Day 83 – Phineas & Baal-Peor

Today’s passage is pretty blunt. Israel’s sin – both sexual and idolatrous – is flagrant and widespread, and God’s reaction and punishment is strong and perhaps hard to read. Talk to me or another leader if you are troubled by what you read.

• The first verse today throws us into the thick of the action. How were the Israelites sinning? The verb “to whore” means to have repeated unmarried sex.
• Notice that this activity was with the daughters of Moab – i.e. not Israelites. We read about the Moabites yesterday. God had instructed the Israelites not to marry (and of course to not sleep with) people from other lands. Why do you think this was? You can see one of the reasons in Numbers 25:2-3.
• What was God’s response in verses 4 and 5?
• Who was the one person to stand up against this behaviour, particularly when he saw the blatant and unapologetic act of sin in verse 6? What was this person’s connection with Aaron?
• What did Phineas do? The passage in Psalms may help you to summarise it. Can you imagine what it might have looked like?
• How did God respond to Phineas’ strong, God-focused action?
• The New Testament says people will know Christians by their love and their “zeal” for God. That means that we work actively to keep God’s Word at the front of everything we do. How could we act like Phinehas (and I don’t mean by stabbing people in the belly…)?
• Think about the words of blessing that Balaam said over the people and the sinful actions of the people below. It might remind you of the time when God was giving Moses the Ten Commandments on the mountain whilst the people below were making idols out of gold. Can you think of other times when God was blessing His people even whilst they were turning away in sin?

Today’s passage showed God’s judgement against the people who were disobeying His command to not marry other nations. God gave this rule to the people because they were to be holy – set apart for God. The Israelites followed God, and the people in the other nations didn’t. By intermarrying they could have had their hearts dragged away from the true God and possibly towards false ones. We saw this in Numbers 25:2 today.

At Eureka we discourage boyfriend/girlfriend relationships with non-Christians. We’ve had talks on it in the past, and it is teaching that extends to the adults too. Harry, Jonah and Anabel – I know you are still young, and this might not be something on your hearts at the moment. Nevertheless, as today’s passage refers clearly to it, I thought I’d discuss the topic a little further.

For Christians nowadays, we have similar rules to the Israelites in the Old Testament. We can marry someone from any nation we choose, but Paul, in 2 Corinthians 6:14-15, says that we shouldn’t be “yoked” together with someone who doesn’t love Jesus. What does he mean by the word “yoked”? Well, this is a reference to farming. In those times, they used animals to pull ploughs. If you put two donkeys together to pull the same plough, they could work well together. But if you put a donkey and large ox together, it wouldn’t help at all. The two animals are too different, and would continually pull away from one another, and may break the equipment.

It’s good to have friends who are not Christians. You shouldn’t hide yourself away in a purely Christian friendship bubble. Potentially the only way your friends will hear about Jesus is through you, so for evangelism to work, you need to have friends to tell the gospel to! We will never dissuade you from having non Christian friendships, as long as they don’t encourage you in activities that are wrong (drinking alcohol before you should, looking at material you shouldn’t, encouraging you to skip church activities, etc).

When it comes to relationships, at the level where you would call each other boyfriend/girlfriend or where the connection between you and another person is based on a physical desire for each other, we are called to be much more careful, and Paul’s teachings are very relevant. This becomes even more acute when you get older.

Do we discourage these relationships because we’re boring, or because we’re unrealistic about life? Of course not. The fact is that we’re very realistic about the problems these relationships cause. The problem is that of basic disagreements about what is, and isn’t, “acceptable” in a relationship. One person will expect the other to go further physically, perhaps. In these situations the one who’s trying to hold back will be severely tested. Or their attitudes to areas of faith will continually challenge you. Perhaps they will not understand the focus you put on church activities and will encourage you to skip them to do something else.

Another consideration is simply that the Bible says not to do it. So if you are hoping that you can convert your partner to have a faith in Christ for themselves, you are doing it in the wrong way. It’s hard to encourage them in their faith when you are ignoring teachings in your own faith to be with them in the first place. Flirt to convert isn’t the wisest plan!

You might say that this is too much to expect for a teenage relationship – especially if it’s your first or you’ve just got together. “Give me a break… we’re nowhere near having a serious relationship and we haven’t even kissed yet” is perhaps the argument that’s in your head. Yes, that may be true. But all relationships start there – and they grow. And as they grow, so do the temptations, and so does the pain of stopping it when you suddenly realise that it has become more serious than it should.

When you commit your life to Jesus, in baptism, confirmation or some other way, the people in the church agree that they will help you to walk with God at all times. It’s our job, therefore, as youth leaders, to encourage you, and to challenge you, in order to equip you to make wise decisions in this area. We are also well aware that it’s not easy. Talk to me, or Chris, or another leader if you want, if this is something you would like to talk more about.