Mark Those Who Grieve
A couple of years ago while flying to New Zealand I asked God to speak to me about the nation. And God gave me a word. This word is true for that country but I believe it is equally true for Christians everywhere in this day because this day we are living in is bringing a dividing, a winnowing, a separation. The essence of the word was this:
Like the blood on the doorposts of Egypt, God is going throughout the land putting a mark on those who grieve and lament over the detestable things done it
(see Ex.12:22-23; Ezk.9.3-4).
God is marking those with a heart like Phinehas who are so grieved over the trampling of his holiness that they will act righteously, to right what is wronged. The picture here is not merely one of deliverance from death but of atonement. Just as the blood on the doorposts was a type of Christ’s atoning sacrifice, so those like Phinehas who stand up for righteousness are upholding Christ’s atoning work against the judgement of death that would otherwise visit the Church. Those who are grieved at the afront to God’s glory from churches that are worshipping Baal Peor because they have embraced a sexual ideology opposed to God, are actually interceding to avert God’s judgement.
But you don’t think judgement is coming, do you?
Then the Lord…said to him, “Go throughout the city of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of those who grieve and lament over all the detestable things that are done in it.”
5 As I listened, he said to the others, “Follow him through the city and kill, without showing pity or compassion. 6 Slaughter the old men, the young men and women, the mothers and children, but do not touch anyone who has the mark. Begin at my sanctuary.”
-Ezk.9.3-6
“Begin at my sanctuary.”
“Begin at my Sanctuary!”
Begin there, where the people think they are safe; where they believe they have nothing to repent of. Start there!
God always waits, with great patience, to see if his people will turn to him willingly. If they don’t, he then waits to see if they will listen to the warnings he sends – from his messengers, the prophets, and from calamitous events that are permitted to shake us. When both of these attempts fail, he still refuses to give up on us. But the only means he has left to shake us from our stupor is judgement. You can read all about it in the history of Israel. They went from Egypt to Promised Land to Exile; from Slavery to Redemption to Judgement. And in case you want to dismiss that as just some Old Testament thing, Paul says that God’s judgement (specifically referencing this Baal Peor episode) was written down as an example and a warning to us not to “test Christ, as some of them did – and were killed” (1 Cor.10:1-11).
Judgement is God’s final act of mercy. But before he gets there, in every situation of failure such as this, God searches for someone, even just one person, who will defend his honor. His eyes range throughout the earth looking for those whose hearts are fully committed to him.
And this is what he’s doing now – looking for those like Phinehas who are as zealous for God’s honor as God himself is.
Are we one God will put his mark on? Or are we already too conformed to the thinking of this world?
When God can’t find someone to distinguish between the holy and the profane, between the clean and the unclean; when the leaders he has tasked to deal with it equivocate and dither, then, since there is no one else who will deal with it, God himself acts in judgement (Ezk. Ezk.9:3-6; 22:26-31).
“I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one.
So I will pour out my wrath on them…. bringing down on their own heads all they have done”.
Ezk.22.30-31
The Church is being deceived by the thinking of Baal. No one wants to stand in the gap because no one recognizes there is a gap. Like the Israelites in this story, Christians see nothing wrong with their sexual practices. And they certainly don’t discern a spiritual connection. Even if they’re not practicing those things themselves then they see nothing wrong with others doing so.
Kozbi – Voluptuous Deception
But maybe you think I’m reading too much into the story. Maybe I’m making a connection between idolatry and immorality that isn’t really there? Perhaps I’m saying something the writer of Numbers never intended? Well, just before you dismiss it all, let me point out something unusual in the text.
Women are named fewer than a tenth of the times men are in the Old Testament. So if the writer deliberately mentions a woman’s name you can be certain it’s pretty important. Here he mentions her twice, making this woman hugely significant and indicating that the writer might be trying to show us something.
The woman here is Kozbi, and the root, kzb, from which her name comes has two distinct meanings: the first is “to lie, deceive, to disappoint”; the second means “to be voluptuous” and was an attribute of fertility gods and goddesses (viz. Baal, Asherah, Ishtar).
The writer of Numbers could easily have left her unnamed and just told us the sad history of Israel’s failure. But he uses this woman’s name as a proxy for the god that Israel has become bound to, effectively telling us that although she (Kozbi/the god) is alluring, enticing, voluptuous, she is in reality a deception, a lie that cannot give what it offers.[10] In fact, Hebrew frequently refers to idols as “the lie”.
The point is, the woman at the center of this story is both a seduction and a delusion, and the writer is telling us that the story isn’t simply a history but a model of the seducing/delusive power of the idol to yoke us to gods that are the antithesis of who our God is. They are delusion; he is Reality. They are the lie; he is the Truth.
Sexual immorality is a seducing idol that yokes us to deception.
In First Corinthians Paul highlights the power at work. An idol is nothing, he says. It has no power. That’s as true today as it was back then. But, he goes on to say, behind that dumb idol is a demonic force. That demon is not powerless. And “you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons” (10:21).
Christians are being deceived by the allure of the idol. Some are enticed, as Eve was, to question the word of God. And like Eve, they believe their eyes are being opened. If I’m only more tolerant; who am I to judge; I really am a victim; I trust my feelings…. Some are deluded – willfully rejecting the truth. They’re eating the sacred meal to Baal, so to speak. And the idol, which to them is nothing, is in reality a powerful spiritual force that is manipulating their minds, twisting God’s word to say things it does not say and mean things it does not mean. We have yoked ourselves to a lie – the lie – and in return have become blind to the Truth.
Churches of the West are filled with Christians who want to have God but don’t really want to give up the pleasures of the world either. They may not do drugs or participate in violence or extort money from the helpless, but the things of the world hold their attention, and their thinking is saturated with the world’s ideologies: the difference between marriage and living together is just a piece of paper; gay marriage is fine so long as they love each other; if they were born that way who’s to say it’s wrong?
God isn’t running a competition for the most tolerant Christian; he’s looking for someone zealous enough to stand in the gap on behalf of a sinful people.
Is that you?
- You might argue that it’s simply because shrine prostitutes and places of worship were so obviously associated in the Ancient Near East. But Paul demonstrates that the connection goes far beyond that when he links idolatry and sexual immorality in Romans 1. ↑
- This story takes place when Israel is on the verge of entering the promised land. That’s important. This tragic event seems to be Satan’s last attempt to thwart God’s plans for his people right at the point of them receiving his promises. Keep that in mind as you read this story in relation to the Church – or your own life. ↑
- https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21565503.2018.1518784?scroll=top&needAccess=true& ↑
- www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/media/39147/bsa34_moral_issues_final.pdf ↑
- https://www.christianpost.com/news/christians-are-following-secular-trends-in-premarital-sex-cohabitation-outside-of-marriage-says-dating-site-survey.html ↑
- https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/05/04/though-still-conservative-young-evangelicals-are-more-liberal-than-their-elders-on-some-issues/ft_17-05-04_millennialevangelicals_420px/ ↑
- http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/media/39147/bsa34_moral_issues_final.pdf ↑
- https://1s712.americanbible.org/cdn-www-ws03/uploads/content/State%20of%20the%20Bible%20Report%202013.pdf ↑
- BDAG ↑
- Stephen K. Sherwood, Berit Olam. ↑
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