Princeton Presbyterian Church (EPC) Sermon # 1675
March 2, 2025
Genesis 11.1-9 Click here for audio worship.
Dr. Ed Pettus
(This is an extended outline, not a verbatim transcript.)
“God’s Purposes Fulfilled”
Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.” So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.
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Bricklayers United
One of the unfortunate things we notice throughout Scripture and beyond, is the sinful nature of humanity that kept coming back again and again. We see it in Noah’s day and we see it again here in Genesis 11, and we know the problem of sin continues through biblical history and the time of the prophets and so forth. While it is painful to see the sin of Adam and Eve inherited by all of us, there is also throughout Scripture the theme of God’s grace. The good news, great news, is that God’s grace has come to full expression and fulfillment in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Okay, that is really all I need to say today! Thanks for coming!
Oh wait. We have a story to tell. Genesis 11 is the story of the tower of Babel. This story is uniquely placed in Genesis in the middle of a genealogy. One of the things that I have come to deeply appreciate is the brilliance of the written Word of God. It is not just in the words themselves, but also often in the structure of the text. This is one of those examples. If we look back at the end of chapter 10 we would see that the genealogy ends with the sons of Shem. Then the Babel story begins in Genesis 11. Immediately following Babel it picks up with the descendants of Shem. It is like making your family tree and placing a story in the middle of the tree that does not seem to matter to the genealogy. The rest of the family tree goes through the end of Genesis 11 to Abram. Then Genesis 12 begins the story of Abram and the covenant of God to make Abram’s descendants a great nation and a blessing to all families.
Why place this story in this place? The most logical and theological reason is because the story shows sinful humanity yet again, this time trying to thwart God’s command to fill the earth and have dominion over the earth. All these descendants of Noah and his family are listed and they all have the command from God to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. Instead of spreading out to fill the earth, they settle in one area. Instead of filling all the earth, they decide to go vertical rather than horizontal.
It begins with an affirmation that all of the men and women who have multiplied had one language. We might think this would be great if we all had one language. But, as we will see, God sees this one language situation as problematic. The people gathered together, settle in one place, and decide to start making bricks. Their purpose was to build. They start a project by making the necessary materials needed to build. They all understood one another. Let’s make bricks. Let’s burn them thoroughly, that is, to cast them in the fire to make them hard and good for building. People were smart. They knew how to build proper strong structures. It was important to be able to build. Building a city and houses and other structures was not the real problem. As we will see, it was the motive behind this project.
There is also an irony in this skill of brick making. One day they will be making bricks for Pharaoh. That time would come later in the history of Israel when they will be enslaved in Egypt and this skill that they have honed over years will be their life as slaves.
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A Name For Ourselves
As noted, nothing much had changed in human sinful nature through these stories in Genesis. In this story the attempt is to make a name for themselves, for the sake of their own glory. Now, we should know that there is nothing wrong with having having a name that is well known or famous or prosperous. The difference is in whether we are seeking a name for our own sake or whether God makes our name for His sake. Abraham will be promised a great name, many descendants from His line (name), but what is attempted here at Babel is not for the sake of God’s glory, but man.
They seek to make a name for themselves so that they will not be dispersed. There is an apparent fear of not staying together. But this is also a denial of fulfilling the Lord’s direction to spread out, to fill the earth. One of the purposes of the building was to focus on human accomplishment. “Look at what we have done.” This will also be a huge temptation following the exodus when the people forget that it was God who brought them out of slavery and the people will begin to credit themselves and the animals who carried them and their possessions out of Egypt (Deuteronomy 8).
This is a characteristic of our time as well. People desire to make a name for themselves, or as we might call it today, to become famous. That is part of the reason we have had an explosion of competitive shows on TV like American Idol, or America’s Got Talent, or other shows of survival or some other type of competition. Lots of young people strive to become famous, wealthy, and make a name for themselves. This is also one of the drives on social media, TikTok, Instagram, X, YouTube, or Facebook.
Our other tendency is to “one up” one another. In the Babel story, a taller tower to reach the heavens. We also seek to make the tallest tower, the fastest car, the strongest army, whatever it takes to make a name for ourselves, to get into the Guinness Book of World Records. Build our TikTok subscribers, number of views, make a name for ourselves. This is a phenomenon of our technological age. Most of us who still remember life before cell phones, before cable and satellites and internet, we are glad we are not exposed to the world through social media. We want to keep some sense of privacy and modesty. The Christian life is not one that seeks to make a name for ourselves, but we seek to lift the name above all names in Jesus Christ.
We might also be sobered by the knowledge that many many people have made a name for themselves but are soon forgotten by the next generation. How many of us can remember famous names as far back as the 1940s, for instance, and we might mention a name to someone currently in their 20s or 30s and they ask us who was that? Hollywood stars, music icons, even among all the presidents of the USA only a handful are remembered by name. Famous when they were president, but soon forgotten.
A Jewish thinker has said, “The famous are rarely significant, and the significant are rarely famous.” How many “celebrities” do we see making grandiose claims for politics or climate or other causes who think their words have any significance on those issues? Let us not seek to make a name for ourselves, but instead seek to glorify the name of our God.
There is another point of interest in Genesis that we can only see in the Hebrew. The Hebrew word Shem actually means “name” or “renown” (famous, reputation). The story of the tower of Babel is first of all surrounded by names and in particular Noah’s son Shem, and then in the Babel story the people want to make a name for themselves, to become renown. “Let’s make ourselves famous!”
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Confused the Language
God’s solution to the problem of people not fulfilling His command to fill the earth is to confuse their language. It is interesting to see that their sin is linked to their unity of language and communication. What might that say to the unique qualities of various languages, nations, in the sense of decentralized power? Even our own government is designed to check and balance power. The same holds true for the Presbyterian system. The members, elders, Presbyteries, and General Assembly are all subject to checks and balances so that no one group has all the power.
Genesis 11.7 uses the same language as the creation story, “Let us…”. In Genesis 1.26, “Let us make man…” and here in 11.7, “Let us go down…”. The Christian understanding of this plurality is the Triune God – God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God comes down, not because He is seeking to forgive, or to deliver, but to scatter. For the good of the people He confuses their language and this story will forever be a symbol of confusion and inability to understand other languages.
The word babble, B-A-B-B-L-E in English means incoherent speech. How many times did we hear babbling on the presidential campaign trail? “Word salad” is the new term for babbling. How many times do we hear people saying lots and lots of words but not really saying anything? I remember a scene from the show Cheers, you all remember Cheers, a lot of famous people from that show, well, unless you ask a twenty year old! Anyway, the scene was a politician visiting the bar to garner votes and the character Frasier is upset that the politician says a lot of words without really saying anything. So Frasier makes a bet with Sam that he will say nothing meaningful in response to a question.
Sam: I'm a small businessman, and I was just wondering, when is this economy going to turn around?
Politician: I'm glad you asked that. I say now is the time to roll up our shirtsleeves and get to the bottom of this. The only way we're going to defeat this thing is if we all do it together.
Babbling. Saying words that have nothing to do with the question. The Hebrew word babel is another interesting Hebrew play on the words. Babel is from the root word balal which means to “confound” or “mix up”. It is also the root for the name Babylon which means “mixed up”. God has come down to mix up their words so that they will not be able to communicate and complete their building project.
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God’s Purposes Fulfilled
God fulfills His purpose to fill the earth by dispersing the now confused people. Have you ever played that game when everyone gets a card with a specific term and you have to find the others who have the same card? Everyone in Genesis 11 had to find anyone else who could speak the same language. Different languages located one another and moved out to form new communities. God spread them out in order to fulfill the command to be fruitful and fill the earth.
There is a prophetic blessing for God’s people in Zephaniah 3.9, “For at that time I will change the speech of the peoples to a pure speech, that all of them may call upon the name of the Lord and serve him with one accord.” By God’s grace we are able to call upon the name of the Lord, the name that matters for our salvation and forgiveness and healing and wholeness, the name above every name. One day we will not be concerned about making a name for ourselves, because only the name of God will matter and only the name of God matters for today. God will build a city not like Babel, but one with a solid cornerstone, “For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God” (Hebrews 11.10). We can never thwart the purposes of God. He will find a way to fulfill His plan as He has already done in Jesus Christ. In His name we are set free from the bondage of making a name for ourselves. We are empowered to work toward bringing glory to the name of Jesus and to share His name with others.
One last note: some Bible commentators suggest that the day of Pentecost was a reversal of the confusion of Babel. God brought the world back together on the day of Pentecost when all understood the same message in their language. I suspect this was a foreshadowing of the way things will be in heaven. We will all understand one another as we worship the Lord. Amen.
*More details on Genesis 11 here - S.M. Baugh https://tabletalkmagazine.com/article/2025/02/the-city-and-tower-of-babel/
