Advent Series - December 3

 

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JMJ

December 3

After the flood, Noe and his sons had children and they had children and so on. Years went by and families grew into tribes and tribes grew into cities then nations. They became skilled in building with bricks and in their pride decided to build a tower that would reach all the way up to heaven without God's help.

God saw this prideful plan and put a stop to it by giving people different languages so that no one could understand one another. Everyone sounded  as if they were babbling, so we call the tower that caused it all, the Tower of Babel. Since they could no longer communicate, all work on the tower stopped and people moved away. (Genesis 11)

If you look at the very end of the Bible in the chronological index, it says that one man did not agree to help build the tower. His name was Heber. Heber was the great grandson of Noe’s son Sem.

To reward Heber’s faithfulness, God let him keep the original language. We call this language “Hebrew” after Heber. So now you know that Adam and Eve spoke Hebrew in the Garden of Paradise!

Heber had children and his children had children, until another special person was born. That person was Abram. When Abram was 75, he went to live in the land of Chaanan with his family and his nephew Lot. Eventually, they parted ways and Lot went to live in Sodom.

Then there was a war and Lot was taken captive. When he heard this, Abram went with his servants and rescued Lot and Lot’s family and possessions.

After the rescue, Melchisedech, the king of Salem (which means peace), and priest of the most high God, brought forth bread and wine and offered them in thanksgiving. He blessed Abram saying, “Blessed be Abram by the most high God, who created heaven and earth.” (Genesis 14:18-19)

Melchisedech is a mysterious person. We do not know where he came from, or when he died. He
offered bread and wine to God when most sacrifices at that time were animals. Melchisedech is a priest and a king; the king of Salem (which will later be called Jeru-Salem…Jerusalem!)

Melchisedech prefigured Our Lord, the King and Eternal High Priest of the Heavenly Jerusalem.

Melchisedech offered bread and wine, which prefigured the Sacrifice of the Mass. Our priests today have the power to change that bread and wine into the very Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

When a priest is ordained, he is told, “Thou art a priest forever, according to the order of
Melchisedech.”

So Melchisedech is an interesting figure in the Old Testament, but Abram would have a greater part to play.

Abram was the great great great great grandson of Heber.

Abram was born 450 years after the flood, just 2 years after Noe died. (Noe’s son Sem would live until Abram was 50.)

This marks a new time in the history of mankind.

Before he died, anyone who wanted to follow the true God could have talked to Noe. The chronological index shows that Noe was born just 126 years after Adam himself died! Noe would have been able to talk to men who had known Adam, the first man personally! Those people could have told Noe exactly what Adam said regarding the creation of the world, original sin and the promise God made of the Redeemer.

But now Noe was gone. Men had much shorter lives since the Flood and there was a danger that the words of God would be lost.

So God had a special plan. He wanted to have a race of people whom He would adopt as His Own family. They would be His “Chosen People” in order to guard the true faith until the coming of the Savior.

God chose Abram to be the father of His people. He changed Abram’s name to Abraham, which means, “father of the multitude.”

We will talk more about Abraham tomorrow.