What will be our Legacy?

Bishop Ray Chamberlain, former Bishop of the Holston Conference, once told a group of us probationary elders that "the future of the church will be decided over biblical interpretation". It is true that the different groups that fight in the church, conservative and liberal, fight because they have a different view of the Scriptures.

This week we are having a class on Biblical Interpreration with Dr. Bill Arnold. The goal of the class is help us interpret the Bible correctly with a view on both testaments and not making it say whatever we want it to say. Today he gave a devotional from Genesis 11 on the story of the tower of Babel. Below is the texts and some of the highlights.


Genesis 11:1-9 Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. 2 And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. 3 And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. 4 Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth." 5 The LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which mortals had built. 6 And the LORD said, "Look, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another's speech." 8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore it was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.

Genesis 1-11 tell us the story of how we were made, what life was like before sin, how sin affects us. In Genesis 1:28 God gave the command for people to "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it". Instead of obeying God and filling the earth, we see here in Genesis 11 the people disobey God, gather together, build a city and make a name for themselves. Interestingly, dr. Arnold indicated that bricks were high technology for that time. Their ancestors could have never done what they were attempting to do. They thought the evolutionary chain had hit its height with them and they would leave a legacy to future generations on how great they were.

In our day and age we have a similar view. We beleive we are more advanced than any previous generation and technology can save us. Every generation thinks it can do great things (see the 60's). We build much higher buildings that Babel. We try to leave legacies so people will remember how great we were.

We as ministers are just as susceptible to this. We try to build legacies and things that will last. Dr. Arnold said today,"We can have a building named after us. But will people remember us in 50 yrs?, 100yrs.?, 500 yrs? 1000? Yrs." Our kingdoms will fade away. But the only lasting contributions are to God’s kingdom, God’s city (Augustine) that will never fade away.

I find it interesting that the only way God could get the people to do what he commanded was to get them to speak different languages. THen they filled the earth.

Another insight I gained today from the text is what the command to Abram was in Genesis 12:1. God commanded him to "Go". Abram obeyed and he went. We read this in Genesis 12:4, "So Abram went, as the LORD had told him". Dr. Arnold said the Hebrew for that phrase is all one word. In other words, Abram went immediately in obedience.

I sometimes think about this in terms of the church in America. In the great commission Jesus told us to go and make disciples of all nations. For the most part that is not happening very well. Now because we won't go, God is bringing the nations to us to America. We can have relationships with Hindus, Muslims, Catholics, etc. even in our small southeastern communities. The question is "will we lift a finger and go to the people God has brought to us?"