PREVIEW: What is the answer to the culture of child sacrifice?
Child sacrifice is perhaps the very pinnacle of human godlessness: sin at its starkest, its most extreme.
In the Ancient Near East it was to the false god Molech; in the UK today it is to the false gods of autonomy, fear of others, financial security, genetic perfection…
In “abortion” the worst of our culture is laid bare: literally sacrificing others (the smallest and weakest) for the sake of self.
What is the answer?
At the Cross we see a very different kind of sacrifice, and the only remedy to our child-killing culture:
- Instead of the sacrifice of others for the sake of self, we see the Son of God sacrificing himself for the sake of others.
- Instead of seeking to defend or justify himself, he sought to defend and justify others – by taking our sins upon himself.
- Where we humans claim godlike authority over life and death, God humbled himself as a human and subjected himself to death.
- Where we pursue independence, the approval of others, worldly wealth, bodily wholeness, Jesus sacrificed all these things to reconcile us to God.
At the Cross, the culture of child sacrifice is reversed and overcome. God has volunteered himself as the only perfect and sufficient sacrifice, defeating the demonic powers that demand the blood of the innocent, taking the penalty for sin upon himself.
At the Cross we stand forgiven, healed, restored, reconciled – whatever our history, whatever stake we’ve had in this child-killing culture – if we look to him in repentance and faith and adoration.
And at the Cross we see Christ-shaped activism, a blueprint for how to engage a dark world. So how will we respond?...
- In a culture that will sacrifice others for the sake of self, will we sacrifice ourselves for the sake of others?
- In a culture that seeks to defend and justify itself, will we accept hatred as we seek to defend and justify the innocent?
- In a god-complex culture, will we proclaim and emulate the Living God who humbled himself as a man and tasted death?
- In a culture fixated on self and the here and now, will we gladly give up all these things for the kingdom that is coming?
“This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” 1 John 4:10
What do you see at the Cross?