Tower of Babel today

Technology is great but technology can get us in trouble! Way back there, after the Flood, the descendants of Noah developed some cutting edge construction technology as they got into the city building mode. There weren't a lot of rocks for building so they developed brick making from the clay.

-

Genesis 11:² As the people migrated to the east, they found a plain in the land of Babylonia and settled there.

³ They began saying to each other, "Let's make bricks and harden them with fire." (In this region bricks were used instead of stone, and tar was used for mortar.)

-

Apparently the new techniques were very effective and the people became pretty confident in their ability to build and expand.

-

Genesis 11:4 Then they said, "Come, let's build a great city for ourselves with a tower that reaches into the sky. This will make us famous and keep us from being scattered all over the world."

-

The people, who had not long before, experienced the Flood seem to have lost the strong connection with God. They see that they are able to invent and build and now they want to launch into self-directed ambition. They decide to build a tower that reaches way up into the sky. It's as if they are saying, "We don't need Heaven to reach down anymore. We can build our way to Heaven on our own."

-

But God enters the picture at this point. He is not pleased that the people are all united around this Man-centered ambition. There is a time when unity is very good. But, apparently, when men are united around the wrong direction it is not good. The Lord confuses the language of the people so that they cannot understand each other and the different language groups scatter to find their own place on the earth.

-

We don't have a Tower of Babel these days. We do have Cell phone towers, skyscrapers, massive bridges and we have digital technology that makes us feel very powerful. These days we believe that we have all the knowledge at our disposal to do whatever we want. This is a time when man feels on top of his game. We believe that, because we can do a great deal, we know which direction to go. But I think we confuse our advances in technology with wisdom to know how to use that knowledge and that ability. Today, we listen a great deal to each other, but we may not listen a great deal to God. Because there is much we can do, we think that we don't need God's input. And so our moral compass spins and the base desires that are fed by the World drive us, just as they drove the ancient people of Babel.

-

A time may come when the Lord confuses the ways of man once again, so that we look up, and not only around, to find our direction. The Lord must be the foundation if our towers are to stand as lighthouses for Him.

-

blessings,

Rob Smith

");