Some Things Never Change

Day 27:  Genesis/Psalm 27, Judges 3

*"Is not the testimony of history that one becomes what one worships?"

When the Israelites were driving out the people of the land that God had promised to Abraham (see chapter 1 or Judges) some of the nations refused to be displaced.  Either they were at the time too strong for the people of Israel, which seems unlikely because who is too strong for God?  Or the Israelites were just tired and decided not to worry about them.  It's the "good enough" idea.  You know, they were supposed to drive out all the people but 9 out of 10 nations in this geographical area is "good enough" so we'll call it good.

In Judges three we read why this happened, or rather, why God allowed it to happen.  Verses one and two read, "These are the nations that the Lord left in the land to test those Israelites who had not experienced the wards o Canaan.  He did this to teach warfare to the generations of Israelites who had no experience in battle.

So God allowed these nations to stay in the land so that He could use them to test the Israelites faithfulness to Him and also to help them keep their fighting skills sharp.  But in verse seven we're told that the Israelites failed the test.  They did evil in the eyes of the Lord, they forgot about Him and instead served the images of Baal and the Asherah poles.  So the Lord was angry with them.

I did a little research and it seems that the Canaanite god Baal (means lord or master) took several different forms but overall appears to be their storm and fertility god whose image was that of a bull.  His name was used often as a generic term for any god who they worshiped.  Asherah was a fertility goddess and her images were phallus'.

It's interesting to me that the two gods who led Israel astray all those years ago represent the very two sins that most cause us to stumble today.  The idea that we are our own "lord" and sexual immorality. The Bull was supposed to represent strength and virility and we often and easily believe that we are smarter and stronger than God so we decide that we can make our own choices and go our own way without Him.  And perhaps the most devastating sin in terms of it's trapping, mis-information and spiritual destruction is that of sexual immorality.  Many a person, institution and spiritual giant has fallen at the hands of sexual sin and yet we continue to fall for the same traps and even now have made the sin of sexual immorality a thing to be celebrated and fought for and bragged about.

Like Israel, the nation, person or family that falls for these traps of satan, that we're our own god and that sexual sin is okay, will soon and completely be destroyed.  Not by God, but by the very sin that we fight to commit.  Like an addiction it quickly enslaves and controls us.

God, let me always see you as wise and righteous even when I don't understand why you tell me to avoid certain sins.  May I obey your commands and avoid the traps of the devil who seeks my destruction and not my liberation.  And may I fight to keep my body, heart and mind free from sexual sin which wages war against my body and does so much more to destroy me and my relationships than it does to build them up.  Again, let me always conform to you and the image of your Son no matter how good the feeling or how powerful the urge - Your ways alone are right and good.

*Bible.org Baalism in Canaanite Religion and Its Relation to Selected Old Testament Texts