God’s Word for You

Numbers 23:1-6 faith through the means of grace

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Thursday, November 18, 2021

Balaam’s First Message

23 Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.”

In contexts like visions and parables, the number 7 usually represents holiness.

• Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne (Revelation 1:4)
• See, the stone I have set in front of Joshua! There are seven eyes on that one stone, and I will engrave an inscription on it,’ says the LORD Almighty, ‘and I will remove the sin of this land in a single day. (Zechariah 3:9)
• Its openings, its portico and its palm tree decorations had the same measurements as those of the gate facing east. Seven steps led up to it, with its portico opposite them. (Ezekiel 40:22)

In historical settings, seven is usually a number with no spiritual significance at all (such as Esther’s seven maids, Esther 2:9). Here, however, there may have been a pagan attempt to use seven as some symbolically important numeral. Since this was a Moabite sacrifice, the significance of the bulls and rams do not necessarily mean what they would have in Leviticus 1:5 or 5:15, but we are told in verse 3 that this was a “burnt offering,” that is to say, and offering that would not be eaten, but completely burned.

2 Balak did just as Balaam had said. Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar. 3 Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering, while I go off by myself. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet me. Whatever he shows me I will tell you.” [So Balak went and stood by his burnt offering, and Balaam called to God]  and then he went off to a barren hill.

This pagan ritual was meant to be something that God would accept, but God does not accept the offerings, prayers, or supposedly good works of unbelievers (Proverbs 28:9; Isaiah 59:2; John 9:31; Romans 10:14; Proverbs 6:16-19). So even though God would appear to Balaam in this case, it was not because Balaam’s sacrifice was pleasing to him. The false prophet sent away the pagan king, but this was no sham of fellowship. Balaam was used to getting his visions alone, and we see that even with genuine believers the Lord preferred to speak with them while they were alone (Genesis 28:11; Jonah 2:10-3:1; Habakkuk 2:1-2; Zechariah 1:8; Luke 1:9-11) or while they were with their wives (Genesis 18:1-6; Judges 13:8-11). It shouldn’t be a surprise that Balaam wanted to be by himself.

Luther thought that Balaam went to consult with true preachers of God, meaning men of Israel, from among the Levites, but that on this occasion he did not consult with true preachers (LW 54:88). Cautiously and humbly, I have a different opinion. I think that Balaam actually went off on a barren hill and, as on the previous occasions, God really did speak with him directly.

4 God met Balaam, and Balaam said to him, “I have set up seven altars, and I have offered up a bull and a ram on each altar.” 5 The LORD put a message into Balaam’s mouth and said, “Return to Balak, and you are to deliver this message.” 6 Balaam returned to Balak and found him standing by his burnt offering, along with all the officials of Moab.

As I have said before, God picked up Balaam to use him the way that a man might pick up a stick to accomplish some task. God “put a message into Balaam’s mouth,” but for all the good it did to Balaam, the message could just as well have been delivered by the donkey as by the man.

If Balaam would only have listened to the gospel God was going to speak through him, he would have had his faith handed to him the way any Christian does through baptism or the preaching of Christ. But if not? Balaam had the ability every sinful man has in his fallen stupidity. This is to decide for himself to resist the Holy Spirit, reject the gospel of salvation, and reason his way out of God’s loving mansions and soaring spires down into the devil’s foul and noxious dungeons and smoking pits. Indeed, this is the only ability mankind really has. We confess: “I believe that I cannot by my own thinking or choosing believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to him” (Explanation to the Third Article). This is what Paul means when he says, “You were dead in your transgressions and sins” (Ephesians 2:1). A dead man cannot choose to come to life, and a spiritually dead man cannot choose or decide to come to faith. No one, certainly not you or I, nor Peter nor Paul nor Abraham himself, could ever know anything of Christ or believe in him and embrace him as our Lord unless that faith was offered to us through the preaching of the gospel by the Holy Spirit. All of the work of Jesus on our behalf would go unnoticed without being preached to us. He lived the perfect sinless life God demands of us (Leviticus 19:2), and his innocent death atoned for our sins, even according to the unwitting prophetic word uttered by the high priest (John 11:50-51). The Holy Spirit hands us this message and faith in Christ in our baptism and in the preaching of the gospel, and he did it when it was impossible for us to come to faith by ourselves. “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins” (Colossians 2:13). Now our faith results in praise to Jesus (1 Peter 1:7), and through Jesus we have the certainty of a home with him forever in Paradise.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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