Church: Reformed Baptist Church of Franconia | Text: Numbers 24 | Date: August 20, 2023 | Speaker: Fred Zaspel

Open your Bibles with me, if you will, please, to the book of Numbers, Numbers chapter 24. Believe it or not, we are continuing our studies on the Psalms. But as I’ve mentioned, I want to back up before we look at our last subject with regard to the Psalms in our evening series, and that is the Messianic Psalms.

I want to back up and give a broader look at the Messianic hope in the Old Testament and how that informs then what we find in the Psalter. I suspect that after that, I’ll continue with some more Messianic prophecy, at least for a little bit in the evening messages once we’re done with the Psalms. But tonight we want to look at Numbers chapter 24 and the prophecy of Balaam, an interesting figure.

Now just for a recap, remember what we looked at last time. We showed that the Messianic theme—first of all, for those of you who were not here, maybe we could back up further than that. Messiah… I’ll tell you a funny story. Bruce Waltke, he’s the guy I worked with on the Psalms, he’s the king of Psalms studies today, just about; he’s a wonderful man. And he told me that this would be back in 1958 or something like that. He was teaching a week-long series of lessons, a course on Messianic Psalms down in Louisiana. He taught for a whole week on it. He got to the last class, finished teaching, and he asked, “Well, before we close, are there any questions?” A whole week of studies on the Messianic Psalms. Any questions? One fellow raises his hand and says, “Dr. Waltke, what is a Messianic Psalm?”

You feel for the guy. He could have died at that moment. What have I done here? So he said, “I decided from that point onward, anytime I talk about the Messianic Psalms, I’m going to back up and talk about Messiah and explain what it is.” Messiah, of course, just simply means the anointed, God’s anointed one. It refers to the offices in Israel. The prophet, priest, and king were anointed offices. But there became, in Israel’s hope, a prophet par excellence, a priest par excellence, a king par excellence—the anointed one par excellence who would come, and that anointed one, the Messiah, becomes this Messianic hope.

The Messianic Hope in Genesis

Now, that hope did not begin in Israel. That Messianic hope actually, we saw this last time, begins with the Bible story itself. In Genesis chapter 1, we have God, the great king, appointing his newly created man to rule and to extend God’s rule, to rule as God’s vice-regent over the earth, to extend that rule from Eden to the ends of the earth, multiply, have dominion over the earth. That, of course, failed. He did not extend God’s rule over the earth.

And immediately in that context, Genesis chapter 3, God makes a promise. The first promise of the gospel is Genesis 3:15. God promises a champion who will come from the seed of the woman to fulfill what Adam had failed in doing. And so from the very beginning of the Bible story, this Messianic hope—this one who’s not called the anointed yet, but this hope of a leader who will come—is alive.

Particularly in the Old Testament, although the three offices of prophet, priest, and king are always there, it is the kingship of this anointed one, the anointed one as king, that becomes dominant. And we see that—we’ll see that next time in terms of 2 Samuel chapter 7 and God’s promise to David. But that’s alive; that hope is alive ever since Genesis chapter 3.

And then we follow the Bible storyline through that in the early chapters of Genesis, as we’ve seen in our Sunday school lessons over the last year. We have in the first 11 chapters of Genesis the problem established. A man is created. He fails. Rebellion against God. Rebellion continues until finally God judges and wipes everyone out through the flood, except for Noah and his family. There’s this restart with Noah, and actually I think there’s another Messianic prophecy there in the promise to Noah in Genesis chapter 9. It’s not as clear, so I haven’t taken time with it.

But then we have in chapters 10 and 11 of Genesis the dispersion of the nations. And then one—these nations in rebellion—and then one man is chosen out of those nations to make a new nation, and through his offspring all of the world will be blessed. Kings will come from him. This is Genesis 12, Genesis 17. Kings will come from him. And so we have this hope of a leader who will come, not only now of the seed of woman broadly, but specifically through Abraham. It’ll be a descendant of Abraham who will come.

And we’ll see how this promise continues to narrow until finally we come to Matthew chapter one and verse one: the book of the generation of Jesus Christ, son of David, son of Abraham. And the Messianic theme comes crashing together on Jesus. Well, then we saw Genesis 12, the promise to Abraham that the world will be blessed through him. This promised champion will come from Abraham through this great nation that will come from Abraham, the nation of Israel.

And then we saw in Genesis chapter 49 last week, and also in Genesis 49 last Sunday morning in Sunday school, this wonderful prophecy of Jacob regarding his sons, and in particular Judah. The scepter will not depart from Judah until the one comes to whom it belongs. This ruler will come; the peoples of the earth will bow before him. And so we have now, it’s narrowed further. Seed of the woman, seed of Abraham, the offspring of Jacob, the offspring of Judah. And through him, this anointed one will come. And this hope is very much alive.

The Context of Numbers 24

Well, now we come for the next high point of that. There are other what we would call Messianic prophecies before this, but in terms of the highlights of it, we come to Numbers chapter 24. Now here in this context, we don’t have time to go back through it all, but chapters 21 and following provide the immediate context for us.

We are near the end of the 40 years of wandering now. In Numbers chapter 21, if you want to glance back at that—back in verses 1 to 3 of Numbers 21, Israel asks God, “If you give us Arad, the king of Canaan, we’ll destroy their cities entirely.” God gives it to them, and they did. And so they’re gone. Verses 4 and following, Israel asks Sihon, the king of the Amorites, for passage through the land, and he refuses and in fact goes against Israel and opposes them, which of course was a great mistake. And Israel took their cities and made them their own, and that was it with them. And so Numbers 21 sort of concludes with verse 31: “Thus Israel lived in the land of the Amorites.” They’ve taken it over. Verses 32 and following, we have the same with Jazir, Bashan, Heshbon, all the same. Israel now is on the northern plains of Moab, and they’ve taken these lands from those who were there, and now they belong to Israel.

Well, that brings us to Numbers chapter 22, and we have Balak—Balak, the king of Moab. He sees what’s happening and it doesn’t take long to do the math. He says, “Uh-oh, they’re coming our way.” And he’s worried about that and so he’s in league with the Amalekites now. And together they call Balaam to come and make a curse on Israel.

Now Balaam is an interesting figure. He’s a bad good guy or a good bad guy. I’m not sure how to say that. He’s an interesting kind of a figure. He’s living out near the Euphrates in Mesopotamia. So it’s a long trip. I don’t know how they’ve heard of him. I don’t know what the connection is; we’re not told. But they send a delegation to Balaam: “We’ve heard about you and that your prophecies come to pass and that those whom you curse are cursed. And so we want you to come back and curse Israel for us. We don’t want them coming against us.”

Balaam asks God, “Can I go?” God says, “No, you can’t.” And so he doesn’t go. They come back again the second time. “So we really want you to go. We’ll pay you really well.” And so Balaam asks God again, and God is not happy with that. “All right, go.” It’s kind of that kind of thing where he allows him to go, but God is not happy with Balaam for wanting to push it. And so Balaam goes, and that’s the famous donkey incident when the donkey has more sense than Balaam has and talks to him about it. And then through all of that, Balaam, you remember, says, “Okay, nevermind, I won’t go.” And He goes, “No, you want to go, you go, but you don’t tell them anything other than what I tell you to tell them.” And so he goes.

Well, Balaam arrives then—this is chapters 22 and 23—Balaam arrives and Balak then takes him to a vantage point, some kind of a high point where he can look out and see just a fraction of the Israelites, not all of them, but he can see part of the camp of Israel. And he says, “Now you can see them from here. Go to work; this is what we pay you for. Pronounce your curse against Israel.”

And so then we have the first oracle of Balaam. This is chapter 23, verses one and following. The oracle itself begins in verse seven. He gives this first oracle and basically says, “God has blessed Israel. How can I curse them? God has blessed them. Israel will prosper.” Well, Balak isn’t happy with that. “That’s not what I pay you for. I don’t pay you to come and bless them. I pay you to curse them.” And Balaam responds, “I can only say what God has told me to say. That’s the deal.”

So Balak takes Balaam to another place then. And this is beginning in verse 13 of chapter 23, takes him to another vantage point where he can see Israel. He says, “Let’s try this from this vantage point, from over here.” And then we have the second oracle of Balaam, chapter 23, verses 18 and following. And basically, Balaam says, “God is going to do for Israel everything he said he would do. You cannot curse who has been blessed. Israel will prosper.” Well, Balak really is not happy at this point. And he tells Balaam, “Just shut up. Don’t talk anymore at all. I don’t want your cursing. I don’t want your blessing. Just, just shut up. Don’t talk anymore at all.” Balaam reminds him, “I’m just saying what God has told me to say. I can’t do any more or less than that.”

Well, then we come to chapter 24 and Balak essentially says, “Okay, let’s try from over here.” We have another vantage point. And we have Balaam’s third oracle, chapter 24, verses three and following. And he basically says here, “Israel is blessed. She will prosper like a lion. She will eat up all of her adversaries.” And Balak is really unhappy at this point and says, “Just shut up and go home. Go back. This is not what we brought you here for.”

Balaam’s Final Oracle

And so in response to that, now, chapter 24 verses 15 and following, we have Balaam’s final oracle. This oracle, beginning with verses 15 and following, has to do then with the future of Israel. It’s a spectacular prophecy of a coming ruler who will rise from within Israel, and it has to do with Israel’s dominance through this ruler—dominance over Moab and over Edom and all of their enemies. And it’s a significant prophecy then in the developing theme of royal Messianism that we find in the Old Testament.

I think I’ll pick it up with verse 12. Numbers 24, verse 12:

Balaam said to Balak, “Did I not tell your messengers whom you sent to me, ‘If Balak should give me his house full of silver and gold, I would not be able to go beyond the word of the Lord to do either good or bad of my own will. What the Lord speaks, that will I speak’? And now behold, I’m going to my people. Come, I will let you know what this people will do to your people in the latter days.”

Now, there’s a significant expression we find throughout the Old Testament. Invariably, it has to do with something in the distant future. It has eschatological significance. We saw this in Genesis 49 where Jacob brings his sons together: “I’ll tell you what’s going to happen in the latter days.” We have that expression here. It happens often in the Old Testament. So verse 15:

He took up his discourse and said, “The oracle of Balaam, the son of Beor, the oracle of a man whose eye is opened, the oracle of him who hears the words of God and knows the knowledge of the Most High, who sees the vision of the Almighty falling down with his eyes uncovered. I see him, but not now. I behold him, but not near. A star shall come out of Jacob and a scepter shall rise out of Israel. It shall crush the forehead of Moab and break down the sons of Sheth. Edom shall be dispossessed. Seir also and his enemies shall be dispossessed. Israel is doing valiantly and one from Jacob shall exercise dominion and destroy the survivors of the cities.”

Then he looked on Amalek and took up his discourse and said, “Amalek was the first among nations, but its end is utter destruction.” And he looked on the Kenite and took up his discourse and said, “Enduring is your dwelling place and your nest is set in a rock. Nevertheless, Cain shall be burned when Asher takes you away captive.” And he took up his discourse and said, “Alas, who shall live when God does this? But ships shall come from Kittim and shall afflict Asher and Eber, and he too shall come to utter destruction.”

Then Balaam rose and went back to his place. And Balak also went away—and decided that was a waste of money. That last part wasn’t in the text. Well, Balaam leaves now. By the way, we are told in chapter 31 that on his way out, Balaam counsels Balak as to how they could trip up Israel. And that’s what the incident of Baal Peor, where the women of the Amalekites seduce the men of Israel, bring them into idolatry. And this is something that haunted Israel for some time. So Balaam is not that good of a guy.

Now in verse 17 here, in the prophetic vision, Balaam sees a man, but it’s a man who has not arisen yet. In fact, it’s far off. “I see him, I behold him. I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near.” So when he does see and behold, he’s stressing that this isn’t just a casual glance; he didn’t just catch a glimpse. There’s been some studied reflection on this, some thoughtful consideration of what he is seeing. It says, “I see him.” Who is the him? Well, he tells us it’s a star. And then he calls him a scepter. All right, he’s a ruler of some kind or a star, a leader figure with a scepter rising out of Israel. So he’s a political or a military ruler who is to come, an Israelite king who will come and destroy his enemies.

Now in the last part of verse 17, he describes the great military success that this ruler, this star rising out of Israel, will have. And it says he will crush the forehead of Moab. That’s Balak. He’ll crush you. Moab’s done when this ruler comes. He will break down all the sons of Sheth. Now that one’s a little bit more difficult to identify. What is he saying here? If here Sheth is Seth, the son of Adam, then all of humanity is in view. He’ll defeat all of humanity, because all of humanity is descendant of Sheth—of Seth through Noah. If, however, the word means, as it can be translated, confusion or tumult, something like that, what he’s saying here is that all the troublemakers, all the enemies, all the adversaries will be defeated.

Verse 18, Edom shall be dispossessed. This is Israel’s ancient enemies. Verse 19, you shall exercise dominion and destroy the survivors of cities. Verse 20, Amalek: he was the first of nations—that is, he was the first one to attack Israel—and they will instead be the first ones destroyed. Verse 21, Kenites: they have a degree of protection. Remember Moses’ father-in-law, Jethro; he was a Kenite, and they were offered some protection. They did not assimilate in Israel; they lived separately from Israel. And they lived there safely until, as Balaam says here in verse 22, they were taken away captive in the Assyrian assault on Israel. That would be 722 BC.

Then verse 24, he mentions other Gentile powers. Ships shall come from Kittim. That’s the ancient word for Cyprus. Shall afflict Asher and Eber. Asher, it’s Assyria. Eber, this is the land of Palestine. So we have an invasion from the West that he’s talking about, some ships coming from Cyprus. Kittim came to be a word that was associated with the Roman armies and their naval forces coming from there. So there’s an invasion coming from the West—that Rome, of course, would be later. First of all, there’s Alexander the Great, and he too, he says in verse 24, he too shall come to utter destruction. The bottom line: so far from cursing Israel, God will bless her and she will prosper. Israel will dominate by means of a royal champion who will come from her midst.

The Identity of the Star

All right, there’s the prophecy in broad look. Question then is: who is this star? Verse 17, who is this star or this scepter… this figure with a scepter rising out of Israel, exercising this wide dominion over all of his enemies? Who is it? And with that, a question: when will it happen?

Well, in Numbers 25, we have the account of the Baal worship at Peor, that I mentioned earlier, and we have Moses and the Israelite army defeating Midian, who was involved in the league against Israel with Balaam. That’s Numbers 25. In 2 Samuel chapter 8, we have David defeating Moab and Edom in his military conquests. So that’s some kind of fulfillment of it, perhaps. But the problem with that is that later in the prophecy of Jeremiah, Jeremiah 48 and 49, we have a repeat of Balaam’s prophecy. So it’s still looking ahead to the defeat of Moab and Edom. And in fact, in verse 20 and following here, we have the mentions of these other nations, Kittim in particular, Cyprus. That defeat, of course, hadn’t been seen yet in history.

So when does all this happen and who is this star? Well, you notice that the timeframe is not exactly stated, but there is a long range in view. Verses 20 and following, the very mention of Kittim clues us in that he’s looking long range for that. And then in verse 14, way at the beginning, he tells us right up that this is for the latter days. This is something to come in the distant future. And then in verse 17, we have the same idea: “I see him, but not now. I behold him, but not near.” This is something that’s going to come in time to come. So the reference is some kind of eschatological look, looking far ahead into the distant future.

Now we have an echo of this prophecy in Amos, if you’d like to look there in the prophecy of Amos chapter 9. Amos, of course, is famous for his prophecies of the day of the Lord that is coming. In chapter 9, we have the destruction of Israel prophesied, and then the restoration of Israel prophesied in verses 11 and following. Verse 11 and 12:

“In that day I will raise up…”—by the way, that’s an echo, “in that day,” remember, Balaam’s prophecy in the latter days. We have an echo of that here—”In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its breaches.”

Now this now is long later. This is after David. So it’s looking to the Davidic promise. It’s echoing here the Balaam prophecy: “And I’ll raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old, that they may possess the remnant of Edom.” There’s the direct reference back to the Balaam prophecy: “that they may possess.” It’s the same language used in the Balaam prophecy. “They may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the nations who are called by my name, declares the Lord who does this.”

So verse 11 talks about the restored Davidic house. This is a reference back to the promise to David in 2 Samuel 7 that we’ll see next week. It will have fallen at some point. Of course, we see that in the latter time of Old Testament times when the Davidic tree—that kind of symbolism is used—the Davidic tree is cut down to a stump. And then he says it’ll be restored. And it says, “I’ll repair their breaches.” Evidently it’s the divided kingdom in view. “I’ll raise up his ruins,” that’s David’s ruins, “rebuild her,” that is the booth of David, and then “I’ll do it in that day.” And the purpose for it, verse 12, is to possess or take possession of Edom. And that’s the language used in Numbers 24.

So we have this prophecy picked up again, Balaam’s prophecy picked up again by Amos. What’s interesting about that is that not only does this prophecy still stand, but James in Acts chapter 15 at the Jerusalem council points back to the Amos prophecy, which pulls from Balaam’s prophecy. James looks back to the Amos prophecy in Acts chapter 15 and shows how it is fulfilled in Jesus. I’m not going to spend time with that. Today we’re running out of time.

Some also suggest that there’s an allusion to this in the early chapters of Matthew, in the infancy narratives of Matthew. You remember the magi had seen his star. Is that a reference to the Balaam prophecy, the star that comes out of Jacob? I don’t know what to think about that. That kind of thing happens a lot, that there are cryptic references like that back, and it could be. What it has going for it is that Matthew is filled, in those early chapters, filled with this fulfillment language of Old Testament prophecies being fulfilled in the arrival of Jesus. What that interpretation has against it is that in Matthew’s use of all of those fulfillment passages, he always names them. “This is what Hosea said,” and there’s where the prophecy is, and he quotes it. And he doesn’t do that with regard to the star, so I’m not sure that Matthew is referring to that or not. It could be.

I think we do have a final reference to this Balaam prophecy in Revelation chapter 2, verses 26 to 28, and this is where Jesus is addressing the church at Thyatira, and he says:

“The one who conquers and keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron as when my earthen pots are broken in pieces. Even as I myself have received authority from my Father, and I will give him the morning star.”

That probably is an echo of the Balaam prophecy. All right, so Numbers chapter 24, we have a prophecy of a future Davidic king who will rule over Israel’s enemies and establish God’s kingdom universally. It is then explicit Messianic prophecy, explicit royal Messianism, if we can call it that.

And that, by the way, is the way the ancient Jewish literature took it. The ancient Jewish theologians, all the Targums and things, understood it that way. And this idea of a star who is coming was something that was picked up in ancient Israel. In fact, when pretender messiahs would come and lead in their revolts against foreign powers and such, they would take up this name. The most famous of that, of course, is Simon Bar Kokhba. The Bar Kokhba Rebellion in the early second century of this era—he was Simeon the Star. He revolted against the Emperor Hadrian, the Emperor of Rome, and he was crushed so badly that Simeon the Star… that the name, the Star, was stamped out of use after that, and in fact, virtually all Jewish discussion and hope of Messiah died with Simeon the Star. They had already missed the Messiah, and Simeon comes along, claims it, and there’s a great excitement around him. It fails, and then the hope in Israel failed with it. Of course, they’ve not looked to Jesus for that.

Well, given the Messianic reference that we find later in the Old Testament and then in the New Testament, the timeframe and the distant future and all of that, it seems then that the nations that are mentioned in the prophecy—where he will be ruling over these nations and crushing them—they are probably to be understood in a typical fashion to speak of this ruler’s world dominance against all enemies; they’ll all be subjugated to him. And that of course is what we saw last time in Genesis 49 and verse 10 with the Judah prophecy.

Well, I was going to go next to 1 Samuel 2, but this took me longer than I expected. I’m going to wrap it up. But keep all of this in mind as it progresses. And note how the promise grows. It starts in Genesis chapter 3. Right at the first human rebellion, God makes a promise that he’s going to send the seed of the woman who will succeed where Adam has failed. The next big one, Genesis chapter 12, Genesis 17: God will bless the world through Abraham’s seed. He’ll send kings from his body. In Genesis 49, we have the rule and authority over the nations through Jacob’s son, Judah. And now, Balaam’s prophecy of this king coming out of Israel to crush his enemies.

So, royal humanity created in its royal dignity has failed. But in the words of Hebrews chapter 2, we don’t see yet everything put under his, that is man’s, feet—but we see Jesus. And that’s the point he makes in Hebrews chapter 2. Jesus will come; he will succeed where man has failed and fulfill for us what we have failed to do ourselves.

We have this developing theme in a progressive way. We have the prophecy given back in the Garden of Eden or whatever, however many years ago that was. Then we have it given again in a big way to Abraham; that’s about 2000 BC. Then we have it again given by Jacob concerning Judah; this is around 1800 BC. Then we have again now through Balaam; this is about 1400 BC. And we’ll see it progressing through till finally it meets in Jesus. All right, we’ll continue this next time. Let’s stand and be dismissed in prayer. Pastor Greg, would you pray for us, please?