GENESIS
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Notes on Genesis 11
Some bible theologians believe the language was Hebrew because the names not only were in the Hebrew language but also had Hebrew meanings. Everyone spoke the same exact language though. In Acts chapter 26:14 Jesus spoke to Paul in the Hebrew language when Paul heard a voice on the way to Damacus and was struck blind. It is getting closer to the time when the earth will again be one language and one speech. The language barriers are being torn down. Will we use it for good or evil?
So we see that a hundred years after the flood, people journied from Mount Ararat in Armenia to the east of the Eurphrates river and then decided to build a city. Perhaps they just didn't want to separate and spread out. Is it wrong to build cities and towers? It
could be that this unity was not for good purposes. Perhaps they
wanted to build a structure high enough to escape another flood.
This would have showed rebellion against God and unbelief because
God promised not to sent one. Here is what I found from one source from Dake's comment on this chapter: A Babylonian description of the tower of Babel discovered in 1876 indicates there was a grand court 900’ X 1,156’, and a smaller one 450’ X 1,056’, inside of which was a platform with walls around it, having four gates on each side. In the center stood the tower with many small shrines at the base, dedicated to various gods. The tower itself was 300’ high with decreased width in stages from the lowest to the highest point. Each stage was square. The first stage measured 300’ square and 110’ high; the second measured 260’ square and 60’ high; the third 200’ square and 20’ high; the fourth 170’ square and 20’ high; the fifth 140’ square and 20’ high; the sixth 110’ square and 20’ high; and the seventh 80’ long, 60’ wide, and 50’ high. On the top platform measuring 60’ X 80’ was a sanctuary for the god Bel-Merodach. Other references tell us that Nimrod the great grandson of Noah is the one who had this tower built in rebellion against God. Noah begat Ham, Ham beget Cush and Cush begat Nimrod. I read where Nimrod was killed perhaps by one of the wild beasts he fought. His wife became pregnant and declared her son Tammaz to be the reincarnation of Nimrod. This began the Babylonian mother and child image that was worshipped long before Christ. She may have tried to make people believe her son was the promised Messiah. How much of this is true, I don't know. We are at the mercy of historians and other writers. However, I wouldn't put it past Satan to try to bring in a false Messiah before the real one came along. In the latter days a false Messiah will come on the scene before the 2nd coming of Christ so why wouldn't someone try to send one to deceive people into believing in a false Messiah years before the real Messiah came. We see though that God eventually breaks up false religious systems. He may even break up Christian religions also to keep us from getting too big and taking over governments instead of preaching the gospel that saves the soul. What we see for sure in these passages is, "Let us make a name for ourselves." This is the beginning of apostasy and false religious systems. We tend to want to make a name for ourselves. We want to get big and create big organizations perhaps using the name of the Lord to gain followers but some use their own name. It is not wrong to have large churches because we grow bigger if the gospel is spread right and perhaps we need more space to meet and worship God but instead of trying to just get people into our own space, why not spread the gospel all over the world and start small churches all over. We don't have to make a name for ourselves, boasting of our large numbers. Our goal should be to spread the message of the gospel even if it doesn't benefit our own local church. The whole world needs to hear the gospel which is:
If doing this makes our church grow, that is great but if we grow in the salvation of souls whether or not they ever attend our own local body; that should be our goal. Some people get upset over the many different denominations, saying division is not of God. I wonder though, how do we know that? I know our local congregations need to be made one in love in order have God's will in our mist but sometimes division is of God. If we all joined into one church with one head of the church and that head is not Christ but some man, we would get very big but sooner or later, we would take over governments and use force to spread our religion instead of preaching the gospel of repentance. If we stay small, we have less money and less power in this world but we would have to depend more on God to survive. The only numbers we need to be concerned with is the number of souls saved from sin whether or not we receive any material benefit. Unbelievers, may ask, how would we know the real from the false? We shall know them by their fruits. Very rarely will a false Messiah sacrifice himself but rather will sacrifice others in his place. A true Messiah is not going to hide in the mountains and send innocent children to their deaths by encouraging them to strap bombs to themselves to blow up a bunch of people they hate. A true Messiah would encourage us to love one another and love God with all our hearts. Many old false religious systems had child sacrifices, torture, forced conversions, mysterious rites, secrets and other things that is contrary to the bible and what God really stands for. A true Messiah will want to save the lost from the sin that separates them from God. If someone had to die as a sacrifice for those sins, a true Messiah would give himself. The devil steals, kills and destroys and his followers will do the same. Jesus came that we may have life and have the living water within us. The well of living water will spring up and we will inherit eternal life. This is available to men and women, children and adults, rich and poor, bond and free, and is available to all races, not one being inferior to another. Women are welcome. Jesus ministered to women. He cared for women as well as men. He didn't leave them out. A religion that makes women dependent upon a man for her salvation is not a true religion. Women can be filled with the Holy Spirit as well as men.
The gifts of God are for all who believe, not just male, not just adults, not just a certain tribe but all means all who believe in Jesus the Christ.
We see God causing the first great division. If we are united in evil, we need to be stopped. If we try to set up God's kingdom before His comes by the use of force or military might, we are not doing God's will. If we didn't have separate denominations and churches, this is what we would end up doing. How do I know? I read church history. Being one with Christ and in the same mind and one accord doesn't mean that we have to all join the same church and have one head with a hierarchy. I can accept my Baptist neighbors as brothers and sisters in the Lord, without having them join my church. I literally do have Baptist neighbors by the way. I would hope they accept me as a fellow Christian even if I don't go to their church.
Who is God talking to here? He said, let us go down. It had to be either angels or Jesus. Perhaps both for Jesus existed long before He became man. I don't believe God stopped something innocent here. I often wonder what it was that God was putting a stop to. There will come a time when God will stop mankind again from crossing bounds that are not to be crossed. That must have been a time of great confusion for a while but it seems as if God allowed certain groups to speak the same language so that they would not be divided not be completely alone. This is an amazing miracle. God confounded their languages but yet gave different groups of people the same language so they could communicate with each other but not anyone from another group could understand them.
This is different from the tongues given on the day of Pentecost because when one speaks in tongues by the Holy Spirit they do not lose their ability to understand and speak their own native language. Here at Babel, they seemed to have lost their ability to communicate with one another in their native tongue and had to scatter all over the world in groups. Before the literal return of Jesus Christ, we can't have total unity. Man has proven himself too weak and vulnerable and easily is lifted up in pride. We tend to rob God of glory when we get too big. I'm not against church growth but something happens when we get so big and powerful. We are then less likely to keep putting our trust in God but glory in our own numbers. We need to keep trusting the Lord, spreading the true gospel and operating in the gifts of the spirit God gave the church until that which is perfect has come and all believers are perfected in the faith. Look around us, that which is perfect has not yet come. This tower of Babel represented a false unity. It was a unity against God. True unity will not exalt one person above another. It may be hard for some to believe but there should be no difference between clergy and laity, a bishop and a minister or even a lay minister. The whole feet washing incident with Jesus and His disciples was to show us humility and that we are the same in Christ. Unity is being in the same mind and one accord in the spreading of the gospel. It doesn't mean all join one large church with a leader, under him bishops and elders and under him others and the laity being on the bottom of a big totem pole. No religious system should be set up that makes people dependent upon man for salvation. Man has no business getting in the way between and individual and Jesus Christ. Never should we forsake the assembling of ourselves together with other believers but this is not confined to any one denomination or church organization. We can meet in homes or church buildings. It makes no difference as long as Jesus is held as the head and no man or woman is exalted above Him or stands in between Him and the individual believer. We can intercede for other believers in prayer with the same mind and one accord but we are not to do the praying for them all the time but encourage them to learn to pray to God themselves. A true minister brings people to Christ for salvation, not become a medium between that person and God. We want to bring people to God, not ourselves. If a person lived in a remote area where there was no church body, he or she should be able to live for God and stay near to Him. God's salvation is individual. It is being born again by the spirit that saves, not being baptized into a church or joining a church. Now we have the genealogy or line of Abraham from which comes the promised Messiah that is to be a light to the Gentiles as well as the Jews.
So we see some of Shem's descendants came from the area of Babylon as well as the whole human race. They were scattered from Babel unto different parts of the earth. The line of Shem through which came Abraham was from the Ur of the Chaldees.
Haran is close to what is Syria today so we see some of Abraham's kin settled in that area while Abraham and Lot went further south into the land of Canaan.
Abraham didn't depart from Haran until the death of his father, Terah. Although the lives of men were considerable shorter, they still lived longer than men do today. Disease and inherited disease had not yet totally increased in the line of Shem. The bible does not give us all genealogies of men but concentrates on those that leads to the Messiah that is to save the world from the sin that separates all of us from God. We see through Abraham the hope of all mankind to have eternal life. After Jesus Christ came years later, genealogy records were no longer recorded in the bible. The purpose had been fulfilled by then to show us how Christ fulfills all the law and is the one God promised to send to us in Genesis 3:15. I'm not totally against researching genealogy but there may be a good reason that it is no longer important in the bible. Now it doesn't matter who our ancestors were, through Christ we can inherit eternal life and become a child of God. Both Moses and the prophets wrote of Him. David prophesied of Him. His name is Jesus or Yeshua. This is the Son of God, Christ, Messiah and savior. The only bridge between God and man. There is no other way to receive eternal life. DC
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