Chapter 23

So we have Balaam, a chastened man, who has been given a very close brush with angel-conveyed sharp pointy death. It’s been made extra specially clear to him that he MUST say what God has said, and ONLY what God has said. Or else.

Oh yeah, and all that was conveyed to him via a talking donkey.

Balaam presumably isn’t in a terribly good mood. It’s not been a good day.

It’s about to get worse, from a financial point of view at least. Let’s face it, if your employer wants you to curse someone and you wind up blessing them, your employer is entitled to be a little flummoxed[1].

Numbers chapter 23 is basically the continuation of Balaam’s story. As you may recall, God wasn’t overly keen on him going with Balak in the first place, but since Balaam so insisted, God reluctantly let him go, on the condition that he ONLY say what God told him to. And the angel with sword/donkey incident is designed to drive this point home.

In this chapter, Balaam starts off with giving his instructions on how a prophecy is to happen – Seven bulls and rams burning on altars! – and then gives his “oracle,” the verses of prophecy that he is to speak. This basic pattern is done three times, although the last time spills over into tomorrow night’s chapter.

One thing here – there’s no question that Balaam is telling what he believes to be the truth. These oracles are going to cost him dearly, yet he still gives them.

We’re going to look briefly at the two oracles. The first oracle is based around a simple theme – “How can I curse someone God has not cursed?” Balaam sees the camp of Israel, and witnesses the number of people. He compares it to the particles in a cloud of dust.

Not surprisingly, Balak isn’t pleased. For some reason, though he thinks that if he puts Balaam somewhere that he can’t see as many tents, he might be able to do a better job of cursing the Israelites.

It’s often said that to do the same things and expect a different result is a very definition of insanity. You can see this here, because when Balak takes Balaam to a different place and has him try again, once again Balaam’s oracle is very different from what was expected.

This time, Balaam’s theme is that God doesn’t lie. “God is not a man that he should lie,” is something I have known for most of my life as a memory passage, and here I get the chance to see where it comes from!

Although I have had this verse quoted as an encouragement, in its correct context it is a stinging rebuke against someone who expected God to change His mind with a change of scenery.

I think we can sometimes be guilty of the same idiocy as Balak. We want God to bless what we do, which is understandable; but we come to that inconvenient realization that what we intend to do is something that is outside of God’s revealed word.

A friend of mine once told me that she was seeking to divorce her husband. She told me that she was “seeking God’s will for her life,” and that she didn’t believe that this will included him.

The fact is that God DOESN’T condone divorce, although it is a regrettable necessity sometimes. There was no violence or infidelity, she simply wanted out. I told her that I couldn’t see how God’s will could be for her to divorce; she went ahead anyway. I later found that there had been another man in her life.

God’s revealed word makes his stance on divorce (and infidelity!) clear, but my friend had made up her mind anyway. She wasn’t looking for guidance, really, but a pretext to do as she wished.

This is a big example, but it’s not like this person is alone. Frankly, I think we can ALL think of situations in which what we want has come first, and what God wants has come second. Sadly, I think most of us could probably think of examples of how we have even distorted God’s word in our own minds so we could justify things we wanted to do that, if we were honest with ourselves, were purely and simply wrong, wrong, wrong. Maybe for us these situations have not been as life-destroying as my friend’s choice; if so, that’s because of the grace of God. Our rebellion (let’s call it what it is) is less obvious than hers, but exactly the same in character.

In recognizing that Balak was stupid, we recognize that we are worse – Balak didn’t know God as we claim to, and many gods of the ancient world were capricious and prone to change their minds easily. No such mitigating factors apply to us. We know God, we know that He doesn’t lie or change; but we do what we know is wrong anyway.

At this point I have to admit that there are some things I need to repent from, and maybe there’s some for you too. The good news – the flipside of this issue if you like – is that we worship a God who is changeless – and part of that changelessness is His willingness to give grace, to put aside His wrath at Christ’s expense.

I have just realized that this particular chapter has turned from a lighthearted tone into a very serious tone. Sin is a major downer, especially when we come to the ugly realization that we are ourselves sinners – perhaps sinners that God is working on fixing, but sinners anyway.




[1] You COULD argue that there’s a breach of contract issue here, but I suspect that Balak was a little spooked by the events described in this chapter and didn’t want to annoy God further!