reverse Babel

Monday May 20^th, Genesis 11:  5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. 6 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. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."  8 So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 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.  Sitting around the campfire, the child asks, “why do some people talk so we can’t understand them?”  The question prompts this story.  On the one hand it is just a story, on the other hand, like most stories in the Bible, it is a glimpse into the heart of humanity.  Humanity wasn’t ready to get together and try to solve the world’s problems.  Humanity then, as now, was just a bit too immature.  Humanity was as a child, too focused inward upon itself.  The melt downs and bubbling ups and the Boston bombings of terror or the Texan explosions of greed show that things have changed little.  Pentecost is a move to change that. Rather than looking inward for our personal gain, Pentecost sends us out into the world to be the hands and feet of God in the world.  It reverses Babel.  Now if only our maturity would catch up.