Title: GOD’S DEALINGS WITH A “CROOKED STICK”

Focus: Through his dealings with Balaam—a “crooked stick” and enemy of God’s people—God warns, comforts, and encourages us.

Function: To encourage the people to face each day with the realization that the devil is prowling around to devour Christians, and to draw comfort and encouragement from God’s dealings with Balaam and Israel.

Text: Numbers 22:21-38

A true story: When I was about 6 years old, my father bought a goat. The goat became the milk supplier of our family. Every night my father milked the goat, and I was his loyal partner, watching my father’s dealings with the goat.

Something remarkable and puzzling always happened as I watched. When my father milked the goat, the goat would often turn its head toward my dad’s ear and lick his ear. My dad’s face ended up against the goat’s ear. And that’s when it began: according to my father, the goat was telling my father all kinds of things about me. And the goat had all kinds of advice for me. It was amazing (and a bit scary) how much that goat knew about me.

Of course, I questioned these father-goat “conversations.” So my Dad invited me to milk the goat and try to have a conversation with the goat. Well, it did not work. The moment I sat down on the stool and began to milk the goat, the goat moved away from me. But when my Dad took over and began milking, the goat turned its head again and licked my Dad’s ear and “told” my Dad that I was too young to milk goats.

I’m telling you a true story, but surely it is unlike the story of Balaam and his donkey. My father was playing a game with me and somehow the goat got into the act as well. But I was not witnessing a true miracle in my father’s barn.

With Balaam, however, we are dealing with a miracle from God. For God uses Balaam’s donkey to knock some sense into Balaam’s head. Balaam, you see, is a “crooked stick” and an enemy of God’s people. And through his dealings with Balaam, God warns, comforts and encourages the church today.

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Let’s begin with Balaam—the man. Who is he? What is he about? Balaam, it appears, is familiar with witchcraft or sorcery in the Middle East. He dabbles with the powers of darkness, with gods or evil spirits; he is in cohorts with these gods.

Balaam bends the powers of evil to advance his own name and reputation among the nations. For Balaam will pronounce curses upon people for a fee—mind you. And the evil powers blind the minds of the people and terrify them in their hearts. Thus the powers of darkness continue to have a hold upon the nations, and Balaam grows wealthy and famous as he manipulates the gods. The devil uses him to prowl around to devour God’s people; and Balaam uses the devil to fatten his own pocket book. Balaam is a first class shyster—a crooked stick.

Here is the remarkable thing: God uses Balaam in his service. When the Moabites and Ammonites call upon Balaam to pronounce curses upon the Israelites (so that they may be defeated militarily as the Israelites are spiritually paralyzed or bound by the curses), the angel of the Lord seeks out Balaam. And God made it clear to Balaam that Balaam can only pronounce those things upon the Israelites that God has laid upon Balaam’s lip.

This, of course, means that Balaam will incur the wrath of the Moabites and Ammonites. After all, they are willing to pay him handsomely for pronouncing curses. But God made it clear to Balaam that he must bless the Israelites. This is a situation Balaam does not like and has never encountered before. Whereas in his dealings with the powers of evil, Balaam is always able to bend these powers to his own advantage, Balaam is unable to bend or manipulate the God of Israel to advance his own pocketbook and reputation. Israel’s God has Balaam in his lock. And God has warned Balaam not to manipulate this situation and go against the wishes of God.

Balaam’s professional career is at stake, and Balaam is somehow hoping that Israel’s God will change his mind, loosen his grip on Balaam, and let Balaam get away with obliging the wishes of the Moabites and Ammonites to curse these Israelites and teach them a lesson. And thus we find Balaam sitting on his donkey, brooding and scheming a way to manipulate the express will of Israel’s God to Balaam’s own advantage. And that’s when Balaam’s ass begins to act up.

The donkey sees the angel of the Lord blocking its road; Balaam is blind. He does not see the wrath of God expressed by the angel of the Lord with a drawn sword in his hand. The donkey turned off the road into a field; Balaam beats the donkey; the donkey presses close to a wall, crushing Balaam’s foot against it. Balaam beats the tar out of the donkey. Then the donkey—seeing no way out, or back, or forward—lies down. Balaam beats his donkey with his staff. Then the angel of the Lord opens the mouth of the donkey, and the donkey speaks to Balaam: “What have I done to you to make you beat me these three times?” Thus we see God dealing with this “crooked stick” and enemy of the Israelites.

Now what is happening here? Well, God is using Balaam for his own purposes; God is also searching Balaam’s heart, and what God sees there—a brooding, manipulating, conniving, yes evil spirit—leads him to express his wrath to Balaam.

God uses Balaam’s donkey to shame Balaam. God calls Balaam NOT to undermine God’s wish to speak only what God puts upon Balaam’s lips. It is only after God chides Balaam through his talking donkey, that God removes the blinders from Balaam’s eyes. And thus we read: “Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the road with his sword drawn. So (Balaam) bowed low and fell facedown.”

And the Lord exposes Balaam’s reckless thoughts and conniving heart, saying: “I have come here to oppose you because your path is a reckless one before me. The donkey saw me and turned away from me these three times. If she had not turned away, I would certainly have killed you by now, but I would have spared her.” You see? God is bringing Balaam to his senses and he warns Balaam to repent from his evil conniving.

In response, Balaam says to the angel of the Lord: “I have sinned. I did not realize you were standing in the road to oppose me. Now if you are displeased, I will go back. The angel of the Lord (however) said to Balaam: ‘Go with the men, but speak only what I tell you.” God brings this “crooked stick” and enemy of his people to his knees. It is NOT Balaam who manipulates this God of Israel; rather, it is Yahweh, the Lord who has bound Balaam to do his bidding.

What, then, is that bidding or mission of the Lord? Do you remember the promise of God to Abraham—a promise that concerns all the nations of the world? “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” That’s the covenant promise to Abraham—and to the nations of the world.

Now think! That promise came to Abraham and his descendants. But now that the Israelites are on the verge of entering the Promised Land and inherit God’s blessing, the nations become aware of God’s favor toward his people, the Israelites, and toward all who bless God’s people.

In fact, the nations now hear that Israel will become a blessing to the nations of the world. How do they hear that good news? By way of God’s dealings with Balaam, his donkey, and the Moabites and Ammonites. By way of a sorcerer, by way of a donkey, and by way of a hostile act toward Israel, God trumpets to the entire known world good news for those who bless God’s people and who look for a blessing from God’s people Israel.

That blessing will be announced a little later, when Balaam speaks his fourth oracle over Israel: “I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near. A star will come out of Jacob; a scepter will rise out of Israel.” That star is the Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, the One who brings the blessing of eternal life on a restored creation to all who turn to him and join the people of God. Thus we see that God draws a straight line from Moses to the Promised Land to Jesus and to us today and to the restored creation. God uses this “crooked stick” called Balaam to draw the straight line of promised salvation and blessing to his people.

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But there is more. Some may think that these O.T. stories are obscure and therefore irrelevant to our postmodern lifestyle today. But these stories announce good news; these stories have the power to keep us on the straight and narrow road of Christian discipleship.

For example, through his dealings with Balaam, God warns us today. There are many people today, also in the church, who try to manipulate God to their own advantage. So called “evangelists” and religious leaders who promise healing by selling “blessed-over” prayer cloths to gullible Christians and viewers come to mind. In the 16^th century, Christians protested the selling of indulgences. Today, religious shysters (claiming to speak for God) are selling a health and wealth gospel, thus prostituting the Bible’s teaching—only to advance their own prestige, fame, and pocketbook. As God warned Balaam, so he warns us today by means of Balaam’s donkey.

Today, the church of Christ is under attack by all kinds of people who hate the Christ, who can’t stand Christians, and who would love to see the church vanish from culture and from the public square. Thus they promote secularism, atheism, and relativism; thus they seek to impose immoral values and vices upon us by way of textbooks, by way of laws and by way of political correct speech.

Woe the church that wishes to speak out against the practice of homosexuality! Woe the Christian who objects to obscene speech and pornographic display in public and in movies or music! Woe the Christian who tries to promote the right to life and opposes abortion on demand! Woe any Christian who dares to call others to repentance from sinful and immoral ways!

Today, however, God says to us through his dealings with Balaam: “Woe to you when you harm the church! Woe to you when you pervert her message of good news! Woe to you who seeks to persecute and destroy my people.” God warns us all today! God will bless those who bless his people; God will curse those who curse the church of God.

Secondly, through his dealings with Balaam, God comforts us today. Remember now that God’s people are totally oblivious as to what’s happening behind their backs: The Israelites are resting by the Jordan, near the city of Jericho. They are eager to inherit the Promised Land. They are unaware, however, of what Balak, the King of Moab, is doing; They are unaware that a world-renowned sorcerer is on his way, bent on making a buck and advancing his reputation by pronouncing curses upon them, so that they become spiritually paralyzed or bound and thus vulnerable to military attack by Moabites and Ammorites.

The devil—through Balaam and Balak—is on the prowl to devour God’s people. They are oblivious to the danger. But not our God! God protects his people. He watches their backs; he shields us as we live under his umbrella of covenant promises and love. In Jesus Christ, we find union with God’s Spirit and protection by God’s grace. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus—not sickness, not death—nor the powers of evil and death itself. Thus God comforts us as we embrace and enter the story of God’s dealings with this “crooked stick” called Balaam.

One more thing! Through his dealings with Balaam, God also encourages us to carry on in our Christian walk today. Sometimes, you and I may feel abandoned and alone—bumping into a wall of unbelief and secularism. If you take your relationship with Christ and the Christian faith seriously, you are always going against culture, against the grain of popular opinion, and against the latest fad that promises happiness and personal pleasure today.

Perhaps, you get tired of “being the Christian oddball at work or at school.” Perhaps you are tempted to “shuck it all” and follow your own desires.

Thousands have left the church in recent decades for other gods. Today, God warns us, comforts us, and encourages us to remain faithful. God reminds us that in Christ Jesus we are not alone; God does not abandon us; in fact, God is looking out for us.

Thus we are left with one question: are we looking up to God and his Word to take our cues for life?

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.