Have you ever said to yourself, ‘I can handle it’?  Maybe you were with your friends, and they were doing something you know you shouldn’t be doing, but you said to yourself, ‘What’s the big deal?’ Maybe the discussion was becoming gossipy, judgmental, or critical, and you just went with it.  Maybe you are scrolling, and you begin to see things on your social media feed you know you shouldn't be looking at, and you think to yourself, ‘It’s not that serious’.  Is there anything in your life that is growing and you don’t want anyone to know about?  As you keep the secret, you keep telling yourself, ‘I’ve got this, it’s not a big deal’.

When I was in high school, right across the street, there was a park.  We were allowed to go into the park when we had breaks.  On the edge of the park, there were train tracks.  One of my friends, Wes, thought it would be cool to jump on the train as it rode by.  It was a pretty slow train, so it didn’t seem like a big deal.  Soon, we were all jumping on the train, riding it, and jumping off.  Why?   Because it wasn’t that big of a deal.   We could handle it.  It wasn’t that serious.  And then one of our friends tried to jump on, slipped, fell, and almost died.  We went back to class, never spoke a word of it, and never tried it again.  Have you ever had moments like that?  It wasn’t a big deal until it was.

The last couple of weeks, the story we have been talking about is when the Children of Israel had a chance to walk into the Promised Land, but they turned back.  Their decision to not follow God, God said, was contempt, and their punishment was to go back into the desert for forty years.   What did they do?  You would think they would go to God, repent, and ask for forgiveness.  They didn’t.   They woke up the next day and tried to fix their problem themselves.  They continued to be unable to place their trust in God.  It makes you wonder: who would do that?  Who would experience God and struggle to place their trust in God?  The answer is, we would.

Last week I gave you this verse.

Corinthians 6:19 Don't you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and who was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourselves but to God; 20 he bought you for a price. So use your bodies for God's glory. GNT

When we give our lives to Jesus, I don’t own me; Jesus does.  And that is our tension in life.  Like the Children of Israel, we want to trust God until we don’t. We want to give Jesus ownership of our lives, and then we don’t.   Do you see it?  We are living out the story we are reading in Scripture.

Today we are in Numbers 25, which means we are jumping over forty years of stories.  Our story today is after they have wandered around for forty years.  I want to highlight some of the stories we are jumping over.  Story 1: God gave them more laws and regulations to stay pure.  Story 2: A story of another rebellion by 250 prominent leaders of Israel.  Those rebelling against Moses were told to stand together.  The ground under them opened up and swallowed them.  Story 3: They ran out of water again and again; they rebelled.  God told Moses to speak to the rock to produce water, but Moses hit the rock.   Water came out, but because of that, Moses was not allowed into the Promised Land.  Story 4: The Canaanites nearby attacked Israel.  Israel prayed, and God enabled them to destroy the Canaanites.  Story 5: Israel again started murmuring against God and Moses.  God sent poisonous snakes.  Moses made a snake of bronze so people could be saved by looking at it.  Fun fact: that bronze snake is still a logo on the side of many medical buildings and equipment.  Story 6: King Sihon mobilized his army to destroy Israel.  They attacked, and Israel destroyed them.   King Og then attacked them.   Israel destroyed him too.  I really encourage you to read through those stories, place yourself in the story, and ask, ‘How would I have responded?’

The story we're talking about today is near the end of the forty-year journey.  They are near the Promised Land for the second time.  And they are on the border of the Moabite and the Amorite nations.  King Balak, king of the Moabites, was terrified of Israel because he knew Israel destroyed the Canaanites, King Sihon, and King Og when they attacked Israel.   So, King Balak called on a prophet, a sorcerer, called Balaam.  Balaam isn’t a good guy.  He was someone who would bless and curse people for money.  Do you remember the story in the Bible where a donkey spoke?   It was Balaam’s donkey.  King Balak wanted to hire the prophet Balaam to curse Israel.  Three times King Balak tried to get Balaam to spiritually curse Israel.  And each time God showed up to the Prophet or sorcerer Balaam and told him, " You cannot curse Israel; you can only bless Israel."  King Balak was furious.  God would not allow any spiritual curses to harm Israel.

Here is where the story gets crazy.  We know from Numbers 31:16 that the prophet or sorcerer Balaam couldn’t curse Israel, so he created another plan to harm Israel.  Remember I told you he wasn’t a good guy.  He created a plan to have the Moabite women seduce the men of Israel with a party and sex, and then idol worship.  The plan was simple: if you can’t beat them, get them to compromise.

Let’s see what happens.

Numbers 25:1-3 While Israel was camped at Shittim, the men began to have sex with the Moabite women. It started when the women invited the men to their sex-and-religion worship. They ate together and then worshiped their gods. Israel ended up joining in the worship of the Baal of Peor. God was furious, his anger blazing out against Israel. 

4 God said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of Israel and kill them by hanging, leaving them publicly exposed in order to turn God’s anger away from Israel.” 5 Moses issued orders to the judges of Israel: “Each of you must execute the men under your jurisdiction who joined in the worship of Baal Peor.” 

6-9 Just then, while everyone was weeping in penitence at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, an Israelite man, flaunting his behavior in front of Moses and the whole assembly, paraded a Midianite woman into his family tent. Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw what he was doing, grabbed his spear, and followed them into the tent. With one thrust he drove the spear through the two of them, the man of Israel and the woman, right through their midsections. That stopped the plague from continuing among the People of Israel. But 24,000 had already died.

10-13 God spoke to Moses: “Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has stopped my anger against the People of Israel. Because he was as zealous for my honor as I myself am, I didn’t kill all the People of Israel in my zeal. So tell him that I am making a Covenant-of-Peace with him. He and his descendants are joined in a covenant of eternal priesthood, because he was zealous for his God and made atonement for the People of Israel.” MSG

That’s wild.  It’s not a story we share in Children’s Ministries.   If you were a kid in church back in the day, they didn’t have a flannel board story of a sex party and a public hanging.  This is a story that you read when you are older, and it blows your mind.  

Let’s talk about what happened.  The first thing I want to bring out is that there were spiritual powers at work.  In Numbers 22, 23, and 24, we see that King Balak wanted Balaam to curse Israel, and God would not allow it.  God was protecting them.  

Please hear me: we have spiritual enemies at work today.  Enemies of God.  Enemies of God’s people.  Enemies of the mission of Jesus.  There are principalities that stand against God, and they are trying to destroy the church, marriage, family, individuals, and everything that God established.  How do we know?

Ephesians 6:11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. NIV

What we see in this story is that God is greater than all the powers that wanted to curse Israel.   And God is greater today too.  He is greater than all the powers at work that are trying to destroy the church, marriage, family, individuals, and everything that God established.

This story also reveals the real danger.  What is it?   To be clear, it wasn’t King Balak of the Moabites.  It wasn’t the dark demonic powers at work.  What was it?  Compromise.  Or, put another way, the passive Israelite.  It’s a way of living that says, I would do what God said, but ‘It’s not that big of a deal.’ ‘We can handle it.’  ‘It isn’t that serious.’  ‘Why do you make everything a thing?’  

Everyone in Israel knew the number one commandment of God.  Let’s read it.

Exodus 20:1 And God spoke all these words: 2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 3 “You shall have no other gods before me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments. NIV

They knew God freed their moms and dads from Egypt.  They experienced walking through the Red Sea on dry ground when they were little kids.   They knew God is a jealous God.   They knew they weren’t supposed to party with other countries.  They knew having sex with other women and worshipping idols was wrong.  

What happened?  They had been wandering for forty years.  It’s hard.  It’s hot.  It’s not all that fun.  It feels ordinary.  It’s boring.   Then pretty girls showed up.   Pretty girls wanted to know, ‘You want to party?’  Well, yeah, we do.  ‘It’s not that big of a deal.’ ‘We can handle it.’ ‘It's not that serious.’ ‘Why do you make everything a thing?’  For the Israelites, following God has been boring.  We have been in this desert for forty years.  Finally, something fun.

What is our real danger today?  Our compromise.  The passive Christian.  The person who lives in this world and says I would do what God said, but… ‘It’s not that big of a deal.’ ‘I can handle it.’ ‘It wasn’t that serious.  ‘Why do you make everything a thing?’  

Here is a great quote I want to share with you.

“Those who believe they believe in God, but without passion in the heart, without anguish of mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, and even at times without despair, believe only in the idea of God, and not in God himself.” – Madeleine L’Engle

Back to our story.

Numbers 25:6-9 Just then, while everyone was weeping in penitence at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, an Israelite man, flaunting his behavior in front of Moses and the whole assembly, paraded a Midianite woman into his family tent. Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw what he was doing, grabbed his spear, and followed them into the tent. With one thrust he drove the spear through the two of them, the man of Israel and the woman, right through their midsections. MSG

There was one man who didn’t compromise.  There was one man who had passion for God.  There was one man who thought it was a big deal.  There was one man who said, ‘Yeah, I'm going to make a thing of this because it matters.’  His name was Phinehas.  

God said this about Phinehas.

Numbers 25:10-11 He refused to tolerate the worship of any god but me. TLB

The passion of one man stopped the plague from killing more.  

Please hear me:

We do not understand the damage of our compromise.  

And we do not understand the power of our passion for God.  

Our greatest danger isn’t our enemy; it’s our passive way of living.  

Before we move on, I want to say that when I say passion, I'm not talking about an emotion; I'm talking about a decision.  Emotions go up and down and sideways.  I am talking about making a decision that pushes through your emotions.   

Let me ask you.  Are you passive about God and the things of God?   Are you passionate for God and the things of God?  

Jesus talked about our passion for God; I want to read it for you.

Matthew 13:43-44 Are you listening to this? Really listening? God’s kingdom is like a treasure hidden in a field for years and then accidentally found by a trespasser. The finder is ecstatic - what a find! - and proceeds to sell everything he owns to raise money and buy that field. MSG

The kingdom of God is more valuable than anything in this world.  God’s grace.  God’s healing.  God’s freedom.  Sin forgiven.   Courage given.  Life in eternity with God.  The local church.  The mission of Jesus.  All of it is God’s kingdom.  

In this story, the man who found the treasure was ecstatic.  Why?  He knew what he had found was too good to be true.  It was incredible.  He left and did everything he could to get his hands on it.  That’s passion.  It’s a way of living that says, I know what I found, and it’s unbelievable.  I am so done with everything in this world.   Nothing in this world could ever be as valuable as what I found.  I want God.   And I'll do anything to get my hands on God.

Let me ask you: are you passionate for God?  

If you struggle with passion for God, here is step one to find passion for God: Be honest.  Be honest with yourself that you are passive and repent.  Be honest; say it to yourself.  Don’t ignore it.  Don’t downplay it.  Don’t make excuses.  Just admit it.  Then repent.   That means you change something.   You change daily habits to pray, read Scripture, and apply it to your life.  

Please hear me: we don’t become passionate accidentally.  We don’t become passionate by compromising.  Being passive doesn’t lead to passion.  Passion is a decision; it’s intentional.  Where there is no passion, there is no intimacy.  Where there is no intimacy, there is no fruit.

I want to close with this.

We do not understand the damage of our compromise.   And we do not understand the power of our passion for God.  Our greatest danger isn’t our enemy; it’s our passive way of living.  

Never say, ‘It’s not that big of a deal.’ ‘I can handle it.’ ‘It wasn’t that serious.'  ‘Why do you make everything a thing?’  

I want you to see this.   Phinehas stood up, and the plague stopped.  What might change in your marriage?  What might change in your family?  What might change in your children?  What might change in your church?  What might change in your life?

It might start with you.