“Moreover thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hast borne unto me, and these hast thou sacrificed unto them to be devoured. Is this of thy whoredoms a small matter?” Ezekiel 16:20.
As Paul the Apostle acknowledged, confronting Christians with their backsliding and disobedience of the Lord is not an easy matter.
It causes much heartache to the one required of the Lord to do it!
The apostle wrote to the Corinthian church, which he had to rebuke very sharply for their departure from the truth of God: “For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote unto you with many tears; not that ye should be grieved, but that ye might know the love which I have more abundantly unto you,” 2 Corinthians 2:4.
If there is anything of the Father’s love and concern for His children in the heart of a faithful minister, then he will act in a manner like that of the Father!
“And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby,” Hebrews 12:5-11.
The passage in Ezekiel from which we have chosen our verse, begins with the record of the Lord’s past mercies to Israel and ends with the oft repeated promise of future blessings.
In between is the sad account of Israel’s sins as seen by the Lord.
Stark Language
The language and descriptive terms the Lord uses when dealing with the sins of His covenant people, indicates that to the Lord the ‘backsliding’ and ‘rebellion’ in which His people were engaged at that time, was far more abhorrent and offensive to Him than the offenders could possible understand!
Backsliding dims our view of sin and it becomes ‘less sinful’ and more excusable than it is otherwise perceived to be by sanctified eyes!
Indeed, we become blind to our sins when we backslide. This is illustrated in the writings of Malachi. “A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour? and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the LORD of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name?” Malachi 1:6.
Few will comprehend the reason why the Lord uses such terms as He does in Ezekiel chapter 16. But we must learn that our backsliding is akin to the evil actions of an adulterous wife. Thus, when referring to His people, the Lord uses very strong descriptive terms!
The Lord likens His people unto an abandoned orphan that He rescued and wonderfully cared for and made His ‘bride’ (verses 4-14).
Please note the words of verse 8: “I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou becamest mine.” The spreading of His garment over her is seen as a claiming her for His wife.
It was what Ruth asked of Boaz when she claimed the benefits of ‘the kinsman redeemer’. “And he said, Who art thou? And she answered, I am Ruth thine handmaid: spread therefore thy skirt over thine handmaid; for thou art a near kinsman,” Ruth 3:9.
But the one who was made the bride of the Lord was most unfaithful and the Lord refers to her sinful treachery in the plainest of terms which doubtless would have been deemed offensive when Ezekiel declared God’s Word to the nation.
The words “harlot”, “whoredom”, “fornication” and terms akin to these the Lord employed to portray the wickedness of Israel!
I repeat, few realise just how offensive is sin in the eyes of the lord.
Wife
If Christians are indeed the “wife’ of the Lord, as stated by Paul and also in the book of the Revelation:
“For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body,”Ephesians 5:23.
“Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife,”Revelation 21:9, then such behaviour as straying from Him and setting our hearts upon sin, merits these dreadful descriptive terms the Lord employs in Ezekiel 16!
We are commanded to:
“Now set your heart and your soul to seek the LORD your God . . . ,” 1Chronicles 22:19.
“If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth,” Colossians 3:1-2.
If our affections are set on anything of this earth, its ways, its activities, its carnal habits, and not on Christ, we are guilty of ‘spiritual adultery’! That is the basic lesson of Ezekiel chapter 16.
However, the Lord specifically refers to the wicked actions of some parents in the verses 20-22.
THE ACTIONS OF PARENTS TOWARD THEIR CHILDREN ARE LISTED AMONGST THE ACTS OF ‘SPIRITUAL ADULTERY’!
1. The actions of those cruel parents has a parallel today. “Moreover thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hast borne unto me, and these hast thou sacrificed unto them to be devoured. Is this of thy whoredoms a small matter,” verse 20.
Specifically what is referred to here is the heinous actions of mothers and fathers who forsook the Lord and followed an idol. It was condemned by Jeremiah.
“For the children of Judah have done evil in my sight, saith the LORD: they have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to pollute it. And they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart,”Jeremiah 7:30-31.
Dr John Gill makes this comment on these verses about the idol Moloch. ‘Moloch, which was made of brass; and they heated him from his lower parts; and his hands being stretched out, and made hot, they put the child between his hands, and it was burnt; when it vehemently cried out; but the priests beat a drum, that the father might not hear the voice of his son, and his heart might not be moved.’
It is unbelievable the cruelty that a departure from the Lord and His Word will produce toward children, even amongst mothers and fathers!
The apostasy of our nation today shows the same cruelty toward children. Daily there are reports of their murder and abuse. Parents have been repeatedly prosecuted for the most diabolical acts toward their offspring! Starving, savage beatings, burnings, drownings and many more unspeakable actions toward little ones by their parents have been repeated in the evidence given in numerous court cases involving the death of children.
It is impossible to understand how such treatment can be meted out to children and it is heart-breaking to read of such events!
Not the first time
Sadly, it was but a repeat of the cruelty displayed by Israel’s parents in a former time of departure from the Lord! Stephen, the first martyr, informs us in his message before the Sanhedrin, before he was murdered, of this sad episode.
Referring to Pharaoh’s treatment of their forefathers, Stephen said: “The same dealt subtilly with our kindred, and evil entreated our fathers, so that they cast out their young children, to the end they might not live,” Acts 7:19.
In that time of backsliding and departure from the Lord, the Israelite parents sought to ‘buy’ ease from their troubles by complying with Pharaoh’s evil demands that they kill their male children!
“And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, of which the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah: and he said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him: but if it be a daughter, then she shall live,” Exodus 1:15-16.
It is sad to read of the spirit of compliance that there was amongst the parents of Israel!
Yet is there not the same spirit of compliance seen today amongst Free Presbyterian parents who place their children under the soul-destroying teaching of the state school?
2. But there is cruelty toward children to be seen amongst Christians! It is not so much PHYSICAL cruelty as it is SPIRITUAL cruelty. It is not a cruelty that leaves its marks to be seen immediately in the lives of children, indeed, it is not until eternity that the full impact of this child cruelty that I speak of, will be manifested.
I am speaking of the cruelty endured by children who are placed under the ungodly and unChristian teaching of the state school!
Simply put, such are the textbooks and the general philosophy of the present state school system, that children are essentially taught that the Bible is wrong; God did not create the earth, the moon and the stars and we are not creatures of His creation!
The Bible is also wrong regarding sin. Sodomy and allied immoral perversions are NOT sins and those who engage in such are to be treated with respect and honour!
Again, abortion, the murder of the unborn, is not a sin. It is perfectly acceptable.
These and many other corrupt views are set forth in the modern classroom.
The recent controversy regarding the guidelines on ‘Transgenderism’ and other matters condemned by Scripture, promoted by the Education Authority in the state school system here in Northern Ireland, serves to highlight just what is going on in the classroom.
Some of the guidelines required that:
‘Schools should foster an environment where transgender individuals are valued and supported.’
‘Each school should have a designated staff member to act as a first point of contact for pupils questioning their gender identity.’
‘Teachers are encouraged to adopt a gender-aware approach to teaching and learning.’
Warnings
Despite repeated warnings of the corruption in the classroom of state schools, Christian parents, including many Free Presbyterian parents, ignore the warnings and place their children in the hands of this modern-day ‘Moloch’!
Oh! the children are not burning in literal fire, but their minds are poisoned and polluted with anti-Christian views and notions which will invariably cause the pupil to reject Holy Scripture to the damning of their souls and then will come the ‘burning’!
It may be supposed that Christian parents will argue that they teach their children the truth of the Bible and send them to Sabbath School and take them to church. That will guard them from error!
What is a child to make of the parent sending them out to sit 6-7 hours A DAY under modernistic and devilish influences?
Would simple logic not indicate that what they hear in some 3-4 hours of instruction PER WEEK must be deemed by them to be LESS IMPORTANT for them to learn and heed, than the more intense and prolonged instruction in their day school?
The Bible warns us that:
“A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump,” Galatians 5:9.
“Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt (destroy) good manners (morals, character),” 1 Corinthians 15:33.
The proof of what I say is to be seen in the offspring of many Christian parents. There is an abandoning of the ‘faith’ that their parents profess and they go their own way, in obedience to what they were taught in the ‘state school’.
3. Christian parents are ‘sacrificing’ their children for reasons that are base and carnal! They don’t want to pay the small amount that a Christian education will cost; they don’t want the bother and inconvenience of maybe having to transport their children some miles to the nearest Christian school; they don’t want to bear the reproach that may come their way as a result of rejecting the state system and linking themselves with ‘Christian education’!
I dare say that such motives are not far removed from those that prompted parents in the days of Jeremiah and Ezekiel to cast their children into the fires of Moloch.
In thinking of this, the actions of those ungodly parents long ago, were more merciful than those of Christian parents who defiantly send their children to a state school in these days.
I say that because I am of the opinion that infants who die before the age of understanding, are covered by the atonement of Calvary and would have gone from the cruel ‘hands’ of the scorching idol into the paradise of God!
The outlook for these children who attend the state school and who imbibe the damnable errors taught there, is that spoken of by Christ.
“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him,” John 3:36.
The pupil, who in adulthood follows that taught to them in the state school, will reject the Word of God and reap the inevitable consequences.
“But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death,”Revelation 21:8.
4. Christian parent, if you send your child to the state school you risk reaping in eternity that terrible harvest – heaven without your children.
Remember the cry of David upon hearing of the death of his spoiled, rebellious son, Absalom.
“And the king said unto Cushi, Is the young man Absalom safe? And Cushi answered, The enemies of my lord the king, and all that rise against thee to do thee hurt, be as that young man is. And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!” 2 Samuel 18:32-33.
It is said that the king’s mourning had an impact upon the jubilation of that day of victory!
“And the victory that day was turned into mourning unto all the people: for the people heard say that day how the king was grieved for his son,” 2 Samuel 19:2.
I just do not know what the impact will be upon parents who learn on that coming day of ‘VICTORY’, that as a result of the evil taught in school, the school that they insisted on sending their children to, their loved ones will not be in heaven with them!
But there is something in that scene of David’s mourning that Christian parents should consider and heed.
Rev Ivan Foster (Rtd)
Monday 15th September 2025