In Numbers 22 the king of Moab saw the size of Israel camped near them and was terrified. He knew he couldn’t fight against them, and he feared that they would devour the land because of their enormous population. He summoned a man named Balaam to curse them for hire, but after an encounter with God he told the king’s servants to go back to their land because God has refused to let him go with them. The king was relentless and sent higher up servants. Balaam consulted God again and since the answer was still no and the king was not giving up, God told Balaam to go with them to speak God’s words, but not to do anything. When Balaam tried to go with them, he was opposed by God but didn’t realize it. His donkey saw the angel of the Lord with a sword drawn and he moved off the path three times, but Balaam kept beating the donkey until God opened the donkey’s mouth and allowed him to speak. I have always been amused by this story and why it seems that Balaam doesn’t act surprised when the donkey speaks to him. Maybe they left that part out of the story, but after the donkey questioned Balaam he reminded him of his years of faithfulness and asked him why he didn’t trust him when he moved from the path. God also questioned Balaam in the same way, and he told him that had the donkey proceeded, Balaam would have been killed and the donkey would have lived. The donkey saved Balaam’s life by opposing him. This had me thinking of all the times I thought opposition was coming against me, but realized later that it was designed to divert my direction. There are faithful godly people in my life that are for my good, so if they are questioning my plans or appear to be in opposition, I really need to listen to what they have to say because they might be seeing something I am blind to see. Proverbs reminds us that there is safety in the council of many. Especially God-fearing people who are hearing from God.
I also thought about the fact that God’s promise to bless Israel could not be thwarted by any other plans to curse them. Those who try to curse those who are blessed by God will find themselves opposed by God himself. This was all going on while the camp of Israel slept soundly in the wilderness completely unaware of the threat that lurked and the protection of God that halted it all. When we are obediently surrendered to God, He keeps the promises that are in his word. We have no idea how many plans have been made with the intent to curse us that God has opposed and stopped while we sleep soundly and unaware.
One last thing I pulled from this is that we also have to be careful that we don’t allow ourselves to curse someone who is blessed by God because we will also find ourselves in opposition with God Himself! Curses are not just magical spells or black magic divinations. The bible tells us that rebellion is the spirit of witchcraft, and this includes a rebellious attitude towards someone that causes us to speak out against them. If we take this further if we speak out in an attitude of disrespect and rebellion toward leaders, we are in danger of opposing God because God established authority. Even authority figures that we disagree with. Our negative mouth in opposition to authorities in our lives put us in opposition with God. It’s ok to have questions but we need to be praying for our leaders and taking our concerns to a higher authority by appealing to God. If we actually did this we would not only see change, but we would also have a heart change ourselves.
