You'll notice in your bulletins that we are finishing up this mini series within a series on responses to revelation. And the sermon text is numbers 22, 23 and 24. So you can turn in your Bibles there. We will not be going through these chapters expositionally this evening. We have read them already together as a congregation, but we need to consider them all because we're going to consider the prophet Balaam's response to God's revelation or his self-disclosure. This is what this series is about. What we have here is God's revelation in my hand, and we see in this book of Numbers three responses to that revelation. The response of the donkey we covered first. It is a response of deference, of obedience. That is the God-honouring and Christ-exalting response to what God says in His Word. Now, we saw that king's darkness, Balak, a couple of weeks ago. And really, this is an aspect of that darkness as we look at a prophet's deception tonight. Well, again, we need help, don't we, as we want to consider these things. So let us turn to our God and Heavenly Father one more time in prayer and ask His blessing. O God, our Heavenly Father, again we thank you for your most holy word. We ask that you would give us eyes to see your truth, that you would give us ears to hear it, and that you would give us hearts to receive it. We do not want to leave this place of people who are unchanged. We want to leave this place more in love with our Saviour, Jesus Christ. We want to leave this place more conformed to His likeness. And so, Lord, we ask that You would be our Teacher. And Lord, I also want to pray for those who may be self-deceived this evening. I want to pray for those who think that they are in a right relationship with the one triune God, and they are not. May you dispel and do away with that self-deception. May they see who they are before a just and a holy God, and may they flee to Jesus Christ. Lord, we ask that you would grant that. We ask that You would grant that, that You would display Your character in Your mercy, and that You would glorify Your great name and exalt the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ. May Your Holy Spirit be powerfully present in our midst. May He be like He was at creation, brooding over the waters. May He be doing His re-creating work this evening. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I want you to keep your Bibles open. We're going to start off with Numbers 22 and I will read you a verse momentarily, but I want to relate a situation that I encountered several years ago. We were at Port Perry Baptist Church at the time and we were in the midst of a missions conference and we gathered part of the missions conference. It spread throughout the entire weekend and we were invited to a breakfast. I noticed as I was sitting at a table, there was an imam there. a Muslim cleric. He was dressed in full Muslim garb. He had the beard, everything. And he sat down at one of the tables and I watched him very closely. He did not partake in any of the fare that we had that morning. And then to my utter shock, we were led out of the breakfast room, out of the gymnasium where we were eating, into another room where this imam was going to basically tell us of the falsehood of Christianity the corruption of Christianity, the corruption of the gospel of Jesus Christ, particularly by the Apostle Paul. I'm thinking to myself at this time, boy, the missions committee is really taking a chance with this. This is rather dangerous. And so we filed into this room and the room was a big Sunday school room, but there was a partition that was erected in the middle and the ladies were led in one side out of sight of the imam, but they were within earshot where they could hear and the men were seated right before him. And so we all kneeled down and he kneeled on his carpet. And he started speaking very confidently about the corruption of our scriptures, how they have been twisted over generations. And then he spoke about the notorious Apostle Paul and how he corrupted the gospel of Jesus Christ. At this point, I'm thinking this is a mistake. What is this guy doing? I'm starting to think, is he for real? And other people were getting very agitated as well. One of the fellows wanted to get up there and just take a shot at the guy. And he continued to answer question after question very calmly, very confidently in this Far Eastern accent. And finally, to our great relief, his countenance changed and his accent changed and he revealed that he was a Canadian. That he had been a Christian missionary in Pakistan for many years. And though he gave all the external evidence of being a real Muslim, he was a fake. He was a fraud. But I can tell you this, I will never forget what he said. The impact was so great. I want us to hold that story in our minds as we finish our look at responses to God's revelation with an examination of this prophet. Very interesting character. Now, some of you may have wondered, why am I doing man's responses to God's revelation in three parts? After all, preacher, aren't there only two responses to God's revelation? That is correct. There are only two. There is only that response of deference or obedience or of darkness, which leads to rejection. Only acceptance and only rejection of God's revelation. There is no middle ground of response. However, there is one aspect of rejection or darkness that I think we need to look at. And I feel compelled to do so because it is so, so prevalent in our day. And that aspect of rejection is deception. Deception. And we see this response so clearly in the life of this pagan prophet, Balaam. Again, I've said he is one of the most interesting characters in the Bible. I want to introduce you to him as we start. This is a mini-biography of Balaam, son of Beor. Don't you find these names amusing? A lot of them rhyme, a lot of them start with Bs. It's amusing as you read through the text. Notwithstanding that, where was he from? He was way far from the east. He lived on the Euphrates River in the town of Pithor. Now, there was another town, Mari, just down the river. It is said through archaeological excavation that they excavated what was found to be a temple of these prophets that basically did their trade in much the same way that Balaam did. These cultic practices, they were engaged in exactly the same thing. You will remember that Balaam was a pagan soothsayer. He was a prophet. He was a magician for hire. And that is why Balak summoned him, the king of Moab. His fame was well known. We don't just read about him in the biblical texts. In fact, as recently as 1967 in Deir el-Azhar, Jordan, they excavated a hitherto unknown prophecy of Balaam, showing that even 500 years after he was killed, his fame still resonated in the Middle East. Now, you'll remember his assignment. He was hired by Balak. Israel is at the cusp of getting into the Promised Land. Balak, king of Moab, doesn't like this, and so he hires this prophet to pronounce a curse upon Israel. But what does God do? He superintends. He intervenes. And he causes Balaam to pronounce not a curse, but a blessing upon the people. And then comes his death. We read about that in Numbers 31, verse 8. And interestingly, at the hands of the Israelites. Now, if you're like me and you're reading through these chapters, Balaam is a little bit of an enigma, isn't he? He's a little bit of a mystery. Was he a believer? Or was he an unbeliever? When you read the narrative, Balaam appears on the surface to be a saint, doesn't he? I want you to hear these words from his first oracle. You don't need to turn here, but from Numbers 23, verse 10, he says, let me die the death of the righteous and may my end be like theirs. Sounds pretty good, doesn't it? Sounds pretty good. However, we see throughout the Bible, whenever Balaam is referred to, he is referred to as one who is false before God. He is false. And therefore, his response to God's revelation is not one of acceptance, but one of rejection. One of deception. There's a solemn warning for us here. We too can outwardly accept, yet inwardly reject the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And you will recall, that is how I want us to remember or reflect on what God's revelation is. Predominantly, primarily, that it is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We can fool those around us. We can even fool ourselves in regards to accepting what Jesus Christ has done. Really, the story of Balaam dovetails very well with what we are looking at in the epistle of James. We are looking at authentic Christianity. Balaam here is inauthentic, so I want to view him as a case study for what we're looking at in the mornings. And what I'd like to do is I want to expose him as a fraud that any deception that prevails in our hearts might be done away with by the Spirit of God's grace. And we're going to be doing that by examining three relationships of this prophet through these chapters. And we're going to note the difference between, first of all, sentiment and desire in Balaam's relationship with the world. Secondly, we're going to note his profession and bent in his relationship to sin. And finally, we're going to notice the difference between his claim and reality in his relationship to God. Well, first of all, Balaam's relationship to the world. Look at his outward sentiment in Numbers 22, verse 18. Now I want to hear the pages starting to flip. You'll recall Balak sends a whole bunch of Moabite dignitaries to impress Balaam and coax him to come and pronounce this curse upon Israel. And you'll recall Balaam's prior response in verse 12. He says basically, get out of here, take a hike. And in consequence, what King Balaam does is he sweetens the pot. He gets even more important guys to travel all the way to the Euphrates River and entice Balaam to curse Israel. But what does Balaam do? He answers them. Even here in verse 18, even if Balaam gave me his palace filled with silver and gold, I could not do anything great or small to go beyond the command of the Lord my God. He went on to state pretty much the same thing after his third oracle in chapter 24, verse 13. His outward sentiment is obvious and it is consistent. You're going to hear some sarcasm in this sermon. This was a man of principle. He was a man of honor and he was repulsed by filthy lucre. He was incensed at the thought of being bought by money. His allegiance was to those things that were eternal. Now, if you do not detect my sarcasm, it was there. What an uncompromising man who shunned the treasures of this world, right? Wrong. Wrong. I want us to notice his deception and the inconsistency between his outward sentiment and where his inward desires were. Look at verse 19 in chapter 22. He says to the dignitaries, now stay here tonight as the others did, and I will find out what else the Lord will tell me. Did you get that? Interesting, right? He knew what God's command was. Don't have anything to do with these dignitaries. I have devised to bless this people. They are my chosen ones. Send them away. What does Balaam tell them? Hold on a moment. Let me go seek the counsel of God once again. Just in case. Rather than simply obeying God's command to not accompany them, Balaam sought the counsel of God. Why did he do that? I'll tell you why. Because his allegiance was to the world. Particularly, his inward desire was for wealth, and that desire urged him forward. We're given a hint of Balaam's true desire if you look at chapter 22, verse 22, in the very fact that though God permitted him to go with these Moabite dignitaries, he was angry when he went. Why? Because his motives were not right. He had designed within his heart to oppose what God had told him to do, or would tell him to do. He was going there for the money. In fact, Gordon Wenham says, and he's a New Testament common or an Old Testament commentator rather, he says the constant harping on money matters might suggest that Balaam's apparent indifference was really an oblique demand for a huge fee. were also given the testimony of the Scriptures as to Balaam's true desire. He is condemned throughout the New Testament. He was a man of greed. He was a man of the world. Second Peter 2 15 in the middle of that chapter where Peter is condemning false prophets and saying you should have nothing to do with them. He has these words. They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam, son of Beor, who loved the wages of wickedness." It puts you in mind of many of the things that we see on TV, doesn't it? False prophets abound. Not only in ancient Israel. But today, Jude 1.11 picks up the theme. Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain, these false teachers. They have what? They have rushed for profit into Balaam's error. They have been destroyed in Korah's rebellion. And we need to hear this well. Inward desires will eventually unveil the trueness of our sentiments, or we can keep a cap on them in our own strength for a long, long while. But, but, we will naturally be drawn to act in line with who our true master is. If we are of God, we'll be drawn to pursue the things of God. If we are of the world, we'll be drawn to pursue the things of the world. Understand what is happening here in this man. Balaam desired the world and his desires made his sentiments an absolute sham. It didn't matter what he said outwardly. What does the relationship between our sentiments and the trueness of our desires in the deepest part of our hearts tell us? Is there a consistency between our sentiment and our desire, or is there an inconsistency? Matthew 6, verse 24, Jesus says, no one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot love God and what? Money. Money. Well, let's move on. Balaam's relationship to the world is very clear. What about Balaam's relationship to sin. I want us to move from profession, his outward profession to his inward bent. First of all, in his outward profession, we see an adherence to righteousness. We saw this in verse 18. Now we're going to look at several verses here. We note his firm declaration there to only speak and to do what God says. Did you notice that? Move on to verse 38 and see what he says there. Well, I have come to you now, Balaam replied, but can I say just anything? I must speak only what God puts in my mouth. Turn to chapter 23 in verse 12. I want to use the ESV here, the English Standard Version. Shows a diligence here. And he answered and said, must I not take care to speak what the Lord puts in my mouth? There's a diligence there. There is a carefulness that he is wanting to convey to Balak. Down to v. 26 of chapter 23, Balaam answered, did I not tell you I must do whatever the Lord says? And then in chapter 24 v. 13, Even if Balak gave me his palace filled with silver and gold, I could not do anything of my own accord, good or bad, to go beyond the command of the Lord. And I must say only what the Lord says. His outward profession was an adherence to righteousness, to doing only and saying only what God told him to do and told him to say. Look at chapter 22, verse 34. Notice also in his outward profession, in his relationship to sin, that he has an aversion to it, at least an apparent aversion to sin. After God opened Balaam's eyes, remember the donkey's eyes were opened first, to see the angel of the Lord standing in the way, what does Balaam say? He goes, 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." What a pious man. Pious man. What an adherence to righteousness. What an aversion to sin. We see the confession there. What a holy contrite man who shuns sin. A man after God's own heart, right? Well, you know the answer. You know where I'm going, right? Wrong. I want us to observe the deception and the inconsistency between his outward profession and his inward bent. Now, fast forward to chapter 31, verse 18. We'll be looking at some of the intervening chapters in the coming weeks, Lord willing. In chapter 25, we witness the heresy, or at least we will witness the heresy of the Israelites at Peor. But to summarize it briefly, what happened there, the Israelite men were seduced by Moab to have sexual intimacy with the women of the land. Now, it's interesting. Do you know who instigated that? Do you know who instigated that? It wasn't King Balak. He wasn't very bright. We saw that a couple of weeks ago. He was the king of darkness. The Bible states that it was Balaam, son of Beor, who instigated it. We read in chapter 31, verse 18, they were the ones, speaking of the women, who followed Balaam's advice and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the Lord in what happened at Peor so that a plague struck the Lord's people. In fact, in the letter to the church in Pergamum, if we can fast forward right to the book of Revelation, we find this fact reinforced in Revelation 2, verse 14. Nevertheless, I have a few things against you. You have people there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin by eating food, sacrifice to idols, and by committing sexual immorality. Balaam had led the people of God into gross sin. When we see in chapter 25 that Balak went his own way and Balaam seemingly went back to the Euphrates, he was not done with the Israelites yet. He was clever, really. Really, he was clever. He couldn't pronounce a curse upon their bodies, so he went after their souls. That is what he did. And he did so because that was his inward bent. Balaam loved sin and he loved to entice others to sin. Do you see the incongruity between His outward profession, His adherence to righteousness, His aversion to sin, but deep down in His heart, His bent was for sin. He loved it, and He loved to bring others into it. Charles Simeon says, now compare his inward bent with all his professions of reverence for God, of regard for holiness, and of his desire for everlasting happiness, and what an astonishing inconsistency will appear. Well, what do we make then? What do we make of his adherence to righteousness? And I want to put ourselves in the text that we may prove our profession as possession and true. He was the one who said that he would only do what the Lord told him to do and only say what the Lord would tell him to say. John Calvin calls it was just a parade of obedience. It was for effect. That's all it was. Again, Gordon Wenham says the repeated statements that Balaam will declare only the word that God puts in his mouth may be intended to emphasize the inspiration of his oracles rather than the holiness of his character. What do we make of his aversion to sin? And this is so important. We are not to offer false confessions. We are not to come before Almighty God. pleading the merits of Jesus Christ just as a means of fire insurance that we can put in our pocket. Do you know why he confessed sin there? Because he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way with drawn sword. He saw judgment coming. And yes, we need to preach judgment, but there must, there must, there must be a brokenness for sin. And there was not. With Balaam, he had his hand caught in the cookie jar. That's all that was happening there. Momentary, momentary conviction. Look at verse thirty four of chapter twenty two. His confession was only in the light of impending punishment. I did not realize you were standing in the road to oppose me. He wanted to avoid the sword and was sorry that he got caught. Balaam's outward professions are unveiled as a sham by his inward bent. He taught others how to sin. Now, someone may ask here, how is it possible for one to profess so many truths and be rotten to the core? How is it possible for somebody to raise a family and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ for many years and still be rotten to the core? Is this just an isolated incident? Unfortunately, it is not. I want to answer that question by means of an illustration. Actually, a quote. I want you to tell me what you think of the quote, first of all. Listen closely. I'll read it twice. Christianity does not remove you from the world and its problems. It makes you fit to live in it triumphantly and usefully. Let me read it again. Christianity does not remove you from the world and its problems. It makes you fit to live in it triumphantly and usefully. What do you think of that quote? Good or bad? Give it to me. What do you think of it? Not a trick question. Did you like it? Oh, you're scared. I promise you it's not a trick question. It's a good quote, isn't it? Great quote. Excellent saying. It's so true. It's so biblical. It is of God. Do you know who spoke it? Have you ever heard of Charles Templeton? Canadian, I'm ashamed to say. He accompanied Billy Graham on many of his earlier crusades. He was the means of winning many sinners to Jesus Christ. He proclaimed an adherence to righteousness and an aversion to sin in the Gospel that he proclaimed. And yet, at the end of his days, he became an agnostic. That just means he doesn't know whether there's a God or not. He denied the Christ of the Bible. And what he did when he wrote that book, Farewell to God, is he led others into the same sin. It is possible, my friends, It is possible to live a life that is just a sham. The fact that we speak and profess God's words, it means nothing. God can use anyone as His spokesman. Our inward bent will eventually unveil the truth of any outward profession. If we are lost in sin, we will naturally gravitate to do those things that are sinful and encourage others to sin. Speaking of deceptive and false prophets, the Apostle Peter writes in 2 Peter 2, verses 21 and 22, of them the Proverbs are true. A dog returns to its vomit and a sow that is washed goes back to her wallowing in the mud. What does our bent Tell us about our profession. When we leave these hallowed walls, when we leave this sanctuary, when we live our lives throughout the week, do we go back to the mud? Are we like a dog who returns to its vomit? Not pretty pictures, are they? We need to ask ourselves, do we have a bent to shun sin or do we have a bent to court righteousness? And if we have a bent to do the latter, that means we have been regenerated by the Spirit of Almighty God and that we are in a saving relationship with Jesus Christ truly. What do you love? What do you love? Balaam loved sin. We'll look at, finally, Balaam's relationship to God. Again, let's look at chapter 22, verse 18, and see his outward claim. Balaam answered these dignitaries, even if Balak gave me his palace filled with silver and gold, I could not do anything great or small to go beyond the command of the Lord What? My God. Possessive pronoun there. Very interesting. Balaam claimed to the Moabite leaders to have a relationship with the one true God of the universe. Not only of Israel. The Lord, my God. You notice also he uses God's covenant name, the Lord. You'll see that in most of your texts as capitalized. In fact, if you'll remember what we have read before, Balaam even laid claim to know the Lord's Christ. Remember that? Look again at chapter 24 and verse 17. Balaam says, 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. He saw the Lord's Christ. Oh, here was a man who clearly was on intimate terms with the triune God. He foresaw his coming kingdom and king who would reign in righteousness. And he looked forward in eager expectation to them both. Right? That was sarcasm again. Wrong. wrong, and I want us to witness here finally the deception and the inconsistency between his outward claim and his inward reality. And this really speaks to what James has been writing the scattered Christians in his epistle. Look at God's response in verse 20 of chapter 22, simply put. His inward reality, he did not know God. He didn't know Him. And there are three evidences that I want to draw your attention to. The first one is found in verse 20. We've seen that Balaam approached God as his Lord. But look at how the covenant God of Israel responded to him. That night God came to Balaam and said, since these men have come to summon you, go with them, but do only what I tell you. Did you get it there? How did God respond? That night God came to Balaam and said, since these men have come to summon you, go with them, but do only what I tell you. Two verses previous to that, He calls God, My Lord. But how does God respond back to this pagan prophet? This prophet of presumption? He does not use His covenant name, does He? He uses the word God. Not the covenant name. God communicated with this pagan prophet, but consistently used the word God when He responded to him. It is as if he was saying to Balaam, there is no covenant relationship between you and I. Recognize that. I am addressing you as God, but not as covenant Lord. No covenant relationship. We see that in God's response. Balaam, no matter what he professed, he did not know God. And how do we know that? We know it from God's own pronouncement back to this pagan prophet. The covenant name is not used. Let's move on to God's pronouncement. Look at verse 32. The angel of the Lord's pronouncement regarding the road that Balaam was on. The angel of the Lord asked him, why have you beaten your donkey these three times? I have come here to oppose you because your path is a reckless one before me. That word reckless. I think it is only used once in the Old Testament. Interesting word. It means your path, Balaam, is one that is perverse. It is absolutely contrary to the path that children of God are reborn to tread upon. Balaam was rushing headlong into oblivion and certain destruction. And this is not the path of one who is in a saving relationship with God. That is God's pronouncement. And that is Balaam's reality. And sadly, we see the judgment of God in chapter 31, verse 8. We observe God's vengeance upon the Midianites for the seduction of the Israelites at Peor. And along with those Midianites is who? Balaam, son of Beor. Under God's just condemnation. Under God's judgment. Dear professing friends, I implore you to see the inconsistency that is here between Balaam's outward claim and his inward reality. And I will ask you, are you involved in the self? Same deception. Are you playing the same game? Have we truly experienced the mercy of God firsthand? Can we really say with Thomas, my Lord and my God, Does His Spirit live in our hearts? Understand that claiming to know God and actually knowing God, they are two different things. And do not be like the self-deceived fool who on the day of judgment will be shocked to hear our Savior's words, I will tell them plainly, I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers. This is serious, serious business. Do you see how empty it can be to say, as Balaam said, let me die the death of the righteous and may my end be like theirs when one does not produce the fruit of righteousness before that end comes. What use is our knowledge of man's duty before God when we don't practice that duty before God? What use is our view of judgment when we make no effort to prepare for that judgment? What use is our knowledge of God when by His grace our hearts have been taught to fear Him? What use is our view of Christ when we do not love Jesus above all other things? I'll tell you what use it is. It is of no use whatsoever. It is evidence that our response to God's revelation is a deception. And, oh, we can pretend to fool those that are around us. But we can't. We can't. We can't fool God. We can be good at speaking Christianese. We can be adept at playing the part of a pious believer. But we can't fool Him. We can't fool Him. Oh, I want to conclude with a few sobering questions. I know this isn't the sort of sermon that is uplifting, but is the sort of sermon that is absolutely necessary. So take these things to heart. What is your relationship to the world? Do we esteem in our heart that our treasure is not here, but it is in heaven? And the treasures that we have there are far above anything that we can procure and acquire in this world. What is our relationship to sin? Do we hate it? Do we shun it? And do we follow hard after Christ in holiness, encouraging others to follow in His train, in His footsteps? And what is our relationship to God? What is it? Is He our inner delight? Is He our passion? Is He our joy? I'll examine these relationships, put off deception, and put on the only God-glorifying response to His Gospel, and that is in acceptance, the repentance of your sins, and fleeing to Jesus Christ in faith, trusting in His merits alone. Let us pray. O our God, we know that these narratives and stories in the Old Testament are for our benefit. They often act as a mirror. Lord, I pray that in this life of this pagan man, this unregenerate man, I pray that if someone is in the sin of deception, even this night, that they think they are in the narrow way and they have never come to faith in Jesus Christ. They have never come through the wicket gate as John Bunyan said. I pray that if they are self-deceived, that you would dispel that self-deception and that they would cast themselves on the mercy of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. And Lord, for those of us who love You, we know there are inconsistencies in our own heart. We pray for Your grace. Again, we pray that we would not lay up treasures on this earth, but we would lay up treasure in heaven. I pray that we would be those who are holy. And I would seek after righteousness. And I pray that our love for You would grow exponentially day by day. As we search your word, as we understand what your will is for us, and as we live out that will before this society that is dying and this world that is lost in sin, use us. Use us, we pray, for the honor and glory of Jesus Christ, we would ask it. Amen.