Balaam’s messages
23
📚And Balaam said to Balak, “Build here seven altars for me, and prepare here seven oxen and seven rams for me”. 2 📚And Balak did as Balaam said; and on each altar Balak and Balaam offered an ox and a ram. 3 📚And Balaam said to Balak, “Stand by your burnt offering, and I will go aside. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet me. And I will tell you whatever he reveals to me”. And he went to a high place. 4 📚And God met Balaam, and Balaam said to him, “I have prepared seven altars, and on each altar I have offered an ox and a ram”.
5 📚And the LORD put a word in Balaam’s mouth, and said, “Return to Balak, and tell him this”.
23:4-5 God had decided to use this prophet for His own purpose and so put His message in his mouth (v 16. Compare Deut 18:18; Isa 51:16; Jer 1:9).⚜
6 And he returned to him and saw him and all the leaders of Moab standing by his burnt sacrifice. 7 📚And Balaam began his poetic utterance 📖, and said,
“Balak the king of Moab has
brought me from Aram,
out of the mountains of the east,
saying,
‘Come, curse Jacob for me,
and come,
denounce Israel.’
8 📚How shall I curse those whom
God has not cursed?
Or how shall I denounce
those whom the LORD
has not denounced?
9 📚For from the top of the rocks
I see him, and from the hills
I look at him.
See, the people will live alone,
and will not be reckoned
among the nations.
10 📚Who can count the dust
of Jacob,
and the number of a fourth
of Israel 📖?
Let me die the death
of the righteous,
and let my end be like his 📖!”
11 📚And Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies, and, look, you have positively blessed them”.
12 📚And he answered and said, “Must I not be careful to speak what the LORD has put in my mouth?”
13 📚Then Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place. You can see them from there, but only the most distant part of them, but you won’t see all of them. So curse them for me from there”.
23:13 Balak in his superstitious ignorance thought a change of place might bring a change of message (v 28).⚜
14 📚And he brought him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered an ox and a ram on each altar. 15 📚And Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering, while I meet the LORD over there”.
16 📚And the LORD met Balaam and put a word in his mouth, and said, “Go back to Balak, and say this”.
17 📚And he came to him and saw him, and the leaders of Moab with him, standing by his burnt offering. And Balak said to him, “What has the LORD said?”
18 📚And he began his poetic utterance, and said,
“Rise up, Balak, and listen;
hear me, you son of Zippor.
19 📚God is not a man,
that he should lie;
nor a son of man,
that he should repent.
Will he say something,
and not do it?
Or speak,
and not make it stand?
20 📚Look, I have received a command
to bless;
and he has blessed;
and I cannot turn it away.
21 📚He has seen no evil in Jacob,
nor has he seen trouble
in Israel.
The LORD his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is
among them.
23:21 This can hardly refer to what God saw in their hearts, or their fallen nature, or their sinful rebellion and complaining. It refers to their standing with Him, His separation of them to be a holy people. Now the believer has by faith a perfect righteousness – the righteousness of Christ Himself (1 Cor 1:30; Phil 3:9), and in this righteousness there is no taint of evil.⚜
22 📚God brought them out
of Egypt.
He is like the horns of
a wild ox for them.
23 📚Surely there is no sorcery
against Jacob,
nor is thereany divination
against Israel.
Now it is to be said of Jacob
and Israel,
‘What God has done!’
23:23 Num 22:7. Balaam is telling Balak that it is a waste of time and effort to use mantras against God’s people. The mighty God was with them. See Rom 8:31; 1 John 4:4.⚜
24 📚Look,
the people will rise up
like a great lion,
and raise himself
like a young lion.
He will not lie down until
he eats the prey,
and drinks the blood
of the slain”.
25 📚And Balak said to Balaam, “Don’t curse them at all, or bless them at all!”
26 📚But Balaam answered and said to Balak, “Didn’t I tell you, saying that I must do whatever the LORD says?”
27 📚And Balak said to Balaam, “Please come; I will take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God for you to curse them for me from there”. 28 📚And Balak brought Balaam to the top of Peor which faces Jeshimon.
29 📚And Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here, and prepare seven oxen and seven rams for me here”. 30 And Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered an ox and a ram on each altar.