January 19th, 2025

Today’s sermon began with the Carscaddon’s incredible testimony of God’s sovereign hand in the preservation of the life of their son and of God’s placement of his life into their family and into ours.  It is a testimony of how God cares for every single life and how He works in the midst of our communities, transforming hearts, displaying His grace through adoption and through the Pro-Life movement.  It is a powerful reminder that God’s plans are never thwarted even in the darkest of circumstances.

We cannot consider the sanctity of life without thinking of the moral decline of humanity, even within America, where we find it, today.  It is God’s desire for life to flourish and in order for life to flourish, the church has to be engaged: we cannot be found idle.  As we give regard to the book of Habakkuk and its focus on the moral decline of Judah, we find the key struggles of Judah were idolatry: the worship of false gods.  Today, an examination of these struggles is appropriate for our consideration in regard to the sanctity of life.  Specifically, Judah struggled with:

• idolatrous worship of wealth, success, power and personal autonomy;

• religious hypocrisy, focused on tradition and cultural identity;

• sexual immorality, which normalized sexual practices that clearly contradicted God’s design for relationships;

• security in personal alliances, prioritizing political systems and military power over God’s guidance;

• materialism and greed, believing that happiness was achieved by material possessions and accumulated wealth, while in reality, discontent ran rampant; and,

• spiritual apathy, lacking zeal for the things of God.

What we find is that Judah had replaced trust in God with reliance on self, human ingenuity and the technology of the day.  How obvious it is that the nation of Judah in Habakkuk’s view, Judah in its darkest days as God was bringing Babylon to judge them, bears a striking resemblance to that of America!

In the midst of these struggles, Judah began to practice a particularly heinous sin that God declared deserving of death, a sin prompted by the introduction of a particular idol.  By definition, an “idol” is anything that takes the place of God in our hearts, receiving the worship, trust and devotion that alone belongs to God.  There are three common characteristics of idols: a misplaced trust, relying on it for security, meaning, or identity (Jeremian 17:5-8); a distortion of worship, giving to it the “ultimate” worth that is due God, thus violating the first commandment (Exodus 20:3-4); and, a rebellion against God’s glory, replacing it with created things, suppressing the truth of His sovereignty and majesty (Romans 1:21-25).

Central to idol worship is self.  “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh (physical pleasures) and the lust of the eyes (material possessions) and the boastful pride of life (personal glory - what is achieved), is not from the Father, but is from the world” (I John 2:16).  Any form of self worship is from Satan, not God (Isaiah 14:12-14), rooted in his rebellion against God.  We see self-exaltation revealed in the way we heavily guard against: emotional discomfort - striving to avoid vulnerability and humility;

physical discomfort - not wanting hardship or sacrifice; and, spiritual discomfort - not wanting dependence on God or acknowledging our sin.  At the very center of self exaltation, the epitome of Judah’s (and America’s!) struggle, is comfort.
 

The God of All Comfort

BUT GOD, knowing and understanding the heart of man and of his weaknesses, presents Himself to man as the God of all comfort (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).  Comfort is highly sought by all humanity.  Positioned above the animals and eternally above the angels, uniquely composed of body, soul and spirit, humans were created with the distinct capacity to both receive and offer the vital necessity of comfort.

God is Comfort

The reason comfort is a common human need is because humanity suffers distress in the unique way of a three-dimensional experience: past - grief and regret (Genesis 37:35, Matthew 26:75); present - daily troubles and worry (Matthew 6:25-32); and,  future - fear and dread (Matthew 6:34).

Beyond these daily struggles is the ultimate distress with which every human lives: sin against God, beginning at the age when every person understands his sin (Romans 1); however, God Gives Himself as the cure (2 Corinthians 1:3).  Comfort is an essential part of who God is.  As such, it is something that He provides.  All comfort originates from God, coming from Him because He is compassionate in nature, offering us a relationship filled with peace, joy and blessing, not disorder (I Corinthians 14:33), allowing us to rest in Him.  “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22-23).

God provides an endless source of comfort.  The world is able to experience comfort because of God’s mercy and common grace.  He is the creator of all good things (James 1:17) and, as such, all comfort flows from God’s sustaining hand; therefore, His comfort extends to both believers and unbelievers (Matthew 5:45).  God’s ultimate comfort, found in all circumstances in all ways, is alone found in Christ.

Comfort in Christ

Outside of a relationship with Christ, humanity is left in distress, left in its sin.  We see this as we observe children who begin life without a care in the world but, as they are instructed in the ways of the world, bringing the Word of God to bear on them, they begin to see their sin and begin to experience distress, at which time we offer them the Gospel of hope.

The longer we live our lives, the more we understand who God is, distress increases.  Yet, unbelievers suppress the truth of God (Romans 1:18), refusing to worship Him.  We find them darkened in their understanding, left in idolatry and in moral collapse, which culminates in ultimate distress, alienation from God in this life and in eternity.  They are left hopeless.

It is the call to the church to go out and give unbelievers the glorious proclamation of hope that is only found in Christ (Romans 8:1).  There is freedom from all past, present and future guilt through the confession of Christ as Lord (Romans 10:9-10).  In Christ, God grants His ultimate comfort, sending His Spirit to dwell within us, affirming He is always present with us, that His comfort is constant and unshakeable and that we have irrevocable forgiveness as His children.  His love for us is so deep the entire Trinity ministers to us.  The Gospel is a radiant message of comfort, Christ being the fulfillment of God’s plan for His people.

Yet, Judah turned away from the Messiah, refusing the comfort He provides, because they, like America, today, enjoy the sinful substitutes of true comfort and of its immediate gratification.  They sought their solace in idols and false securities, rejecting the source of life and peace.  From the line of David, the lineage of the Christ who brings salvation and comfort to humanity, also emerges the insidious legacy of Molech worship.
 

Modernity and Molech

Similar to today’s America, Judah found itself in a perpetual state of wanting to be comforted in all circumstances and in all ways.  By way of reminder, all of humanity has the basic need to be comforted.  As with all legitimate needs, such as food, clothing, shelter and money to pay for those needs, there is a persistent temptation to elevate these needs to idolatry, to seek our needed comfort in creation rather than in the Creator.

Molech

Molech, a god of comfort, was a sinful substitution to that need.  A sacrificial offering of a family’s first child to Molech was promised to give you everything you wanted: the promise of prosperity.  Molech is believed to have originated with the Phoenicians, a loosely gathered group of people who inhabited Canaan between 1500 and 300 BC.  We know the Canaanites commonly engaged in Molech worship.  In Acts 7, we find Stephen chastising Israel, telling them that when they left Canaan, they left with both the Tabernacle of God and the tabernacle of Molech.

In Genesis 12, we find God calling Abraham to Canaan and later, in Genesis 15, we find God establishing His covenant with Abraham.  In Genesis 22, we find God requiring Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice.  In God’s divine mind, understanding that later would come the sacrifice of children, God demonstrated His love through the provision of the sacrifice, demonstrating He is not like any other god in that He would sacrifice for the comfort of the people.  Fast forward 500 years after Abraham, as Joshua led the Israelites out of the desert into the Promised Land, God warned Israel against participating in Molech worship with specific instruction to eliminate all the gods they encountered.  

Despite God’s explicit instruction, Israel did not listen, incorporating Molech worship into their own traditions.  The temptation was too great, seeing evidence, seeing people prosper, that made this worship believable.  This temptation must have been great because the worship of Molech was heinous!  Jeremiah 7:31 tells us that it was the parents who presented their children to be burned in Molech’s fire.  Through historians, we learn that parents would try to remain stoic, so as not to dishonor the ritual and jeopardize their prosperity, and that musical instruments were played to ease the parent’s conscience and to muffle the screams of the children.

As the kings of Israel were established, beginning with Solomon, this worship was allowed to continue.  In 2 Kings 21:5, we find that Manassah built an altar for Molech in the temple of God, himself burning one of the Davidic heirs.  With the kings doing this, Molech worship became widespread throughout Judah.     

Molech in America

Is not this heinous worship persisting today in America through the sacrament of abortion?  In 2024, over one million abortions were committed.  More than 63 million children have been sacrificed since Roe v. Wade in 1973.  In 2023, almost 46,000 abortions were performed in NC, with 54% identifying as born-again Christians.  We should not be surprised because many mainline denominations support this atrocity.  Abortion functions much like the sacrament of Molech worship in ancient Canaan and we see a fervent passion arises among its advocates when its legality is threatened because their god is under attack.

The tactics have changed but, the worship is the same: parents still present the children for sacrifice and the violence occurs within the womb so that the screams of the baby cannot be heard.  The goal is the same: “without reproductive rights, there is no American dream” (Oprah Winfrey).  We see that the American dream is financial comfort, security, power and control through the building of wealth.

“Sanctity of Life” Sunday is a day the church sets aside to remember that God esteems human life, valuing life from conception to death (womb to tomb!).  Is it not ironic that the church in our country has established a day to remember life’s sanctity?  Such a day is only needed because life is being jeopardized, just as it was in Canaan, because abortion has reached a religious status, a sacrament, with the world seeing an animal and a human as identical in order to justify the killing of children.

Human life is a sovereign, miraculous gift from God, coming from His divine mind, will and plan.  Only God can create life.  Psalm 24:1 tells us that our lives are not our own.  1 Samuel 2:6 tells us life, both to give and to take, belongs only to God. 1 Samuel 1, along with Genesis 20 and 29, tell us that God opens and closes the womb in judgment.  Psalm 139 tells us that God knits and forms our frame and that He determines our days.  He provides eternal life.  From beginning to end, life is God’s work; yet, we find ourselves as Judah in Canaan.  What is our response?
 

A Call to Action

In the words of God, complacency is complicity!  “If the people of the land should ever disregard (willfully overlook or ignore) that man when he gives any of his offspring to Molech, so as not to put him to death, then I Myself will set My face against that man and against his family” (Leviticus 20:4-5).

A Call to Hope

As a church, we first need to call people to hope with the message of the Gospel.  One in three women, including women in the church, have had an abortion.  These women need to know there is no sin that cannot be forgiven.  God redeems from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).  He is a God who offers complete comfort, including comfort from our sin against Him.  Comfort through hope is a comfort received and a comfort shared, which multiplies God’s kingdom.  God comforts us so that we may comfort others in need of comfort (2 Corinthians 1:4).

A Call to Confront

At the age of 16, young King Josiah made a commitment to wholeheartedly pursue the Lord.  At the age of 20, because he was determined to worship God alone, Josiah tore down the sacrifices and removed all traces of Molech worship, knowing they were an abomination to God (2 Kings 23:10).  After Josiah’s death, Israel slid back into rebellion and returned to human sacrifice.  From our brief overview of Habakkuk, we find that God used the Babylonians to eradicate Molech worship in the people of Judah.

As we live in the midst of a rebellious nation, we are to live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4), seeing God’s eternal perspective, confessing our own sin and boldly calling those around us out of their sin to worship God alone.  Like Habakkuk, we tremble at the coming judgment while we proclaim God’s promises today!

We know the world prioritizes comfort…whether it be the choice in abortion, a mother’s autonomy, career ambitions or financial stability…over a child’s right to live.  While it may not be abortion for us, this is the epitome of the sacrament of comfort.  If we trace the idol of comfort to its ultimate conclusion, we find it is not a far reach from sacrificing our own children in order for our lives to be perceived as better.  God will tolerate NO idol worship above our worship of Him!  “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20).

The outcome of Roe v. Wade marked a cultural shift in which the right to life was redefined and the sacrifice of children was legalized and celebrated as a cornerstone of expressive individualism.  

A Call to Act

As Christians, we cannot idly stand by, turning a blind eye to the modern-day Molech cult of abortion or any other lifestyle or choice which stifles the flourishing of human life.  Remember the warning God gives in Leviticus 20:4-5.  Living in silence in the presence of such an atrocity is complicity.  God calls us to speak out, speaking the truth in love with the courage to defend the most vulnerable among us.  “Rescue those who are being taken away to death (unjust treatment); hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.  If you say,’Behold, we did not know this,’ does not He who weighs the heart perceive it? (Proverbs 24:11-12).  God knows your excuses for knowing and not acting!

Within our church, we have multiple avenues down which we can walk.  We must pray, give, serve and speak for the sanctity of human life whenever we are given the opportunity.  We must see that these are opportunities to minister the Word and to introduce those around us to the Word, to the one who determined that life indeed is sanctified.

We know that our Lord gave up all comfort for us.  In the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings, may we be found in communion with Him.  Amen.

Selah

• Does a careful, honest examination of how you live testify to the same value that God places on every human life? 

• Do you find yourself seeking the American dream, sourced in financial comfort, security, power and control through the building of wealth, or seeking the kingdom of God, walking in a manner worthy of His calling on your life?

• Has the Lord revealed any idol in your life receiving greater devotion than to Him?

• Having received Christ, the only comfort and relief from man’s distress, are you actively and earnestly offering that comfort to those whom God has placed in your life without regard to its potential cost or suffering?