Elton Wong’s last article reminded me of a story I heard once. There was an atheist who declared, “There is no God! And look! Your own Bible says the same thing!” Then the rest of the passage was pointed out to him, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.'” (Psalms 14:1)

If you read the rest of the story in the example Mr. Wong has given, you will find out that some of the Israelite men had begun to visit the temple prostitutes of the Moabites, and had even begun to worship their god, the Baal of Peor. God told Moses that all the men who had engaged in worshipping other gods and were involved in sexual immorality with the Moabites must be killed. While the Israelites were weeping over the sin of Israel, a man came up with one of Moabite women right in front of the Israelite leaders and went into his tent to have sex with her.

Phineas took a spear and killed them, as they were openly doing what was detestable to God, and because God had commanded it. This had nothing to do with interracial couples (as a side note, Moabites and Israelites are of the same race … the Moabites are descendants of Lot, a relative of Abraham) but everything to do with blatant rebellion against God.

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Jeff Owens

Alumnus

Crystal, Minn.