Kill Disobedient Children Says Pastor Ben Skaug

Another long post which I don't expect anyone to read, but I just want it on the record that I disagree with almost every word spoken by Pastor Ben Skaug in the following video where he tries to convince his audience that this next piece of biblical nonsense from Deuteronomy makes perfect sense:

If someone has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey his father and mother, who does not heed them when they discipline him, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his town at the gate of that place. They shall say to the elders of his town, “This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.” Then all the men of the town shall stone him to death. (Deuteronomy 21:18-21)

 

original video here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU-nCov2R4w

If I call Pastor Ben Skaug a cruel, callous, uncaring, miserable piece of shit, you can be sure that most Christians will be highly offended and say that I am a child of the Devil.

But they are not offended (not even slightly) when Pastor Ben Skaug publicly defends a bible text that says Christian parents have the God-given right to kill disobedient children for something as mild as gluttony!

Pastor Skaug then goes on to tell his gullible Christian audience that they will not be punished for killing their children, but they will be rewarded instead. "Lavished with covenantal blessings," as he puts it.

But it's worse than that because he also states that if Christian parents do not obey the biblical law (and kill their disobedient children) then it is the parents who will be punished!

Christians listen to that utter piffle and agree with every word of it: "Hallelujah, praise the Lord. Kill the gluttons, slay the drunks, murder the children; it says so in the bible."

You doubt a modern Christian would ever behave so badly? Check out this incident which occurred in 2017:

Transcript from video:

I think in this one we have to take a step back for a moment and to see that the covenantal structure that God has with his people. God lays out the covenant law and says 'here are the things you must do to remain in covenant with me. If you do them then I am obligated to pour out and lavish upon you all the covenantal blessings' - and you see those listed in Deuteronomy 28 - 'But vice-versa, if you break the covenantal law then here are the covenant curses that I as a perfectly holy, just and right God, am obligated to now pour out upon you.'

This section in Deuteronomy 19 concerning the child: If you as a parent has a child who is continually breaking and transgressing the covenant law of God, you must remember that if you as a father were to harbor this child - and furthermore as a city - if the city harbored the child who was a continual covenant transgressor, then God is obligated - not just sitting back being mean - he's obligated to pour covenant curses out, not just upon you, but now upon the entire city.

So now, when you think about that question, it goes back to the fact, do you love God more than you love all other things? Jesus Christ says this exact same thing in a different way in the New Testament when he says, 'All who love child, mother, father, sister, brother, more than me, are not worthy of me.' So, in other words, do we love God pre-eminently, or do we not? 

And if; if we make an idol out of anything; if we place anything above the living God then we are harboring that which trangresses - and we cannot! He is worthy of our love. He is worthy of our devotion.

Spoken by Pastor Ben Skaug.

Let's go through Skaug's diatribe, point by point.

(My comments in red) 

I think in this one we have to take a step back for a moment

That's code for "let's change the subject". Here's how he does it.

and to see that the covenantal structure that God has with his people. God lays out the covenant law and says 'here are the things you must do to remain in covenant with me. If you do them then I am obligated to pour out and lavish upon you all the covenantal blessings' - and you see those listed in Deuteronomy 28.'

See what he's done? Instead of discussing God's immoral command that gluttonous children should be stoned to death Pastor Skaug is talking, instead, about the wonderful advantages (lavish blessings) that benefit people who become Christians and obey God.

Notice, also, that Pastor Skaug mentions the "blessings" that can be found in Deuteronomy chapter 28, but he fails to mention that the blessings last only until verse fourteen - and then come the curses. Curses that continue without a break until verse sixty-eight! Fourteen verses of blessings. Fifty-four verses of curses.

And you won't believe some of those curses; Christian torture porn at its most disgusting. 

'But vice-versa, if you break the covenantal law then here are the covenant curses that I as a perfectly holy, just and right God, am obligated to now pour out upon you.'

Now this bit surprises me because Pastor Skaug actually mentions the curses. But notice the bland language he uses. He says that "if you break the covenantal law then" you must bear the "covenant curses" which (he implies) are "perfectly holy, just and right." Let me list just a tiny few of those "perfectly holy, just and right" curses as they appear in Deuteronomy 28:15-68 and then you decide whether or not you would be prepared to worship the Christian God of Love:

• The Lord will send upon you disaster, panic, and frustration in everything you attempt to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly
• The Lord will make the pestilence cling to you until it has consumed you
• The Lord will afflict you with consumption, fever, inflammation, with fiery heat and drought, and with blight and mildew
• The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies
• The Lord will afflict you with the boils of Egypt, with ulcers, scurvy, and itch, of which you cannot be healed.
• The Lord will afflict you with madness, blindness, and confusion of mind
• You shall be continually abused and robbed
• You shall become engaged to a woman, but another man shall lie with her.
• Your sons and daughters shall be given to another people
• You shall be continually abused and crushed, and driven mad by the sight that your eyes shall see.
• The Lord will strike you on the knees and on the legs with grievous boils of which you cannot be healed
• You shall have sons and daughters, but they shall not remain yours, for they shall go into captivity.
• The Lord will bring a nation from far away, from the end of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle ... It shall besiege you in all your towns
• In the desperate straits to which the enemy siege reduces you, you will eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your own sons and daughters whom the Lord your God has given you.
• Even the most refined and gentle of men among you will begrudge food to his own brother, to the wife whom he embraces, and to the last of his remaining children, giving to none of them any of the flesh of his children whom he is eating
• She who is the most refined and gentle among you, so gentle and refined that she does not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground, will begrudge food to the husband whom she embraces, to her own son, and to her own daughter, begrudging even the afterbirth that comes out from between her thighs, and the children that she bears, because she is eating them in secret for lack of anything else
• The Lord will overwhelm both you and your offspring with severe and lasting afflictions and grievous and lasting maladies.
• The Lord will take delight in bringing you to ruin and destruction
• Your life shall hang in doubt before you; night and day you shall be in dread, with no assurance of your life.

And there's a whole lot more Christian torture porn where that came from. If you're looking for sadistic pornography, forget about the Internet; just read your bible!

This section in Deuteronomy 19 concerning the child:

I think he is referring to Deuteronomy 21 (probably thinking of verse 19 in that chapter).

If you as a parent has a child who is continually breaking and transgressing the covenant law of God,

This time Pastor Skaug is preparing to blame the victim. He is suggesting that the "child" has become an unrepentant recidivist who has passed beyond redemption and become eligible for the maximum possible sentence - the death penalty!

Once again I should like to remind you that Skaug is talking about the death penalty for gluttony! Gluttony for Christ's sake! The death penalty! And not a painless death either; but death by stoning! (Excuse the exclamation points but I think they are necessary here.)

But Pastor Skaug is being more evasive than his gullible audience could imagine because, in the bible, God is not talking about punishing recidivists. He's not even talking about "three strikes and you're out". God is demanding the death penalty for the first offence! Check out this incident where God orders the offending child to be put to death at the first offence:

If anyone secretly entices you—even if it is your brother, your father’s son or your mother’s son, or your own son or daughter, or the wife you embrace, or your most intimate friend—saying, “Let us go worship other gods,” whom neither you nor your ancestors have known, any of the gods of the peoples that are around you, whether near you or far away from you, from one end of the earth to the other, you must not yield to or heed any such persons. Show them no pity or compassion and do not shield them. But you shall surely kill them; your own hand shall be first against them to execute them, and afterwards the hand of all the people. (Deuteronomy 13:6-9)

Or this incident where an old man was picking up sticks on the Sabbath and God had him executed before the day ended:

When the Israelites were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the sabbath day. Those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses, Aaron, and to the whole congregation. They put him in custody, because it was not clear what should be done to him. Then the Lord said to Moses, “The man shall be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him outside the camp.” The whole congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him to death, just as the Lord had commanded Moses. (Numbers 15:32-36)

Pastor Skaug knows all these details but he deliberately withholds that information from his audience because he is trying to blame the victim. Skaug is trying to convince his audience that God only wants to punish people who are "continually breaking and transgressing the covenant law of God," whereas the bible clearly states that even gluttons and stick-picker-uppers must be stoned to death on the first offence.

you must remember that if you as a father were to harbor this child - and furthermore as a city - if the city harbored the child

Again Pastor Skaug shows his rat-cunning by casually absolving his gullible Christian audience from all responsibility for the murder of their own children. He is casually (and without biblical authority) suggesting that it is the city that has applied the death penalty - not God, not the parents, but the city - so now it's a problem for local government and nothing to do with the parents (or God).

(the child) who was a continual covenant transgressor,

As I've already shown, Pastor Skaug is pissing in your ear when he tells you that the disobedient children are being punished for continual wrong-doing. God wants people dead at the first offence.

then God is obligated - not just sitting back being mean - he's obligated to pour covenant curses out, not just upon you, but now upon the entire city.

Pastor Skaug is now implying that the gluttonous child must be stoned to death otherwise everyone in the whole city would be guilty of "harboring" the sinner and God would be "obligated to pour covenant curses out" upon the city residents. Much better, Pastor Skaug implies, that one gluttonous child (or an elderly stick-picker-upper) is stoned to death immediately, than that a whole city is punished for failing to obey God's "perfectly holy, just and right" law.

So now, when you think about that question, it goes back to the fact, do you love God more than you love all other things?

Well maybe some people can cope with a situation like that - but what sort of parents kill their own children for gluttony and then defend their actions by saying "God made me do it."

[I'm thinking to myself that if Pastor Skaug (slippery bastard that he is) was defending them in court, he would suggest they change the reason from "God made me do it" to "The Devil made me do it."]

Jesus Christ says this exact same thing in a different way in the New Testament when he says, 'All who love child, mother, father, sister, brother, more than me, are not worthy of me.'

Once again Pastor Skaug fails to give his gullible Christian audience the full story. Jesus Christ doesn't just say "You are not worthy of me" and leaves it at that. Oh no, Jesus Christ, like his old man, enthusiastically recommends the death penalty for all backsliders when he says:

If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea. (Matthew 18:6)

Not many Christians know that verse because rat-cunning pastors like Ben Skaug never preach it from the pulpit. (You can probably guess why they don't. It doesn't fit too well with the "gentle-Jesus-meek-and- mild" shit they teach in Sunday School.)

So, in other words, do we love God pre-eminently, or do we not?

Put me down for "not".

And if; if we make an idol out of anything; if we place anything above the living God then we are harboring that which trangresses - and we cannot! He is worthy of our love. He is worthy of our devotion.

But that is total bullshit because we've already seen Deuteronomy 13:6-9 where God says that if anyone makes an idol out of anything or they decide to worship other gods, then:

Show them no pity or compassion and do not shield them. But you shall surely kill them; your own hand shall be first against them to execute them.

God is worthy of nothing; certainly not our love and devotion. He's a fucking serial killer for Christ's sake!

Here endeth the lesson :)