Some years ago, I was invited to join a group of ardent church attendees who had a plan to form a large worship team. The plan was that this mega worship team, comprised of worship leaders and others, who could hold a tune, from various congregations, would perform at church functions and events.
A meeting was held via zoom to flesh out this brilliant plan, however, as I listened to speaker after speaker, not once did I hear the mention of God; not Father, nor Son, neither Holy Spirit – it was “Well I this” and “When I that” and me and my and us and we. My spirit did a summersault into a leap, nailed the landing and I excused myself. I have neither seen nor heard of this mega worship group performing at any church events.
Then they said, “Come,
let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the sky, and so make a name for ourselves; -
Genesis 11:4 (NABRE)
The mega worship group reminded me of the tower builders whose
primary motive was to make a name for themselves; the focus was never about the
true worship of God but purely about self-exaltation, a biproduct of pride.
This tower building incident, for those who may not know, occurred
when the descendants of Noah were migrating east after the flood. As Genesis
11:2 tells us,
they found a valley in the
land of Shinar and settled there.
Here, they consciously made a group decision to build a tower with the intended purpose of becoming like God. Reminds you of someone? Lucifer perhaps? His ambition was to ascend above the heights of the clouds; [to be] like the most High. (see Isaiah 14:12-14 KJV) The same goal as these valley settlers.
But why though? They had received specific instructions long
before they found this valley in Shinar. In Genesis 9:1 (KJV) we read,
And God blessed Noah and his
sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
Okay so from the jump, these descendants were operating from
the point of disobedience; God had already told them to replenish the earth.
How are you to fill the earth when you decide to settle in just one area?
Even after the flood, Noah’s descendants still turned out to
be rebellious toward God; it’s not like they weren’t aware of the reason for
the flood. That story, their story, would have been passed down from father to
son to son. Proof of their knowledge is in the continuation of Genesis 11:4 in which
they said,
…so that we won’t be
dispersed over all the earth
They hadn’t forgotten; this was deliberate disobedience. They chose not to spread out all over the earth but cluster in a valley instead. Their rebellion was intentional.
How many times have you heard from God and intentionally decide to do things your own way?
Now, these people were united, and God calls for unity but if
it is not aligned with His will, rebellion against Him will certainly be the
result.
According to Genesis 11, in those days after the flood,
everyone spoke one language which enabled unified communication – in other
words they were all on the same page. However, this single language-same
culture-one page living prompted a misuse of that unity.
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Together, they attempted to attain godlike status – like the serpent’s lure to Eve in Genesis 3:5. Their attempt was thwarted by God Himself who frustrated their plan by not only confusing their single language by mixing it up good, He annihilated the tower and scattered the people, so they could no longer cooperate with, relate to or understand each other.
God utterly and completely destroyed their ability to communicate
with each other through language. Unable to babble, that tower became known as
the Tower of Babel – “Bab-El” translated “gate of God” appropriately highlights
their misguided intentions.
Beloved, you need to understand,
The Lord of
heavenly forces has created a plan; who can stop it? God’s hand is extended; who
will stop it? – Isaiah 14:27
(CEB) (see Job 42:2)
Just as their disobedience and pride called for God’s
intervention, ours will too. God’s people must unite but always with the right
motives and intentions.
How many times have you either witnessed or been involved
with a group of churchgoers whose plans fall apart before they even get off
the ground or if the plans do come to fruition everything goes terribly wrong?
Many years later, God in His mercy, reversed the effects of that
time. The descendants of Noah, from whom we all descend, were divided due to
the language barrier but then something incredible happened.
Acts chapter 2, there’s another gathering of people, described as a multitude and all together in one place. Not scattered but clustered in Jerusalem, not to make a name for themselves, or ascend above the heights of the clouds, they have all united for one purpose – to worship God and sacrifice to Him. It was the Day of Pentecost.
It was the day of the promised outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
The day that flames of fire alighted upon those gathered in the entire house
and…
They were all filled with the
Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit enabled them to
speak. (v 4 CEB)
And verse 6,
They were mystified because
everyone heard them speaking in their native languages
Beloved, have you experienced something that had a
particular effect or outcome, then it was miraculously reversed?
That Day of Pentecost, God was reversing Babel. It was God’s
miraculous provision of grace, in that, those “divided tongues” was a new
language. Just as varying tongues were distributed in Shinar as punishment, new
tongues were distributed on the Day of Pentecost as a gift.
On that day, language barriers were broken through the gift
of tongues. The apostles were enabled to unite those gathered by preaching the
Gospel – the Good News of Jesus – in foreign languages.
The reversing of Babel was a healing of unity,
communication, and relations. The curse was broken; understanding was restored that
the in-gathering of the scattered – the journey back to God – could begin.
Very soon we shall gather to commemorate the Day of
Pentecost but our journey on the road to Pentecost will not end, not until we
too have our own Spirit encounter. Spirit lives in our reborn selves but not
all of us have had the pleasure of that broken-barrier experience; we still
have up towers of miscommunication which bar us from understanding Spirit’s language,
but it need not remain that way. Allow Spirit to remove the language barrier so
that you may properly enjoy the Gift that was given by Christ.
Amen †
Shelley Johnson “On the Road to Pentecost: Reversing Babel“ ©
2025 June 2, 2025
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