"Say What?"
Text: Genesis 11:1-9
5-19-2024
In the name of Him who unites us with His love, dear friends in Christ. Can you imagine the excitement on the plains of Shinar? A brand-new building was being erected in their new city. It was going to be a tower. But not just any old tower! This one was going to be the talk of the town. It would be taller than any other tower in existence. People would be able to see it from far, far away and be attracted to it like a moth to the flame. Best of all, when folks saw this magnificent city and awesome tower, they=d say AWow! It must be a magnificent and awesome group of people who built this!@
So, the blueprints were made and the work crews were organized. They were in a hurry because they were so excited. Stones were hard to come by in this area so they decided to make bricks out of the abundant mud by baking them in kiln furnaces to speed up the production. Huge vats of sticky tar were collected to be used as mortar in between the bricks. Before long, everyone who was alive would know just how smart and great these people really were!
I can picture the construction workers with big smiles on their faces even though they were sweating profusely from the hard work. They laughed with excitement as each level of this huge skyscraper went up. Higher and higher it went. Nobody was ever going to be able to top this one! They were proud of their new creation. But just when things were going great guns, something went wrong. One day, the workers showed up at their usual time, excited and ready to build some more. Two of the bricklayers, Omar and Elam, had been working side by side every day on the project. They were good friends.
A strong gust of wind blew through the work area and suddenly everything changed. Omar called out, like he had done a thousand times before, to the man who brought their supply of bricks. He only had to shout one word: “Bricks!” and the guy knew to bring them another load. But when Omar opened his mouth, what came out was AZiegel!@ The man looked at Omar like he was crazy. So, he asked, ALadrillos?@ Omar was confused and frustrated. All he wanted was more bricks! He shouted, AZiegel! Ziegel!@ That=s when his partner Elam stepped in. He frowned at Omar and shook his head. Then he held up a brick and said AMatonni!@ Omar shouted at his friend, ANicht Mattoni! Das ist ein ziegelstein!@ It didn’t take long for them to realize that they were all 3 saying the same thing but in different languages.
For a moment, they were silent. And as they listened, they heard the same sound of confusion rising up from the other workers. They heard words that didn’t make any sense and it scared them. So they quickly rushed home to their families. Thank God, their wives and children still spoke the same language as they did but they couldn’t understand what had happened to their neighbors. In the next few days, they located several hundred people who shared their new language. Because of all the confusion, there was no way that the magnificent tower would ever get finished now. There it stood. It was supposed to be a monument to their greatness but it had become a symbol of their failure and utter confusion. And so, it became known as the Tower of Babel, which in Hebrew means: Aconfusion.@
What was the sense in hanging around in Shinar anymore? Why look at that stupid, half-finished tower day after day? It was a painful reminder of how their quest for greatness had flopped. They packed up their belongings and moved a long distance away along with the people who spoke like they did. Those who spoke the other languages did the same thing. Due to this, they scattered themselves all over the region in their own communities.
Admittedly, I added a little color to the story but that=s basically what happened at the Tower of Babel. One minute everybody on the face of the earth was cooperating and spoke the same language. The next minute all the words from their neighbor=s mouth was a bunch of silly babbling. And believe it or not, God was the One who caused this confusion to happen. He did it in order to frustrate the evil intentions of these people. But you also must realize that God was motivated by love and grace. Let me explain.
Did you know that this Tower of Babel incident took place only 100 years after the great flood? Every living thing on earth had been killed except Noah and his small family. But do you remember why God had destroyed everything in the Flood? Genesis 6:5 tells us:“The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. @ Instead of letting that wickedness multiply any further, God brought it to an abrupt end. But within 100 years, mankind was starting to head down that slippery slope of evil again. So He stepped in at the Tower of Babel and interfered before that could happen. Scholars have estimated that there were only about 30,000 people on earth at the time of Babel. In His Grace, God nipped the problem in the bud before the population grew any more and the sin got worse.
But wait a minute! What was so awful or evil about building a tower? Well, the text tells us. It says that they got together to build this magnificent tower to Amake a name for ourselves.@ They were not building this monument to the glory of God. They were building it for their OWN glory. They wanted people to pass by and comment how great these people were, not how great their God was. That=s arrogant, sinful pride at it=s worst! It was idolatry. They were trusting in themselves and their accomplishments rather than trusting solely in the true God of heaven. And God would not tolerate it.
You see, our main objective in this life is not supposed to be making a name for ourselves. Rather, if we obey God=s will and commands, He promises blessings beyond our imagination. In the very next chapter of Genesis, we see an example of this. When God called Abraham, He promised, "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.@ I just wonder if the whole debacle of the Tower of Babel wasn’t running through Abraham=s mind when he heard this. These people had tried to make their name great and God stopped their sinful rebellion. Now, God was going to show Abraham and the world the right way, which was to worship and obey God and Him alone.
Our text also tells us that the people of Shinar were afraid that they might be Adispersed over the face of the whole earth.@ That was in direct defiance of what God had commanded Noah and his sons when they left the Ark after the Flood. God told them "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.@ God wanted them to spread out and repopulate the world. But at Babel, the people were planning on doing the exact opposite. So God, in His own way, accomplished His holy will by using the different languages to scatter them.
You don=t have to think long or hard to come up with examples of how people are still trying to repeat the Tower of Babel routine today. Over the centuries, people have tried again and again, but God in His grace and mercy continues to frustrate those plans. Men like Julius Caesar, Napoleon, and Adolph Hitler have tried to “make a name for themselves.” Hitler in particular wanted to have a master race that everyone else in the world would have to admire and bow down to. But God thwarted his unholy intentions. Now, like the Tower of Babel, Hitler=s name is an embarrassment to his countrymen.
The same is true even in our faith lives. If we were to build a great big, brand-new church in order to attract people=s attention, I=m not quite sure God would be pleased. Ask yourselves, why do people so often seek out the mega churches instead of a smaller one like ours? Well, to be blunt, it’s for bragging rights. Not so they can boast about what Jesus Christ has done for them by His grace, but so they can brag that they go to the biggest church in town with all the church services, the programs, the stage and the lighting, and of course, the best band around. The temptation is there for the clergy too. When we meet with our fellow Pastors, we want to brag about how big our congregations are and the new programs we’ve started. Sadly, bringing glory to God’s name gets put on the back burner.
And that same danger can be true in our personal lives. Why do we want a bigger farm, more livestock, or newer tractors? Why do we want our business to grow and expand? Why are we aiming for that promotion at work? Why do we want to be accepted into this or that group? Is it all so that we can bring glory to God? Or are we trying to build a monument to our own names? Or what about your reputation at school or in the community? Do we want our name to be known so that people will comment on how God is guiding our lives? Or are we just seeking to be popular with our peers?
That attitude is what got the folks at Babel into trouble. God frustrated their plans to keep them from falling deeper into sin. And I can promise you, in His own special way, God will do the same in your life too. You may not like it at the time, but He=s doing it for your own good. Better yet, by the power of the Holy Spirit we can stop these sinful adventures of willful disobedience before they become an embarrassment and deadly trap for our souls. All we need to do is recognize our sinful arrogance and turn to God for forgiveness. And that’s what He bestows on us for Jesus’ sake. Now we bear HIS great name by which we are saved.
Christian friends, wishing that we could all speak one language so that it would bring the peoples of the world together is just a pipe dream. You see, even if that could be accomplished, it wouldn’t unite us. Sin is what destroys our unity. It confuses the communication with our fellow man and it interrupts our communication with God. But thankfully, the Lord has united us in one language and one purpose within the Christian Church. He has united us with the language of love; the love of Jesus Christ. And He has united us with the one purpose of bringing glory to His name. May God bless us as we speak to each other in that language which knows no borders and isn’t restricted to a particular ethnic group. And may we always be looking for opportunities to glorify His name in the world around us. Amen!
Soli Deo Gloria!