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Find the answers to all those questions you were too embarrassed to ask in Sunday School. Welcome to Weird Stuff in the Bible, where we explore scripture passages that are bizarre, perplexing or just plain weird. Hosted by Luke Taylor.
Why Did God Want to Kill Balaam?
Numbers 20
Thumbnail: let God say no
God is not schizophrenic
God is not schizophrenic. OK? I just wanna put that out there first. God is the same yesterday, today and forever. God does not contradict Himself. And if He looks like He is, the problem is on our end, not His. Amen? OK.
I just feel like I have to establish that because Numbers 22 starts the story of Balaam, and God in this story, Balaam does exactly what God says, and yet God decides to kill him for it.
Numbers 22:20-22
20 And God came to Balaam at night and said to him, “If the men have come to call you, rise, go with them; but only do what I tell you.” 21 So Balaam rose in the morning and saddled his donkey and went with the princes of Moab.
Alright, so far so good, right? God says go. Balaam goes.
22 But God's anger was kindled because he went, and the angel of the Lord took his stand in the way as his adversary.
And as you keep reading, this angel of the Lord was standing there with a sword to literally kill Balaam.
Wait wait wait. As I said before: God is not schizophrenic. So why is he upset with Balaam here?- upset enough to literally kill him?
I find all of this to be weird, and I’d like to explore why it’s in the Bible. Turn to Numbers 22, and let’s get weird.
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(Continued)
Welcome to Weird Stuff in the Bible, where we explore scripture passages that are bizarre, perplexing or just plain weird. This is Luke Taylor, and today we’re going to be talking about the story of Balaam. We come upon Balaam because he comes up in our study of Jude. And we need to step away from Jude and take a few weeks to establish who Balaam is before we get back into Jude. And there’s a heck of a lot of weird stuff mentioned in the stories of Balaam, so it’s fertile ground for a podcast called Weird Stuff in the Bible.
Balaam the greedy profit
So Balaam was a greedy prophet. Now, was he a true prophet or a false prophet? We will dig into that question in a few episodes. But Balaam had an interesting relationship with God. He really did talk to God and receive genuine prophecies from God. But he was also a very greedy guy and used his prophetic gift to make money.
He was a prophet for prophet. His ministry was not a non-profit organization. So to understand what is going on in the story, let’s read it in context.
Numbers 22:1-4
Then the children of Israel moved, and camped in the plains of Moab on the side of the Jordan across from Jericho.
2 Now Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. 3 And Moab was exceedingly afraid of the people because they were many, and Moab was sick with dread because of the children of Israel. 4 So Moab said to the elders of Midian, “Now this company will lick up everything around us, as an ox licks up the grass of the field.” And Balak the son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at that time.
So this story is gonna deal with two guys who are named Balak and Balaam. I always say, if you need help keeping straight which is which, Balak’s name ends with a K, and he is the King of the Moabites. So just remember K for King. King Balak is feeling treated by all these Israelites living next to him, so he wants a prophet to come and curse the Israelites for him. Let’s go on.
Numbers 22:5-8
5 Then he sent messengers to Balaam the son of Beor at Pethor, which is near the River in the land of the sons of his people, to call him, saying: “Look, a people has come from Egypt. See, they cover the face of the earth, and are settling next to me! 6 Therefore please come at once, curse this people for me, for they are too mighty for me. Perhaps I shall be able to defeat them and drive them out of the land, for I know that he whom you bless is blessed, and he whom you curse is cursed.”
7 So the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the diviner’s fee in their hand, and they came to Balaam and spoke to him the words of Balak. 8 And he said to them, “Lodge here tonight, and I will bring back word to you, as the Lord speaks to me.” So the princes of Moab stayed with Balaam.
So far, it’s like, what’s the problem? Balaam is offered this money for his services, but he says, “Let me see what God thinks about that.” Pretty good answer, except: Balaam really shouldn’t have had to even ask God in the first place. “Hey God, you know those covenant people you have down there in the valley? Would it be OK if I cursed them, for money?” It’s really something that Balaam SHOULD have been able to say no to without consulting God.
(Numbers 22:9-12)
9 Then God came to Balaam and said, “Who are these men with you?”
10 So Balaam said to God, “Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab, has sent to me, saying, 11 ‘Look, a people has come out of Egypt, and they cover the face of the earth. Come now, curse them for me; perhaps I shall be able to overpower them and drive them out.’ ”
12 And God said to Balaam, “You shall not go with them; you shall not curse the people, for they are blessed.”
Pretty cut-and-dried, right? God does NOT want Balaam doing this thing. And this is what Balaam reports to the people. I hope you’ve been paying attention to this story through verses 1 through 12 because we’re going to stop and psychoanalyze Balaam in verse 13.
(Numbers 22:13)
13 So Balaam rose in the morning and said to the princes of Balak, “Go back to your land, for the Lord has refused to give me permission to go with you.”
Now, most of us would pump our fist in the air at that statement. Hey Balaam, good job man, God told you “no” so you told the people “no.” Congratulations, good job honoring the will of God.
Let’s just pick apart what Balaam said to the men. “Go back to your land, for the Lord has refused to give me permission to go with you.”
Let’s just imagine for a minute that I’m a teenager again and my friends invite me to go to some wild party. There’s gonna be underage drinking and sex and drugs and immorality and nothing I should be involving myself in. So I ask my parents and my parents tell me no. Then I go back to my friends and I say, “Hey guys, my parents say I can’t come to your wild party, sorry. My parents say no.”
If I say that, what does that response say about me? I’m really saying, “Guys, I want to come and join this party, that’s what I want to do in my heart; but mom and dad say no.”
Now in that case, the obedience is still a good thing. But it reveals a heart that desires this party I shouldn’t be at. See the difference here? It’s not like I said, “No guys, I’m not gonna be part of that wicked stuff.” I am saying, “No, my parents won’t let me.” It’s like I’m saying, “I really want to, but the boss says no.”
Now let’s re-read what Balaam told the men, with that in mind: “Go back to your land, for the Lord has refused to give me permission to go with you.”
Balaam is saying, “I’d love to curse them, but God is telling me I can’t.” His heart wants to, but God says no. And the men get the hint that perhaps Balaam is persuadable.
Verse 14
14 And the princes of Moab rose and went to Balak, and said, “Balaam refuses to come with us.”
See, they leave God out of it because they see this as a Balaam issue. Balaam’s response left the door open to future negotiation. “We just need to make this more enticing and maybe he’ll say yes.”
Verses 15 through 19
15 Then Balak again sent princes, more numerous and more honorable than they. 16 And they came to Balaam and said to him, “Thus says Balak the son of Zippor: ‘Please let nothing hinder you from coming to me; 17 for I will certainly honor you greatly, and I will do whatever you say to me. Therefore please come, curse this people for me.’ ”
18 Then Balaam answered and said to the servants of Balak, “Though Balak were to give me his house full of silver and gold, I could not go beyond the word of the Lord my God, to do less or more. 19 Now therefore, please, you also stay here tonight, that I may know what more the Lord will say to me.”
Let’s again psychoanalyze Balaam’s words. He says, “I can’t do it.” There are many ways he could have said no. He could have said “I don’t want to.” He could have said “I will not help you curse them.” But instead Balaam says “I can’t.”
Again, we can applaud the fact that he’s obeying God, but his word choice reveals his heart desire. That’s why he invites them to hang around and says he’ll ask God again.
He already knows what God said. God doesn’t care how much money Balaam is offered; God has made his will known to Balaam already. Even if God hadn’t made His will known directly, it’s still obvious that Balaam should not curse them. He shouldn’t even have to ask. But he keeps asking.
Numbers 22:20
20 And God came to Balaam at night and said to him, “If the men come to call you, rise and go with them; but only the word which I speak to you—that you shall do.” 21 So Balaam rose in the morning, saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab.
Oh I imagine Balaam was glad to hear that. “God said yes, God said yes!”
But if you’ve been paying attention to the story, you’re probably as confused as I am. Why would God say yes now? And then it gets even weirder:
Verse 21
Then God’s anger was aroused because he went
And this brings us back to where we started. First of all, now we see how weird it was that God said “yes” after saying “no” before. Then we see something even more bizarre: that God is angry about Balaam going along with this thing that God had just said YES to. How can we make sense of this?
Why God Got Mad
Here’s what’s going on. I will quote from John Bevere in his book Killing Kryptonite:
If we really desire or covet something, and God has communicated His will on the matter (whether through His Word or in prayer) yet we still desire it, God will often give it to us, even if He knows it is not best for us and that we will ultimately be judged for it.
And if that sounds weird, you might be surprised to know that this idea is all through the Bible. I Samuel 8, the people say “give us a king, give us a king.” God says it would be a bad idea for them, but since they keep demanding it, God gives it to them.
The Israelites in the wilderness, they keep begging for meat. Begging and begging and begging. Finally God sends them quail, and it makes them sick.
Ezekiel 14, one of the most shocking chapters I’ve read in all the Bible. God says that if you like false prophets more than true prophets, God will tell the false prophets a lie just so that they can deceive you and give you bad information. God will give you what you want, and that can be a terrible terrible thing.
Romans 1 says that if you desire to reject God and worship created things rather than the creator, He will give you over to a reprobate mind.
You can’t claim, “well I was reprobate, it’s not my fault.” “Well that false prophet I was listening to deceived me, it was his fault.” “Well God said we could have a king, well God is the one who sent us that meat.”
None of those excuses get you off the hook when your heart is not right. And even though God said Balaam could go with King Balak’s men, his heart was not right, and he was really just in it for the money.
Balaam is like a preacher who came home and told his wife, “I just got a job offer at a bigger church. I’ll have a bigger salary, we can live in a bigger city with a bigger house. I’m gonna go upstairs and pray about it.” And his wife said, “Do you want me to come pray with you?” And the preacher says, “No, you stay down here and start packing."
You see, that old joke is exactly Balaam. He finally gets what he wants, and God lets him have it, and boy, is God gonna let him have it. That’s why God says yes, but God is very very angry with Balaam.
We’re going to get deeper into that story next time. If you think it’s weird now, just wait until we read the rest of Numbers 22…
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Housekeeping/Mailbag
Next time on this podcast, we will continue Balaam’s story with one of the weirdest stories in the entire Bible, and I teased it all the way back in episode one of this podcast: the story with a talking donkey. Did a donkey actually talk? Come back next time for that episode.
Make sure you’re subscribed so you can get it!
What weird stuff in the Bible do you want to know more about? weirdstuffinthebible@gmail.com
Closing Thoughts
I have a five-year-old son, and he just doesn’t know what’s good for him. Literally. If I left it up to him, he would have ice cream and cookies for every meal. He would watch Spiderman from the time he got up until the time he went to bed, and if he had no bedtime, that would be until about 10 o’clock every night.
He would do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted, and that would be a very very bad life for him- if he didn’t have a daddy to tell him no.
We have a Father in heaven who loves us. Loves us enough to tell us “no” to a lot of the things that we want. And unlike what Balaam did, we should just learn to accept God’s “no.”
Let me read that quote from John Revere again: If we really desire or covet something, and God has communicated His will on the matter (whether through His Word or in prayer) yet we still desire it, God will often give it to us, even if He knows it is not best for us and that we will ultimately be judged for it.
Sometimes God says no to our prayers.
And we have to let God’s NO be NO.
We shouldn’t keep begging God to say YES when the YES would actually be bad for us.
God loves us enough to say NO. And if your heart is right with God, you should be able to take NO for an answer.
So if you think that’s weird, I hope you’re a little more weird today, too. Thanks for listening, God bless you for sticking around until the end, and we’ll see you next time.