MY PASTOR PREACHED A TOUGH SERMON about the Bible yesterday. At least I think it would have been a tough sermon to prep for. It certainly took courage to speak the words. I have no doubt about that.
In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if some folks left the church in objection to what he said.
He dealt with some of those tough, “God-is-mean” Old Testament passages that most preachers skip.
Like the time Joshua told the Jews:
“Jericho and everything in it must be completely destroyed as an offering to the LORD” (Joshua 6:17).
The scholar tech word for “completely destroyed” is herem (Hebrew), which is often translated as “ban,” meaning it’s banned for humans and reserved for God.
Here’s how I understood the pastor’s take on passages like these. They reflect less about God than they do about the culture and the people of the day.
For example, the Moabite Stone, an ancient inscription from what is now the Arab country of Jordan, says another warrior did much the same thing for his god:
“Kemosh [a god] said to me, ‘Go, take Nebo [a city] from Israel,” so I went by night and fought against it from the break of dawn until noon, and I took it and slew all, 7,000 male citizens and foreign men 7,000 men, female citizens, foreign women and female slaves. For Kemosh I put it to the ban.” Mesha, about 840 BC
That word “ban” means the same thing as the Bible’s phrase “completely destroyed.” The victims were sacrificed as offerings to a god.
So as the pastor reads the Jericho story, the anonymous writer of Joshua may have been presuming God’s backing because what Joshua did was customary at that time in history. And if God had opposed the idea, he would have vetoed it and stopped Joshua—since God controls everything. (That’s one reason, by the way, that Job’s friends presumed he sinned up a storm since he was reaping a whirlwind of misery.)
My pastor says he filters all the stories of the Old Testament through the revelation of God that we have in the life and teachings of Jesus. And as far as he’s concerned, the idea of killing men, women, and children isn’t something that fits neatly into Jesus’ call to disarm: “Love your enemies” (Matthew 5:44).
What do you think about this?
My pastor’s sermon should be posted online sometime this week. I’d be happy to share the link in a comment box below, if anyone would like to see it.
I would like to read it, Steve! Thanks!
Debbie, it’s actually a video. I’ll post the sermon link when it’s available. Might be as early as today.
You pastor sounds like a very intelligent man. I have struggled with this issue recently and we basically passed over this in our Bible study. Some have thought that the “writer” put this in to justify the actions of the Jews in wiping out the Canaanites. Personally, I don’t buy that explanation because Scripture is so honest with all the wickedness of the Jews — the fact that they too were wiped out because of their sin. In fact, every nation was destroyed because of sin — all the Prophets in the Old Testament record it. I kind of take another view — one that is not popular — the fact that God allowed them to survive as long as they did, because of their sinfulness, is because of God’s grace. They were wicked and deserved what they got. The question we should ask is not why God would allow this happen to the Canaanites, but rather why did God allow them to go on this long in their wickedness! This sobering thought is covered by the Apostle Paul in his sidebar in Romans Chapters 9 – 11. He has to explain his concept, “If salvation is by God’s grace, then why doesn’t Israel accept the message?” Paul explains that in Chapter 9 its because of God’s election and sovereignty, in Chapter 10, Paul explains its because of their wickedness, and in Chapter 11, Paul says that their is an election of many that will believe. How does this all fit together? — only God knows! Paul never answers the question, “Why does God blame us for our sin when God does what he wants?” His answer: Shut up, who are you to question the Creator? Does the clay tell the potter, why did you make me like this? (my paraphrase). Habakkuk questioned God about the use of the Babylonians, a nation more depraved than Judah, to wipe out Judah — and his response was to pray and trust God! So I file this under “pending” and trust God. Thank God for his matchless grace or we would all be consumed!
Thanks Wayne. Here’s a link to the pastor’s sermon on the topic. I think you and Debbie would both enjoy hearing what he has to say. This link takes you to the home page, but the sermon is located right there at the top of the page. http://cor.org/
The sermon was excellent and you are very privileged to have a Pastor that studies the Scriptures — what wonderful resources — they are also privileged to have you there too! I feel another book coming on for you — Go for it! Difficult questions from the Bible. Stay balanced my friend — this will be your toughest assignment to date. Do we get a salary for giving you your next book? LOL
I still am one of the “suck it up” crowd — his illustration of Chemosh from the Moabites made sense. Problem I see, and this is my opinion, is the God of the Bible YHWH, is the living and true God and to say that the Hebrews “ban” to sacrifice women and children — was more like all the other “Deities” surrounding the Hebrews is disturbing to me. Obviously, Jesus believed in much of what written in the Old Testament.
What about the New Testament? We have Ananias and Sapphira struck dead just for telling a lie, we have Simon the Sorcerer struck blind for wanting to have “powers” from the Holy Spirit? — we can find so many things disturbing to us in the Scriptures. Your Pastor is right that we need to study those things historically and not rip those things out.
There really is no satisfying answer for me — there are things that I don’t understand. I am far from being a fundamentalist or Evangelical — I want to hear more.
Continue your “balanced” approach, my friend, in your books and drive us all crazy. By the way, I love this Blog!
Thanks, Wayne. Someone in church mentioned the Ananias and Sapphira story to me after the sermon. I think that fellow was in line with your approach to the Bible. My guess is that the pastor might have approached that story the same way as he did the Old Testament stories, allowing for the possibility that the writer attributed the deaths to God but that God might not have been the culprit. But I’m just guessing; I don’t know what the pastor would say about that.
I’m enjoying the sermon series, though.