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As a corporate worship pastor, my time is often spent considering how our corporate worship, as well as our church as a whole, is functioning (or not functioning) according to Scripture. My goal is to ensure that every aspect of our services and our ministries are practicing what the Bible has laid out for us through examples and commands. There are certain passages in Scripture, however, that point out what we should NOT be doing in corporate worship. Genesis 11 is an example for us of what corporate worship should NOT look like.
The chapter starts by explaining that everyone had the same language and the same words. Everyone was on the same page when they spoke to each other, and their mission was clear: “Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name.” (Gen 11:4). As a result of their building, God decided to scatter the people throughout the earth, and confuse their language (vv. 7–8). This is a familiar passage for many people, but we often ask the question, “why?” What’s wrong with building a tower and having excellent communication?
We need to take a closer look at what the people were accomplishing in this feat. Their goal wasn’t simply to build a tower; it was to make a name for themselves (v. 4). Rather than filling the earth and subduing it (as God had commanded Adam and Noah), the people were settling in one spot (v. 2). They saw their own agenda as better than God’s, and it showed when they decided to make a city for themselves and to make a name for themselves. Everything was about them! Instead of following what God had set as His agenda, they sought to accomplish their own agenda. They wanted to be popular. They wanted to be famous. They saw themselves as the “next big thing,” and their tower was going to literally be the “next big thing.”
Yet, for all their pompousness, notice how God interacted with them: “Then Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built.” (v. 5, emphasis added). They saw themselves as something big, yet the text shows that God had to bend over to see this little tower that the people were building. It has the idea of a human bending over to look at an ant on the ground. In the world that God had made, this was quite a small thing.
In the beginning of creation, it was God who was naming everything, demonstrating His authority and ownership over it. Yet, the people here sought to make a name for themselves. Instead of being under God’s authority, they wanted autonomy from God. They wanted nothing to do with God. As a result, God confused their language and scattered them across the earth (vv. 7–8).
But what does this have to do with the Church? Why does this matter for our corporate gatherings in 2024? Think about this: in God’s providential plan of redemption, His goal is to glorify Himself by reversing sin in the world and making Himself great. So what is the reverse of the result Babel? What is the reverse of a people scattered and language confused because of their desire to make themselves great? How about this: a people gathered with a language understood by everyone, in order to glorify God. Sound familiar? This is the day of Pentecost. At the day of Pentecost, God reversed the sin of Babel. He brought people together, and through the Holy Spirit allowed them to understand one another, despite different languages, all for the sake of bringing God praise.
The inception of the church demonstrates that we gather, not to build ourselves up, but to build up the name of Christ and identify ourselves with Him. It’s not to say, “Look at what I can do.” It’s to edify one another by saying, “Look at what God can do.” Our goal is NOT to be like Babel; it’s to be the Church that God has raised up, and that God has ordained for His glory.
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