Allotted (Acts 17: 26)

The crisis at America’s southern border might have been the major reason Donald Trump won the election so handily back in November. Today, his very public deportations of “illegal aliens” / “undocumented immigrants” continue to make him a hero in the eyes of many and an absolute villain for others. While some hate him and his policies, others just think he’s doing what he was elected to do. Christians square up on both sides of that line of scrimmage, usually with pretty firmly-held ideas about why their own side is right. One way of saying what we think about it is to say “America is for Americans.” Others cringe at such talk.

Are we all okay?

Biblical faith lives at a crossroads where some of the most ancient stories we know about meet up with the jagged edge of how people think and live right now. Over the last two weeks, we have noticed some of the unexpected intersections of ancient Greek philosophy and mythology with the gospel of Jesus Christ, from the lips of the apostle Paul, in what he said to a gathering of educated, sophisticated thinkers on Mars Hill in Athens long ago.

Today, we finish our foray into Paul’s time in Athens. If you think it’s been weird so far, just wait. In fact, this is likely to be one of the weirdest sermons you’ve ever heard me preach. We are going to go places today that’ll probably just start with you. Still, believe it or not, what Paul is going to talk about this morning directly relates to the current immigration debate in America, and the squabbles over who the land belongs to and why, in America and around the world. Let me show you what I mean.

Acts 17:26-27

4 solid truths about why any given land belongs to any particular nation

Each nation of men is the handiwork of God

Most of us have known for many years that humans are the handiwork of God. What many of us may not realize is that the Bible also teaches that God’s creative purposes extend to the tribes and peoples and nations of mankind. And listen up please! When the Bible talks about nations it is not talking about political entities, something drawn on a map. It’s talking about large groups of people related by shared blood and religion and culture. Listen again to how Paul put it to the philosophers on Mars Hill:

^26a And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth

In other words, it is not just persons God is the creator of; it’s peoples. It’s families and tribes and nations. The Greeks Paul was preaching to were created to be Greek. The Hebrews among whom he grew up were made to be Hebrews. The Cherokee nation were created by God to be Cherokee. The Māori were made to be Māori. And yes, Americans are here on this continent to be American. We’ll definitely come back to that.

Before we go any further, though, we need to stop and ask ourselves, who was the one man God made every nation of men from? If you were thinking it’s Adam, it’s not. It’s Noah. Do you remember? The Great Flood killed every human being on earth except Noah and his family. When they got off the ark, God gave them a mandate much like the charge he gave to Adam and Eve:

Genesis 9:1 And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. • • •  ⁷ And you, be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.”  • • •  ¹⁸ The sons of Noah who went forth from the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth…. ¹⁹ These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the people of the whole earth were dispersed.

That’s the ninth chapter of Genesis. Then comes chapter ten, where Moses enumerates the seventy nations of the Ancient Near East, and shows how each of them descends from one of Noah’s three sons. After that comes chapter eleven, where Moses describes how Noah’s descendants almost didn’t disperse across the earth. Instead, they tried to all stay together, in a city, with a tower. Do you remember?

Genesis 11 ¹ Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. ² And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. ³ And they said to one another, …“Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” ⁵ And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. ⁶ And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.. ⁷ Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” ⁸ So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. ⁹ Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.

In other words, the tower of Babel story in chapter 11 explains how the Seventy Nations of chapter 10 came to be. Which means that the events of the beginning of chapter 11 actually happened long before the events of chapter 10. That seems backwards, but that’s the only way it makes any sense.

I recognize some people in the room might think the Tower of Babel narrative is just a weird kids’ story that God included in the Bible so we could draw pictures of it for kids to color. That’s certainly what I thought when I was younger. But all scripture is breathed out by God, and is profitable for teaching and rebuke and correction and instruction In righteousness. This story is not just so we can paint cool pictures. It’s actually crucial to understanding the trajectory of God’s dealings with mankind. And it’s key to what Paul was talking about here on the Areopagus.

The one man that God grew into all the nations is Noah. The nations are the ones listed in the Table of Nations in chapter 10 of Genesis. And it’s from those seventy nations that all the hundreds or thousands of the nations of the earth today have developed across the centuries—including the classical Greek city-states like Athens or the massive empires like those of the Romans or the Americans. Paul’s point is that each of those nations was made on purpose by the hand of God.

Yes, I know that flies full in the face of the consensus shared by professional historians, anthropologists, and archaeologists around the world.  I simply believe that wherever their findings disagree with what the Bible teaches, their findings are wrong. Further study will prove the Bible was right all along. Just give it time.

All the nations are put in place on purpose by God

I let you know last week that the word “allotted” was going to be really important for us today. It’s so important that it’s the title of the sermon! Also last week I summarized the point of verse 26 as the meticulous sovereignty of God over every detail of our lives and our world, including who lives where and when. So just listen to the verse again:

²⁶ And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place,

That’s one of the stranger verses in the Bible, for a couple of reasons. One of those reasons is what it says about the sovereignty of God, firmly embedded in what it says about lots. The other is that it is only one side of the truth, in both the ancient world and the modern.

The casting of lots was an ancient game of chance, Like when we flip a coin or roll some dice, either as a simple and fair way to make a necessary decision there is a way to gamble for money. The game involved tossing stones of specific shapes and colors to see how they landed. The practice is mentioned scores of times in both testaments of the Bible.

One thing that is notable about the casting of lots in the Bible is the confidence people had that God was completely in control of how the lots fell and therefore of what decisions were made. We should notice what the Bible says about it, especially in Proverbs 16. Let’s look at Proverbs 16:1, 9, 33, and let’s pay attention to the fact that in each of these verses, what we hear is not just the opinion of an ancient Hebrew. It is the teaching of the scripture, and therefore it is infallibly correct   T&R&E  Theologians call this “meticulous sovereignty.” It means that God is completely in control of even the tiniest detail of everything that ever happens. As R. C. Sproul used to like to put it, “There is not a rogue molecule in the entire universe.” The lots always land precisely where God planned for them to fall.

This is particularly relevant for how God commanded Joshua to portion out the tribal territories in the promised land. We hear God’s command in Numbers 26:

⁵² The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ⁵³ “Among these the land shall be divided for inheritance according to the number of names. ⁵⁴ To a large tribe you shall give a large inheritance, and to a small tribe you shall give a small inheritance; every tribe shall be given its inheritance in proportion to its list. ⁵⁵ But the land shall be divided by lot. According to the names of the tribes of their fathers they shall inherit. ⁵⁶ Their inheritance shall be divided according to lot between the larger and the smaller.”

Then we see Joshua’s obedience in Joshua 18:

⁸ … Joshua charged those who went to write the description of the land, saying, “Go up and down in the land and write a description and return to me. And I will cast lots for you here before the Lord in Shiloh.” ⁹ So the men went and passed up and down in the land and wrote in a book a description of it by towns in seven divisions. Then they came to Joshua to the camp at Shiloh, ¹⁰ and Joshua cast lots for them in Shiloh before the Lord. And there Joshua apportioned the land to the people of Israel, to each his portion.

Notice the language: the lot, allotment, portion, apportionment, inheritance. Those are powerful words that show up in several different contexts throughout the Old Testament and the New. It even shows up in our modern English today. What do you call a piece of land that you purchase in order to build a house on? It’s a “lot.” When you want to talk about someone’s basic status or condition or outcome, you might refer to his “lot in life.” In every one of those usages of the word, the fundamental idea of God’s sovereignty lies not far from the surface. My lot in life means the way God planned for the details of my life to work out. That’s the reason why I should be content with my life. What I have is what God gives me, and I should be satisfied with that. It’s not that I should never want more than what I have or work for more. It’s just that I should be able to trust God and thank him for everything I have, even if I never get anything more. I should be content with my lot. The lot is all about the meticulous sovereignty of God over every detail of our lives and our world.

How are we doing? Are we OK with this? Because it’s about to get weirder. Moses says something in Deuteronomy 32 that is simply mind-boggling. And it relates directly to Acts 17:26.
⁷ Remember the days of old;
consider the years of many generations;
ask your father, and he will show you,
your elders, and they will tell you.
⁸ When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
when he divided mankind,
he fixed the borders of the peoples
according to the number of the sons of God.
⁹ But the Lord’s portion is his people,
Jacob his allotted heritage.

When, long before Moses wrote Deuteronomy in 1400 BC, did the Most High give the nations their inheritance and divide mankind? That happened at the Tower of Babel. And what does it mean that he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of sons of God? Well, there was a well-known Canaanite tradition that the Most High God, named just “God,” had 70 sons. More than one author in the Old Testament agrees that there were many heavenly beings known as the sons of God. Moses seems to be saying that the Canaanites were right about the number 70, because at at one point in the dateless past the one true God had divided up humankind into nations, apportioning them into 70 portions to correspond to the 70 sons of God. Moses says In Deuteronomy 32 that the Lord’s portion, or inheritance, or allotment, is Israel, the 12 tribes that descend from the 12 sons of Jacob.

And that implies that, just as the gods of the nations received their nations by lot, so also Jehovah received Israel to be his very own people [[ ]] by lot. And that is freaky beyond words, because it seems to suggest that the one true God gets what he gets my pure chance, just like the gods of the nations.

If that were what this passage is saying, that would be a serious problem. But Deuteronomy 32:8-9 is not saying that at all. Remember? The lot never falls by chance. It always falls just exactly where God has already planned for it to fall. Meticulous sovereignty. What that means is that God lays claim to Israel as his very own by his own sovereign will and election. And God hands the nations of the world over to other spiritual beings as an act of his own sovereign justice and judgment. In other words, the greatest judgment visited on humanity at Babel was not the confusion of their languages. It was their being handed over to the darkness. The one true God, in an act of righteous wrath, turned to the nations over to the enemy to let the dark powers have their way with them. That is exactly what you’re reading about when you read Romans one and wonder what it means that God handed the peoples over to their own sin.

So let’s go back and read our passage.

²⁶ And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place,

When Paul was preaching to the pagans on Mars Hill in Athens, he was letting them know that the reason they were in Athens under the authority of Athena was that God had allotted that lot to them. It was just part of their lostness. [[ ]]

So what in the world does that have to do with us in America today? It just tells us that we are here because God put us here. And that that placement is part of God’s justice. If we are under dark powers, it’s because we have invited them in, and God in judgment has given us what we wanted. We are, and we do, And he has.

Each nation of men is the handiwork of God

All the nations are put in place on purpose by God

This is true regardless what the nations think

You really have to wonder what those Athenian philosophers were thinking when they heard Paul saying these things. Then again, perhaps we don’t have to wonder.

Probably the greatest of all of the Athenian philosophers over the centuries was a man named Plato, who died about 400 years before Paul spoke his piece on the hill. Here is a very interesting passage from one of his Dialogues:

 Critias In the days of old the gods had the whole earth distributed among them by allotment. …They all of them by just apportionment obtained what they wanted, and peopled their own districts; and when they had peopled them they tended us, their nurselings and possessions, as shepherds tend their flocks, …. Now different gods had their allotments in different places which they set in order. (ca 360 BC)(vs 1400 BC)

I expect every last one of them was thinking about that passage from Plato as Paul spoke these words:

²⁶ And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place,

Paul is saying that the God of the Hebrews is the one who allots territories to the peoples and their gods. Athena didn’t win Athens in a crapshoot before the beginning of time. God in wrath put Athens under Athena as an act of right, good, just judgment.

I’m reasonably sure that’s not anything the Athenian philosophers were happy to hear. Many of them didn’t even believe in Athena or the other gods and goddesses. They would have thought that what Paul was saying was backward bigoted and hopelessly benighted. Any of those philosophers who still held to the old traditional religion would have been doubly offended by what Paul was saying. True to form, Paul knew good and well what he was doing and how it was likely to land. He just loved people enough to tell them the truth whether they liked it or not.

• modern beliefs about why people live where they live, and when
• migration due to economic pressures
• importation because of conquest
• deportation because of conquest Assyria, Babylon
• same realities show up in the Bible
• migration due to economic pressures (Joseph, Ruth)
• importation because of conquest (Assyria)
• deportation because of conquest Assyria, Babylon (Exile)
• repeated insistence that the invisible but irresistible hand of God’s providential purpose is behind everything that the people of Israel are seeing in their lives and in their world
• the truth that all the nations are put in place on purpose by God is true regardless what the nations think
• Athenian philosophers
• modern Americans
• the only question that matters is, what is God’s purpose?

Each nation of men is the handiwork of God

All the nations are put in place on purpose by God

This is true regardless what the nations think

God’s settled purpose is to bring the nations back to himself

• I say that because of what God says in the very next verse

 ²⁷ that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, 

• I also say it because that has been a major theme of the book of acts all the way from the very beginning
• Jews gathered back to Jerusalem from all the nations on the day of Pentecost
• the Holy Spirit speaking to them in their own languages from the mouths of simple people who would have no way of knowing all those languages
• God fulfilling prophecy after prophecy to regather Israel from the nations
• and then send his people back to the nations to take them back from the gods under whose authority they had been placed so many centuries earlier
• the whole reason why Paul was even in Athens
• and frankly the whole reason why you’re in Dundalk today

 ²⁷ that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, 

• three lessons for Christians in the dark today if in fact the purpose of God in placing us in our town and in our country, and his purpose in bringing other people into our town and into our country is to bring the nations back to himself

       We are not globalists

• we aren’t necessarily people who think that being an American is meaningless, that’s the only thing that matters it’s helping people all over the globe
• it’s the thing that matters most, if you understand what it actually means to help people… we’ll talk more in just a second about how God really calls us to help people
• free to be patriotic loyal Americans who believe that God has given us this land because he has
• there are some things about this that are blessed and good, and there are some that are challenging and call for us to think deeply and change

       We are not nativists

• there are some voices among Christians in America saying that the only people who have any right to be here are native-born Americans
• Christians shouldn’t think like that
• we believe the sovereign God is the one who put us Europeans here a few centuries ago
• Native Americans
• documented or undocumented migrants

• no, it is not wrong for a nation to control its borders, for people to make conscious and deliberate decisions about how many newcomers they can assimilate
• nor is it wrong for America to make and enforce good immigration laws
• it is wrong to hate newcomers and have a settled attitude of dislike toward them
• far more than that, it is blasphemously wrong to think that we have ultimate sovereignty over this land
• God is the sovereign that’s the whole point of the casting of lots

       We are evangelists

• the one purpose we can say for sure that God has for putting us here today is this: we are too live and tell the good news of Jesus Christ and seek to make disciples of everyone we ever know

what God wants them to do

• think deeply about Roman soldiers casting lots for the garment of a Jewish Carpenter hanging on a tree