Introduction
- Some names are proverbial for evil.
- Exx. Jezebel - Babylon - Cain
- So is Balaam in the Bible.
So Peter here, like Jude, mentions him as a prime example of a wicked man.
BALAAM WAS A WORSE MAN THAN WE MAY THINK
* There were good points about Balaam:
- He was a prophet (Numbers 22 - 25 (4 chapters)
- beautiful words - ex. Numbers 23:19/23
- but he was a bad man
OBSERVE: Common grace was all he had. - He spoke of Christ:
- Numbers 24:17 - the glorious Saviour
- a 'STAR' - later 'SUN of righteousness'
APPLICATION: Godless men may use pious words. - He said some memorable words
- Numbers 22:8 - excellent words, but!
- Numbers 22:30
APPLICATION: He looks like a saint!
* But for all that, he was a Bad Man:
- He forsook the right way
- He craftily found a way to curse God's people (Explain).
- He knew the right way and forsook it.
- He wanted unrighteous wages
- to be well paid for his sin
- the sin was to curse God's people
- He found a way to curse God's people
- Balak was afraid of Israel
- so Balaam ruined Israel by a devilish trick
APPLICATION: Beware of Satan's craft.
HIS WICKEDNESS WAS REBUKED BY A DUMB ASS
* The narrative in Numbers 22:21f
- Why Balaam wanted to go
- his mind knew what God said but his heart loved the money offered.
APPLICATION: We only go straight after conversion.
- What Balaam feared to lose
- the large sum of money
- he wanted to be a millionaire
APPLICATION: So do many people today.
- How God gave him mercy
- the angel was there to kill him
- but the ass had more sense
APPLICATION: Sin makes us worse than beasts
- The blindness of Balaam
- he did not see the angel
- sin blinds us and deceives us
APPLICATION: How near death is us all!
- The voice of the ass!
- Numbers 22:23, 30
- The angel appears to Balaam
APPLICATION: If only people listened to God's voice.
- Balaam's sin not cured
- he got a warning
- but he still went on!
APPLICATION: To ignore God's voice is to go on to destruction in the end.
THE LESSONS WE LEARN FROM BALAAM
* It is called "madness" - why "mad"?
- It is madness to love money
- This offered him by Balak as reward
- But money should never be our God
APPLICATION: Have you got money as your God?
- It is madness to forsake God's way
- God's way = that of faith/holiness/love
- the Ten Commandments as our rule
ILLUSTRATION: Adam - Judas. Where did it get them?
APPLICATION: It is sad when people forsake God.
- It is madness to harm God's people
- he played a wicked trick on them
- God's people can be deceived by evil
- when they are, they suffer great loss
APPLICATION: That is why we must love both God and His people.
Do you?
- It is madness to ignore God's warnings
- the "dumb ass" - what a lesson!
- but Balaam ignored the warning
- in the end, he perished
APPLICATION: Ignore the Gospel - and you perish.
CONCLUSION
So like Judas, who was
- warned by Christ
- covetous and so perished
See Acts 1.