Nations Created

Listen to today’s reading:

Genesis 11:5-9

But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

Psalm 86:9

All the nations you have made
will come and worship before you, Lord;
they will bring glory to your name.

Revelation 7:9

After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.

Today’s Reading:

Smart coaches create an easy, efficient language that only their own team understands. They’re called signs. A common sign for hitters, for example, from a third base coach could be a belt swipe with the hand to tell the batter to lay down a bunt. It’s easy to remember because belt and bunt start with the letter “b.” Signs also let catchers communicate to pitchers too so that they can trust that the pitcher is going to throw the right pitch. Mixing up signs with your catcher or missing a sign from a coach on the base path can have consequences. Obviously, a coach from another team cannot (and should not if he has good signs) communicate anything to the opposing players with his own signs. That defeats the purpose. At one time, the Bible says that there was only one way of communication on earth between people. There was only one language on earth up to the time of the Tower of Babel. God saw what man was doing and didn’t want them to proceed in building their tower – a structure that they wanted to make, they said, so that they could reach heaven to make a name for themselves. The way that God stopped their work on the Tower of Babel was by confusing the people’s unifying language. In an instant, he created completely new languages and people couldn’t understand each other, surely throwing them into a chaotic mess. We don’t know exactly how many languages were created that day, maybe hundreds, but God consequently made respective people groups too and entire nations that spread out all over the world. This is what we see today, thousands of years later. We are still separated by languages all over the map. However, this won’t be the case in the end. A new people is being created under our Lord from every tongue, tribe, and nation. In John’s vision in Revelation 7:9, the Bible says, “After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.” One day, believers in all different nations will no longer be scattered, but they will be gathered in understanding of each other, praising God forever thanks to the saving work of Jesus Christ.

Today’s Prayer Guide:

Praise – Praise God for creating great diversity of language and culture even in our great sin.

Confession – Tell him that you have not valued your brothers and sisters from different languages and cultures.

Ask – Ask God to bring his kingdom to earth, ending confusion and miscommunication between nations under the banner of his kingdom.