Exodus 34:10 – 17 “And the LORD said, “Behold, I am making a covenant. Before all your people I will perform wonders that have never been done in any nation in all the world. All the people among whom you live will see the LORD’s work, for it is an awesome thing that I am doing with you. Observe what I command you this day. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. Be careful not to make a treaty with the inhabitants of the land you are entering, lest they become a snare in your midst. Rather, you must tear down their altars, smash their sacred stones, and chop down their Asherah poles. For you must not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.
Do not make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, for when they prostitute themselves to their gods and sacrifice to them, they will invite you, and you will eat their sacrifices; and when you take some of their daughters as brides for your sons, their daughters will prostitute themselves to their gods and cause your sons to do the same. You shall make no molten gods for yourselves.”
Make no mistake! God has NO illusions about the Israelites! True, God has given Moses plans for a portable Tabernacle and for a completely new mode of worship. But God also knows the human heart, and God knows that if the Israelites ever encounter full – bore fertility cults, they will jump into all kinds of perverted practices without a second thought!
In ancient Egypt, it was the goddess Hathor who was identified with the sky, women, fertility, and love. The Greeks considered Hathor to be another form of their goddess of love, Aphrodite. Hathor’s principal animal form was that of a cow and she was strongly associated with motherhood. (Encyclopedia Britannica) It’s possible that many of the Israelite women might have carried small images of Hathor or even necklaces with her image as they left Egypt. And some of the Egyptian women might have given the Israelites such necklaces as they were giving up all their jewelry to get rid of the Israelites. (Possible response of an Israelite lady to a Hathor necklace from her Egyptian neighbor, “Oh great! I’ve always wanted one of those!”)
Now God is sending the Israelites to a land inhabited by many tribes worshiping different fertility gods. God is warning the Israelites to have nothing to do with any of these practices and to destroy every evidence of them. In fact, the Israelites ultimately do not obey God completely; these religions remain a snare for straying Israelites until they are finally carried away by the Babylonians and the Assyrians. It is only after the Israelites are carried off to other countries that they FINALLY reject these idols!
APPLICATION: The word “awesome” gets thrown around so much today that it has lost most of its intrinsic value. Someone finds a great bargain while shopping? “Awesome!” Someone wins a ball game? “Awesome!” But in the beginning, “awesome” meant something totally different. The original connotation of “awesome” indicated an event so enormous, so unusual, so magnificent, and so out of the ordinary that all anyone could do was to remain silent in wonder. In the Book of Job, at the end of God’s answers to Job’s accusations, Job says to God, “You asked, ‘Who is this who conceals My counsel without knowledge?’ Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak. I will question you, and you shall answer.’ My ears had heard of You, but now my eyes have seen You. Therefore I retract my words, and I repent in dust and ashes.”(Job 42:3-6)
God is promising to do an awesome thing. But the price of deliverance is obedience. Sadly, it’s a price that the Israelites will ultimately be unwilling to pay. The question for us is this: when God shows you something, do you obey or do you argue? Do you find fault or do you worship?
The second thing to note is God’s warnings of what will happen if the Israelites compromise with the fetish worshipers. “Do not make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, for when they prostitute themselves to their gods and sacrifice to them, they will invite you, and you will eat their sacrifices; and when you take some of their daughters as brides for your sons, their daughters will prostitute themselves to their gods and cause your sons to do the same.” Sex is NOT merely a physical act but also a spiritual one. Demons transfer during sex. There is an old saying, “You lie down with dogs; you get up with flees.” This proverb could be paraphrased to read, “You have sex with demon worshipers; you get up with demons.”
Twenty – six years ago, we knew a young man who was a bright Christian believer and active in his church. But over the years, this fellow became sexually involved with a series of ladies from fetish – worshiping families. Now this man has a vagabond spirit and cannot focus on any task for very long. The talents that might have made him a success have been largely wasted and he does a poor job of supporting his children. Without deliverance, this man is still being influenced by demons.
Truly, God knew what He was doing when He warned the Israelites against all these practices! But what if you find yourself in a situation where you have been sexually indiscriminate? The way out is repentance, repudiating your earlier acts, refusing to repeat this behavior, and confessing your sins to God. Let’s pray!
PRAYER: Father God, we confess that we have NOT kept your word and that we have engaged in sex with people from whom we may have acquired evil spirits. Lord, we confess these acts as sin! We beg you to cleanse us, to help us turn away from sexual sins, and to follow you whole – heartedly all of our lives. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.
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