God Is Not a Man

Balak treated blessing and cursing like a technique. If he chose the right hill and offered enough, perhaps he could control the outcome. At Bamoth Baal, seven altars smoked with bulls and rams. But Yahweh met Balaam and put a word in his mouth. The first oracle said, How shall I curse whom God has not cursed? How shall I defy whom Yahweh has not defied? It described Israel as a people that dwells alone, too many to count like the dust.

Balak protested, I took you to curse my enemies, and behold, you have blessed them altogether. Balaam replied, Must I not take heed to speak that which Yahweh puts in my mouth? At the field of Zophim on Pisgah came the second oracle: God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should repent. Has he said, and he won't do it? Behold, I have received a command to bless. He has blessed, and I can't reverse it.

The oracle continued: Yahweh his God is with him. The shout of a king is among them. God brings them out of Egypt. There is no enchantment against Jacob. Balak said, Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all, then tried a third place, Peor. Paul writes in Romans 8:31, If God is for us, who can be against us? In Christ, believers share the same secure blessing: every promise of God is Yes in Him (2 Corinthians 1:20).