Genesis chapter 11 and that's on page 15. I'll begin reading at verse 1. Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As men moved eastward they found a plain and shiner. and settled there. They said to each other, come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly. They used bricks instead of stone and tar for mortar. Then they said, come, let us build ourselves a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth. But the Lord came down. to see the city and the tower men were building. The Lord said, if as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down. Confuse their language so that they will not understand each other. So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth. The word of the Lord. May we pray. Lord help me as I take this familiar story to apply it to our lives today. to bring comfort and encouragement, and also a challenge to speak clearly and concisely. In Jesus' name, amen. Today is Father's Day. I'll reflect on my father, and I'm very grateful for him. I'll never forget when my father called me and told me that I should come home because my mother was having surgery. That was the last time I was ever with my father when he was physically and mentally healthy. We walked and talked and a lot of things, and my mother recovered that surgery. Some years later, my father's congestive heart failure put him in the hospital, and I received a phone call from my first grade teacher, who was very close friends with my mother, and she said to me, you need to come home. I remember the phone conversation I'd had with my mother that Sunday afternoon because I always called my parents on Sunday afternoon. And my mother appeared very confused. And so I used to go to an early Tuesday morning prayer meeting not far from my house. And that morning I said, I need real wisdom because I'm concerned about my parents. So we prayed and when I got to the office, the phone rang and that was Mrs. Chestnut who had been my first grade teacher. So I caught a flight. I got into Myrtle Beach late that night. and she picked me up and dropped me at my mother's house. And it was then, in February of 1983, that I realized my parents were not my parents as I had known them. That's always a profound thing. It's a kind of death. It's like knowing your father and mother are still alive, but now suddenly the roles are changing. And I became the father, and my father and mother became my children, and it became my responsibility to take care of them. I miss my father so often because I think back how wise a man he was, and what a generous and kind man he was with time. Time for me is more precious than money. Time is valuable. You can make more money, but you can't make more time. My father always took the time to make sure that I was where I needed to be, whether it was at youth fellowship on Sunday night at our church or for a practice at our high school for this or that thing. My father always gave me his time, and I remember my father. As I look back, And as I mentioned to the Children and Children's Church, the first empire builder was Nimrod. He was a powerful man. When the Greek word, when the Greek Septuagint was written to translate the Hebrew scriptures, they used the word from which we get the word giant to describe him. He must have been a giant of a man. He was very brilliant. He was very clever and he persuaded people to look to him. I submit to you that powerful political leaders often milk our need for a father. in order to gain power, in order to gain influence. And I'm struck with that. The first empire builder who founded a number of cities, you can read in Genesis 10, who founded a number of cities, was a very powerful, brilliant, charismatic figure who knew how to appeal to people's instincts. And I look at politicians today. And I see that those that are often successful in gathering a group of people around them are those that tap into our need for somebody to take care of us, somebody to protect us. And therefore, we look out there at our enemies, but we look to that political leader to support us against the people we fear. And I think that has relevance today. But the thing that we see in this story that's so important is that He is involved in building the Tower of Babel. Now, we don't have the tallest steeple in Texarkana, not by a long shot. Is this about not having tall steeples? Is it about not having tall buildings? No, we see here exactly what it's about on page 15. And there we're told in verse 3 of Genesis 11, they said to each other, come let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly. They used brick instead of stone and tar for mortar. Then they said, come let us build ourselves a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth. We see several things here in this. The first thing I want you to see is going back to the second C of the seven C's of history, and that is corruption. In the fall of humankind into sin, what is it that Eve did? What is it that Adam did? They reached up to take the fruit. And they're reaching up. What are they doing? They're raising a fist of defiance against God and his law, his standards of truth. It's defiance. And what I submit to you is this, in the building of the Tower of Babel, they are lifting a united fist in this ziggurat that they built. And what they're doing is an attempt, let this sink in really well, what they're doing is an attempt to go back to Eden on their terms without God. I believe that you can demonstrate that the Garden of Eden was on a mountain. and from it flowed the streams. Is the Garden of Eden attainable in this world today? No, it was utterly, totally, and completely destroyed in the catastrophe, the great flood that we spoke about last week. But what this is, this tower represents an attempt by human beings without God to obtain paradise. If we let that sink in, we'll see something here. What they're trying to do isn't in and of itself evil. To build a big tower is not evil. To go live in the city isn't evil. But we do appear here to see, what we do appear, what it does appear to say here is that God does not favor the city, but the rural life. In other words, human beings clustering in cities is not as healthy for human beings as living out in the land with small farms, overseen by people, digging in the ground, planting their crops, raising animals. That's the healthy thing. But man didn't want to do that. Instead, man wanted to cluster in cities. And if you look at the world today, Clustering in cities is a very unhealthy thing for people. It's very unhealthy. We don't need concrete. We need green grass. We need vineyards. We need fields with corn and other crops. But you see, what they're after is establishing a world-renowned empire that is a monument to themselves. So Nimrod, this first great empire builder, is the leader of all of this and he's orchestrating this building of a tower. And the deal is, so that we may name, at the bottom of the page 15, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth. Let's look at the things they wanted. They wanted peace. They wanted world peace. They wanted prosperity. They wanted world prosperity. They wanted no war. They wanted unity. All the things they wanted are good things, but here is what makes it evil without God. It's godlessness that defines evil in this world, and we must understand that what they were after, while good and noble, was wicked because they were doing it in their name, to make a name for themselves, a monument for themselves, to seek all these things. If you hold your hand there, I want you to turn with me for a moment over to the gospel, well I shouldn't call it the gospel, but in one ways it is the gospel of Isaiah. Isaiah chapter 2, and we look there on page 1062, And what he talks about here is actually a restoration to Eden, okay? Isaiah chapter 2, this is what Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Look at verse 2, Isaiah 2-2. In the last days the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains. It will be raised above the hills and all nations will stream to it. Many peoples will come and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us His ways, so that we may walk in His paths. The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between the nations and settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore." Where is that particular Bible verse inscribed? Does anyone know? It's on the walls of a building in New York City. The United Nations. Now, the concept of the United Nations is not a bad thing. And they quote this scripture here, beat their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. But the reality is the United Nations is not founded on God. It's not founded on Christian truth. It's founded on an ideal of peace, world peace. But here's what you have to come to grips with. Without God, this is controversial, the United Nations is an evil institution. Without God, the United Nations is an evil institution. Has it solved any of our world's problems? I don't think so. I do think that they have prevented some wars by people getting down and talking to each other, but you realize the whole way the thing is structured. with veto powers by certain nations. In the beginning, one of those nations was Taiwan. And then under probably America's most brilliant politician of the 20th century, the last half of the 20th century, the one who hardly was a, well, I won't go into that. I don't want to assassinate poor Richard, Richard Nixon. Betrayed Taiwan, knifed it in the back, and got the People's Republic of China to become one of those vetoing-powered nations. It's interesting, isn't it? So whenever the United Nations wants to take on a real problem, it can be vetoed by one of those nations, one of whom is China, and one of whom is us. So when it comes to really dealing with conflicts, The United Nations founded without God doesn't really do what it wants to do. But is it a noble goal? It is a noble goal. The building of the Tower of Babel was a noble goal, but without God it's an evil goal. And so we see that here. I'm struck. that God does not want a one world government. And that seems like the way to go. After all, we have so many problems in our modern world. Think about the People's Republic of China. And think about how they pirate our videos and DVDs. What can we do about it? Hollywood moguls want that money. And so They want to control China doing that. Is China going to submit to the people that make our movies or our songs? I don't think so. But the goal is to have a law that is enforced among all the nations by a united force. Currently we have a young man from the church that I served for 40 years named Will McBride and Will McBride is in Sarajevo as part of a peacekeeping force because he's in the Louisiana National Guard and they're sent there and we pray for him daily. We're trying to make world peace but look at what we've got going on right now. Look at the attack on Iran. And I will submit to you this. Iran is not Iraq. First of all, Iran is Persian, not Arabic. It is a huge country with vast resources and allied with China and with Russia. And that attack resulted in a huge attack with missiles getting through the so-called Iron Dome. and hitting many places in and around the modern state of Israel. And as I'm speaking this morning, who knows what's going on? Because Iran has missiles that can penetrate the Iron Dome. And remember, the Israelis have nuclear weapons, and they're not afraid to use them. Well, what happened? What would happen? So can the UN stop that? They'll talk. They'll make speeches. They'll talk about what's going on with the Palestinians in Gaza and all these things. But the UN hasn't done anything. Why? Because without God, without God, without God, we can never achieve this. That's the goal of the Tower of Babel. Now listen to what God says here. in verse 5 of Genesis 11. The Lord came down to see the city and the tower that men were building. The Lord said, if as one people speaking the same language they begin to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Let that sink in for a moment. God is saying that a united world without him will create incredible wickedness and evil. If they can stay united, nothing will be impossible to them. And then God says, come, let us go down and confuse their tongue. And what did he do? This is a miracle. This is anti-Pentecost, if you will. And when Pentecost Sunday was around a year ago, I spoke about this. because Pentecost is God's answer to the Tower of Babel, where God unites people in Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit. So God confused their tongues. Wow. What did that mean? It meant that Nimrod's dream utterly, totally, and completely failed. They did not achieve a one world government. They could no longer communicate with each other. Do you realize that in our world today we have amazing things? I put my sermons on sermon audio. Sermon audio now with artificial intelligence and having a direct pipeline to the internet that bypasses the United States government. They're like a foreign country, but they exist in Greenville, South Carolina, and they're going to set up another branch in the United Kingdom. They have a direct pipeline so that governments lack the ability to shut down their internet. But what they have available is beyond belief. I used to have to pay someone to transcribe my sermon, and then I always had to go behind and correct. But now it's available free of charge and every single sermon on sermon audio is automatically transcribed by artificial intelligence and exists. Now that's interesting. So we're Not too bad. Okay. Thank you, Miss Nell. So, well, that's kind of like God confusing their tongues. Here we are building this sermon and brick on brick with putting that tar on it and all of a sudden, here comes Quentin to get his grandfather. So anyhow, God confuses their tongues and where was I? Oh yes. Sermon audio not only transcribes all of its sermons going back, going back to every single one, but get this, they put them in various languages. Do you know that my sermon that I'm preaching right now, that hopefully is being recorded on video and audio, that my sermon, within a few hours, will be transcribed and it will be available in various languages, such as Spanish and so on. I find that phenomenal. I find that amazing. The Tower of Babel, man's language is confused, so to make it impossible for them to have global governments governance, now through artificial intelligence transcribing sermons into various languages of the world. I find that amazing. So what did I see here with this passage? Confusion. The fourth great sea of world history is confusion. God confused the languages of people so that they could not have a one world government. And that means for me, as I look at the world, I do not want a one world government. I do not want one powerful government enforcing the laws with a united military under the control of a central authority over every nation. Why do I want that? Because I believe that Genesis 11 warns us of the danger of a worldwide global government that overrules the issues with various nations. Now I'm not for nationalism either, but I am for national sovereignty. I believe that nations are healthier when they are governed as locally as possible. Limiting the power of the higher-ups, I think, is a good thing. So where are we in world history? I think we're returning to the Tower of Babel. I think that we are undoing what God did by creating with artificial intelligence the ability to communicate. I was in a meeting in San Antonio less than a year ago with two pastors who had escaped from Cuba. And as they were talking, I realized that someone pointed out to me I had a device on my iPhone and I downloaded the software. And it showed me in real time what they were saying in Spanish in English. It's not like the old days where you had to look up a phrase. The first time I took a trip into Mexico in 1991, It was amazing. We had a phrase book and my friend Barry Brumfield and my son Ben and I traveled to meet missionaries near Mexico City and we stopped in various cities. We didn't have a cell phone and they were expecting us a day earlier. And I remember stopping in Queretaro, Mexico, which is a beautiful colonial city with aqueducts. And I remember asking, I looked in the phrase book, Donde Espanol? Does anyone know what Donde Espanol is? Where's the bathroom? So anyhow, I remember, again, we were doing this. Well, now, years later, with that piece of software, I can speak good into it and it can speak to them in Spanish. What a world we are in now. It's amazing. It's amazing. And never forget this. With this thing going between Iran and Israel and us, because we're deeply embroiled in it, there are a lot of things at stake. If the United Nations had power, it would seize America and seize Israel and seize Iran and say, no more of that. But they don't have that power. Well, where are we? The fourth sea of world history is confusion. And it's God's will to confuse man's effort to do good on man's terms. May we pray. Lord, we pray that you would protect us from a global, powerful, one world government that through artificial intelligence and through traffic light cameras and all these other things has the ability to control. Lord, I realize this sermon is going out on the internet and we get about a thousand hits a month on this site. We pray for help and protection because some things I've said over the years are probably terribly offensive to some people. Protect this church, protect the Christian church, and give us to live our lives sanely and soberly as we trust in you and you alone to protect and deliver us. In Jesus' name, amen.