Genesis 10-The Table of Nations and the Sovereignty of God
Sunday October 16, 2005
Genesis: Genesis 10-The Table of Nations and the Sovereignty of God
Lesson # 44
Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 11:1.
On Thursday evening, we completed our study of the genealogy of Noah’s three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth that appears in Genesis 10, called by theologians, “the Table of Nations,” which records that the human race descended from these three sons of Noah.
Genesis 10:32 records that after the Flood the human race was divided by ethnicity (“families”), geography (“lands”), language (“every one according to his language”) and politics (“nations”) (Gen. 10:32).
Genesis 11:1-9 records that this was the result of God sovereignly intervening at the Tower of Babel and dispersing a Satanically inspired rebellion by the human race against His sovereign rulership.
At the Tower of Babel, the Lord manifested the fact that He is sovereign over the nations of the earth, which means that He has complete power over all the nations, so that He exercises His will absolutely, without any necessary interference from the nations.
Psalm 22:28, “For the kingdom is the LORD'S and He rules over the nations.”
At the Tower of Babel, the human race was deceived by Satan and under the rulership of Nimrod, and united by a common language and purpose in rebelling against God’s rulership.
This rebellion expressed itself in building of the city of Babel and its Tower, which would serve as the center of their one-world government and state religion under the rulership of Nimrod foreshadowing the one-world government and state religion that will be under Antichrist during the Tribulation.
At the Tower of Babel, the human race was saying in effect “God we don’t trust You, nor do we need You, we will go it alone without You and set up a government, with our own religion and our own ruler to lead us.”
The Lord’s response to this rebellion was to sovereignly decide to divide the human race geographically by confounding their universal language into many different languages, which resulted in the human race being divided by ethnicity, geography, language and politics (Gen. 10:32).
This sovereign decision was executed through the function of His omnipotence.
Genesis 11:1, “Now the whole earth used the same language and the same words.”
Genesis 11:2, “It came about as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar (in modern day Iraq) and settled there.”
Genesis 11:3, “They said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.’ And they used brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar.”
Genesis 11:4, “They said, ‘Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.’”
Genesis 11:5, “The LORD came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built.”
Genesis 11:6, “The LORD said, ‘Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them.’”
Genesis 11:7, “Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, so that they will not understand one another's speech.”
Genesis 11:8, “So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city.”
Genesis 11:9, “Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of the whole earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth.”
Satan’s strategy against God in relation to the human race is to establish “internationalism” whereas at the Tower of Babel, God demonstrated that His desire for the human race is “nationalism.”
In Acts 17:26-27, Paul teaches that God established nationalism so that the human race might see their need for Him whereas at the Tower of Babel, they did not see their need for Him.
Acts 17:26, “and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation.”
Acts 17:27, “that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.”
The Tower of Babel teaches that when the human race is united independently of God that they will not see their need for Him whereas divided and independent from each other, they will.
God’s purpose is to give the nations as an inheritance to His Son Jesus Christ with His Bride, the Church ruling with Him in the city of Jerusalem with Israel as head of the nations.
At the present time, Jesus Christ is not on planet earth bodily ruling the nations in Jerusalem rather, He is seated at His Father’s right hand while the Father makes His enemies a footstool for His feet.
Psalm 110:1, “The LORD (God the Father) says to my Lord (God the Son): ‘Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.’”
The nations of the earth are enemies of Jesus Christ because Satan deceives them.
1 John 5:19, “We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.”
At the present time, the Father is working out His purpose to gather these nations for a showdown with His Son at His 2nd Advent, at which time, the Son will destroy those who oppose His rulership and receive the nations as His inheritance.
The 2nd Advent of Christ takes place seven years after the rapture of the church and will be visible to the entire world and at that time, the Lord Jesus Christ will come from heaven with the Church and the elect angels to deliver Israel from the Tribulational armies and Antichrist and will establish His millennial reign.
Psalm 2:1, “Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing?”
Psalm 2:2-3, “The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the LORD (God the Father) and against His (God the Father) Anointed (Jesus Christ), saying, ‘Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!’”
Psalm 2:4, “He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at them.”
Isaiah 40:15, “Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales.”
Isaiah 40:17, “All the nations are as nothing before Him, they are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless.”
Psalm 2:5-6, “Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury, saying, ‘But as for Me, I (God the Father) have installed My King (Jesus Christ) upon Zion, My holy mountain.’”
Psalm 2:7, “I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD: He (God the Father) said to Me (God the Son), ‘You are My Son, today I have begotten You (signifying God the Son became a human being).’”
Psalm 2:8, “Ask (Jesus Christ) of Me (God the Father), and I (God the Father) will surely give the nations as Your (Jesus Christ) inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as Your possession.”
Psalm 2:9, “You (Jesus Christ) shall break them with a rod of iron, You shall shatter them like earthenware.”
Revelation 19:15, “From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty.”
Psalm 2:10, “Now therefore, O kings, show discernment; Take warning, O judges of the earth.”
Psalm 2:11, “Worship the LORD with reverence and rejoice with trembling.”
Psalm 2:12, “Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way, for His wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!”
Zechariah prophesied that the Lord Jesus Christ at His 2nd Advent will establish His millennial reign and will rule bodily in Jerusalem over the nations.
Zechariah 14:1-7 is a prophecy of the 2nd Advent of Christ.
Zechariah 14:1, “Behold, a day is coming for the LORD when the spoil taken from you (Jerusalem is personified) will be divided among you (not “among you” but rather “in your midst”-Hebrew: distributive use of the preposition be, “among” and noun qerev, “midst of a group of people” in context, the inhabitants of Jerusalem).”
Zechariah 14:2, “For I (God the Father) will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle (during Daniel’s 70th week, aka, the Tribulation), and the city will be captured, the houses plundered, the women ravished and half of the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.”
Zechariah 14:3, “Then the LORD (Jesus Christ) will go forth and fight against those nations, as when He fights on a day of battle.”
Zechariah 14:4, “In that day (2nd Advent of Christ) His (Lord Jesus Christ) feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north and the other half toward the south.”
Zechariah 14:5, “You (citizens of Jerusalem fighting against the Tribulational armies) will flee by the valley of My mountains, for the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel; yes, you will flee just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Then the LORD, my God, will come, and all the holy ones (elect angels and the church) with Him!”
Zechariah 14:6, “In that day (2nd Advent of Christ) there will be no light; the luminaries will dwindle.”
Zechariah 14:7, “For it will be a unique day which is known to the LORD, neither day nor night, but it will come about that at evening time there will be light.”
Zechariah 14:8-11 is a prophecy of the millennial reign of Christ.
Zechariah 14:8, “And in that day living waters will flow out of Jerusalem, half of them toward the eastern sea and the other half toward the western sea; it will be in summer as well as in winter.”
Zechariah 14:9, “And the LORD will be king over all the earth (during His millennial reign); in that day the LORD will be the only one, and His name the only one.”
God the Father has given the nations as an inheritance to His Son Jesus Christ because He was obedient to His will and died for the sins of the entire world.
Philippians 2:5, “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 2:6, “who (Christ Jesus), although He existed (Greek verb huparcho denoting the preexistence of Jesus Christ) in the form (Greek noun morphe signifying the divine essence of Jesus Christ) of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped.”
Philippians 2:7, “but emptied (Greek verb kenoo denoting that Jesus Christ “denied” Himself the independent function of His divine attributes in order to execute the Father’s plan of salvation and does “not” mean that He empty Himself of His deity) Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.”
Philippians 2:8, “Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
Philippians 2:9, “For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name (Greek noun onoma, signifying the superior rank, power and authority of the human nature of Jesus Christ over both angels and men) which is above every name.”
Philippians 2:10, “so that at the name (onoma, “rank”) of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven (elect angels and saved human beings) and on earth (fallen angels in the earth’s atmosphere, saved and unsaved human beings) and under the earth (unsaved human beings in Torments and fallen angels in Tartarus and the Abyss).”
Philippians 2:11, “and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Greek noun kurios signifying the absolute sovereign authority of the human nature of Jesus Christ over both angels and men), to the glory of God the Father.”
Satan is attempting at the present time to prevent Jesus Christ from receiving His inheritance and ruling over the nations and he does this by promoting internationalism and antagonism towards Israel but he is fighting a losing battle against an omnipotent and omniscient and sovereign God.
Isaiah 46:9, “Remember the former things long past, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me.”
Isaiah 46:10, “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, ‘My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.’”
Isaiah 46:11, “Calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of My purpose from a far country. Truly I have spoken; truly I will bring it to pass. I have planned it, surely I will do it.”