Confusion: Dispersion at Babel

Answers Bible Curriculum Second Edition Unit 3 Lesson 29

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all right I think it’s time for us to begin good morning everyone welcome to Sunday school thank you for that today we’re moving on to the fourth seat in our seven C’s of history remember that seven C’s of history that’s that outline that basic outline of all redemptive history and even the future for Humanity and we’ve already gone through the first three C’s our first seat creation takes place around 4000 BC God makes the world and then our next seat corruption the fall of man into sin takes place around the same time wasn’t very long after creation that man fell and then thousand six hundred fifty years go by centuries go by and around 2,350 BC we ran into our third seat catastrophe the worldwide flood we spent the last several weeks talking about that catastrophe and how it interacts even with our present day in multiple ways but today we come to that fourth seat the confusion the confusion at Babel now about how many years after the flood is this event if you remember when we talk through this outline a number of lessons ago so only about a hundred years later just kind of crazy dispersion at Babel takes place around two thousand two hundred and forty BC I will see a little bit more specifically as to how we arrived at that date that estimate but the closeness of the date may shock you a little bit considering how serious and devastating God’s judgment in the worldwide flood was how can man so soon rebelled against God again Noah and Shem are not even dead yet according to the information provided in Genesis and yet man as a whole is rebelling against God again now in some ways that shouldn’t surprise us because what does God announce at the very end of the flood after Noah SH giving a sacrifice to God God says I’m not gonna flood the earth again for the intensive man’s heart is evil his youth man hadn’t changed as a result of the flood and God knew that and so in some ways this rebellion is not that unexpected but this does show us just how deep our problem with sin is as humans sin is so ruinous to our rates that even after eight overwhelming cataclysmic judgment like the flood man will again choose to rebel this is why we need the Lord’s radical salvation now when it comes to Babel this is another event in our history both the rebellion of man and God response to it that has had a profound impact on all of us and it goes very far and explaining why the world is the way that it is today if you want to have a good foundation for understanding disciplines like history or anthropology or sociology then you have to understand what happened at Babel now we’re gonna take two lessons to examine this event in our history this one and then the next time I’m teaching with you here’s our agenda for today a little bit more expansive normally I don’t have quite as many items but we’re first gonna examine the historical events historical account of this event and Genesis 11 verse was once an I and will take time to identify what was the sin or sins that called for God’s judgment at Babel I will explain why mankind was scattered as a result of what happened at Babel we’ll discuss when this event took place and how we come up with a date for it and then I will describe how memories that Babel actually exist all over the world today of course the Bible stands on its own but it is amazingly affirmed by even data and things in the world today let’s pray and then we’ll get to our lesson well God I thank you for this word this shows us the world as it really is your word really is illuminating it isn’t lightening it does show us show us the way by your light God I pray that you’d help me to be able to explain this well that be faithful to your word and it be clear that it have its proper impact on those who hear in Jesus name Amen let’s start by looking at God’s brief but very informative account of what happened at Babel so please open your Bibles to Genesis 11 and we’ll read verses 1 to 9 Genesis 11 1 to 9 now just so you know what happened in between the flood and this account in Genesis 9 at the end of Genesis 9 we hear a prophetic curse announced by Noah on his son hams descendant Canaan says Canaan will be cursed of course that has implications for Israel’s own interaction with the peoples of Canaan and then in chapter 10 we get a genealogy that describes how Noah’s sons and their descendants spread out throughout the world and they go in all different directions but why well then Genesis 11 follows and explains that’s what we’re gonna read Genesis 11 1 to 9 please follow along with me now the whole earth used the same language and the same words came about as they journeyed East that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there they said to one another come let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly and they used brick for stone and they used tar from water they said come let us build for ourselves a city and a tower whose top will reach into heaven and let us make for ourselves a name otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth the Lord you know that’s Yahweh Yahweh came down to see the city and a tower which the sons of men had built Yahweh said behold they are one people and they all have the same language and this is what they began to do nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them come let us go down and there confused their language so that they will not understand one another speech so you always scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth and they stopped building the city there for its name was called Babel because there Yahweh confused the language of the whole earth and from there Yahweh scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth as always let’s start with just basic observations at the text notice that it says everyone at that time there is only one language and one dialect on the earth everyone spoke all the same words and of course this is very different from what we experienced today yeah we know there are tons of languages in the world and even within a language there are many many dialects for instance have you ever stumbled over the differences between American English and British English same language but not the same dialect we don’t share the same vocabulary for example the British don’t call it a television but a what a telly how did you see that on the telly and the Brits don’t call it an advertisement by the way advertisement I saw it on the advertisement now such differences can be humorous but they can also lead to a lot of misunderstanding and frustration and this is this is not the way it was in the days before Babel amenity at this time had one language one dialect one vocabulary everyone could understand everyone else now the text says that the people traveled east though it could be translated they traveled from the east and the people and the people were travelling presumably from where the ark had landed now where was it that the ark had landed it would be Ararat you see a little map on your screen with Mount Ararat big big there but notice that Genesis 8 4 I know it’s not in front of you but Genesis 8 4 it says the mountains plural the ark landed at the mountains of Ararat so this could be anywhere in their region of Ararat it’s actually some good geological reasons for thinking that Mount Ararat as it’s known today was not the mountain on which Noah’s Ark landed because there’s many signs that it was an active volcano in the past and probably was during the days of the flood said that would not be a good place to land the ark anyways in that region is where the ark settled and so the only surviving people came from that area from that mountain range and they journeyed to the land of Shinar now where shanaar we learned elsewhere from the Bible like Genesis 10 Daniel one that she now refers to the land around Babylon the plain between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers now let me see if I can point this out on the map that’s my little pointer so if you see on the screen or it says Babylon here that’s actually a little bit far north of where the city of Babylon would have been city of Babylon would have been down around here in between the two rivers okay let’s see if I could turn off the laser pointer okay good again so the people are traveling towards the land of Shannara that would be the area around the city of babylon that plain human race is multiplying they’re moving south and east to these Plains and this would be where the future kingdom of Babylon would arise now what is it that they build there or they they suddenly get this urge to build and what is it that they want to build notice it says they want to build a city and a tower a city and a tower we often remember the tower forget the city but they actually they start with the city let’s build a city I want to build both those things now probably one of the reasons we forget about the city is because we don’t hear much about it it’s not described for us but the tower does get a description the towers described as eight with a top that will reach into heaven very tall tower now what might this tower have looked like well we can’t say for sure there’s all sorts of interesting artistic impressions of the Tower of Babel but if we look at other ancient towers especially in the area of the Middle East Mesopotamia and the like we can get an idea though these ancient tall buildings were known by another name anybody know what the towers of Babylon and Mesopotamia were called yeah ziggurats the ziggurats I’ll show you a picture there we’ve found many many ziggurats remains of ziggurats archaeologically ziggurats rock often used as temples or religious structures it was thought that these buildings because they extended into the heavens that they were a place where gods and men could meet together they’re kind of like ladders for men to reach the gods and for the gods to reach men now it’s quite possible that the Tower of Babel was conceived as a super ziggurat the tallest most skillful ziggurat that men could produce in those days and notice the construction materials for building this Tower this is a garage baked bricks and tar from Mordor notice the reasons given in our text for why the people want to build the city and the tower they want to make a name for themselves and they want to prevent themselves from being scattered they don’t want to be scattered across the face of the whole earth now notice what God observes when he comes to look at man’s work God states that this observable unity in man makes men powerful to accomplish whatever he sets out to do God even says nothing will be impossible for him God then decides to confuse man’s language so the people won’t be able to understand each other and notice the phrasing do you notice anything similar about what God says and what the people say stay miss begin the same way come let us write people said come let us make a city let us make a tower let’s take bricks and bring her thoroughly and God says come let us this likely by the way is an implicit reference to the Trinity doesn’t make too much sense for God to be saying this to angels God is acting independently here of course the doctrine the Trinity is not explained in this section of Scripture but it fits with the doctrine of the Trinity as it revealed at other places and this is this is profound here man is powerful when he’s united but how is that compared to God God United purpose within the Godhead proves stronger than man now what is the result result of God’s action of confusing man’s language we see three in the text the people scattered they stopped building the city and the place receives a new name Babel now why is it called Babel the text says it’s because their God confused the languages and you’ve heard me say this before any time a name is given in the Old Testament and then there’s an explanation you can bet that that name has something to do with the explanation and so it is hear the name Babel is associated with the primitive Hebrew verb bulow which means to mix to confound or to overflow thus the name Babel from a human perspective has the idea of confusion the name was of the city was called confusion because their God confused the languages by the way every time the name Babylon appears in the Old Testament it’s the same name as the one recorded here even though our translations say Babel in this passage and Babylon and other passages is actually the same name so the Hebrews whenever they heard the term Babylon they would have been able to connect it with the city and the event that took place here in Genesis 11 this I think has something to do with also why there’s reference to Babylon in the New Testament there’s a there’s a link that goes all the way back to Genesis 11 now I say that in the Hebrew Babel means confusion but why do we call it Babylon today well that etymology into English it comes via Akkadian into Greek Akkadian was an ancient Babylonian language and bob-bob aloo an Akkadian means gate of God gate of God and that got transliterated into Greek until Babylon II which means gate of the gods so that’s interesting on the one hand the Hebrew is confusion but on Akkadian Akkadian and into Greek and then even into English the name of Babylon has the idea of the meeting place with God or the gates of God now take your time to make these observations let’s now ask some interpretation questions all right so what is the great sin what does the roots in put on display in this passage clearly it’s pride it is the pride of man on display and it’s almost to the point where it sounds ridiculous it looks childish they say let us make for ourselves a name let’s show how great we are let’s build a monument to us let’s cause all people who are to come and even God and His angels in heaven to behold our glory this is silly silly how can man be saying this they want to make their mark on the universe it went all creation to look at them by building the city in this tower and how different this is from people like David and Solomon they were great men great builders Solomon builds the temple of God David helped build the temple of God but what was their attitude about it they were building this building for the Lord’s honor not their own and they recognize that whatever skill or power or glory they had it was given to them by God and they were not to glorify themselves but our forefathers those men and women at Babel the very descendants of Shem ham and Japheth they did not give God his do but they sought to steal his glory and how silly it is because God so easily unravels a tall man looks powerful looks great look what he’s accomplishing and then God steps in where’s your power oh man where’s your wisdom where’s your glory you can’t even understand each other anymore God could say I did this to you with a simple word I just made a command and everything changed and this is consistent with what God does God will not give his glory his rightly deserved glory to another man has no right to try and take God’s glory now this is ridiculous isn’t it but you know what the same behavior is manifested by man today even in you and me isn’t that right our pride doesn’t seem so ridiculous to us but it is just as ridiculous as what man was trying to accomplish that Babel the old man that principle of sin that sinfulness that we still have with us it craves for our intrinsic value to be affirmed intrinsic value in our flesh we want people to see how much we deserve love wealth honor power or whatever it is when we get depressed or we get angry when people don’t honor us the way we think we ought we even get angry at God we get angry at God for not giving us what we think we deserve we fall into self-pity we might even use spirituality to slake our desire for self exaltation we can become like the Pharisees but we can become like the Corinthian church saying things implicitly with our lives like everyone look at me I’m doing a good deed instead of saying everyone look at God because he has accomplished a great work on my behalf he’s accomplished a great work in me because of pride even God’s saving gospel can be and is often mutated to say you are great oh man God is enamored with you and he wants to save you and bless you and give you a prosperous life it’s all about you but that’s a false gospel that’s know the Bible declares in contrast the Bible says God is so great you ought to be enamored with him obedient to him grateful to him because he should undeserved kindness to you indeed we should not look at the tower babbles like oh I know it’s just that crazy thing that people did back then no the same pride of Babel it’s with man today certainly in the world we see all sorts of manifestations of pride people looking to exalt themselves but even human among God’s people pride is a temptation to which we often yield looking for our own glory instead of God’s now can we say that there’s another sin taking place here beyond pride there’s a direct disobedience to God what about the idea of scattering across the earth man specifically disobeying God’s command to fill the earth after all we see in our passage that man besides saying let’s make a name for ourselves they say lest we be scattered across the face of the whole earth and then that’s exactly what God causes them to do they are scattered across the face beholder and it is notable that Genesis 9:1 says this is part of God’s blessing to Noah and God blessed Noah and his sons and sets then be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth fill the earth and Genesis 97 repeats the idea as for you be fruitful and multiply populate the earth abundantly and multiply in it now many Christian theologians have said yes Answers in Genesis says yes many good trusted teachers say yes man is directly disobeying God’s command to fill the earth and I can see where that perspective comes from but I do have a couple hesitations which I feel is only right to share with you before we can say yes they’re obviously sinning would you need to notice that and what God says to Noah filling the earth is always attached to another action multiplying it says be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth which makes sense as the amount of people on earth increases they’re gonna need more space they’re gonna need more living room and so they’re gonna naturally spread out from one another and this is what we see actually takes place in Abraham’s and lot’s life if you remember they were joining together Abram with his nephew lot until eventually they say to one another this land can’t sustain the both of us let’s separate from one another so this filling the earth it is connected with man’s multiplication and if God was commanding from man to artificially spread out well then we have a number of questions that might arise as to how man was supposed to do this how would they know where there are too many people in one area it’s not as if God had a certain quota system where he says whoa thousand people is too much for this this spot of land some of you need to move along now it’s possible that God gave more direct revelation that’s just not recorded in the Bible but I would man know when he needed to spread out how would he know he was disobeying God’s to man and third these commands if they are indeed commands given to Noah regarding multiplication and filling they’re actually framed in the Bible as blessings rather than commands if you just look back at Genesis 9:1 God’s words Noah begin with and God blessed Noah and said to him in fact we see the same thing with Adam in Genesis 1 and with the animals of creation when God says be fruitful and multiply it first says and God blessed them saying so these were a blessing it’s a little bit similar I think to how we have the phrase have a happy birthday or a happy birthday are you literally commanding a person to have a happy birthday or else know you’re expressing well wishes you are seeking to give a blessing to that person and so it’s not insignificant that these phrases about filling the earth they are framed as part of a blessing now one could say well yeah they are a blessing but it’s just a blessed command there may be something to that certainly God would be wanting to have his image filling all the earth remember a man is made in the image of God or as the image of God and as their true ruler of all creation and the true ruler of the earth God would want his image in every place and as I say it’s significant that all you can turn almost any trusted teacher throughout history and they all say yeah man was refusing to spread out at Babel and that’s one of the reasons why God judged them so even though I have some hesitations there are some questions that I don’t I’m not sure what the answers are in terms of how man knew to spread around the earth it is quite possible that man was also sinning in this way nevertheless I don’t think that’s the main sin here I think it’s possible that the people at Babel could have built a city together could have lived together but specifically why did they want to do that it was to make a name for themselves it was their pride that was what was fueling their desire to be together and if to disobey God I was fueling their desire not to spread out on the earth and why would pride be connected to that well if man spreads out he’s no longer as powerful that unity is what gives him strength it’s having all the people with their specific skills and the abilities let’s say there’s a great metal worker who’s part of the city of Babel if he moves away well then the whole city doesn’t have that ability anymore or there’s a great scribe there’s who’s good at writing down laws or composing laws if he moves away well the glory of Babel suffers so ultimately it was the pride of man that was fueling whatever since he was doing in this instance I should also say building a city building a high tower those are not sinful acts in themselves but it was the reason that man sought to do these things and God did not leave man unchecked in his pride and in his sin God gave man has a judgment the very thing that man fear the diminishment of man’s power the humiliation of man’s name and the scattering of man took away man’s unity and he caused man to spread around the earth but how exactly did this work how is it that confusing the language equals spreading around the earth why would people with different languages suddenly move away from what what do you think we’ll consider instead of the danger of being with somebody who you can’t understand even today even when you’re not in danger of somebody who doesn’t speak the same language people tend to separate from those who don’t speak the same language they don’t hang out they don’t interact it’s very hard to interact if somebody doesn’t know your language in fact if we consider how things might have been at that time what if a bunch of people showed up at your door brandishing weapons and shouting at you in a language you don’t understand do you want to be around those people I don’t think so say you know I think we need to move you’re gonna put some distance between you and them and so these kind of things were happening at that time you couldn’t understand them you didn’t really want to hang out with them and you’re kind of afraid of them and so you move away people therefore who spoke the same language unit and it may have been as small as one family they separated from those who didn’t speak the same language and as families moved into new areas of the earth they had children and their children spread out as well they found more land to use nessa generations passed and people moved further and further apart their languages continued to change some languages mixed with other languages and other languages simplified or acquired new characteristics this is a development of dialects which can even over time turn into whole new languages you know it’s amazing if you’re familiar with some of the families of languages and our history we have something called Romance languages that doesn’t mean that they’re really romantic means they all come from the Roman language Spanish French Italian they’re very similar to one another in some respects but oftentimes people who speak those languages can’t completely understand each other originally they were one language they were Latin but over time because these people didn’t live in the same area they developed new characteristics so that people couldn’t even speak the same language anymore so this same thing is happening with the world after Babel people are spreading out from one another having children those children are spreading out from one another and this leads to the rise of whole new people groups not just separate ways of speaking but separate ways of thinking separate customs separate legends even eventually separate religions this is really the rise of the different civilizations of our world there was only one civilization before that but after Babel you had these competing civilizations and cultures and it came from man having different language now consider the historical implications of this truth this biblical truth if all the civilizations could only emerge after Babel that even the most ancient civilizations did not appear on the earth before Babel took place and as I say Babel took place according to the genealogies of Genesis around 20 to 40 BC and we don’t have to worry about the civilization of pre Babel pre-flood man nothing from the flood before the flood appears to have survived the catastrophic nature the flood flood prevented that the only evidence of civilization then that we can find would have to be of civilization after Babel now some secular historians will probably object to this and they’ll say something like but we know that the pyramids in Egypt were built around 2600 BC and we know that the civilization of Egypt was founded many centuries before that it couldn’t have been that Egypt emerged after Babel because we know from historical and archaeological research that Egypt existed before that time how should we react to that kind of assertion should we say no you know I guess you’re right let me see if I can reinterpret the timeline in Genesis to conform to what you have found as a historian and our horan archaeologist this is the approach that many Christians take many Christian leaders many Christian teachers but I think there’s something being forgotten in all this and that is we start and stay with the Bible remember none of us were there in the past do not have access to all the past data even historians and archaeologists they must interpret the past using assumptions as we’ve seen as I’ve tried to emphasize in these lessons when you don’t start with the Bible as your fundamental assumption if you don’t use the Bible for your foundation for interpreting the past you’re going to come to wrong conclusions because you’re going to make the wrong assumptions we must stand on what is plain in the Bible and when we do it’s actually not that hard to explain seeming historical discrepancies to explain how the secular archaeologists can say one thing and how the Bible can say another in the case of dating Egypt and the pyramids it has to do with the assumptions that historians make about Egypt’s history part of that part of how they date the construction of the pyramids or the foundation of the kingdom of Egypt it has to do with what Egyptian historians recorded about themselves what ancient Egyptian historians said about their own Kingdom and the fact of the matter is those ancient Egyptians probably exaggerated the ancientness of their civilization they probably exaggerated the length of the various dynasties now why would they do that what do you think yeah Dwayne yeah that’s a great point it’s all part of the same impulse that was displayed at Babel it’s to make a name for themselves if you have an older Kingdom if you’ve been around for hundreds thousands of years oh that makes you seem like you’re pretty cool if you have a King Pharaoh who’s supposedly lived for hundreds of years well he seems like he’s a pretty big deal and you know the pharaohs were treated as gods in much of Egypt’s history so there was an incentive for people in Egypt for historians to exaggerate their history for their Pharaoh’s sake for their kingdoms sake and the Egyptians weren’t the only ones who did this the Greeks did this Babylonians did this even in the in the times of the New Testament early Christians were asserting that a young earth basically against the claims of the people around it that day because the cultures around him said oh yeah we’ve been around for you know tens of thousands of years they said well it’s not what the Bible says it’s just the same thing it’s an assumption then that modern historians have taken when it comes to Egypt and other civilizations that doesn’t really check out with the Bible it’s not really justified that’s why I say we can be confident that yes Egypt did emerge after Babel and if Babel took place around 20 to 40 BC and Egypt must have emerged around 2100 BC or so you know when it comes to history a lot of what the world assumes takes a really really really long time actually it can take place in a much shorter amount of time they assume oh it just had to take place it it must have been a very spread out on the timeline that’s because they have this evolutionary assumption everything takes place slowly gradually you know it takes a long time for anything to happen when you realize no man was sophisticated and intelligent even at that time he can make rapid progress and that appears to be what man did even after Babel spread out around the world but civilizations then rapidly developed and the in places where man settled not every place not every place was conducive to that but in many places around the world Egypt included so just to sum off a sum up this point unlike the histories that were written by mere men the Bible is always trustworthy and Jesus says it cannot be broken so again we can be confident we stand on the Scriptures and we can do that even for things like Babel this is the Nate to say nothing by the way of how the Bible’s historical claims have been vindicated again and again throughout history and people say oh you know David King David he never exists there’s no historical evidence that King David ever existed until they found it I know like oh and it’s been that it’s been the same thing with many many other things to get back to my original point though the process that we see starting at Babel and playing out in the rest of history is this continual mixture mixture and separation of cultures mixture and separation of languages mixture and separation of people groups we can also see that over time these people groups began to look different from one another each people group began to acquire distinct physical characteristics like size hair color skin tone facial structure now we’ll talk a little bit more in our other in our next lesson about Babel as to how that precisely happened now I say that this separation at Babel took place around 20 to 40 BC how do we know that why why do I make that claim well comes through the time details actually given to us in Genesis around this passage turn back to Genesis 10 for a moment Genesis 10 looked down at verses 21 to 25 this is the section that’s describing Shems descendants and how they spread out in the world liquid says starting verse 21 also to Shem the father of all the children of Eber and the older brother of Japheth children were born the sons of Shem were elam and asshur and arpachshad and Lud and Aaron the sons of Aaron were us and whole and gather and our pack shed became the father of Sheila Sheila became the father of ebert two sons were born to Eber name of the one was Peleg for in his days the earth was divided and his brother’s name was Joktan now you’ve got to love when the biblical author throws in a little intriguing detail in the midst of genealogy when we see that here it’s not so look oh yeah Peleg was born No Peleg whose name means division we hear about him in his days the earth was divided what exactly does that mean well some think that this division refers to the division of the continents and the palings days the continents separated from one another but this is unlikely because from what we know about science today the separation of continents would have required pretty catastrophic tectonic movements which probably would have resulted in a worldwide flood but God already promised he wouldn’t flood the world again so more likely the separation the continents took place during the flood that’s consistent with the tectonic and the volcanic activity that’s that would have been part of the flood that’s probably when the continents separated from one another so then and what sense was the Earth divided in pay legs days well the only other major division recorded in these early chapters of Genesis is the division that takes place at Babel from science it makes sense in a literary literary way he describes yes the earth was divided and in peleas days and then he describes how it was divided in the next chapter so it appears to be in pay legs days the earth was divided by the confusion of the languages now how many generations went by from Shem to Peleg if we trace it here we have four in between Shem and Peleg we have four five who count Shem yes Shem Arphaxad Shila Eber Peleg just five generations so this means that from Shem only four generations then came after the end of the flood and then we had battle between the flood and babble just four or five generations by the way linguistics waka linguistic side note it’s from Shem that would get the terms Semite and submit it and it’s from Eber they ever get another term related to the Jews what turn Hebrew that’s right and both of these would become designated for the people of Israel because they were in that they were in the lineage of Abraham so Babel takes place in Peleg days and it’s only four generations from Shem so that gives us a big idea of when Babel took place but we can even get more specific because turn over back to Genesis 11 we hear about Babel in the beginning of Genesis 11 but then there’s that genealogy in the second half remember this genealogy is unique it’s like the genealogy of Genesis 5 and that it is a Crono genealogy there’s a genealogy that gives us the length of days of each descendant listed and when they bore the next descendant if you look down to verses 10 to 16 you’ll see the same names that we just looked at from Genesis 10 sham RPAC chat etc down to Peleg so if we have this time information here how can we use this in combination with Genesis 10 to estimate when babbled happened well it’s pretty simple we just add up the ages or add up the years in between the birth of each descendant from Shem to Peleg and so when we do that it goes something like this 2 + 35 + 30 + 34 equals about 110 years about 110 years went by between sham and Peleg that means because the confusion of languages the division of the earth by language took place in days of Peleg that Babel probably took place around 110 years after the flood now was it exactly 110 years what’s a little hard to say because chapter 10 says the earth was divided in pay legs days so sometime during his life however pay legs name means division headaches name means division and presumably that division must have happened then early in his life because otherwise why would he have had that as his name so again it probably is just about 110 years from the flood that Babel takes place not a long time and again it shows this man’s heart so see that God through Moses saw fit to give the people of Israel and us today specific time details so that they would know when key events took place in history in relation to their own time and this is consistent with the other kind of time details that we’ve already observed in Genesis Moses the Spirit of God was very intense having the people know where they fit in the timeline of history now even though the Servilia at Babel was a very ancient event the memories of Babel are still evident all over the world today then memories of Babel are observable in the world today and we can see this first of all archaeologically we have the Tower of Babel which is probably a ziggurat type scrub structured a step pyramid structure and we see the same structure the same kind of structure all over the world not I show you some here on the screen some of these are in South America Southeast Asia the Middle East all very similar type structure these step pyramids or ziggurat type structures and what is interesting too is that all of these to my knowledge were used as religious type structures a place to meet with God a place to extend into the heavens to to offer sacrifices or to meet with the gods this is not surprising considering that babble actually took place now someone might say well well the reason there are step periods everywhere is because they were they were an easy structure to build people all came to the same conclusion if we’re gonna build a pyramid site structure we got to build it this way because that’s just how you build those types of things maybe there is something to that but it is still significant that these structures would all be similar to one another even when spread out around the earth considering that we know that Babel took place the descendants of Babel these first groups of people as they spread out around the earth they would have carried with them memories of the events of Babel and so similar tower structures are not surprising especially as monuments to themselves or for some sort of religious purpose another interesting evidence we see of Babel memory of Babel around the world has to do with legends involving one language splitting into all the languages of the world this is not just recorded in the Bible but we see these even in legends spread out all over the earth consider I don’t have a slide about this but I’ll just tell you about it the keychain of Guatemala they told of a time when the tribes had multiplied and they left their old home for a place called Toulon and here the language changed and people sought new homes in various parts of the world as a result not being able to understand one another it’s just like what the Bible says or the Makia tribe in northeastern India they tell the descendants of RAM who were strong men and we’re growing dissatisfied with the earth and aspired to conquer heaven they thus began to build a tower higher and higher rose the building there their legend says till at last the gods and demons feared lest these giants should become masters of heaven as they already were of Earth so they confounded their speech and they scattered them to the four corners of the world hence arose all the various tongues kind or how about this Polynesians on the islands of how is said that rata and his three sons they survived a great flood then they made an attempt to erect a building by which they could reach the sky and see the Creator God the taya but this God in anger chased the builders away he broke down their building and he changed their language so that they spoke diverse tongues it’s just like what God says in the Bible now there were some alterations but this makes sense because Babel actually took place and the stoical memory of it it was carried by the peoples all over the earth no skeptic will hear all this and say well see this is just evidence that the Bible is a story just a myth that was borrowed from other myths from the cultures around them but again that that’s a conclusion that comes from certain presuppositions certain assumptions anti supernatural anti-biblical evolutionary etc and we know that the Bible is true so actually it’s the opposite these things don’t show that the Bible is untrue they are just another testimony that the Bible is true because Babel actually happen because God actually separated the language from languages from one another we would expect the memory of Babel to exist in various cultures and that’s precisely what we see by the way if you’d like to hear more about these legends that I just shared with you or hear about others you can find those at Answers in Genesis org in the article entitled tongue twisting tails tongue twisting tongue I can’t even say tongue twisting tails and Answers in Genesis org so we’ve seen today that what happened roughly 4,200 years ago has affected us all because of our forefathers because of our as men prideful rebellion at Babel we have there many different languages than people groups that we do today but before we finished talking about Babel I went to us to explore at least two other main questions and these are kind of interpretation kind of application first what attributes of God does this judgment on people by confusing their languages demonstrate what do you think well certainly demonstrates his holiness right his holiness injustice he’s the God who hates sin he hates sinful pride and so he acted he acted in judgment just as he will against all sin God greatly humbled man just as the scripture says God is opposed to crowd he gives grace to the humble so see God’s holiness what else do we see we see his mercy and this is something we shouldn’t miss here there is mercy being displayed here there’s patience there’s compassion how so it’s because God did not choose to destroy man I mean man is doing the same thing just another version of what he did before the flood God had every right to destroy all of man say oh they’re rebelling again time to wipe him out it doesn’t do that it doesn’t even do what he did with no and just saving a few people no he only chose to curse man by confusing his language but even this in a way was a mercy this judgment wasn’t mercy because of confusing man’s language God limited man’s ability to rebel against God one man was totally united he used that unity to exalt himself in and against God but when God breaks that unity man can’t face God that way anymore which makes me think in light of this would it be good if in our world mankind became totally united one language one culture one government one church etc would that be a good thing we’d like to think so right unity is a great thing but no because the heart of man man would use this unity to actually rebelled against God now perhaps some of you are thinking hey that reminds me isn’t it exactly what the book of Revelation says book of Revelation describes a future of which man will be united under the Antichrist in the system known as Babylon what does man do with that unity he fights against God he fights against God’s people so in a sense the confusion of man’s language was a mercy from God because it prevented man from uniting in rebellion against God so it was a judgment and yet her mercy and there’s also something here about God’s faithfulness God promised he would never destroy the world again with water and he refrains to do that here even under flagrant even when man is being flagrantly disobedient and that’s also God’s faithfulness to his promise to the woman in the garden he said there will be a godly seed they’ll be opposed to the seed of the serpent and one from that godly seed well one day come and defeat the serpent that can’t happen if God wipes out all of humanity so God Cruz himself faithful says I made a promise I’m gonna make sure it comes to pass I will not destroy all of man because I made this promise so again we see the faithfulness of God we see the power of God for sure by a simple command God sends all the rebels up of the earth in the total chaos in an instant he totally reprograms each person’s brain to speak and understand a new language it’s really hard to learn a new language I don’t know if any of you have tried you can speak multiple languages it’s really hard but God did it in an instant and he wiped out any understanding of the old language that they had this is a powerful God who is also holy there’s also just he’s also faithful and it’s also merciful see all of these attributes of God in display in our text and why same reason why it was given to Israel is that we might regard God rightly that we would take him seriously and that we would seek His mercy for we ourselves are sinners and we need God’s mercy now here’s another question how does life in Christ interact with the curse of Babel how do how does the salvation we have in Christ interact with these things we’ve learned about Babel you may notice that in Christ man does return to unity and man does return to power but in God not in man consider the force that the church is supposed to be when it conforms to God’s design God describes his church as a body and a body in which each member though differing from one another and excelling in various areas excelling in different gifts they’re all devoted to one goal glorifying God and declaring his gospel when the church is united they become powerful not in their strength but in God’s strength in a similar way actually even in a greater way than man’s unity at Babel really the unity that man displayed at Babel is just an evil mutation of what God always meant man to be and we see this in how God designed the church we are to be united as the people as the people of God even more United then the people were at Babel because our unity doesn’t come from sharing the same language or the same culture and no we’re all different in those ways if we consider the church around the world and we’re not united in self-glorification but were united in Christ we’ve actually been placed into God’s Son and Mister unity transcends language or culture we have a bond that no other people on earth can have and our power is not based off of human intelligence creativity or strength but God supreme wisdom and his life-giving spirits but the question is if Christ in a reverses Babel for his people is that what we experienced are you today are you United with your brothers and sisters in the goal of the gospel are you using the gifts that God gave you together with your brothers and sisters for that goal this is the main reason why we are still on earth it is to glorify God it is to make him known it is to fulfill the Great Commission we all have different roles to play in that but we are to be united in that purpose as we are united in Christ but are we are you I’m sure we have a certain level of unity certain level of cooperation and using our gifts but is that where God really wants us to be you know something else that’s reversed when it comes to Christ and Babel is that what do we see in the book of Revelation people from every tribe tongue and nation glorifying God saying you are worthy of all power glory and honor in the direct contrast to Babel right man was looking for his own glory but in the end all people’s people from every kind of tongue tribe and nation they’ll be ascribing glory to God God is going to use us to bring that about and we are to be united in that purpose our history our ancient history is tragic the flood Babel the fall but in Christ that has made wondrous he indeed makes everything new but he has given us a charge when it comes to the church in our unity in our service and we wouldn’t fulfilled that charge that’s all I have for you today any quick questions before we end okay well as I say that’s all for this week next week is a review week but I’m actually going to be away I won’t be with you next week Steve como I know he’s not here today because he’s travelling Steve koma has graciously agreed to lead the Sunday School class in the review day they’re gonna be watching and discussing a video presentation that has to do with what we’ve been learning over the last unit so I won’t see you next week and then the week after is Resurrection Sunday and we won’t have Sunday school so that means it’ll be three weeks from now the next time I get to see you but when we come back or to return to babble and talk about how even though man separated into different people groups we are still one race it may begin to look different from one another but we are all still one one race one blood and all in need of Christ talk about that more next time let’s pray as we end today well God we thank you thank you for your mercy you Lord you displayed your power your holiness at bad Babel man was so ridiculous in his pride to try and exalt himself against you to not pay attention to you and when we can do the same thing today even as Christians God forgive us forgive us for where we do such a heinous ugly thing but Lord we think that you have forgiven us in Christ even for all our pride all of that has been wiped out paid for by Christ amazing work on the cross and yet God walking worthy with you means that we must get rid of pride oh lord I pray that you would do the work of humbling God it can be painful Lord but we need that if we want the Blessed way if we want to walk worthy we need to be humble and not proud and Lord we know that it manifests in many ways prayer being one of them but Lord accomplish that among your people and that Lord we know that humility also leads to unity it leads to having patience with one another and it leads to being united in purpose serving one another I pray that you would do that for Calvary I pray that you do that for your people hello that we would conform to your design as you created us and also as you recreated us in Christ for your glory God and for our good for our joy thank you for your wonderful design and Jesus name Amen all right thank you all I’ll see you in a few weeks