Genesis Chapter 11 is where we will again be this morning,
picking up that verse 10 and finishing out the chapter.
When I was a sophomore or perhaps a junior in high school,
I, I went to our school's library and I, I picked out this
book that was sitting there on the shelf, arranged for
everybody to see it so you can see the cover.
The Hobbit. I'll tell you, I knew literally
nothing about The Hobbit and, and it's author, JRR Tolkien.
I did take note of the fact that apparently the guy had two
middle names and I thought that was pretty cool.
I enjoyed reading classics and the whole lot of those books we
had to read in high school. So I thought I would try out
this fantasy thing and see what that was like.
As I opened the pages I was intrigued to find maps and when
I began to read I started to get lost.
There was this Bilbo guy, and eventually Frodo comes along and
Gandalf, a bunch of dwarves dwelling glowing Thor, Bjorn,
Bard, King Thrandle, Thorin, Elrond the elf was thrown in
there, and some other elves. And then there were the bad guys
like Smog, Gollum, and Sauron. Also, I didn't realize that
there was this whole world that Tolkien had created.
I didn't know about the Shire and about Middle Earth.
And actually I was really new to this whole fantasy thing
anyways, so I didn't even know how to engage with it.
I got lost and all these people, and I tried to keep everything
straight and I did something that I'd never done before.
I bailed on the book. I just couldn't do it.
Due date came and so I turned it in.
It wasn't until some 2 decades later that I was able to pick
the book back up again and finish.
This time I paid careful attention to each of the
characters and where we were, even sometimes consulting the
map. I know that sounds geeky or
weird, but it's what I had to do in order to process everything
that was coming my way. Anybody else resonate with that
with with that book? Like it was a little hard to
track. OK, good, good.
Now, as we finish up this morning, this section of this
section of Genesis, we come to another genealogy.
Lots of names. We see a number of these names
back in chapter 10, but but how do those names figure into God's
story? Verse 10 begins.
These are the generations. These are the generations of
Shem. This is a a new Tolidoth
section. This opening is a signal to the
reader, hey, pay attention, something new's about to happen.
And the words for generations toledoth I've mentioned this
before, is used 11 times total in this book.
And whenever we see these words, these are the generations we
should pay attention because Moses is trying to tell us
something important is going on in the text.
Now this new genealogy is another flashback.
It's widely believed that the incident at Babel occurred about
halfway through this genealogy. And we're not reading through
this genealogy, but it's believed that occurred about
halfway through this genealogy and Peleg's generation in the
last chapter, verse 25, it read to a bear were born two sons.
The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was
divided. This refers to the consequences
received from the Tower of Babel experiments.
The verb palag is used in the Old Testament to describe
division of languages. So the word play between palag
and Peleg helps us see that division as referring to the
Babel events that occurred 5 generations after the flood.
Noah's oldest son, Shem appears in verse 10 and then the
genealogy walks us up to the precipice of the patriarchs.
In chapter 5 there were 10 generations listed from Adam to
Noah. Now here in Chapter 11 there are
another 10 generations listed. There's Shem Arpakshad, Sheila
Ebert, Peleg, Rau Serug, Nahor, Tara, and Abram.
Here Moses has masterfully conveyed God's intentionality in
filling the earth. The number 10 is similar a
little bit to the number of #7 in that 10 often portrays
fullness or completeness. This second set of 10 conveys to
us that there's fullness in God's design for humanity.
There's a fullness in God's design for humanity here.
You might ask yourself, what does that mean?
How was their fullness in humanity?
At that point, the earth's population certainly wasn't
anywhere near 8.2 billion people that we now have.
Genesis changes significantly at this point.
The 1st 11 chapters are a sort of interplay with the various
Sumerian and Babylonian records of how things came to be.
The other ancient Near Eastern texts tried to explain the
origins of the world and humanity, and Genesis steps into
that fray and it says no. Here's how things came to be and
here's the God who created it all.
Though he's an intimate, personal God, he's also the God
who brings justice and saved one specific family through the
flood. The 1st 11 chapters of Genesis
are a polemic against the other religions of Moses day and they
serve to tell the Israelites where they came from.
Also the 1st 11 chapters of Genesis serve as an introduction
to the rest of the book. These first 11 chapters covered
thousands of years and at least 20 generations.
So thousands of years and 20 generations now.
The next 39 chapters will cover only four generations and
roughly a couple 100 years as the narrative dives deeper into
God's selection of this one family to point to the Messiah
who is the one that would come to make things right.
So with that, we now begin a slow excursion into the
narrative of the patriarchs. So if you're able, would you
stand as we read from Genesis Chapter 11, picking up at verse
27 through the end of the chapter?
Now these are the generations of Terra.
Terra fathered Abram, Nahor in Haran in Haran fathered Lot.
Haran died in the presence of his father Terra in the land of
his kindred in Ur of the Chaldeans.
And Abram and Nahor took wives. The name of Abraham's wife was
Sarai, in the name of Nahor's wife Milka, the daughter of
Haran, the father of Milka and Iska.
Now Sarai was barren. She had no child.
Tara took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran his grandson,
and Sarah his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and they
went forth together from earth, the Chaldeans, to go into the
land of Canaan. But when they came to Haran they
settled there. The days of Tara were 205 years,
and Tara died in Haran. You may be seated.
I have to say that may well have been one of the hardest sections
that we've come across so far to read.
There's so many different names. Now you may have noticed how
verse 27 started is said. Now these are the generations of
Tara. If you notice that, then great
jobs being in tune to the text. The last Tolido section, that
was the shortest of them all, brought us from Shem up to
Abram. Now this section drills down on
those last two names in the Shem section, Tara and Abram.
To close out the chapter, Moses is giving us a a few details.
He's kind of throwing us a bone. He's saying, hey, pay attention
to these things. Genealogies seldom give you
details. They usually just stick to a
certain formula, and then they keep repeating that formula a
number of times. The first section of this
genealogy does that, but then this specific section deviates
from the so and so lived a number of years and then
fathered this person, and after he lived another number of
years, he had other sons and daughters.
This section deviates from that formula.
This part doesn't resemble a normal genealogy, and it also
gives us some pertinent details. Now one of those pertinent
details is the death of Abraham's brother Haran, who is
Tara's son. Verse 28 said Haran died in the
presence of his father Tara, in the land of his kindred in ur of
the Chaldeans. We get the impression here that
Haran was younger when he died. Parents aren't supposed to see
their children die, but that's what's happened.
Haran actually died in Tara's presence.
It's a devastating and unexpected sorrow for a father
to outlive his son. What's more is it potentially
puts the prospect of of Terra's house in jeopardy. 1/3 of his
sons were now gone, potentially making it much more difficult
for this particular family line to continue.
Well, this is also significant because Lot was now left
fatherless. Lot may have been in his 20s
when his father died. He would have had some resources
at that point, but he didn't have a family of his own yet.
Lot's fatherlessness would would lead him to tag along with Uncle
Abraham and Grandfather Tara, thereby becoming a significant
character in future parts of the Genesis story.
As we will see, that same verse also gave us a giant context
clue as to who these people are. It's said that they're from ER
of the Chaldeans and they were headed towards Canaan.
They're from ER of the Chaldeans and headed to Canaan.
And when we talk about ER of the Chaldeans, I should start off by
saying that identifying ER with the Chaldeans was a later
interpolation because actually during Abrams time the Chaldeans
didn't yet exist or the Khaldu people had not come to be yet.
That wouldn't happen for another couple 100 years.
Now ER is in southern Mesopotamia.
You can see it there on the map there at the bottom right side
under Chaldea, it says ER. This is in what's today eastern
Iraq on the on the Euphrates River about 140 miles South of
Babylon. You can see Babylon is up there
on the Euphrates River as well. This was Terra's homeland.
The remains of ER are located at Tel El Muka yard in modern Iraq.
From 1922 to 1934, a famous archaeologist Leonard Wooley,
uncovered evidence of a highly developed urban culture there.
During the time of Abram, the streets of Ur were unpaved and
undrained and and narrow. The houses usually were two
stories tall and they were made of fight fired bricks part way
around around the bottom and then part way up the walls.
Then from there the walls were simply mud with an outer coating
of plaster. It's good to remind ourselves of
who these people are. These are a people who worship
the moon God Nana. I'm going to guess at that
pronunciation. I don't know if it's Nana.
Maybe we won't call it Nana
because the moon God isn't good and your Nana is presumably
good, right? So if if Tehran and his family
had any inkling to worship Yahweh instead, it no doubt
would have been difficult for them to do that in a place like
UR. So at a minimum, they're
comfortable being around idol worship and they may have
actually been idol worshippers themselves.
Now there was a great ziggurats in ER dedicated to the worship
of Nana since or was the hub for worship of Nana.
It was quite grand and it sat on the banks of the Euphrates.
And there are remains of that ziggurats even still today.
You can see them there on the right.
So that's the remains, though they are no longer open to the
public because of vandalism of the sites as often happens with
ancient sites. Now, looking back at the map, if
I were to ask you how to get to Canaan from ER, ER is right
here, Canaan is over there. How do we get there?
You go straight West, right? That's how you get there.
Indeed, that is the most direct route.
But that is not what happened. Instead of heading West, they
actually headed northwest, going way out of the way.
Now, there could be a reason for that, possibly because that
might not have been an enjoyable way to go.
It says the words Arabian desert.
That could have been something to keep them from going that
way. But regardless, they traveled
northwest up to Haran. And as as they came to Haran,
they stopped. And I should say that this
place, this Haran is different from the person Haran.
Though they look the same in English, they are actually
spelled different. They are of no relation. 1
wasn't named Haran after the person.
These are unrelated in Hebrew. So Tiraz entourage put down
roots and they settled in Haran. They settled in Haran.
This is modern day Turkey. Haran was an important place.
It was a commercial center of the ancient Near East and it may
have been at an important crossroads and and trade route.
It seems the words settled there have appeared before.
Last week we read Genesis 11/2. It read and as people migrated
from the east, they found a plane in the land of Shinar and
settled there. The same words are used to
describe both the people who had settled in Shinar and built the
ziggurats as well as Terra's family.
The residents of Shinar refused to fill the earth in accordance
with the divine mandate that had been given to all humanity.
So when the text says that they settled there, a shadow is cast
over this decision. Was this a good idea?
The text and genealogy are pointing us to Abram.
But is he just going to be like the rest of the lot, pun
intended, and continue in disobedience?
Another detail we get. Thank you for laughing at that,
by the way. I'm not usually a punny person,
but yeah, it was just, I was just typing the words came out
like the whole rest of the lot. And I was like, oh, that's
funny. So I had to keep it.
Another detail we get in this section was mentioned in verse
30. Now Sarah was barren.
She had no child. This is Sarah's barrenness.
Things don't look good for Tara's family.
He'd already lost one son, and Abraham's wife was barren.
Having children was extremely important in the ancient Near
East. Family was a way to prepare for
the future. Having a lot of children meant
there were more people to help out with everything that needed
to be done, whether it was hunting for food, tending to
animals, farming or or cooking. Many hands do, as they say, make
light work and Abraham and Sarah, I hadn't been able to
produce any offspring to help out.
Besides the practicalities of having children, It's
interesting if you consider today, today children aren't
considered an asset, right? A lot of people in our culture
just look at children as as a problem or just something to be
navigated a a frustration that is an unfortunate quality in our
current social climates. But no, children actually are a
blessing as scripture says. Now, besides the practicalities
of having children, barrenness was also a disgrace in their day
and it was considered a profound crisis.
It brought significant shame to the woman and her family, and
her inability to reproduce was often blamed on some sort of
hidden sin in her life. Abraham and Sarah would be
dishonored wherever they went because they didn't have
children. Now, what's more is Genesis 315
told us there would be an offspring that come that would
come from the first woman, Eve. And this offspring would strike
and defeat the serpent. The narrative has honed in on
Abraham, but his wife is barren, so how could she help produce an
offspring to save them? Sarah's barren state dominates
much of the story, and it even becomes a motif in Genesis since
the divine promises to come involved numerous progeny for
Abram, Sarai, Rebecca, and and Rachel all experience seasons of
barrenness, a huge problem if God is going to eventually make
a great nation out of Abraham's descendants.
The statements she had no children then underscores the
need for God's help. It underscores the need for
divine intervention. The story's only going to move
forward through God's working, which is part of what makes the
book of Genesis so great. As we close out Chapter 11, it's
appropriate for us to consider a couple key takeaways from the
1st 11 chapters of Genesis. Of course, there was creation,
the fact that that God had created it all.
But beyond that, first of all, God is both merciful and just.
He might ask, well, how have we
seen God's mercy on display? It seems like all we've seen is
his justice. God kicked the first humans out
of the garden. God punished Cain for killing
his brother. God sent a flood to destroy the
world. God confused the language of
these people who'd previously only had one language.
I realize it's easy for us to see God's justice.
I think we've been programmed to see His justice 1st every month.
We take time, and perhaps subconsciously we recognize
God's justice when we take communion.
God's justice demands that our sin has to be punished.
And because of God's justice, Jesus came into the world so he
could die on the cross for our sin.
He paid the price for our sin, satisfying God's justice on the
cross. God is just, but He's also
merciful. God's mercy allowed Adam and Eve
to to live after they took a bite of the forbidden fruits.
God's mercy removed Adam and Eve from the garden so they couldn't
eat of the tree of life and live forever in a state of fallenness
and sin. God's mercy reigned over cane as
he deserved death, but God granted him life and then gave
him a mark to prevent others from killing him.
God's mercy preserved a single family for his purposes when all
the rest of humanity had failed to follow him.
God's mercy said that he would never again flood the earth the
way he had. And God's mercy was poured out
at Babel when God prevented humanity from diving headlong
into their own selfish pursuits and destructive behavior.
I love Jonah's words in chapter 4 of the book.
Jonah had finally made his way to Nineveh and he preaches an 8
word sermon. I'm a little over that, he says.
Yet 40 days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
The people repented in sackcloth and ashes they were, they were
sorry for how they'd live their lives, and in repentance they
turned to Yahweh. And Jonah 4 tells us this.
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry,
and he prayed to the Lord and said, O Lord, is not this what I
said when I was yet in my country?
That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish.
For I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow
to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting
from disaster. In other words, Jonas saying, I
knew this was your character. I knew this was how you'd
respond, that you would forgive them.
I didn't want you to forgive them.
So that's why I fled to Tarshish.
Those fish slappers don't deserve forgiveness.
Jonah was offended by the Ninevites.
I hope everyone caught that reference.
By the way, the fish slappers was a reference to Veggie Tales,
which actually did a really good job of of telling the Jonah
story in that that's final summation is that Jonah never
really got it. Yes, correct.
He didn't get it. He was offended by the
Ninevites. They were horrible people.
They were undeserving of God's mercy.
This was a time for God's justice, not mercy.
Jonah's sentiment was that they needed to pay for all their
sins. He believed this so much that
that he exits the town and he goes, sits up on a hill, pulls
up his lawn chair and and just sits there waiting to see what's
going to happen to Nineveh. He's waiting for lightning to
strike. He's waiting for fire to fall
down from heaven, something. He's waiting for God to judge
Nineveh. The reality is that God holds
justice and mercy and proper balance, extending each at the
right time and withdrawing them at the right time.
The Ninevites realized they needed God's mercy, so they
repented. They turned from their ways.
They didn't try to pay a debt that they couldn't pay, and
instead threw themselves on God's mercy.
If you attempt to pay your sin debt on your own, you'll find
that you're unable to pay it. We're filled with sin even on
our best days, and we're not unable to pay the payment for
sin. In such an instance, God's
justice is bad. It's bad news if you're trying
to do it all on your own. God's justice demands a blood
sacrifice for sin, not a work sacrifice, not a nice person
sacrifice. Those things won't get you
there. They won't make you innocent.
In such a case, God's justice would be cast over you and you
would be found wanting. God's justice is perfect and
can't overlook sin. In Christ's sacrifice, our sin
has been addressed and covered with God's mercy.
This is the core of God's character, not only justice but
also mercy, which ties in excellently to the next point.
God is always at work to bring His grace to humanity.
God is always working to bring His grace to humanity.
Grace is when we receive something that we don't deserve.
It's a good and wonderful and, dare I say, even scandalous
gift. Genesis 1 through 11 records
numerous instances in which mankind had had done something
so bad that the human race was subject to God's wrath.
Yet in each of these instances, the Fall King's murder of Abel,
the Flood, the Tower of Babel, God extends his grace.
God's eager to show his grace, and he's slow to unleash his
wrath. Now, we also need to remember
that sometimes God's plan takes a long time, at least from a
humanly perspective, right? God isn't slow in performing
what he says He will do. Second, Peter 39 tells us the
Lord is not slow to fulfill His promise, as some count slowness,
but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish,
but that all should reach repentance.
Often His timing doesn't align with our timing, so we might
think that God is slow, but He's not.
God promised Adam and Eve that he would send a Redeemer to lift
the curse of death, yet that moments was still some 4000
years future from Adam and Eve. Even from our standpoint now
2000 years from cry from when Christ came into the world.
The final fulfillment of that promise, When Christ will come
into the world, he'll set up his eternal Kingdom and abolish the
curse of death forever. That is still future.
God is still working. God is still exercising his
patience. God's, In fact, God's patience
with sinful man is the reason why he hasn't already
established Christ's earthly Kingdom.
There are still more people that he desires to graciously save.
Think about that going forward. We will see that God is
constantly using broken people in his plan.
All the main characters in Genesis will have significant
character flaws. There are no perfect people in
this story. We just finished The Know a
narrative. He was described as having
walked with God, but the fact that he got drunk tells us he's
clearly not perfect. So God will take the imperfect,
broken people of Genesis and use them to propel his story
forward. Along the way, it'll become
clear that this family hasn't earned this special place of
privilege. They have been sovereignly
selected by Yahweh to be the conduit through which the Savior
of the world will come to make things right and restore what
sin took in the Garden. All the names listed in this
genealogy aren't aren't given because of their personal
significance or or notoriety. The only thing of notes is that
their names would go down in history as being part of the
Messiah's predecessors. So many names, but they each
contribute to the story and they point towards God's mercy and
grace when Luke in his gospel list them as Jesus ancestors.
Today's genealogy serves a purpose, and though we might get
lost in some of the names, we can take joy in knowing that the
names are all part of God's design and plan His His plan to
bring salvation into the world. God is working in each of these
lists and has not stopped working since then.
Let's bow our heads and close our eyes.
God, we thank you that you have not stopped working.
We've seen these details this morning that the notion that
Sarah's bareness could potentially stop your plan for
moving forward. When we consider that, it's just
all the more amazing to think about the fact that you worked a
miracle in her and Abraham's life and and in their following
generations to continue that line that would eventually bring
about the Messiah, the one who who came into this world, the
one who will someday set up an earthly Kingdom and will reign
from his throne, making all things right.
We thank you that you are at work.
You are patient. You're, you are so patient with
us, God, and you want more people to come into the fold,
into the Kingdom. So we thank you that you're
continuing to work. You're not done yet.
And we worship you. We worship that wonderful name
of Jesus Christ. And it's in his powerful name
that we pray. Amen.