Genesis 11:31. Terah took Abram his son and Lot the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram’s wife, and they went forth together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan.
The stories in Genesis 1-11 are full of sin and rebellion from people and then judgment and punishments from God. But these stories are also full of hope.
In the garden, when Adam and Eve sinned, God promised to send someone who would crush Satan on day. And there was hope.
After Cain murdered Abel, God protected him with a mark so that no one would kill him. Cain was sent out of Eden, but his family invented things that made the world better. And there was hope.
In the flood story, God’s judgment came upon the Earth as rain because of man’s wickedness. But the Noah family was saved in the ark. God’s covenant of grace was sealed with the rainbow. And there was hope.
At Babel, God both judged and preserved humans by the confusing of everyone’s language. People had to spread out all over the Earth as God intended.
But where is the hope?
The story of the Tower of Babel leaves us wondering, what next? God doesn’t say anything to anyone. There is no promise. No new covenant (do you remember what that is?). No special sign in the sky this time like the rainbow. In fact, the next part of Genesis is pretty boring. It’s a genealogy. Do you know what a genealogy is? Take a minute and look up Genesis 11 in a Bible. This is how it starts in verse 10:
Genesis 11:10. These are the generations of Shem…
Then there are a whole bunch of names until it ends like this:
Genesis 11:26. When Terah had lived 70 years, he fathered Abraham, Nahor, and Haran.
And this is where God’s promise of hope is found, in Abraham. Do you remember anything about Abraham in the Bible? Five times in Genesis 12:1-3 God will use the word bless or blessing when talking about Abraham:
Genesis 12:1-3. 1Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
Abraham will be blessed by God, but Abraham will also be used by God to be a blessing to all the families on Earth. That includes your family. What is the blessing that Abraham offers to us all? Jesus! Through Abraham and his family, Jesus will one day be born. And Jesus will reverse what happened at Babel. AT Babel everyone was confused and separated. But through Jesus, everyone can understand God, trust God, and be united by God underneath the love of Jesus. We will no longer be divided. Instead with Jesus we can all gather together around the throne of Jesus and sing…
Revelation 4:11. “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”
Questions: How does Jesus bring people together that are normally very different and separated (hint: think about the church)? How can Jesus make us hopeful that one day everyone will get along with each other?
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