Genesis chapter 11. Let's read
the first nine verses. If I gave my lesson a title this
morning, it would be The Language of God. It's the story of the Tower of
Babel. Very familiar scripture to all
of us. It's familiar to most everybody. that has been to church
very many times in all their life. Let's begin reading at
chapter 11, Genesis 11, in verse 1. And the whole earth was of one
language and of one speech. And I would hesitate to say there
that This is the time right after Noah and his sons exited the
ark. Eight people on the face of the
whole earth has now come to be this multitude of one nation
under the rule of Nimrod, a tyrant and a false worshiper of God.
And it came to pass, verse two. As they journeyed from the east,
it came to pass. Anytime you see those four words
right there, it means the purpose of God. His hand was in it. It came to pass. If it came to
pass, it's God's will, okay? We'll start from there. As they
journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land
of Shinar and they dwelt there. And they said one to another,
go to, let us make brick and burn them thoroughly. And they
had brick for stone and slime for mortar. And they said, go
to, let us build a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven
and let us make a name. a reputation, power, lest we
be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. And
the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the
children of men built. And the Lord said, behold, the
people is one. and they have all one language,
and this they begin to do, and now nothing will be restrained
from them which they have imagined to do." Go to, and underline
the next two words, let us. God said, let us. That's God,
the Father, and His Son. Okay? Let us go down. And there confound their language
that they may not understand one another's speech. So the
Lord scattered them abroad from fence upon the face of all the
earth. And they left off. They quit
building their city. Therefore, in the name of, is
the name of it called Babel. Babel means confusion. It's not
a language, it's confusion. Because the Lord did there confound,
confuse the language of all the earth, and from there did the
Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth. Now,
this is a record of man's rebellion against God. One would think
that no rational human being with half a brain would think
that such a tower could be erected that would actually find itself
high enough to reach the heaven, let alone God's dwelling place.
It's stupid. What we have in this account
of a great king named Nimrod is the rebellion of universal
religion that claims to be the church of the living God. We'll
get there. Just let me make that statement
for now. Their intent in building this tower was to reach God by
the works of their own hands and their own ability and their
own power. The motivation for building That
tower is exactly the same motivation of all natural freewill works
religion today. First, it's to make a name for
themselves. They're dedicated to claiming
huge numbers. Get more into that. Gaining power
in their name. and control over the congregations
and exerting political influence on as much of society as they
can. Think about that. Bob Jones. I can't name all of them, but
that's where their function and their center was, influence in
society. Show me anywhere that our Lord
got involved in any dispute or anything else about political
activities. First of all, their motivation
was to make a name for themselves. They're dedicated to claiming
huge numbers. And this is their claim. We have
done mighty works, wonders, cast out demons, and preached in the
name, in your name, in the name of Christ. But their works are
nothing but iniquity and all of them will soon be told to
depart from Christ because he never knew them. The true church, this is a picture
of the false and the true in the end. Psalms says, it's written in
the Psalms, that in his temple, God's temple, Everyone speaks
of His glory. These people were claiming their
own glory, promoting their own glory, their own status, their
own name. And God's glory is the intent
and the mind and the heart of every believer to give glory
to God alone. And salvation is by God alone. That's not what these folks were
promoting. They were saving themselves. To glorify God is to honor His
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. In redemption of sinners and
reconciling them to His Father, it's a complete manifestation
of God's goodness, His glory in Exodus there in 33. In showing
mercy to all whom He will, and being gracious to whom he will. Secondly, their motivation is
not so obvious in this point, but it's nonetheless evil. They were at enmity with God. It's an inward willingness of
man to rebel against all that God stands for in his purpose
and in his province. Enmity. That's all it is. That's all we are unless God
intervenes. And this incident occurs just
following the great flood, as I've said, where there were only
eight people on the face of the earth at that point in time.
And God had commanded, God had commanded the sons of Noah to
multiply and replenish the whole earth. And here they are, one
nation, one people, one language, and they refuse to part from
one another, their rebellion's clearly seen in the last phrase
of verse four. Look at it there. Lest we be
scattered abroad upon the face of the earth. Their rebellion against God's
word is the same in our world's false church. They don't declare
it openly, but when they're confronted with the truth that Christ alone
is salvation, that those whom he saved are those who were chosen
and predestined to be conformed to the likeness of God's Son,
who were called by the gospel of Christ's glory and justified
and glorified, when they're confronted with that gospel, they grind
their teeth in rebellion and hatred for God, period. They will not have that man rule
over. The city and the tower that they are building is their
safeguard against God's word. In other words, we will not have
that man rule over us. Now the materials that they used
in their construction are interesting. Bricks, straw, and slime. Clayton probably wouldn't use
that. He gets stone and mortar. But they didn't have any. That's
significant. So the people invented a way
to build. They made bricks from straw and
mud and they dried them in the sun and they gathered slime from
the pits near the Euphrates River there for mortar. And they had
no rock for a foundation. You getting there? But they were
dead set determined in their commitment to build. And although
God had made them upright, they sought many inventions, Ecclesiastes
7. They invented everything from
walking the aisle to praying through, to a Saturday car wash,
and all of it was to impress God, and to justify themselves
by their works, and all of it's nothing but handmade bricks and
slime from order. They have a zeal of God, but
it's not according to knowledge. Their city, Their religion and
the tower are all built with the labor of their own hands
and their end is pretty sad. And this is striking. Their hope is never complete. It always continues. There's
always something to add in their works to further progress in
their holiness. But the good news is there's
another city. There's another. Who's builder
and maker is God. And another tower that's not
built on this flimsy foundation. In fact, it's not built with
the labor of man's hands at all, at all. Our foundation's sure. It's a foundation that God alone
set. It's a city whose builder and
maker is God. It's the heavenly Jerusalem.
Its foundation is the doctrine of the apostles and the prophets,
this word. Its building materials are lively
stones. All this, you know, that's the
coupling between the Old and the New Testament, and the New
Testament revealing what these things meant in the Old Testament. And its mortar is the Word of
God. The inhabitants of this world's
man-made church are devils, according to the New Testament. The true
church is the Israel of God. This city is complete. This city has a tower. In Psalms
18, the city reaches all the way to heaven, to God, Ephesians
2. Now let's consider for a few
minutes more the confounding of their language. I believe the real thing to be
observed here is not the confusion of their language, but God's
sovereign manipulation of his creatures. As I've said, the
sons of Noah were to disperse and possess the entire world,
the new world, known world, but they had rebelled in their sense
of desiring the safety and comfort of numbers, numbers. They stayed put, did not do what
God had commanded them to do, enjoying the safety and the security
that comes with part of being a crowd. They all spoke the same
language and everyone could freely communicate with each other.
There wasn't a soul on the face of the earth that spoke another
language, simply that one. Why leave and venture into the
unknown parts of the earth and be alone when you can be amongst
the crowd enjoying the safety and comfort of them. Language
held these people together. Verse one, the whole earth was
one and of one speech. But God would have them, it came
to pass, to populate the known world. And so the exaltation
of Nimrod His popularity that grew in this nation and the power
that he gained in forming this nation, one nation, was used
by God to establish those happenings of Nimrod and
his gain of power reveals a scheme of God. It was totally within
his providence and within his will that that happened. So that
God would populate the entire earth, it served the purpose
of God. I didn't make that very clear.
But in bringing the world to one place with one mind and one
goal and following that cult leader who had told them they
were going to reach God by their will and power and merit, the
fulfillment of God's purpose followed that. Don't you wish you could watch
TV and the news and see God's hand in it? It is. And when we listen to the news,
it's God's history, God's history. At the pinnacle, at the height
of this nation's existence and all of their zeal to be justified
before God or to be good before God, to claim his and to merit
his favor. All of a sudden they speak one
language. or they speak a language that
was miraculously placed in their brain and it's nothing. It's gibberish. It's gibberish. Standing next to a member of their own family, suddenly
they didn't understand their brother. They could not communicate
with one another. What do you do? I'll tell you
what you do. The only thing you can do is
just keep talking and you find somebody who can speak your language
and understand what you're saying. And when you do, what happens? You're encouraged. And then you
search for others, and then you got three. Eventually, clubs begin to form,
okay? And then communities, and then
there's cities. All the occupants speak the same
language. Then there's boundaries set.
Nations are formed and separate to themselves and the earth is
populated and God's purpose is served. They occupied the whole
known world at the time. Now, for a community to form
and function, there's a necessity of a single language. That necessity
is absolute, one language. But there's a spiritual meaning
here, too, to these natural things. And it's enormous. Its effects are enforced to the
very day that we sit here. the inhabitants of Babel, though
they now speak in different tongues, they don't differ in their religion
at all. They're all seeking God's favor
by their own hands and their own merit and their own righteousness. You can't understand the one
next door in the next nation But their figure, that their
approach to God, is by the works of their hands, and so does this
other nation. Whatever corner of the earth
they've inhabited, they still believe that they can reach God,
reach heaven, by their own will and work. And they carried Babylon
with them wherever they went. and it has become the great whore
Babylon, which is spoken of in the book of Revelation. Their tongues remain confused,
but their religion was established permanently to this day. Regardless of their differences,
they have an internal mindset, a heart's desire, which is eternal
life, heaven, utopia, by making themselves better, more presentable,
and to entice God's acceptance. Free will works religion is the
common carnal language of the entire universe. But out of all their screeching
and all of their rebellion, Scripture declares that out of every kindred,
tribe, tongue, and nation, God has chosen a number that he will
save. It's an innumerable company of
Babylon's inhabitants. One by one, he'll call them out
saying this, come out of her, my people. and be not partakers
of her fornication. And Christ said, they shall come,
they will come. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me, he said, and him that cometh to me, I will
in no wise cast out. A voice is a language. And Christ
said, my sheep hear my voice. They hear that language, and
I know them, and they follow me. Why will they come? Why? They'll come because they've
been given ears to understand a new language, a language that
only they and their brothers and sisters can understand. It's a new language. It's the
first thing that God does for them in giving them life. That
life comes through language, through words, but they're new
words. God said, then will I turn to
the people a pure language. Remember reading that? that they
may call upon the name of the Lord to serve him with one consent." Zechariah 3, Zephaniah 3. The hour is coming and now is
when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they
that hear shall live. John 5. All of God's children
speak one language. We can't understand them believing
as they believe downtown, and they don't understand us. They
find that they are not even a participant, God's people do, in their salvation. And that it's an act of God alone.
No matter where we travel, they travel, God's people, God's children. And although they may not find
themselves hearing natural words they cannot understand, they'll
find family and unity with those who are of like precious faith
because they speak precisely the same heavenly tongue. It's the gospel. of God's redemption
of his people through the sacrifice of his son. I've experienced
that somewhat. I hesitate on personal experiences,
but most of you know that I traveled around Africa one time with Bill
Clark. It was a long time ago. I got down there, got in that
country that was smaller than Kentucky. Those people spoke
68 languages in that one little place that's smaller than this
state. 68 languages. But when Bill spoke to those
people, they understood the language
of the gospel. That's the reason he went. It
was Christ and Him crucified. I could see it in the smiles
on their face. They heard the voice of the Savior
and they understood the language of the Son. And they heard it in their ears
and more so in their hearts. I spent two days with a couple
down there alone. Bill and Ken went on to another
place. But those people, that couple talked to me continuously
for over 36 hours. I didn't understand a word they
were saying, but I managed to see where he would be reading
out of a certain chapter. And he'd sit there and babble
to me, grinning from ear to ear, talking about Christ. I knew
what he was talking about. But here's the problem. The language that the Lord's
given his people, the language that he speaks is a foreign language
to everybody but us. Look at Psalm chapter, let's
take the time to do it, please. Look at Psalm chapter two. Easy to get to. And we'll read one through four. The Lord says here in Psalm 2,
why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing?
The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together
against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, let us
break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us.
He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh and the Lord shall
have them in derision. Underlined derision. Why do the heathen rage and the
people imagine the vain things? The word derision there in verse
four means to speak to them in a foreign language. or to speak
unintelligible, unintelligible, a language which they cannot
understand. He will have them in derision. A language which they cannot
understand will totally frustrate them. When someone speaks to
me in a foreign language or speaks a foreign language around me,
here's the example. My paranoia kind of pushes me
to the thought that I might be the subject of their conversation
because I don't understand them. Like a little third grader, are
you talking about me? That's derision. That's derision. And the language of God and his
children is foreign to this world. Babylon can't understand the
gospel. It derides them. It puts them
in derision and they respond in hate. We speak this foreign
language. It's the vernacular of heaven
and the world's carnal, natural, freewill works religion thinks
that we are the fools. It's foolishness to them. They cannot understand. I hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither entered into the heart of man the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him, but God hath revealed them to
us." That's that language. That's that language. First Corinthians,
our Lord scattered the people of Babel, but he allowed them
to keep their religion because he had purpose to bring his people
to one language. And that's the only people that's
gonna speak his language. He's purpose to bring his people
to one language, abounding toward them in all wisdom and prudence,
giving them an unction from the Holy One and they know all things. Yet they themselves are judged
of no man and the world doesn't know them because they didn't
know him. Now I'm finished, but I want
to leave you with this thought. There's a day coming. Now associate
this with what we've read now. Okay. in Genesis 11, first nine verses. I want to leave you with this
thought. There's a day coming, there's a day coming, and that's
not very far in the distant future, when there's gonna be eight people. One nation will occupy a new
heaven and a new earth like they desired to do here, where Christ
will reign. There'll be no nimrods. There'll
be no tyrants. There will be no unjust person
there. Every one of them is going to
speak the same language, but God's reserved that situation
for himself in his own glory. It's going to be a nation without
number, so many as the stars of heaven and the sand of the
seas. And it's going to be ruled by
King Jesus. Can you imagine? Lord bless you.