Conspiring Forces

I’ve got a really special place in my heart for television shows and movies that tell stories of espionage and top secret stuff. Whether they are true stories or entirely made up, I just really love the covert aspect of things. Especially when the stakes are super high.

Probably the most compelling thing about this stuff is how they tell the untold stories. The behind the scenes stuff that is happening that threatens the livelihood of entire people groups, countries, and ways of life — without the general population knowing whats happening. Like national threats, general danger — all of these conspiring forces — that are fought and defeated in the shadows while you and I go on about our lives none the wiser. Sure we know that stuff is going on, now more than ever because of the speed in which information travels, but the details are all still thinly veiled and easy to ignore.

There is an entire covert arm of the US military that just does stuff in the shadows to thwart attempts to harm the world. There are layers and layers of security on your phone and computer that keep you safe from cyber attacks, and even more layers of protection that secure important databases and the deeply connected infrastructure of our country. When they do their job correctly, you won’t even know it.

I say all of this because often the ones that mean us harm are acting without us really knowing the details. They are these nameless and faceless forces that betray our core desire for safety and security undetected. We may have a sense of danger or that something just ain’t right. Like the world is conspiring against us, but we don’t have the real details in sight about who or what is really going on. We just place our hope and our trust in those that are charged with protecting us.

This is the final sermon in our series “In the Wilderness” and today we are going to look at this very type of situation. We have been looking at the different ways that Human Betrayal is portrayed in the Book of Numbers, and how God’s faithfulness allows humans to heal. We have looked at how God promised to bless all humans and to bring the a reconciling type of peace called Shalom. Then we looked at how that Shalom was achieved in the face of family betrayal, the betrayal of close friends, the betrayal of an entire community, and self betrayal.

Throughout the entire wilderness journey of the Israelites, where they were led out of Egypt and to the edge of the promised land by Moses, we see a community that is apt to this type of behavior — but we also see that God was unwilling to abandon them. God continues to stay in their midst and work to bring Shalom to those whom he loves.

Today we are going to look at one of the final stories in the book of Numbers, which is going to close out this series on human betrayal. So what has happened since last week is that the Israelites have moved closer and closer to their destination — the promised land. The closer that they get, the more interaction that they have with other nations.

Israel finds themselves in the middle of some international conflict, and they defeat the army of a King named Sihon of a people named the Amorites. Now the Amorites had previously just fought and won a pretty big battle against another king in the region: King Balak of the Moab. So that’s kind of the set up, so let’s read

Numbers 22:1 NRSV

The Israelites set out, and camped in the plains of Moab across the Jordan from Jericho.

Alright just some quick house keeping: The Israelites are SO close. The Jordan river is the boundary of the land of Canaan — the promised land. They are just on the other side of where they are headed. Jericho is the first city that they capture when they enter the promised land. So they are close… but they are camping out in the plains of Moab because God won’t let them go into the promised land yet. So lets move on

Numbers 22:2–6 NRSV

Now Balak son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. Moab was in great dread of the people, because they were so numerous; Moab was overcome with fear of the people of Israel. And Moab said to the elders of Midian, “This horde will now lick up all that is around us, as an ox licks up the grass of the field.” Now Balak son of Zippor was king of Moab at that time. He sent messengers to Balaam son of Beor at Pethor, which is on the Euphrates, in the land of Amaw, to summon him, saying, “A people has come out of Egypt; they have spread over the face of the earth, and they have settled next to me. Come now, curse this people for me, since they are stronger than I; perhaps I shall be able to defeat them and drive them from the land; for I know that whomever you bless is blessed, and whomever you curse is cursed.”

So the king of Moab is scared of Israel. He’s heard that they defeated the Amorites. And using simple human logic he realizes “if these people beat the Amorites and the Amorites beat me, then these people can beat me. And I can’t have that.” So he sends for a prophet or sorcerer or whatever you want to call him. This man named Balaam who is apparently some kind of covert agent who can call on divine power to bless or curse people.

Numbers 22:7–14 NRSV

So the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the fees for divination in their hand; and they came to Balaam, and gave him Balak’s message. He said to them, “Stay here tonight, and I will bring back word to you, just as the Lord speaks to me”; so the officials of Moab stayed with Balaam. God came to Balaam and said, “Who are these men with you?” Balaam said to God, “King Balak son of Zippor of Moab, has sent me this message: ‘A people has come out of Egypt and has spread over the face of the earth; now come, curse them for me; perhaps I shall be able to fight against them and drive them out.’ ” God said to Balaam, “You shall not go with them; you shall not curse the people, for they are blessed.” So Balaam rose in the morning, and said to the officials of Balak, “Go to your own land, for the Lord has refused to let me go with you.” So the officials of Moab rose and went to Balak, and said, “Balaam refuses to come with us.”

So basically Balaam is like “I need to talk to God before I take the gig” and God is like “absolutely not. These people are my people, I blessed them.”

So Balaam sends them away.

What happens next is that Balak doesn’t want to take no for an answer. So he sends even more men to Balaam in order to convince him to take the job. So Balaam says this to the men:

Numbers 22:19–21 NRSV

You remain here, as the others did, so that I may learn what more the Lord may say to me.” That night God came to Balaam and said to him, “If the men have come to summon you, get up and go with them; but do only what I tell you to do.” So Balaam got up in the morning, saddled his donkey, and went with the officials of Moab.

So Balaam saddles up his donkey and goes with the men, and there is this super wild interaction between Balaam, God, and Balaam’s donkey in which the angel of the Lord stands in the way of Balaam’s progress to his destination — but only the donkey can see what’s really going on until God opens Balaam’s eyes to the presence of the Angel of the Lord. Oh and the Donkey talks. That’s a whole thing we don’t really have the time to get into. But the important thing is that both the Angel of the Lord and the Donkey are acting as agents of God in order to remind Balaam of God’s warning not to curse the people of Israel. This is what happens next:

Numbers 22:34–35 NRSV

Then Balaam said to the angel of the Lord, “I have sinned, for I did not know that you were standing in the road to oppose me. Now therefore, if it is displeasing to you, I will return home.” The angel of the Lord said to Balaam, “Go with the men; but speak only what I tell you to speak.” So Balaam went on with the officials of Balak.

Balak comes out to meet with Balaam and orders him to curse the Israelites. But Balaam warns him: I am only able to speak the words that God puts into my mouth. Balak says “fair enough” and brings him around. Three times he orders Balaam to curse the Israelites, and three times when Balaam opens his mouth he blesses the Israelites instead. This enrages the king of Moab:

Numbers 24:10–14 NRSV

Then Balak’s anger was kindled against Balaam, and he struck his hands together. Balak said to Balaam, “I summoned you to curse my enemies, but instead you have blessed them these three times. Now be off with you! Go home! I said, ‘I will reward you richly,’ but the Lord has denied you any reward.” And Balaam said to Balak, “Did I not tell your messengers whom you sent to me, ‘If Balak should give me his house full of silver and gold, I would not be able to go beyond the word of the Lord, to do either good or bad of my own will; what the Lord says, that is what I will say’? So now, I am going to my people; let me advise you what this people will do to your people in days to come.”

Balaam is like “hey man it doesn’t matter how much power you attempt to offer or hold over my head. God gets what God wants.” Then he goes on to tell Balak that Israel will some day rule over them.

Not what the king was hoping for right? But the reality is that this entire story shows us a truth about God’s relationship to to his people.

Have you noticed that Israel is not playing an active role here at all? They are there, but the story centers on the activity of Balak, Balaam, and God. There is this conspiring force going on that is intent on destroying Israel. And they don’t even know it’s happening right? But God is actively at work in the background working to make sure that Israel is safe and blessed.

And that’s surprising to people who have read through the story thus far… because Israel really hasn’t done much to deserve such blessing. Yet, God has made a promise to them and to their descendants to bless them and be gracious to them. Even when they don’t know that it is happening.

And this isn’t a reality that ends with Israel. This is the reality of God’s relationship to us as well. It can often feel like there’s something going on that we aren’t fully aware of. Sometimes it just feels like the world is conspiring against us, or worse — that the enemy is causing everything to fall apart in our world right?

We are struck with hardship that we don’t see coming — financial trouble, illness, loss, pain, interpersonal conflict, etc etc. And it often comes in waves and we can’t see or explain what is going on but we just know that something isn’t right.

And listen, sometimes all of that stuff that is happening is just the consequences of living in a broken world on the near side of eternity right? Just like the Israelites were camped out in the plains of Moab, just across the river from the promised land of blessing — we too are in a bit of that place as well. We are so close to the fullness of the Kingdom of God, but we still live in troubled land until the day that Christ returns.

And while the Israelites were lucky not to feel the weight of the curse that Balak wanted Balaam to pronounce upon them… but they faced their fair share of hardship in life. But what the story of Balaam shows us is that in the background God was still blessing them. God was still watching out for them. God was still making a way for them to experience peace.

Human suffering is really one of the hardest things for us to reckon with. The apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans wrote these words:

Romans 8:26–28 NRSV

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.

What Paul wants us to know is that even when it seems like all of this terrible stuff is happening to us, that God has a way of blessing us through it. Paul isn’t saying that God does bad stuff to us, but he’s saying that God is above the bad stuff. God can use it, that God does use it, that God is actively working in covert ways to subvert the effects of evil and to turn it on its head and bring goodness to us.

There is no greater example of this then when Jesus went to the cross. The powers of humanity and darkness conspired together to kill God and the hope that humanity had of redemption and restoration. But God used that evil to disarm the powers that conspire against humanity. Through the resurrection, the eternal effects of evil were rendered useless, and the door was opened for humans to experience the fullness of eternal life both now and forevermore.

Friends this is the message of the book of Numbers and the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ: God is faithful in the face of human failure. Whether that failure comes to us from our families, our friends, our communities, ourselves, or from dark conspiring forces — God is making a way. God is faithful to us. God is the ultimate conspiring force — working behind the scenes to overcome the darkness that comes to us when we experience betrayal.

Healing comes to us when we recognize this reality and allow God to do the work of restoration in our own hearts. God has promised peace and healing to us, and so we must simply remember in the midst of our pain and our suffering that God has got our backs. When it feels like the world is cursing us, God is blessing us and working through the mess to shape us into the image of Christ.