, why would you even start with that statement? Well, I would assume that there probably have been, over the past couple of weeks, many ministers of the gospel who have gone looking for a text upon which to speak so as to be able to address certain developments and happenings in our culture.

And I can understand, to a certain extent, how that happens. I understand the motivations for that.

But the reality is that we finished up Leviticus 19, and it just so happens that Leviticus 20 is the next text.

And, well, you can sort of guess, as we read the first few verses, why it is seemingly somewhat providential that we would be at this particular text.

To what do I refer? Well, let's look at the first few verses of Leviticus chapter 20.

Then Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, You shall also say to the sons of Israel, Any man from the sons of Israel, or from the aliens sojourning in Israel, who gives any of his offspring to Moloch, shall surely be put to death.

The people of the land shall stone him with stones. I will also set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given some of his offspring to Moloch, so as to defile my sanctuary, and to profane my holy name.

If the people of the land, however, should ever disregard that man when he gives any of his offspring to Moloch, so as not to put him to death, then

I myself will set my face against that man, and against his family, and I will cut off from among their people both him and all those who play the harlot after him, by playing the harlot after Moloch.

As for the person who turns to mediums and to spiritists, to play the harlot after them,

I will also set my face against that person, and will cut him off from among his people. You shall consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy, for I am

Yahweh your God. You shall keep my statutes and practice them. I am Yahweh who sanctifies you.

You see now why I mentioned at the beginning that this is simply the next text that we need to look at as we are working through the

Holiness Code and looking at the issue of God's law, and being prepared as the people of God to give an answer as to why we believe that the moral revelation that God has given is a revelation that was not simply given to Stone Age people and has been passed by by our great progressive society.

We recognize that when we read the New Testament Scriptures, we see, for example, in 1

Corinthians 5, that the Apostle Paul assumes that it will be understood by the

Corinthians that the law against incest and incestuous relationships, even though that was found way back in Leviticus 18, was still something that had abiding validity, and that they should be mourning because there were those amongst them who had disregarded that law, which becomes very relevant then in 1

Corinthians 6, in the vice list that Paul lists there in his description of those who engage in homosexuality.

This background goes against what is normative amongst many evangelicals in our land today who have simply taken some very surface -level statements, we are no longer under law but under grace, and assume that that means that we don't really have to worry about even separating the pages that so often you get a new

Bible, you have to have that joyous experience. First, hopefully, you break the binding in properly first.

If you're going to buy one of those expensive Bibles, you break the binding in first, but then there's that wonderful,

I think, great experience of separating all the pages. Now, if you don't get

Bibles with gold on the edges, then you don't really have to worry about that, but I personally enjoy that process.

It's a wonderful process. It sort of makes it mine when I get done. That last page is separated.

Well, it seems that in many churches and amongst many evangelicals today, pretty much most of the

Pentateuch, the pages could still be stuck together and no one would ever notice. It's almost a theological statement more than anything else.

And so for many, the idea of looking at these texts and hearing what these texts have to say just doesn't really cross the mind.

It's not a functional part of the worldview, and I think that that greatly diminishes our capacity for being able to give a full, balanced answer to the people around us as to why we believe what we believe and why we believe that certain issues facing our society today actually are gospel issues, that they address the gospel of Jesus Christ itself directly.

And so we come to Leviticus chapter 20 and we encounter something we already saw in Leviticus chapter 18.

It is something that we will see in Deuteronomy as well. But there is this great concern on the part of God in giving the law to His people to warn the people against what seems to be one of the greatest sins in God's sight, and that is the offering of the seed, any of His offspring to Mulloch.

Now, a couple things before we start looking directly at the text. We need to note some of the things in background here that's always very important.

You don't want to just... One of the concerns I have for all of us is that there is such great evil in our land today that it's easy for us to run to certain texts and try to pull things out, and we have to be very, very careful, we have to be very, very consistent in our handling of the

Word of God. And we all know that as we look at texts, one of the things we do here is we want to make sure that we know what the background is, we know what the context is, so that we don't engage in that kind of abuse of the scriptural text itself.

You will note that there is a difference and a tremendous parallel between Leviticus 18 and Leviticus 20.

Many of the exact same sins and evils are discussed in both, and the liberal commentator will simply say, well, this is further evidence of the lack of skill, of the redaction process that put together all these competing traditions and oral fragments and so on and so forth.

But the reality is, we already saw that in Leviticus 18, before you had that list of sexual sins, before and after, we had that very important section of Scripture that says this is why the land is vomiting out, spewing out the inhabitants, because they have engaged in these things.

And so, that was a discussion of general moral principles that were the basis upon which the land itself was ridding itself of its evil inhabitants.

That's not what you have in chapter 20 of Leviticus. Instead, Yahweh spoke to Moses saying, you shall also say to the sons of Israel, any man from the sons of Israel or from the aliens sojourning in Israel, who, and then we start having the discussion of the sins that come from there.

So, now we have direct laws being given to the nation of Israel as it is in the land in regards to how it is to deal with these kinds of sins.

And so, you have attachments of specific civil penalties to these sins.

You didn't have that. You had a description of these sins as toevah, as abomination, as things that are dishonoring in God's sight, etc.,

etc. You had that in Leviticus 18, but you did not have the civil code, the civil penalties that were to be practiced by those that God was calling by his own name, those who were in covenant relationship with God whose name was upon them.

And that's going to be very important, I think, to remain balanced here is to recognize that, notice at the end of verse 3, when it talks about, this is specifically in regards to offering to Moloch the stoning of the individual, but then notice at the end of verse 3, because he has given some of his offspring to Moloch so as to defile my sanctuary and profane my holy name.

Now, we're going to talk a little bit more about that in a few minutes. But notice that these penalties and this section of the giving of the law is very theological and it has to do with a people who are entering into God's sanctuary and are bearing his holy name.

So to enter into the place of worship and to bear the name of Yahweh upon themselves to be

God's holy people, they have entered into a very specific covenant with God.

They are God's representatives. And therefore to engage in this kind of activity is to defile his sanctuary.

Someone who would enter into that holy place who is so disrespectful and rebellious against God's oft -stated law in regards to offerings to Moloch, this is a defilement of his sanctuary.

The same term that's used to defile the sanctuary when bringing foreign gods in. Well, if in your heart you are willing to engage in this kind of behavior, then just you entering into that sanctuary is defiling that sanctuary and profaning, and we know what profaning means, to take something which is holy and to treat it as if it is common, and so you're profaning his holy name because you're making

Yahweh just one name amongst many names of gods. Any kind of idolatry does this, but this does it, as we will see, in an extreme sense.

There's something about this giving of offspring to Moloch that does this.

But just in a general notification here, as we work through Leviticus 20, recognize that here we are given these penalties that were specifically for the people of Israel in the land.

This is how they were to deal with these sins. Now, when we think about the history that the

Old Testament gives to us, we don't see these penalties being carried out very often.

We don't see it very often. And let me just mention that in looking especially at the penalty in verse 2, the people of the land shall stone him with stones.

Now, I am not suggesting that you go online this afternoon and find yourself a video, but in my study of Islam, as it exists today,

I have seen stonings. And I would not suggest it to you.

It is, to call it troubling, is obviously to engage in modern speak where we are tremendously concerned about.

Well, let's just say it seems that in the current young generation, a line that I was taught as a child has been completely forgotten.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. That last part has been abolished. I think it may be, there may even be a federal court that has specifically abolished it.

I'm not sure, but it seems to be that case that today we just don't want to offend anyone.

Words, you just have to be very careful what you say. And the reality is that when you look at what happens in the stoning of an individual, it is extremely difficult to watch, especially as it's done in Islamic cultures because you actually bury the person up to their hips and so they have no place to go.

And it's a gruesome thing to watch. It was no less gruesome in the land of Israel.

Stephen's death recorded for us in the Book of Acts. We'll get to it in just a matter of weeks. A gruesome death.

And I note the specific statement, the people of the land shall stone him with stone.

It strikes me that the reason that we do not see more bringing to bear of the punishments prescribed by God's law by the people of God but when they were in the land, when they were specifically claiming to be in covenant relationship with God was because the reality of the fact was they themselves knew their own sins.

When you have the people of the land being brought together to actually bring about the punishment, think about what that says to the people who do these things.

Now, we live in a day where, again, online, you can see ISIS and other

Islamic groups seeking to teach their young people to execute the

Kafir. Only a matter of weeks ago, there was, what do they call them, one of the young whelps or pups of the caliphate.

A video appeared of a young boy, eight, nine years of age, being taught to behead a man.

And we recoil at something like this. We recoil at the youth, the age of this young person.

But when you really think down to what's going on here, what is tremendously evil about this is the evil of the men who are pretending to be

God's ministers in this situation. We know that these are people who are enjoying their murderous spree.

These are people who are engaging in rape and pillaging and theft.

These are not holy warriors. And when we see the ultimate penalties being prescribed for certain sins in these texts, we must recognize that the world looks at that and they immediately see the hypocrisy of sinful men engaging in that activity.

And that's why we must see and we must hear and we must recognize verses 7 and 8 and the centrality they play in the holiness of God's law.

You shall consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy, for I am Yahweh your

God. You shall keep My statutes and practice them. I am Yahweh who sanctifies you.

When Israel was in a situation where there was no sanctification going on, where there was no true dedication to Yahweh, where there was no consecration, where there was primarily just surface -level formality, we can understand why those individuals would not want to engage in the application of the penalties of God's law because they would know their own hypocrisy in so doing.

And it would be very easy, therefore, for them to find reasons to overlook and to not engage in the punishment, which, as you see, is a part of this very text because God knows.

God knows that placing this responsibility in the hands of men who are themselves sinners is going to result in laxity, in a non -application.

So you see in verse 4, "...if the people of the land, however, should ever disregard that man when he gives any of his offspring to Moloch."

So it's known to the people, but they disregard it. They refuse to act upon it.

God says, recognize something. I may give my authority to the judges.

I may give my authority to those that are supposed to be my holy people to bring about the punishment of my law, but even if they disregard that law,

I will set my face against that man and against his family.

He will not get away with this. He may think he's getting away with it because the people turn a blind eye, but I want you to hear, this sin is so heinous, this sin is so perverse, that I will set my face against that man and his family, and I will cut them off from among their people, both him and all those who play the harlot after him.

In other words, God takes this very seriously. Very seriously, indeed.

Now, who is Moloch? Well, I've mentioned to you many times that Hebrew is one of the

Semitic languages, like Arabic, Hebrew being much older. And Semitic languages are based upon what are called triliteral roots.

The vast majority of words in Semitic languages are based upon three -letter roots.

That doesn't mean that all words only have three letters, obviously. The vast majority have more than three letters because if it's a verb, you can put a prefix on it, and the suffix will tell you all sorts of things as to objects and so on and so forth.

That's one of the great joys of learning a Semitic language or Semitic languages is the various prefixes and suffixes and all the things that go along with it.

That's what gives most seminary students gray hair before 30, especially trying to learn

Hebrew with babies at home. That was my experience. I hit

Hebrew right as my daughter was born, basically. Josh didn't cause a church problem because I was still doing

Greek then, but I had started that long before he came along, so I was pretty good there. But summer and Hebrew will always be forever linked in my mind in the haze of seminary days, shall we say.

And so when you see the word melech, you see that the three letters would be

M -L and then C -H or K depending on how you transliterate things.

And if you know any Hebrew, as a couple of you do, you know that melech is a term for king.

It's just a term for king. But in the Hebrew Old Testament, it has been pointed, that is, the vowel points have been put in to be melech.

And we know, of course, that the vowel pointings were put in long after the days of Jesus. They came about 800, 900 years after the time of Christ.

And so they are, in essence, a commentary. And we need to be careful that we recognize that that's a commentary that came after the days of Jesus, so it's not an inspired commentary.

But it does tell us that the understanding of the Masoretic Jews at that point in time was that this was to be understood as melech.

And the theory is, and it's sort of hard to go back to 800, 900 years after Jesus and interview the

Masoretes themselves, but the theory is that what they've done is they've taken the letters for king and have put in the vowels for shame.

The word for shame. The understanding that most scholarship has arrived at is that this was a specific god of the

Amorites. Now there's some dispute about this. There's always some dispute about anything that's as old as this goes back to.

I mean, there's dispute about things that happened last year, let alone dispute about things that happened 3 ,400 years ago or something like that.

But in general, the general understanding is that this was a specific

Amorite god who was the object of worship through the giving of offspring.

Now there's some argument as to, well, did it always imply child sacrifice in the sense of the actual death of the child?

Or could there have been instances where there was dedication of the child to a temple cult, something about passing through the fire, which could be child sacrifice by burning.

Or it could be a ritual that involved fire, maybe of some pain to the infant, but not death to the infant.

Again, there's argumentation about some of these things. But there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of argumentation that at least in its extreme forms that it involved the giving of offspring and the death of those offspring and some ancient sources, which don't go all the way back to this time period, but time period thereafter, refer to the use of drums and chants to drown out the horrific sound of the infants who are dying and agonizing death.

It's a horrible thing. Now we understand, remember, think back. It's been quite some time now, but again, it's just the nature of things.

We talked about the gods of the Amorites and the Canaanites and so on and so forth.

And the idea was that these gods had a limited purview of authority and power.

And what you would do is, the idea evidently would be through the giving of offspring, you would actually receive power to conceive even more offspring, both for your herds and your flocks, which might give you more in the way of money, as well as just simply having more offspring.

Because even to modern days, infant mortality rates have always been very, very high.

Modern times, we have made tremendous advances. There's no question about that.

But even in the days of Luther, for example, a woman would have to have as many as 10 live births to get even one child through to maturity.

So I mean, it was a very, very common thing for parents to experience the loss of a child.

And so it's one thing to experience that through the natural processes of this world.

It is something completely different to bring that about voluntarily, to bring that about as a part of perverted religious worship.

And so we have these warnings about Moloch. And there obviously had to have been some kind of attraction, some kind of danger that the people of God, dwelling in the land, would be attracted to this kind of worship.

Because it's so grossly unnatural. It is so grossly unnatural.

You look at the woman holding her newborn child.

And no matter how painful the birth has been, the desire of that woman is to hold that child upon her breast.

To hold that life. And every mother in this room remembers those moments as one of the most special moments in their lives.

And every father in this room who has had the opportunity of being there remembers when that child was brought and was allowed to be held and just the beauty of that moment.

So how any mother, any father, could take that offspring and take it to some priest knowing that that child was going to be murdered.

It is so grossly unnatural. What could possibly, possibly, cause someone to do that?

It is hard for us to even imagine it. It might even be such that we might look at this and say, this could never happen.

And yet, not only did it happen, but the attraction was this constant promise of benefit, of greed, of power to overcome the elements.

Men felt so helpless in the face of the fates, in the face of the blind powers that they could not understand, whether it be blight upon the land or drought or flood or fire or whatever else it might be.

There was such a helplessness that there was a zeal on the part of the priests of Mulloch to promise great benefit.

How else could any man convince his wife to give up that child?

To give up that child? But notice what it says in verse 2.

It doesn't matter whether it's a son of Israel or an alien sojourning in Israel.

Any who gives any of his offspring to Mulloch shall surely be put to death.

The people of the land shall stone him with stones. Now, obviously, we should take the law as a whole.

And that means that there would be an examination. There would be an investigation. It would be a thorough investigation.

There would need to be more than one witness of these events.

It wasn't just on the mouth of one witness that something like this could take place. But with the establishment of this action, with the establishment of this action, the ultimate penalty of death, no repentance, no offering, a person who could be seen to be this hardened in their rebellion against God and in the necessary corollary to this, and that is such a person could not possibly be trusting

Yahweh, that Yahweh is in control of all things, that Yahweh will care for him, that Yahweh will fulfill

His promises. No, this is a person who is truly an idolater at heart. That person is to be cut off from His people, to be put to death, and to be put to death in a specific way that demonstrates and that communicates to the gathered people this sin is serious in the sight of God.

Do not do this. The people of the land shall stone him with stones.

I will also set my face against that man and will cut him off from among his people because he has given some of his offspring to Moloch so as to defile my sanctuary and profane my holy name.

There is in this kind of purposeful... I mean, this is not a sin that you commit by just simply a brief stumbling.

Oh, I can't believe I did that. This takes... This is, to use our term, premeditated.

This takes thought. This takes planning. This is not something that you just stumble and fall because it's one of those old weaknesses of yours and something comes out of your mouth that should never come out of your mouth or whatever else it might be.

That's not what's going on here. This is premeditated evil.

This is rebellion against God. And the result is that it defiles the sanctuary of God and profanes

His holy name. When I first read that, I really had to give some serious thought. How can that be?

But then when you think about what Israel is being called to be, when you think about the nature of the covenant and bearing the name of Yahweh, it makes me think about the baptismal formula.

We are baptized into the name, singular, of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are so, in the

West, individualized that we don't think much about the names that we bear.

I mean, you know, as parents, you find out you're expecting and there's that enjoyable, normally enjoyable, discussion back and forth about names and what do you like and all that kind of stuff.

And it's very enjoyable, but that's not how people did that for a long period of time.

Names were to represent something. They were to speak something to at least the wished -for character.

And there was a much stronger sense of bearing a name, especially a family name.

Today, that's almost gone in our society. There's almost no idea of your ancestors or the honor that comes with your name or something like that.

We've lost that. And I think there is something to be mourned in the loss of that.

But certainly when you had a situation where you take on the name of God in a covenant relationship as the people of God, then when you engage in...

Can you imagine? Let's put it this way. Can you imagine what the priest of Moloch is thinking when you bring your infant?

Knowing that you attend the sacrifices at the sanctuary of Yahweh.

What do you think the priest of Moloch is thinking when you do that? What kind of a statement are you making about your

God? What kind of a statement are you making about the promises of your God? The power of your

God? The sacrifices in the sanctuary? You are profaning

His name. You are making Him just like Moloch. You're covering your bases.

Yeah, I'll offer the sacrifices to Yahweh too, but it doesn't hurt to cover all your bases, you know?

I really need a good crop next year. I really, really do. Because He has given some of His offspring to Moloch so as to defile my sanctuary, to perform my holy name,

I will also set my face against that man. Don't think, idolater, that it's just the people of Israel throwing those stones.

You will still yet have to deal with me. For I will set my face.

You think that that last blow from that last big rock which renders you unconscious is it?

No. Now you get to deal with me. This is to communicate with clarity and with force the seriousness of this sin.

But even if the people of the land should ever disregard that man when he gives any of his offspring to Moloch so as not to put him to death,

God knows that there aren't going to be many stonings in Israel.

Oh, I know. Once a people gets so far from God, you could have lots of stonings just simply as means of political advancement, getting rid of your enemies.

There are people who love death. I mean, that's what Moloch worship is all about.

But to actually claim to be following God's law, those who are not consecrated to Him, those who are not dedicated to Him, those who are pretty much just nominal in their dedication to Yahweh, now, they're probably not going to be doing that.

Then I myself will set my face against that man. I myself. It's emphasized.

This is personal on God's part. I myself will set my face against that man, and not only against that man, but against his family.

There's federal representation here. Remember Achan? Jericho?

What happened to his family? They all suffered with him. There's representation here, federal headship.

But, of course, how could you exactly take one of your offspring and offer it to Moloch without your family being involved in the first place?

I mean, your wife probably is going to notice the missing child, and it would be her duty if she found out what had happened, to go to the authorities.

I will cut off from among their people both him and all those who play the harlot after him by playing the harlot after Moloch.

See, playing the harlot. Unfaithfulness. Bearing the name.

It's like a man. He's got the wedding ring. Hides it when he goes certain places.

Unfaithfulness. Harlotry. Have the name of Yahweh, but hide it.

All those who play the harlot after him, I will set my face against them.

I will cut them off. Even in the days of laxity, anyone who would read this text would recognize

God takes this very seriously. I may think I'm getting away with it. God says, I will not get away with it.

Now, everyone in this room, unless you tuned out about 35 minutes ago or more, cannot help but be thinking about what's been going on in our own land.

And I, even in a few public statements, have made the, what seems to me, perfectly appropriate and obvious connection.

We still have Moloch worship. We still have Moloch worship. There are still people who are willing to trade their offspring for economic advantage, for personal advantage, for personal freedom and autonomy.

And we have the high priests of Moloch. And it seems the high priests of Moloch are untouchable when you live in a culture of death.

They're celebrated, loved, supported, protected. We all have seen, or most of us have seen, the videos as they have come out, the hard -heartedness of individuals who had to be taught to do the things they do.

No normal human being could look at the things they look at and do the things they do without being desensitized over time.

They had to be taught a worldview that rendered us as mere biological products of the process of evolution.

Now, the irony is every single one of them has sufficient biological and scientific training that upon even the smallest amount of reflection would recognize the amazing complexity of the development of life within the womb.

Every one of them has had enough training to understand that development of the embryo and the amazing things that we still do not understand to this day.

How the various kinds of tissues begin to form. They know all of these things and yet when you utterly destroy the worldview that gives meaning to human life, that sees us as the creatures of God, when you embrace a worldview where we are but accidents of chance.

Animals like any other. And then over time, desensitized and desensitized, we can understand how that technician can stand there in that one video.

Heart, lungs, pituitary. Oh, another boy. Oh, another boy.

The priests of Moloch were dehumanized. Not that they were excused by that, but that constant exposure to sin and rebellion and death and degradation degrades.

And unless there is repair through the grace of God and exposure to the truth of God, well, we can understand why.

The pottery, the images that we have dug up of those cultures represent to us such horrific degradation.

But you don't have to have hideous idols to have the high priests of Moloch.

They have offices not far from here. They have offices not far from where we are this day.

And God has always set His face against anyone, anyone who would degrade

His creatures, His creations, those that bear the very image of God.

What was so horrendous about the offering of offspring to Moloch is that it is a fundamental rejection of the idea that God is the

Creator and Sustainer, and that life is a gift from His hand. It is a fundamental replacement of God with ourselves.

It is an embracing of the culture of death, a rejection of the culture of life. And as God set

His face against even those who got away with it in ancient Israel, He sets

His face against those who think they're getting away with it even today. And do you think that there is anything in this text that would say even if, you know, even if the people of the land should disregard that?

Do you think that was a good statement about the people of the land or a bad statement? We live in a land that disregards the high priests of Moloch.

It's not that we didn't know what was going on. We always have. But even now, we have it with such clarity that I'll be perfectly honest with you.

If nothing comes of what we have seen over the past few weeks and may see in the future, as you know, the conspirators of the high priests of Moloch have become involved in seeking to suppress any further exposure of the high priests of Moloch, and they will bear their guilt and their judgment.

But if we disregard this, I would say that we will owe a formal cultural apology to Goebbels and everybody else that we condemned at Nuremberg not that long ago.

Because even those people didn't think of some of the things we've thought up and allow and support with tax money.

It's an amazing thing to think about, isn't it? I say that as one who

I've never been to Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau, but I have been to Sachsenhausen.

Sachsenhausen was one of the death camps closest to Berlin, Hitler's private concentration camp.

I've walked through the medical facilities at Sachsenhausen, and I know what happened there.

And on one level, we still have the moral superiority to say we did the right thing.

But it is amazing how in a matter only of decades, and primarily through apathy and enjoyment of physical things, through affluence, that we find ourselves living in a land where the things they did then are being done again in our own neighborhoods and our own cities.

How fast that took place. It's an amazing thing. What does

God say? I will myself set my face against that man and against his family.

We live in a day where once again, whether we believe

God's word gives us guidance and understanding on these issues or not, will fully determine how we interact with the world around us.

If we don't believe that these laws and these words have any relevance any longer, well, then it's our preference against someone else's preference.

But if we recognize that God has made us in the image of Himself, that human life is precious, and that there should be no place that is safer than the mother's womb.

If we recognize we live in a day where we have never had the amount of knowledge we have now about the humanity of the unborn child, if you are not praying daily against this horrific sin, shame on you.

And if you will not speak, shame on you again. There is no choice here.

There is no argument here. There is no debate here. What our culture needs are

Christians who will warn them of the wrath that is to come. I know our society doesn't believe in wrath.

Animals don't experience wrath from a non -existent God, right? But remember, every person you ever speak to is made in the image of God.

That's the contact point. That's the point of connection. Let us not be silent.

Let us not be amongst the people who disregard. Let us pray.

Let us work. Let us sacrifice. Let us take seriously what the

Word of God says to us this day. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we have prayed often in this place that You, by Your grace and mercy, would end the great rebellion and sin in our land, which is abortion.

And we have prayed for revival in our land.

And yet, as we look around, we see growing darkness. We see a love of death.

And yet we pray that You would continue to make us faithful. That we would continue to pray against that darkness.

And as we have opportunity, we would do what we can to be agents of life. Lord, we thank

You for Your Word. We thank You that by looking at how You dealt with Your people of old, we can have insight and understanding as to Your character and to make application.

For though we do not live amongst a people like Israel today, though we do not live amongst a people who have a sanctuary that they go to, yet we know that You remain the same and that what

You considered an abomination then, You consider an abomination now. So we have light to give.

We have a warning that we must deliver. May we be faithful to do so. And Lord, we do pray once again that You would restrain the madness of the evil of men and women, even those in the very highest places of office in this land who are so dedicated to death.

Oh God, protect us from them. Remove these evil leaders. Bring righteousness and save the innocent.

Oh Lord, we do not want the priests of Mulloch strutting through our streets.

By Your grace, change hearts. By Your grace, let

Your Gospel go forth with fresh power. And may we be found faithful in the midst of all of it.