Walking away from Temptation
When we meet Balaam in the book
of 22nd Chapter of Numbers he is a man who knows the Lord and
appears to be trying to follow Him. Balak, the King of the Mooabites, has seen
the Children of Israel enter his lands and was afraid. There were a lot of them
and he wanted Balaam to smite and curse them with the power of the Lord. When
Balaam came before the Lord he had his answer, the Children are blessed and the
Lord will not curse them. He gave this answer to Balak’s people who told him
and sent higher ranking princes to ask the same. However, what Balaam didn’t do
at that point was leave or refuse to take this any further. The book of Numbers doesn’t say so in exact
words but it appears that Balaam may have been enticed by the lifestyle or by
what Balak could do for him. At this
point he was not a complete loss because he was still trying to walk the line
between the Lord and Balak, telling them he could only do what the Lord said,
the Lord said if they asked he could go with them, he went with them without
them asking. The Lord sent an Angel to block him.
Many of us walk this same line
today. We want both the Lord and the world. We want to serve him and have the
good things that the world can offer. We must remember two things, we cannot
serve two masters and the admonition to care not for what we will eat or wear.
That last part is so hard for me. I like to plan everything out.
A few chapters later we find that
Balaam is still with Balak who was able to provide alters and rams (the best
sacrifices that a rich man could offer) in three different locations, yet none
of this swayed the word of the Lord, Balaam knew this and still stayed with
Balak. Balaam had been taken out of his world and was being shown the world of
the King and it tempted him yet he did not want to disobey the Lord. He was still
trying to walk the line between the two.
The last we hear of Balaam in the
book of Number is Chapter 31 and it is that he was slain, he was guilty of
causing the children of Israel to commit trespass against the Lord in the
matter of Peor and Eleazar the priest was living with the Children of Israel. Balaam
is remembered in by Peter in 2 Peter and John in Revelations as a man who led the
Children of Israel astray by teaching them to eat things sacrificed to idols
and to commit fornication.
It is obvious from this that Balaam
lost his balancing act and fell away from the Lord and led others astray when
he did so. Temptation gained the upper hand with him and led him to disaster.
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