Thy Kingdom Come
A City, a Tower,
and a Name
(Genesis
11:1-9, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, September 7, 2014)
[11:1] Now
the whole earth had one language and the same words. [2] And as
people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of
Shinar and settled there. [3] And they said to one another,
“Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they
had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. [4] Then they said,
“Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in
the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be
dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”
In
1806 several students at a remote New England college took shelter in
a thunderstorm by a nearby haystack. Remembered today with this brief
text from one of Jesus' parables, “The field is the world,” four
of these five young men committed themselves to go to far-off lands
to bring the message of Jesus Christ to people of strange customs and
foreign tongues. This haystack prayer meeting was the beginning of
the American Foreign Missionary movement.
The
gospel of Jesus Christ is God's appointed means to bring the world
together in a common purpose. That vision for unity is God-inspired,
God-directed, and God-empowered. It is all for His glory and it
cannot fail. It should be obvious that none of these things can be
said for other plans for worldwide unity. God gives us the tower of
Babel episode as a case in point. Here people were working together
to build their own city. They wanted to solve the problem of the
divide between heaven and earth with their own tower. They were
inspired by a thirst for their own glory. They saw this endeavor as a
way to stay together. Their desires had all the elements of a
man-made utopian enterprise. What would be the Lord's assessment of
their cooperation?
[5] And
the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children
of man had built. [6] And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one
people, and they have all one language, and this is only the
beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do
will now be impossible for them. [7] Come, let us go down and
there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one
another's speech.” [8] So the LORD dispersed them from there
over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.
[9] Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD
confused the language of all the earth. And from there the LORD
dispersed them over the face of all the earth.
God
came down. He saw. He spoke in the heavenly council. He noted the
potential in their concerted efforts. Then He put it all to a stop.
Confusion was His gift to the world on that occasion. The people
groups of the earth were dispersed. They would not find it so easy to
work together on their own plans to unite heaven and earth. They
would have to wait for the beginning of a new unifying moment in the
history of the world. That unifying moment came with the preaching of
Christ, and it was accompanied by the reverse-Babel sign of Pentecost
tongues.
Put
the Word to Work: The good
plans of the Lord are far better than the united efforts of a
worldwide rebellion against the Almighty. We should not imagine that
peace and prosperity will come from a human endeavor that we all
agree to. Our idea of the perfect community must come from the Word
of the Lord. It must be centered in the living Christ who died for
our sins. This is what we pray for and work toward. This is what we
build with treasures old and new. In the strong Name of Jesus, the
Lord is building a new Jerusalem that will endure forever.
Memory
Verse from the Songs of Ascents—Psalm 122:6-7 – Pray
for the peace of Jerusalem! “May they be secure who love you! Peace
be within your walls and security within your towers!”
Gospel
Reading—Matthew 13:51-52 – New
and old treasures
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