Numbers 22 - Don't be a Fool

We’re going to try something a little different today. Last week, I talked a lot about sheep. But I kind of want to stick with the animal theme. So this week, we’re going to try and get into the mind of a donkey and the time where God made an animal talk!

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Yes… That day… I remember that day well. There I was, sound asleep, when suddenly Balaam bursts into the room. I squeezed my eyes shut and turned away from the light that started pouring in. It was so early and so bright! This was much earlier than Balaam usually went out.

Then again, I’m not really sure you can say Balaam was the kind of man who had a usual schedule. Some days we’d go on long journeys to far away countries. Can’t say I liked those journeys much. Why, you ask? Can’t say I liked the stuff he’d say or do whenever we went away.

It was much better at home. I’ve always been the kind of donkey that would rather just keep to myself and not have anyone bother me. There were times where we wouldn’t leave for weeks at a time. Those weeks were the best! I could cozy up in the warm hay and sleep with only the sounds of flies buzzing around my ears to distract me. Well, that or when Balaam got too excited saying one of his curses.

Yes, you heard me right. Curses. That was Balaam’s business: blessings and curses. Weird job if you ask me. People could hire Balaam to put a blessing or a curse on someone they didn’t like. Of course, Balaam developed a bit of a reputation over time, so he wouldn’t just work for anybody. Usually they had to be kings or the like.

Between you and me, I never agreed with what Balaam did. But I was just his donkey. It’s not like I could tell him I thought he was being a fool. I just took him where he wanted to go. And all in all, Balaam didn’t treat me half bad. The stable was warm, and he let me rest whenever I got tired on those long journeys. Balaam was just… confused. He had this special gift from God, but he wasted it by not listening to Him.

That is, of course, until the day he burst into my stable so early in the morning! See, the King of Moab – Balak, I think his name was – he had hired Balaam to curse the Israelites. The people of Israel had been wandering around the desert for a number of years, and now they were getting mighty close to the Moabite land. And the Moabites, they were scared the Israelites might attack. There were just so many of them!

With the Moabites so scared and all, Balak thought it would be best to get a little help. So he sent messengers to Balaam. I guess Balak hoped that if Balaam cursed Israel, then this would help stop Israel from conquering Moab.  

Now like I said, I didn’t always agree with everything Balaam did. But here, bless his heart, he wasn’t such a fool for once. When those messengers came, Balaam told them straight out, “Go back to your own country. The LORD won’t let me go with you” (Numbers 22:13, NIrV).

I couldn’t have been prouder of him that day. Listening to God, not going around trying to curse people God had blessed. And I mean, really, it’s not like Balaam’s curse would have any power against the God who rules the entire universe! But still, I was glad Balaam didn’t do anything foolish for a change.

Which is why my little old heart sunk when those messengers came back a few days later. It seems Balak REALLY wanted Balaam’s help. Which brings us to when Balaam saddled me up at the crack of dawn to go off and curse the Israelites against God’s wishes.

We made a strange little group. Two Moabite messengers riding on their prim and proper donkeys, all decked out in royal robes. Those donkeys wouldn’t even talk to me. They made fun of me, saying all I was good for was giving fleas a home. That made me pretty mad, and I had a few choice insults ready to bray back to them. But I certainly didn’t expect that anything I was thinking was bad enough that God would send one of His angels!

All of a sudden, this light brighter than anything I’d ever seen burst out in front of me. I let out a loud groan and tried to turn around, but Balaam just kept yelling at me to go forward. I couldn’t understand it. The light was so overpowering – way brighter than that light from the sun this morning! How in Pete’s name did Balaam keep looking ahead of him like nothing had happened?

But I quickly realized I had a much bigger problem to worry about! As my eyes slowly adjusted to the light, I saw the angel standing there with a sword in his hand, and he looked ready for a fight. I was terrified! – I thought he was mad at me for thinking those mean things about the other donkeys! So I veered off the path as fast as I could.

Balaam didn’t like that very much. It seems I was the only one who could see this angel cause the other donkeys kept right on walking without even squinting! Balaam started hitting me to turn around and keep heading towards the Israelites, but there was no way I was going back to where that angel was! You should have seen the size of that sword!

I took a quick glance back to see if the angel was following us, and then nearly fell over my own hooves! This only made Balaam angrier, but I couldn’t help it… The angel was gone! It didn’t make any sense – the angel had been right there! I started to panic, wondering if he was sneaking up on me, when suddenly that angelic light exploded in front of me again!

This happened a few times, and I’m pretty sure I crushed Balaam’s foot against a wall at one point, but I didn’t care. All I knew was that I needed to get myself and Balaam away from that angel! But Balaam didn’t get it; he just thought I was disobeying him. So he just kept on hitting me and trying to make me go forward, which only led us closer and closer to the angel!

Finally, when we were about 10 feet away from the angel, I lost it. I threw him off my back, stomped my front hooves on the ground, and brayed at the top of my donkey lungs, “What have I done to you? Why did you hit me these three times?”

And Balaam was so mad, that he yelled right back, “You have made me look foolish! I wish I had a sword in my hand. If I did, I’d kill you right now.”

“I’m your own donkey!” I screamed. “I’m the one you have always ridden. Haven’t you been riding me to this very day? Have I ever made you look foolish before?” To which Balaam just shook his head no.

And that’s when both Balaam and I realized what was happening. Balaam took a step back. His eyes widened. I snorted in surprise. We were TALKING to each other!

But then I realized Balaam wasn’t even looking at me anymore. He was staring over my shoulder at the angelic light. He could finally see it! He could see the angel on the road, sword in hand and ready to fight! And Balaam, terrified out of his mind, fell down on the ground and bowed to the angel.

Now from what I’ve heard, angels usually say something like “Don’t be afraid” at this point. But this one didn’t. Instead, all he said was: “Why have you hit your donkey three times? I have come here to oppose you. What you are doing is foolish. The donkey saw me. It turned away from me three times. Suppose it had not turned away. Then I would certainly have killed you by now. But I would have spared the donkey” (Numbers 22:32-33).

Now I’ll admit, I was kind of relieved that the angel wasn’t actually mad at me for all those nasty things I had thought about the other donkeys. But then I realized what the angel had just said. The angel would have killed Balaam for not listening. And he’d called Balaam a fool. What was that all about?

I’ve thought a lot about that conversation over the years. And I know I’m only a donkey, but I think I might have an answer. See, God had already told Balaam once not to go on this trip. The Israelites were under His blessing and were not to be cursed. But when those messengers came back, Balaam decided not to listen to God. Maybe he wanted the money Balak offered, maybe he thought God had changed His mind. I don’t know, but when Balaam asked God again if he could go, it’s like God gave him a choice. It’s like God was saying to Balaam, “I’ve already told you not to go. You know what’s right. But it’s your choice.”

So why was Balaam a fool? Well, I’d say it’s because he ignored what was right. The angel called him a fool because It’s foolish not to listen to God. Other ways of doing things might look safer, smarter, or more fun, but just like Balaam couldn’t see the angel right in front of him, we can’t always see what dangers are waiting for us down the road when we choose to not listen to God.

Now I’m proud to say that even though Balaam still went with the messengers of Moab after this, he didn’t curse Israel! In fact, God actually ended up blessing Israel further through Balaam. And all of this happened because Balaam chose to listen to God in the end.

I hope you’ll remember that. Remember that God’s ways are always best, but He won’t force us to follow Him. He wants us to want to listen to Him! He wants us to be wise by listening to what He asks. So when you’re faced with a tough choice on whether to listen to God or not, remember foolish Balaam and make the wise choice instead!

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That's it for February! Next week, we'll be jumping back into the New Testament to hear another one of Jesus' parables. Hope to see you then!

~Brentagious

Luke 15:1-7 - The Ultimate Search Party

How many of you are farmers? Or shepherds? I’m certainly not either of those things… I’m a city kid through and through who has lived in Toronto my entire life. This means that most of my experience with animals has been taking care of my cat Wilbur when I was younger, chasing squirrels, and saving raccoons that have fallen into holes.

Well, that’s not entirely true actually. There’s also the time I had that brutal bee sting, the time I saw two eagles dive bomb out of the sky, and the time when I was really young and got to see a colt (baby horse) being born and learning to walk. So maybe I have more experience with animals than I thought.

But if there’s one kind of animal I haven’t spent a lot of time with, it’s sheep. Sure, I’ve seen them at petting zoos, but I’ve never cared about sheep that much. They’re smelly, their wool gets dirty really easy, and, frankly put, they aren’t always the smartest of animals.

I’ve done a little research, and from what I can tell, sheep are known to follow other sheep without thinking twice. So if there’s a flock of sheep chilling at a really grassy part of a field, and then one decides to move to a muddy part of that field where there’s no food, there’s a good chance that a bunch of the other sheep will follow right after him. And then you’ve got like 10 sheep stuck in the mud and nobody wants that!

But sometimes, sheep wander a little farther than from one side of a field to the other. If they don’t have a shepherd to stop them, sheep can get easily distracted and end up in the middle of nowhere. Yet, this is also where we see that sheep aren’t entirely dumb. Sheep remember people, voices, and names really well! Once a sheep figures out who its shepherd is, that sheep will listen to its shepherd’s voice before anyone else’s. This means that all a shepherd would need to do to keep a sheep from wandering off is to call its name (and maybe whack his shepherd’s crook on the ground once or twice), and the sheep would come running!

At least, that’s the best guess I can make about how sheep think based on my research. Again, I’m a city kid, so any shepherds out there are welcome to correct me if these facts aren’t true. But all the stuff I’ve just said fits very well with Jesus’ description of sheep in His Parable of the Lost Sheep.

The story is pretty simple. There’s a shepherd who has 100 sheep. He’s taking care of them, bringing them to some good fields with good grass. The sheep are all safe. Everything’s going according to plan. A few of the flock got scared earlier and had tried to run away, but the shepherd had stopped them without too much trouble. So you can imagine this shepherd’s feeling pretty good about himself at the moment, thinking, It’s gonna be an easy day of shepherding today!

But hold on… Something doesn’t feel right. The shepherd does a head count and what does he find? There’s only 99 sheep! One of the sheep must have gotten away while he was distracted saving the other ones. But just to make sure, he counts again. 1, 2, 3… 46, 47… 97, 98! There’s two missing now! What’s going on?!?

The shepherd takes a deep breath. Can’t start panicking now! He slows down and counts again. …97, 98… 99! Okay, that’s better, but that means there’s still one sheep missing.

So if this was you, what would you do? Stay with the 99 and hope the missing sheep somehow makes it back okay? Yeah, it’s too bad for the one, but you still have 99 other sheep to take care of! You don’t want the 99 being eaten by a wolf or something. So staying behind seems like the most logical plan.

Or maybe you’re not the only person around. Maybe you can send out a friend or family member to go looking for the missing sheep while you guard the rest of them. No, but that won’t work. The sheep won’t recognize the other person’s voice, and your friend might accidentally scare the missing sheep even farther away!

The sun is getting lower in the sky. Time is running out, and the longer that missing sheep is left alone, the more likely it’s going to hurt its leg or get eaten or walk so far away that it gets lost forever!

Yet, in Jesus’ parable, we see that there was only one plan the shepherd was ever going to follow. Jesus doesn’t talk about how the shepherd weighed the pros and cons of going after the sheep or not. Instead, Jesus says, “Won’t [the shepherd] leave the 99 in the open country? Won’t he go and look for the one lost sheep until he finds it?” (Luke 15:4, NIrV).

That’s how much the shepherd loves his sheep! He leaves the 99 who are safe to find the 1 in danger! I don’t know what the shepherd did with the 99 in the meantime. Maybe he left them with somebody else. Maybe he locked them up in a barn somewhere first. But as much as I like to wonder about this kind of thing, that detail doesn’t seem to bother Jesus. What’s important in Jesus’ story is that the shepherd does everything in his power to make sure that the lost sheep doesn’t stay lost.

In the same way, Jesus doesn’t stop looking for us either. We are like that sheep that ran away. We all have sin in our lives – we’ve all done bad things that have made us run away from God – but Jesus, our good and loving Shepherd, comes looking for us anyway! That’s how incredible His love is: that He would give up everything just to save one of us!

In fact, that’s exactly what Jesus did when He came to earth and died on the cross. Jesus gave up all the good things He had in heaven to live on earth as a man. And then Jesus gave up that life to die so that all those bad things we’ve done could be wiped away forever! And when He came back to life three days later, Jesus began the ultimate search party for all of us sinners who are lost.

Of course, there’s one other part of this story I haven’t mentioned yet. Did the shepherd find his lost sheep? (Pause for dramatic effect...) You bet he did! And when the shepherd found the sheep, he picked it up and immediately brought it home. Then the shepherd ran back to his village to tell all his friends and neighbours, “Look! I found my lost sheep! Rejoice with me!” And with that, the village had a huge party to celebrate!

The best part is that Jesus says the same thing happens after His ultimate search party! Jesus ends His parable by saying, “I tell you, it will be the same in heaven. There will be great joy when one sinner turns away from sin” (Luke 15:7). Just like the village celebrated that the shepherd had found his missing sheep, there is also a big celebration in heaven every time someone believes in Jesus – every time someone turns away from their sin and turns back to God.

And all of that is made possible because of Jesus’ unbelievable love for His sheep – for each and every one of us. Remember that: Because of Jesus’ love, He always looks for those who are lost. It’s up to us, then, to not hide from Jesus’ ultimate search party. Instead, choose to accept His unbelievable love and go back home with Him!

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Hey guys! Hope you enjoyed our first look into the New Testament. I'll be doing another parable in a few weeks, but we've got a jump back to the Old Testament first. And I'll give you a hint on which story we're talking about next: It involves someone who really shouldn't be able to talk but does anyway. See you then!

~Brentagious

SSS: Parables, or Why Sermons Don't Always Cut It...

So this blog is all about storytelling. Anyone who’s been tuning in so far should be well aware of that. And to that crowd, I just want to say, “Thanks! Thanks for sticking with me this first month and change.” And for those of you who didn’t know that, I’m assuming you’re new here. So, to those people, I just want to say, “Welcome! I hope you’ll stick around for at least the next month and change. But preferably even longer.”

I’ve only written one other Second Sunday Switch-up so far (which, if you haven’t already, you can read here), but these posts are a chance for me to write about something a little different to an older audience. Rather than telling a story, these posts will usually focus on faith, ministry, and/or storytelling more generally. But I figured the best way to start would be to see what Jesus Himself had to say about storytelling.

Parables were a huge part of Jesus’ ministry. Sure, Jesus delivered sermons sometimes – the Sermon on the Mount takes up three whole chapters of Matthew for crying out loud! – but Jesus understood the power of story. He recognized that sometimes the most effective way for His audience to learn some deep theological truth was not to describe it or preach it to them. Sometimes, it was better to show a principle in action through stories.

So let’s talk about parables for a bit. Now please note that most of what follows aren’t actually my own original thoughts. I’m just here to give the ideas a bit of artistic flair. A lot of this information comes from Gordon D. Fee and Douglas Stuart’s book How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth. It’s a great book that gives a lot of background information about the various genres of literature found in the Bible. If you have a chance and like to read, I’d highly suggest you take a look at it.

But I digress. First of all, let’s determine what parables aren’t. For instance, parables are not true stories about actual things that happened, nor are they meant to be read as simply moral fables. When Jesus told the Parable of the Lost Sheep, He wasn’t talking about some shepherd who actually left his entire flock at risk of being eaten by wolves to save the one stupid sheep that went off on its own. (Side note: I’ve never really understood the logic there. From what I’ve been told, sheep are pretty dumb, so leaving them alone doesn’t seem like a smart idea… If someone knows more about first-century AD shepherding that will clear this parable up for me, feel free to let me know in the comment section below.)

So if parables aren’t true stories or fables, then how are we supposed to approach these stories? Well, Fee and Stuart describe parables as pseudo-allegories that do communicate moral truths but, more importantly, inspire people to action. Let’s break down what that means.

An allegory is a description or narrative with a sustained semantic reference to another description or narrative. To put that in layman’s terms, a parable is a story where various ideas or images in that story stand in for something else. Importantly, this “standing in” is continued throughout the entire story. So, if we look at the Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis has Aslan stand in for Jesus/God throughout all 7 books.

However, not all parables are totally allegorical (he says as Augustine rolls over in his grave). Some of them are, the most obvious example being the Parable of the Sower where Jesus Himself explains what each aspect of the parable means. But most parables are only loosely allegorical. Thus, in the Parable of the Prodigal’s Son, you should read the father as God and the unfaithful son as representing sinners, but you’d probably be stretching the allegorical nature of the parable too far if you started reading things into the pig slop or the famine.

Moreover, yes, there is typically a truth claim being made in these stories. You are supposed to learn something from Jesus’ parables. But more than that, the point of parables was to inspire people to do something because of what they learned. The Good Samaritan doesn’t just teach us who are neighbours are; it leaves us with the question of whether we are going to be like the Good Samaritan and go out of our way to help our neighbours, whoever they might be! This is not Jesus promoting legalistic Christianity; this is Jesus encouraging His followers through story to live out their faith in everything they do!

To recap, then, a parable is a story where a few elements allegorically relate to real life ideas or situations with the hope of getting listeners/readers to act upon what they have learned. But if you’ve read some of Jesus’ parables, you’ll know that some of them are pretty confusing. Which leads us to a problem, a problem that the disciples point out right after Jesus tells His first story.

Take a look at Matthew 13:1-10 to see how this plays out. Jesus has just told a big crowd a story about a farmer who sowed seeds on a path and rocks and good soil. And then He stops. No tweetable lines about the Kingdom of Heaven, no mind blowing new explanation of the law. I can imagine the disciples looking at each other thinking, “Yeah, and…?” So they ask Jesus why He’s decided to start telling stories instead of, you know, preaching or something…

Now we might be tempted to think that the disciples were a little silly for asking this question. After all, the disciples ask a lot of stupid questions. And this is Jesus we’re talking about. The story’s in the Bible… Of course there’s going to be some spiritual meaning here!

But take your Sunday School Glasses off and actually think about this. Jesus isn’t speaking in a church or a synagogue where it would be expected that He would dive into something super spiritual. He’s teaching to a crowd of people on a beach. Moreover, this is early in Jesus’ ministry. Some in the crowd had probably heard about Jesus and knew what to expect, but I’m sure there were just as many who just wanted to know what all the fuss was about. Either way, it would probably come as a surprise when this usually quite spiritual teacher starts giving farming advice. He gives absolutely no context, merely saying at the end that those who have ears to hear should listen…

No wonder the disciples want to know what His deal is! Why does Jesus think that these kinds of obscure stories are the best way to teach people? And in typical Jesus style, His answer is equally ambiguous:

“Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. This is why I speak to them in parables:

            ‘Though seeing, they do not see;

            Though hearing, they do not hear or understand.’

            . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it” (Matthew 13:11-17).

Did you catch that? Jesus celebrates because the disciples have been given knowledge about the Kingdom of Heaven through story that so many others have missed! He praises the disciples here for having open eyes and ears! And yeah, that might seem a little odd. Jesus usually calls His disciples out for not understanding anything, and the next thing He does is actually explain in detail what the Parable of the Sower is all about. But obviously Jesus sees that His story has awakened some sort of understanding in the disciples, and He’s thrilled!

I’m sure He has a similar thrill when people come to understand one of His parables today too.  The Bible might not give us detailed explanations of every parable, but a reader intent on study and listening to the prodding of the Holy Spirit will slowly come to understand the deeper meaning and call to action in each story. And no, not every parable will have the most obvious interpretation, but this story form makes the message easily accessible to anyone with open heart, mind, and ears.

In short, Jesus placed a high value on His parables! They weren’t just some side project to His main teaching. He saw His parables as equally important to His sermons. It was through stories that people could easily relate to that Jesus revealed the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven. It was here that Jesus showed people how to act, not just told or commanded. And it was through this obscure means of teaching that Jesus said eyes and ears could be opened to even deeper truths.

There is power in stories. This is why people tell stories around campfires, read books, and watch movies. It’s why the most effective Sunday School programs I’ve seen have told stories rather than preached kid friendly sermons. Stories show us things that can’t easily be told, and they have the potential to move, teach, and delight us in ways that no other medium can. Jesus understood the power of story, and He leveraged it to His advantage in His ministry. And I’d love to see more ministries take more advantage of this teaching method too!

As this blog moves forward, parables are bound to come up. They are, after all, some of the more obvious stories in the New Testament. All of the above is the background I’ll be working with when writing my parable lessons from here on out, and hopefully you’ll see it in action on Thursday when I cover the Parable of the Lost Sheep. But for all of you reading this, whether a new reader or old, keep these things in mind too when you read parables for yourself going forward. It might just make parables come to life for you in a way they never have before!

~Brentagious