GENESIS 11:1-9; LUKE 13:1-5
The work was completed. The finishing touches had been applied to the building. The "topping out" ceremony had taken place. The workmen stood back and admired their work. This new building, the biggest they had ever seen, represented to them the very peak of human achievement. They had not use the old technology of painstakingly sawing and splitting stones. They had not had to prepare mortar and wait for courses to dry. Brick is light and easily shaped. Bitumen provides a rapid and watertight bond. With these towers into heaven would become the new architectural form.
And so it was that the world’s first skyscraper was built – not on Manhattan Island but in the plain of Shiner, And with that tower was born in mankind what I will call the "Babylonian spirit". The belief of the Babylonian Spirit was this – humans are sovereign, humans can achieve, humans are like the gods – they even live in the heavens. The lion may be king of the jungle; the whale may be lord of the sea; eagles may rise to the tops of mountains – but man reigns in the heavens and he builds his dwelling there.
Silly people who dismiss the first few chapters of the bible as some sort of fancy religious fairy tell with a moral precept or two throne in, or as "just so" stories to explain how things got to be, skip past the story of the Tower of Babel (the word means Gate to God) thinking it is "just a story".
But if we take the story seriously – and what should Christians do apart from take the Bible seriously? – we see that this is the beginning of a cast of mind, a worldview, that has lurked in the human psyche for millennia. Isaiah saw it and wrote of it:
Isaiah 14:12-14
12 "King of Babylonia, bright morning star, you have fallen from heaven! In the past you conquered nations, but now you have been thrown to the ground.13 You were determined to climb up to heaven and to place your throne above the highest stars. You thought you would sit like a king on that mountain in the north where the gods assemble.14 You said you would climb to the tops of the clouds and be like the Almighty.
Other prophets also called people to reflect on this arrogant attitude – but there at the beginning of the Bible the story is told and God’s assessment is made clear:
Genesis 11:6
6 and he said, "Now then, these are all one people and they speak one language; this is just the beginning of what they are going to do. Soon they will be able to do anything they want!
Of course the temptation is to think of this story as belonging to history. Babylon is no more – and from time to time preachers will point a finger at Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and point out that it is where Babylon of old was – but that is to misunderstand what the Bible is saying.
If we turn from the beginning of the Bible and Genesis to its end and Revelation we find in Revelation 18 one of the most sobering chapter’s in the Word of God.
Rev 18
So what am I saying?
Am I saying that the terrible act of terrorism against the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon and presumably Camp David are the reprisals of God against America, or the West, or capitalism, or something like that?
Well, you know that question has to be asked. It has to be asked where God was when these hi-jacked aircraft hit their targets. It has to be asked what these things mean, and if we do not ask that we are hiding our heads in the sand or putting our hands over our ears and singing loudly in the hope that the question will go away.
So to look more closely at the question I want to think about another tower. A tower that was built in Jerusalem in Jesus’ day. We don’t know much about it. It is called the tower of Siloam and we can assume it was near a big man made pool at Siloam – another site of human engineering skill, another place where people stood in admiration of human achievement. Well one day this tower fell down and when the people started asking why had this happened there were religious folk who were very swift to give an answer: it was the judgment of God. When some other people who were at worship were killed and their remains were desecrated by Pilate the religious people again had the same answer: it was the punishment of God..
Sometimes that is the easy answer to great human tragedy – they must have done something wrong; God is punishing them for this. If it happens to an enemy it is a comforting answer: yes we hated this person so God must hate them too and they deserved this. But if it happens to a fried, to a member of the family, to me … well then the question is a much harder question to address.
So what of the little tower in Jerusalem that fell down and killed 18 people?
That’s what they asked Jesus. "Jesus, was God punishing these people? Had they done something terrible?"
And Jesus did not answer.
Have you noticed when you read the Bible how often Jesus doesn’t answer people’s questions.
And so here. The crowd are saying "Jesus, interpret the events to us; Jesus we want a spiritual lesson from you here about the eternal destiny of these people who were suddenly crushed n the tower." And Jesus turns to them and says:
Luke 13:4-5
4 What about those eighteen people in Siloam who were killed when the tower fell on them? Do you suppose this proves that they were worse than all the other people living in Jerusalem?5 No indeed! And I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did."
I suggest that the way into this is from the last few words "…die as they did". Clearly he doesn’t mean with a tower falling on them or being murdered during a religious service. What he is warning is that death can come on anyone suddenly. If nothing else you must grasp that solemn truth from this week’s events. I cannot conceive of a building that can contain up to 50,000 people. I cannot imagine a building a quarter of a mile high. I cannot imagine a staircase that would take two hours to walk form top to bottom. But after Tuesday I have been made able to imagine sudden death coming on thousands without warning.
Jesus word to me as the tower collapses is: have you repented, and are you living in a state of repentance? If you are not then you are no better off than those people.
I want to go back to the first tower: Babel.
When God came down (you see although those men thought it was such a great thing God actually had to get on his hunkers and get out his magnifying glass to see this little pimple on the face of the earth) he punished the people with scattering. Now this breaks a pattern in these early chapters of Genesis. The pattern is:
Man sins – God chastises – God continues his grace with an action
So Adam and Eve sin by disobeying; God chastises by eviction; God continues being gracious by clothing them.
Cain sins by murdering his brother; God chastise by banishment; God continues his grace by marking Cain so that he will not be killed.
Mankind sins by extensive depravity; God punishes by the Flood; God continues his grace with the new start under Noah.
Then we come to Babel.
Man sins by striving to possess heaven; God chastises by scattering and confusing; and there is no continuation of his grace. We are straight into the second section of the book which is entirely different – it’s all about family histories and real people.
Why?
Because the Tower that ends the first section of the book is bringing us to the point of the whole of the rest of the Bible – to reveal to us God’s wonderful provision fro salvation by his Son.
What lesson am I bringing to you this morning?
Nothing about power or politics; nothing about America or Afghanistan. Just to bring you to the table where the Lord’s Supper waits for us and say to you:
Are you ready? Have you repented and are you living in an attitude of repentance? That is the only thing that matters ultimately.