Hope Again in the Ashes Genesis 11:10-32

The first 11 chapters of the Bible provide us with the details of early human history. An Israelite, Moses, wrote Genesis. And when he wrote this book, he wanted his Hebrew readers to understand where they came from and God's workings in the world before their nation was established.

Last week we saw the darkness of humanity in the Tower of Babel story. We saw the evil that sinful humanity is capable of doing when they work together. God punished them by confusing their languages, by making a mockery of what they had done, by calling the place Babel, and by spreading them all over the earth.

Now if you were to divide Genesis into two parts, it would be the first 11 chapters and then chapters 12 through 50 as the second part. I say this because the first 11 chapters is not Israel's history, but rather it is world history.

The Bible is the only book in the world that accurately tells us about the first humans and the significant events that occurred early on. So a class on world history, if you were to go to a school, they should really have the first 11 chapters if you want to talk about the beginning of world history, and sadly that's not the case often.

Now the second part of Genesis, chapters 12 through 50, is focused on Israel's early history. We see the introduction of Abraham. Abraham and his early descendants would be to Israel what the early pilgrims were to us as Americans.

These were our founding fathers, and if you can remember back to history class in school, we learned about these early colonists, and we learned about where our roots came from. And so the Israelites, as they're reading this, they know where their roots came from.

So Genesis 12 is the beginning of Israel's history. The author Moses, in the first 11 chapters of Genesis, has been setting the table for us because Israel's history, like all history, is traced back to the first humans.

And the early events of history, like Adam and Eve in the garden, or the flood, or the Tower of Babel, impact Israel as they impact everyone. It impacts us. These people and events tell us why the world is the way it is, and how we got to where we are.

Now as we look at the end of the first part of Genesis, if we were to stop with the Tower of Babel account, it would be depressing, right? Because that was really a negative event. This was humanity pledging to a low once again.

We need a reminder that God still has a plan for the human race before we get to the history of Israel, which is in chapter 12. And so that's what we're going to see today. These chapters, in the early part of the Bible, we've seen this over and over again.

From chapters 1 through 11, there's a really tragic story about humanity plunging into darkness through their sin. And then there's hope in that same section. Pointing us to God's plans for the human race that he's not done with us.

So today we are going to look at another genealogy. Now the temptation crossed my mind that maybe we should skip the genealogy and go straight to the beginning of Abraham's life in Genesis 12. But as I thought about this, the Lord reminded me that nothing in the Bible should be glanced over.

From the first word of the Bible to the end of the Bible, it's all the Word of God. And every word has something to say to us. Every passage in Scripture is meant to convey an important meaning to the reader, including genealogies.

So if you're here today and you're thinking, oh man, another genealogy? Didn't we just have one of these two weeks ago? We did, but we're going to do it again. And I encourage you, instead of thinking, oh man, another genealogy, that maybe what you should think is what treasure is waiting to be found in this text.

Because there is a treasure in this text, and I look forward to showing that to you. There is something in this text today that is relevant to your life as a 21st century American. We are going to take the time in this sermon to figure out what that is.

So we are going to see several treasures. So this morning we are going to look at the end of Genesis 11, it's verses 10 through 32. And the title of this sermon is Hope Rises Again from the Ashes. Hope Rises Again from the Ashes.

And I encourage you, as I always do, to follow along with me in a Bible. It's not a requirement, but I do strongly encourage it. Page 10 in the Red Pew Bibles, if you don't have a Bible with you. And our big idea this morning is the continued theme in the first part of Genesis is hope in the face of continued despair.

Hope in the face of continued despair. And we are going to see four ways that hope shines in this text. And the first is through the insertion of the chosen line. Through the insertion of the chosen line.

As I mentioned, Genesis is full of tragedies and catastrophe, but it is always filled with hope. We have seen this over the past few months, over and over again. In Genesis 3 .15, after Adam and Eve fell into sin and the human race plunged into sin, the hope was that one would come to crush the serpent and deliver humanity from the tyranny of Satan.

Because Satan was the serpent. And at the end of Genesis 3, Adam and Eve were clothed with the skin of an animal that was sacrificed. And this covering of sinners would point ahead to Jesus Christ covering sinners with his sacrifice later on in history.

So we saw that light shine in the darkness of the Adam and Eve story. So right after the darkest moment in human history, the fall of humanity into sin, this hope is sprinkled in there. A few chapters later, we saw the flood.

The entire world was wiped out by this flood except for eight people. Noah and his wife and his three sons and their wives. What was the hope in this? Well, God preserved humanity by commanding Noah to build the ark.

Noah's father Lamech also prayed that Noah would be used by God as a comforter to humanity to deliver them from their suffering from sin. And God answered this prayer because Noah was used by God to preserve the human race through building the ark and surviving the flood.

And then from his very line, from his descendants, would come Jesus Christ. So you see the hope that comes from the flood story, that God wipes out humanity but preserves it only to redeem it later on.

As we cross the bridge from world history, so the first 11 chapters of Genesis to Israel's history, chapters 12 and on in Genesis, we are left with hope once again. Because last week we saw the darkness of the Tower of Babel.

We saw sinful humanity plunge to a new low again. And God was furious with the human race and punished them by confusing their language and making a laughing stock out of this tower. It looked bleak for the human race once again.

But we know from the previous chapters of Genesis that God has a plan of redemption for humanity. He's not just going to throw them away just because they keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

And the author drives this point home once again in the midst of this dark situation as he concludes this chapter, chapter 11. Now what we have in our sermon today is two sections. The first is a listing of Shem's descendants.

Shem, from the line of Noah, is the blessed lion. And we have this list all the way from Shem to Abram. And at this point, his name was Abram. We know him as Abraham. His name was later changed. But what we need to remember is that the lion of Shem is the lion of blessing.

Noah had three sons, and the son through whom the nation of Israel would come would be Shem. As I read this genealogy here, understand that this lion has God's blessing upon it. Moses includes this blessed lion to show us hope that God's plan of redemption still stands.

And once I'm done reading this, I will highlight a few of the key details. So pray for me once again as I read this. There's some weird names here. So I need your help along the way. I'm going to read verses 10 through 26.

And here we go. These are the generations of Shem. When Shem was 100 years old, he fathered Arpachishad, two years after the flood. And Shem lived after he fathered Arpachishad 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

When Arpachishad had lived 35 years, he fathered Shelah. And Arpachishad lived after he fathered Shelah 403 years and had other sons and daughters. When Shelah had lived 30 years, he fathered Eber. And Shelah lived after he fathered Eber 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

When Eber had lived 34 years, he fathered Peleg. And Eber lived after he fathered Peleg 430 years and had other sons and daughters. When Peleg had lived 30 years he fathered Ru and Peleg lived after he fathered Ru 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

When Ru had lived 32 years he fathered Seirug and Ru lived after he fathered Seirug 207 years and had other sons and daughters. When Seirug had lived 30 years he fathered Nahor and Seirug lived after he fathered Nahor 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

When Nahor had lived 29 years, he fathered Terah. And Nahor lived after he fathered Terah 119 years and had other sons and daughters. When Terah had lived 70 years, he fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran.".

Okay, let's all take a deep breath now after reading that. Okay, so there is the genealogy. In verse 10, Moses notes that Shem fathered Arpikshad two years after the flood. After the flood, God told Noah's sons to be fruitful and multiply, which means have children.

And you can tell by this note that they did not waste time. Immediately after the flood, a child was born to Shem. So two years after the flood. We see in verse 11 that Shem lived 500 years after fathering Arpikshad.

Now remember several weeks back when we talked about the age of humans, how if you read the early part of Genesis, all these people lived to be so much longer than we do today. And what God did, because of the wickedness of humanity, he actually shortened the age from in the 900s, the first humans, to 120, which is fascinating when you think about it because people today don't live past 120.

There's like this barrier that you can't cross, and God put that barrier there. And it is important for us to highlight this man, Arpikshad. This man is significant because from all the sons of Shem, it is from this man that this blessed line would continue through.

And I'll show you this more in a bit. But as Shem fathers Arpikshad, Shem lives to be about 600 years old. And so the first humans lived to be about 900 years old. Shem lived to be about 600 years old.

God has kind of this stagger. So it didn't just immediately go to 120. A little bit over time, the ages started to shorten. Abraham lived to be 180. And then Moses lived to be 120. So by the time of Moses, that age limit was already set.

So what we see here is that Arpikshad, who comes from Shem, he fathers Shalah. Okay, this is a different spelling than the Shalah that we have in our church. And this is a male. Now, Shalah fathers Eber.

The name Eber would have been significant for these early Israelites reading this passage. And the reason is because of what verse 1021 says. In verse 1021, it says that Shem was the father of all the children of Eber.

Now, many believe that this is where the word Hebrew came from. It sounds similar, Eber and Hebrew. Now, the Israelites would be called the Hebrew people. So they were called the Israelites and they were called the Hebrew people.

So these two terms were interchangeable. Now, after Eber, it says that Peleg is the fifth son from Shem. This Hebrew word that he is named after literally means to divide. And the reason that they believe that Peleg, that he was named this is because in his lifetime, this is when all the people scattered all over the earth.

So that word divide, the people divided all over the earth. And so if you think about when the Tower of Babel account took place, it took place around the time of this fifth person from Shem, okay, who's 15 people removed from Adam.

And so after the Tower of Babel, all these people spread all over the earth in the time of Peleg. Now, in the previous chapter in 1025, it says, in his days, the earth was divided. So that's where we get this meaning of his name.

Now, we see the rest of the names in this genealogy and eventually we get down to Terah. And this man is the father of the significant Abram, the father of Israel. Verse 26 says that when Terah had lived seven years, he fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

So it is significant to point out that this genealogy of chapter 11 follows the pattern of the genealogy of chapter 5. So probably more than a month ago, we looked at the genealogy of chapter 5 and that was the line of Adam.

It went from Adam to Seth and eventually you get to Noah. And one author I read said that the line of blessing in chapter 11 and chapter 5, they both follow this linear pattern with a focus narrowing in on a key descendant.

So a linear pattern means that they list one guy and then they list another guy and then they list another guy. Now, if you look at the line of Cain, they don't do that. Cain's genealogy is actually written in narrative form.

So the line of blessing is written kind of, you know, boom, boom, boom. The line of Cain is written in narrative form. So you see that this connection between chapter 5, which was a line, a blessed line in chapter 11, which is a blessed line as well.

And what I mentioned is that Genesis 5, the line of Adam and Seth that eventually leads to Noah, the whole thing is zeroing in on one man. And what it's zeroing in on is Noah. What's interesting is that right after Noah is mentioned at the end of chapter 5, we go into three chapters that are specifically focused on Noah and his role in the flood.

And what we're seeing here in chapter 11 in this genealogy is that it's zeroing in on this one man, Abram. And then what we're going to see for, we're going to become really good friends with Abram because we're going to spend several months with this guy.

So it zeroes in on this one man, Abram. And what's significant too is that Noah was 10th in the line from Adam. And Abram is 10th in the line from Shem. So you see the parallels between these two people.

So after the sorrow of the tower of Babel, humanity once again is shown hope. And this hope comes from the promise line being continued. We see once again that even though humanity plunges to new heights of despair, God's plan for the human race through this chosen line is still as bright as it can be.

So this is the first way that hope shines after this dark account of the tower of Babel. It shines through the insertion of the chosen line. Because the people reading this would say, wow, God's not done with us.

This line is continuing. And eventually this line is going to lead to Jesus Christ, who's the Savior of the world. You see how this all connects? So this is the first way that hope shines. The second way that hope shines is through light popping out in a place of darkness.

Light popping out in a place of darkness. And we'll see this in verses 27 and 28. We saw last week that the tower of Babel event took place in the land of Shinar, which is present day Iraq. What we just looked at is the blessed line all points to Abram.

The scattering that took place in the days of Peleg, who was the fifth from Shem, and Abram was the tenth from Shem. In Abram's time, the people would already be scattered all over the earth. So you would think that this hopeful son that God would do wonderful things through would come from somewhere else other than the land of Shinar.

Maybe he'd come from Canada, or maybe he'd come from somewhere from the far east or the far south. But you know what? He doesn't come from those places. He comes from the land of Shinar, right where humanity had just plunged into this darkness.

And I will show you this in the following verses, in verses 27 and 28. It says, Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran. And Haran fathered Lot. Haran died in the presence of his father, Terah, in the land of his kindred, in Ur of the Chaldeans.

The Tower of Babel took place in what would later be called Babylon. And it's called Babylon because the word Babel, the languages were confused. And this place has multiple names, including the land of Shinar, the place of the Chaldeans.

And this would have been located right in the Middle East, in present day Iraq, or where the ancient Babylonian kingdom was. And it says here that Abram's hometown is Ur. In verse 28, it says that Haran died Abraham's brother in Ur.

And in verse 31, we further learn that they come from Ur when they leave there to go on their journey. Now Ur was located in the land of Shinar, where the Tower of Babel took place. The Tower of Babel was a place of darkness.

This was a place where people were in open defiance to God. This was a place where God's judgment happened. So you would think maybe God would bring this Savior type person from a different place, but he doesn't.

He raises them up right from the midst of the darkness. The geographic location of this man, Abram, in the Blessed Line, lived right in the middle of humanity's rebellion. He was light where only darkness can be seen.

Now my family loves dachshunds. And dachshunds are also known as wiener dogs. And my dad has had these dogs going all the way back to the early days of his life. And to this day, he still has a dachshund.

Maybe you've seen him when he comes to visit, the dogs following him around. So we love these dogs. What's interesting is that if you look at the history of dachshunds, they come from Germany. And in the early part of the 20th century, Germany was not a place of light.

It was a place of darkness. And even if you have German descent, you would agree with that because of the German Empire. Eventually Hitler comes out of that, where there's Nazi Germany. And during the time of the war, dachshunds were actually persecuted in America.

Because what cartoonists would do is that they would draw a picture of Hitler, and then in that same picture, there would be a picture of a dachshund right next to him. And so what people found is that there's nothing wrong with dachshunds.

You know, dachshunds were light. Dachshunds were hope. And my family has experienced this from the joy that they bring to us. And so dachshunds became this really unpopular dog. And then once people started to own them, they became this really popular dog.

And they came from this place of darkness. Okay? That was an odd illustration, I realize. But my point is, good could come from darkness. And as you think about Abram coming from the dark land of Shinar, he knew about the worst of humanity.

But he would be used by God to bring light to the world. Through a nation, Israel. And eventually through the Messiah, Jesus. God turns evil places into redemptive places. If you think about it, where Israel is located, right in the Middle East, this hot spot of Israel is where God accomplished redemption at Calvary.

This world we live in is full of sin. And God used sinners to accomplish redemption as they nailed Jesus to the cross. The Lord accomplished redemption in this dark place through Jesus 2 ,000 years ago.

And it happened right in this place where there was people who were opposed to God. And so you see how God works. And every day he is saving people in this dark world, transforming them. And if you have a relationship with Christ, he is transforming you.

He is transforming people, pulling them from the dark places. And God causes light to shine in darkness. And he is glorified through it. He shines light in the darkness of your heart. And in the dark world you live in.

Just as he caused light to shine in darkness at the beginning of creation. Remember, at the beginning of creation, it was dark. And God said in Genesis 1 -3, let there be light. Now as a follower of Christ, do you know how the Bible describes you?

The Bible describes you as salt and light in a world where there is no salt and light. So obviously, if you ever have light shining in a dark place, it just stands out, doesn't it? One time, my brother and his friend were in Canada on a fishing trip, and they got caught in this really nasty storm.

And there was a youth leader with them, and they weren't sure if they were going to make it back. I mean, there was lightning going everywhere, and they were probably a few miles from this island that they were staying on.

And one of the guys who was on the island, he actually put a light out so that they could see. Remember, this is a place where there weren't houses. It's just wilderness. It's just darkness. And they could see this light from a few miles away as it was shining in this dark place.

And as Christians, you shine as followers of Jesus Christ. This is what Matthew 5, 14 through 16 says. It says, you are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand.

And it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. So if you belong to Christ, you are a light that shines right in the midst of darkness, just as Abram was a light that popped up in the dark land of Shinar.

So this is the second way that hope shines, through light popping out in a dark place of despair. The third way that hope shines is through the future promised child. Now, we have already seen lots of hope in this passage.

Now, in these last few verses, we will see hints of future hope that would come through this significant figure, Abram. Now, I'll show you this in verses 29 and 30. And Abram and Nahor took wives. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iskar.

Now, Sarai was barren. She had no child. What we will see in a few months from now is the promised child that Sarai, her name is later changed to Sarah, that we're going to see this child that she bore.

The author, Moses, highlights her barrenness in verse 30. He says she had no child. And Sarah will finally bear a child in Genesis 21. But her barrenness is well documented in Genesis. She was old. She was very old.

She was well beyond the age where you can have children. But God does what he always does. When faced with a humanly impossible situation, God is able to accomplish a miracle. Science said that Sarah was too old to have a child.

But God said in Genesis 18, 14, is anything too hard for the Lord? The answer is, of course, no. Nothing is too hard for the Lord. God tested Abram and Sarah's faith and glorified himself when Sarah finally gave birth to Isaac.

And we will look at this a lot more several months down the road. What needs to be stressed is Abram was in the chosen line. He was promised by God that through him this promised line would continue. So they needed a child, of course, to continue this line.

I mean, they were in a dark place. They're thinking, is God going to keep his promise? He promised this child. But Sarah is beyond the age where she can give birth. But God did a miracle. And we will see that in a few months from now.

God delivers by causing Isaac to be born to continue this chosen line that would lead to Jesus Christ. But right here in verse 30, we see more hope following this account of despair at the Tower of Babel.

This line will not stop at Abram, but will continue all the way to Christ because this barren woman will become fertile. And in the conclusion, in a few minutes, I will show you how this directly relates to you.

This is the third way that hope shines through the promised child. I gave away the fourth one. The fourth way that hope shines is through the promised land. The last glimpse of hope that we see is the first mention of the promised land in verse 31.

This is what verse 31 says, Terah took Abram, his son, and Lot, the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai, his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife. And they went forth together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan.

But when they came to Haran, they settled there. The days of Terah were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran. Now, I already alluded to this earlier, that God would plant this people in a central place, the land of Canaan, where modern-day Israel is, right by the Mediterranean, right by Jordan, right north of Egypt, south of Lebanon.

This is the land that God would give Israel. And what we see in verses 31 and 32 is a group of people leaving their homeland to travel to a new place. They are from Ur, which is right smack in the Middle East, in present-day Iraq.

And they traveled west. So Vival went west, and they go west here. Anybody see that movie? Good movie. One of Brianna's favorites. It says that when they set out, their goal was to reach the land of Canaan.

The land of Canaan is, of course, as I mentioned, where modern-day Israel is located. But they ended up not settling there. They ended up settling in Haran. And Haran would have been north of the land of Canaan.

Haran, we see this name show up already in this passage. Haran was a person, but it's also a place. And the place where Haran was located is modern-day Turkey, which is, of course, north of where Israel is.

And in the next chapter, we will see that the Lord commands Abram, Sarah, and Abram's nephew Lot to travel to the land of Canaan. The Lord tells Abram in 12 .7, to your offspring, I will give this land.

You've got to remember, at this time, the people who populated this land, there was multiple groups of people, multiple nations that populated this land. And God said, I'm going to take this land from them, and I'm going to give it to you.

So Abraham's offspring is, of course, the nation of Israel. So he's going to give this land to them. And the Lord would use this nation to be a light to the dark world as he planted them in this precise spot.

In Old Testament times, the people surrounding Israel will look on and learn about the one true God as he worked with his people. And in this way, they would be a blessing to the world, as the Lord would display his glory, this future nation in the land that God promised to Abram.

So the Lord would display this glory through them. And in a minute, I will tell you how this promised land, this land of promise that God would give to Abram, how this is relevant to you. So this is the fourth way that hope shines, through the future promised land.

Now, the continued theme in the first chapters of Genesis is hope in the face of continued despair, through the insertion of the chosen line, through the light popping out in a dark place, through the promised child, and through the promised land.

So what we observed today was a bridge between the first part of Genesis and the second part of Genesis. The bridge was between the world history and the history of Israel. And God was kind to show us hope through a genealogy, as we just saw the darkness of the Tower of Babel.

And every one of our main points is relevant to you. As a 21st century American who lives in Eureka, this is relevant to you. And I want to close by highlighting the application here. And the first point of application is that if you belong to Christ, you are considered God's people, as this chosen line was considered God's people.

And as they had his blessing, so you have his blessing. And if you belong to Christ, you shine bright in a world full of despair. I mentioned earlier how you are salt and light in a world where there is mostly darkness.

And that's the second application. The third application is if you belong to Christ, then you are blessed by the chosen line that comes through Isaac. And you are one of Abraham's spiritual offspring.

And I'm going to pull this point out more in the coming weeks. But this is incredible. That if you belong to Christ, you are actually among Abraham's offspring. Galatians 3 .29 says, if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise.

Okay, so these promises are for you, not just for Israel. And the last application to you is if you belong to Christ, you will forever be a part of God's kingdom on this earth where Christ will reign, and you will reign under him.

This land promise that God made to Abram, it wasn't a temporary promise. This was a forever promise. This was an eternal promise that he made to them. And Christ, the Messiah, is going to reign on this earth with his people, and we are his people.

And so not only will those who truly believe in Christ out of Israel be there, but so will we who are a part of the church. Okay, so you see how this all ties together. You can see God's plan of blessing for you and all his children from long, long ago.

Okay, and we see this in a genealogy today. Okay, so I hope you saw this as I tied this together. Let's pray. Father in heaven, as we as we look at this, Lord, admittedly, it's hard to preach a genealogy.

But Lord, you call us to do it. You call us to read this. You call us to look at what is in here. And I trust, Lord, that you've done something today, and you're going to continue to show people how this is relevant to them.

Lord, the word of God is able to change lives. It's able to transform the world. And we believe that at this church. And so Lord, I pray that through this text today, and in some way that you would show people what difference this makes in their life, and how it all points to you and how it all points to Jesus Christ.

Everything in the Bible is meant to point to him. All roads lead to Jesus, including this text today. And so we praise you, Lord, for the glory that we saw. And it's in his name we pray. Amen.