The Hireling's Mouthpiece: God's Sovereignty Over Sorcery Text: Numbers 23:1-12
Introduction: The Futility of Fighting God
We come now to a fascinating and deeply instructive episode in the history of Israel. A pagan king, terrified by the sheer presence of God's people, hires a pagan prophet to do some spiritual dirty work. He wants to hire a sorcerer to curse the people whom God has blessed. This is the equivalent of hiring a man with a squirt gun to put out the sun. It is a fool's errand from the start, but it reveals to us the glorious and absolute nature of God's sovereignty. God is not one deity among many, fighting for turf. He is the Lord of Heaven and Earth, and all other powers, whether they know it or not, are on His leash.
The world still operates on this same pagan assumption. They believe that if they can just get the right incantations, the right political leverage, the right Supreme Court decision, the right media narrative, they can somehow overturn the decree of God. They want to curse what God has blessed. They see the Church, the Israel of God, and they tremble with a mixture of fear and rage. And so they hire their own Balaams, their talking heads and godless intellectuals, to pronounce curses. But as we will see, God has a way of hijacking the enemy's microphone. He loves to make the devil's own servants declare the glory of His name and the security of His people. This is not just a story about Moab and Israel; it is a story about the world and the Church. It is a story about the absolute, unshakeable, and glorious sovereignty of our God.
We live in a time when many Christians are tempted to despair. They look at the Balaks of our day, the powerful men who hate our God and hate us, and they see the hired Balaams, the media and academic establishments, lining up their altars to curse us. But this passage is here to remind us that their efforts are utter futility. You cannot curse what God has determined to bless. Our security does not rest in our own strength or wisdom, but in the immutable, covenant-keeping character of God. He has blessed us in Christ, and no one, not even a prophet for hire, can reverse it.
The Text
Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.” So Balak did just as Balaam had spoken, and Balak and Balaam offered up a bull and a ram on each altar. Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stand beside your burnt offering, and I will go; perhaps Yahweh will come to meet me, and whatever He shows me I will tell you.” So he went to a bare hill. Now God met Balaam, and he said to Him, “I have set up the seven altars, and I have offered up a bull and a ram on each altar.” Then Yahweh put a word in Balaam’s mouth and said, “Return to Balak, and you shall speak thus.” So he returned to him, and behold, he was standing beside his burnt offering, he and all the leaders of Moab. Then he took up his discourse and said, “From Aram Balak has brought me, Moab’s king from the mountains of the East, ‘Come curse Jacob for me, And come, denounce Israel!’ How shall I curse whom God has not cursed? And how can I denounce whom Yahweh has not denounced? For I see him from the top of the rocks, And I look at him from the hills; Behold, a people who dwells alone, And will not be reckoned among the nations. Who can number the dust of Jacob, Or count the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the upright, And let my end be like his!” Then Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I took you to curse my enemies, but behold, you have blessed them repeatedly!” And he replied, “Must I not be careful to speak what Yahweh puts in my mouth?”
(Numbers 23:1-12 LSB)
Pagan Ritual and Divine Intrusion (vv. 1-6)
We begin with the elaborate setup. Balak, the king of Moab, is pulling out all the stops.
"Then Balaam said to Balak, 'Build seven altars for me here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.' So Balak did just as Balaam had spoken, and Balak and Balaam offered up a bull and a ram on each altar." (Numbers 23:1-2)
Balaam, the prophet for hire, understands the forms of worship. Seven altars, seven bulls, seven rams. The number seven signifies completeness or perfection. This is a full-court press of pagan piety. They are trying to manipulate the spiritual world through ritual. This is the essence of all false religion: if I perform the right actions, say the right words, and make the right sacrifices, I can get God, or the gods, to do what I want. It is an attempt to put God in our debt, to make Him our errand boy.
But notice what happens. Balaam goes through all the motions. He tells Balak to stand by his offering while he goes to "meet Yahweh" (v. 3). Balaam is a syncretist. He knows the name of the true God, Yahweh, but he treats Him like any other local deity who can be summoned and appeased with the right formula. When God meets him, Balaam's first instinct is to brag about his religious performance: "I have set up the seven altars, and I have offered up a bull and a ram on each altar" (v. 4). He's like a child showing his father a finger painting, expecting a pat on the head. He thinks his elaborate ritual has earned him an audience and a favor.
But God is not impressed with the furniture. He is not there to be manipulated. He is there to command. "Then Yahweh put a word in Balaam’s mouth and said, 'Return to Balak, and you shall speak thus'" (v. 5). This is the central point. God does not negotiate with Balaam. He does not ask for his opinion. He commandeers his mouth. Balaam wanted to be a sorcerer who controlled spiritual power; God turns him into a ventriloquist's dummy. He becomes a mouthpiece, a conduit for a message he does not want to deliver. This is a stunning display of God's absolute sovereignty over creation, and particularly over human speech. The God who created the mouth can certainly fill it.
The Un-Cursable People (vv. 7-8)
So Balaam returns to the anxious king and his entourage, and the prophecy, or "discourse," begins. And it is a disaster for Balak's plans.
"From Aram Balak has brought me, Moab’s king from the mountains of the East, ‘Come curse Jacob for me, And come, denounce Israel!’ How shall I curse whom God has not cursed? And how can I denounce whom Yahweh has not denounced?" (Numbers 23:7-8)
Balaam begins by stating the mission brief. He was hired for a simple task: curse Jacob. But immediately, he runs into a brick wall of divine reality. The question he asks is rhetorical, but it is the fundamental question that every enemy of God must face. "How shall I curse whom God has not cursed?" The answer is, you cannot. It is an ontological impossibility. To curse what God has blessed is to speak a lie, to declare something to be what it is not. It is to bang your head against the very fabric of reality that God has woven.
The security of God's people does not depend on their own merit. Israel was, at this very moment, a grumbling, rebellious, and stiff-necked people. Their security rested entirely on the unilateral, unconditional, covenantal promise of God. God had chosen them, blessed them in Abraham, and His purposes cannot be thwarted by human sin, let alone by a pagan king's checkbook. This is our security in the New Covenant as well. We are blessed in Christ. God has declared us righteous for His sake. Who can lay a charge against God's elect? Who can condemn? (Romans 8:33-34). The answer is no one. The world can denounce us, but if Yahweh has not denounced us, their words are just hot air.
A People Set Apart (v. 9)
Next, Balaam describes the unique character of Israel, a character given to them by God Himself.
"For I see him from the top of the rocks, And I look at him from the hills; Behold, a people who dwells alone, And will not be reckoned among the nations." (Genesis 23:9)
From his high vantage point, Balaam sees Israel not just as a military threat, but as a theological reality. They are a people who "dwell alone." This speaks of their separation, their distinctiveness. God had called them out of the nations to be a peculiar people, a holy nation (Exodus 19:6). Their laws, their worship, their entire way of life was designed to set them apart from the pagan world around them. They were not to be "reckoned among the nations." They were not just another tribe with another god. They were the people of the one true God, and this made them fundamentally different.
This principle of separation is carried directly into the New Covenant. The Church is the people of God, called out of the world. We are to be in the world, but not of it. Our citizenship is in heaven. We are strangers and pilgrims here. When the Church forgets this, when she tries to be "reckoned among the nations," when she adopts the world's philosophies, its marketing techniques, its moral compromises, she loses her power and her saltiness. Our strength is in our distinctiveness, our willingness to dwell alone with our God, faithful to His Word, no matter how strange it makes us look to the surrounding culture.
An Enviable Destiny (v. 10)
The prophecy concludes with a description of Israel's vast numbers and their blessed end, which forces an astonishing cry from the pagan prophet's lips.
"Who can number the dust of Jacob, Or count the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the upright, And let my end be like his!" (Numbers 23:10)
The reference to the "dust of Jacob" is a direct echo of God's promise to Abraham, that his descendants would be as numerous as the dust of the earth (Genesis 13:16). Balaam, the hired gun, is forced to confirm the covenant promise of God. He sees that this people is not a flash in the pan; they are a people with a future, a people destined for explosive, worldwide growth. This promise, of course, finds its ultimate fulfillment in the Church of Jesus Christ, which is composed of people from every tribe, tongue, and nation, a number that no man can number (Revelation 7:9).
And then comes the climax. After seeing their unique status and their glorious future, Balaam cannot help but cry out, "Let me die the death of the upright, And let my end be like his!" He sees that to be one of God's people, to be "upright" in His sight, is to have a blessed end. Even in death, there is a fundamental difference. The death of the righteous is precious in God's sight (Psalm 116:15). It is an entrance into peace. Balaam, in a moment of Spirit-coerced clarity, sees that it is better to die with the people of God than to live in luxury with their enemies. This is a profound testimony, wrung from the lips of a man whose heart was filled with greed. He saw the truth, he spoke the truth, but tragically, he did not love the truth. He wanted the benefits of righteousness without being righteous himself. He wanted a blessed end without a blessed life. And that is a bargain that God does not offer.
The Frustration of the God-Fighter (vv. 11-12)
"Then Balak said to Balaam, 'What have you done to me? I took you to curse my enemies, but behold, you have blessed them repeatedly!' And he replied, 'Must I not be careful to speak what Yahweh puts in my mouth?'" (Numbers 23:11-12)
Balak's reaction is one of pure, sputtering frustration. His expensive spiritual weapon has backfired spectacularly. He paid for a curse and got a benediction. This is what always happens when men set themselves against God. Their cleverest plans are turned to foolishness. The cross is the ultimate example of this. The enemies of Christ thought they were cursing Him, denouncing Him, and destroying Him. They lifted Him up on a tree, and in doing so, they lifted up the Savior of the world. God hijacked their evil intentions to accomplish the greatest blessing in human history.
Balaam's reply is laced with irony. "Must I not be careful to speak what Yahweh puts in my mouth?" He says it as though he were a model of faithful obedience. But we know from the rest of the story that his heart is not in it. He is a constrained servant, not a willing one. Nevertheless, his words state a profound truth. God's Word is sovereign. When God determines to speak, He will have His say, and no amount of human resistance or reluctance can stop it. He can make the rocks cry out, He can make a donkey speak, and He can make a greedy, pagan prophet declare the unshakeable blessedness of His people.
Conclusion: The Hijacked Microphone
So what do we take from this? First, we must rest in the absolute sovereignty of God. Our enemies do not have the final word. The media does not have the final word. The government does not have the final word. God has the final word, and He has spoken a word of blessing over His people in Jesus Christ. That blessing is irrevocable. No power in heaven or on earth or under the earth can overturn it.
Second, we should not be surprised when God uses unlikely sources to declare His truth. God is not limited to working through the faithful. He can make His enemies testify against themselves. He can put a word in the mouth of a Balaam, or a Caiaphas, or a secular historian. All truth is God's truth, no matter who says it, and God in His providence will ensure that His truth is heard.
Finally, we must not be like Balaam. It is not enough to recognize the truth, or even to speak it under duress. It is not enough to wish for the death of the righteous. We must live the life of the righteous. We must abandon all attempts to manipulate God with our religious performances and instead surrender to His sovereign grace. We must not just have the words of Yahweh put in our mouths, but have the love of Yahweh written on our hearts. For it is only by faith in Jesus Christ, the truly Upright One, that we can share in His blessed end, and enter into the inheritance of the people whom God has blessed, and whom no man can curse.