“In Numbers we meet Balaam, a false prophet, hired by Balak, king of Moab, to curse Israel. Three times God filled his mouth with blessings instead of a curse. Yet Balaam found another way to provoke God's wrath against Israel. Revelation 2: 14 tells us that he ‘taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit sexual immorality.’ It is this stumbling block that we read about in Numbers 25: 1-3: ‘Now Israel remained in Acacia Grove, and the people began to commit harlotry with the women of Moab. They invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. So Israel was joined to Baal of Peor, and the anger of the LORD was aroused against Israel.’

Satan's best weapon against the Church is not a frontal assault, but a subtle infiltration. His desire to lure the people of God into compromising the purity of worship is clearly seen in the mixing of Israel with Moab.

The fact that the spirit of Balaam was present in the Church when John wrote Revelation shows us that this was not merely an Old Testament problem. The corruption of worship that results from the mixing of human invention with God's appointed means is ever the cunning strategy of the deceiver. (Comin, 46)