The experience of Balaam in the course of one business mission provides a handy illustration of circumstantial signs that God sometimes puts in our path to slow us down or altogether deter us from potential dangers, if we would hear.  Unfortunately, many times, we think ourselves too ‘committed’ to a people or to a project to hear those signs and save ourselves. Only from hindsight do we rue our losses.

Famous Balaam, the CEO of Balaam and Sons, was about to embark on an important international trip when, the night before, he had a strange experience, something like a dream, restraining him from the trip.  However, as he had already committed himself to his clients, and those were diplomatic partners, he had to go.  The lure was too attractive to be lightly dismissed on grounds of one nightmare.  He packed for the trip.

He rode his very reliable limousine.  It had served him faithfully for many years.  On the way, that otherwise dependable car began to behave in strange ways.  No matter what he did to drive it, it seemed very reluctant to go.  It kept wheeling itself this way and that way off the road, bumping against sidewalks in unusual ways, until it simply broke down.  It won’t be forced any farther.

Balaam flared up in his usual temper, this time against a car, kicking and slapping against it.  Then he heard a very strange sound, which such vehicles were never known to make.  As he listened in angry amusement, it became clearer that his path was strewn with danger.  Then he saw another bizarre object in his foggy path: a giant rock against which he might have crashed and died if he had forced the car any further.  Somehow, the rock began to transmit a radio message to the effect that danger was ahead.  Balaam was concerned about the consecutive signs he had seen and heard and experienced in that one day.  Something was not altogether right, he seemed to sense.  Still, he had to go.  The gain ahead was too huge to be missed.

Reducing the spectacular experience of that prophet to relatable contemporary terms shows how, sometimes, we ignore the voice of signs to our doom.  The story is in Numbers 22:1-34. Probably you or someone you know can identify with this story of Balaam in some way.

The Signs of Illumination
To the extent that a sign is something to be interpreted, something that means more than it seems, we can speak of the sign of illumination.  By the light from the word of God, a scripture could assume a fresh meaning, applying to us in a present situation as if had been written or spoken for that particular moment.  You must have had your own experience where a verse of the Bible seemed to be calling out your name.The Bible says in Psalm 119:130: “The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.”  When light is cast upon something, we see it more clearly than before, even though it had been there all the time.  Then certain Bible verses seem to jump out to you, as if a spirit led you there.  It could be a sign in the soul.  Sometimes the sign could be a song, or a sermon, or an act, which strikes one with a significance that it doesn’t strike others with, providing more light to our path.  Psalm 119:105 describes that situation well: “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.”

Valid as this could be, it also should be discerned.  I remember a story once told, of a man who wanted to conjure the Bible to guide a decision.  He opened to a random page of the Bible and pointed his finger at a verse.  It read, “And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.”  He was worried.  He was not Judas.  He tried a second time, and landed on a verse that read, “Go, and do thou likewise.”  He was getting worried, so he tried one more time, and the verse he found, said, “That thou doest, do quickly.” 

Discerning Signs
In Matthew 24:32-33, Jesus said, “when ye shall see all these things, know…”  In other words, the “things” are see-able.  They won’t be things so hard to see.  They won’t be things shrouded in a mystery.  The matter, however, is not just the seeing, but also the knowing; or a seeing that should lead to a knowing.  So, there are “things” that God puts in nature, in our respective spaces, for us to “see” and “know” times and seasons.  If some seasons take us by surprise, it could be because we missed their signs.  Sometimes we have vainly blamed the prophet for being blind to our plight, whereas it was we who had failed to ‘see’ the signs at a time when God chose to speak not through the prophet but through those signs missed.

In the Gospel of Luke, we are also presented with the matter of discerning signs, beyond seeing them.  There, Jesus rebuked a people, saying,

Jesus admits, “ye see”; and further from seeing, “ye say.” In other words, proclamations informed by vision; vision so accurate and fulfilled that Jesus confirms, “and so it is.”  Only “when ye see” can “ye say,” but the saying is the product of discernment.  Jesus’ worry in that passage was not the seeing but an inability to discern or interpret vision, for what we see does not always mean what it seems.  God often asked His prophets, “What seest thou?” (Jeremiah 1:11-12; Amos 8:2; Zechariah 4:2-6; 5:2-3).

Things to See
What are the “things” to see?  They will differ from context to context.  The hands of a clock may be differently designed from clock to clock, but their function is the same.  In the case of Jacob, the ‘things’ he saw were the changed attitude of Leban his boss, the change in the atmosphere of the working environment, the increasing unpleasant toxicity and vilifications in the relationship.  Jacob could not take it for much longer.  Incidentally, God was saying the same to him: “It’s time to go.”  In the case of the fig tree of which Jesus spoke, the “things” to see were not to be hostile emotional expressions on the face of a bitter boss.  They were to be external socio-political and environmental events meant as time-markers; natural events with supernatural eloquence.

Gideon in the Bible also had signs.  In his case, he was specific on what signs he wanted to see: his fleece getting all wet or all dry over the night (Judges 6:36-40).  Abraham’s servant was similarly specific.  God was leading him to get a good wife for Isaac, but he would ‘know’ by the ‘sign’ of character: the girl who was charitable enough to attend well to a stranger, fetching water for him and all his ten camels, each camel capable of drinking over 200 litres (53 gallons) of water, that would be the girl (Genesis 24:12-14). There are signs everywhere. May the Lord open our eyes to see and be able to discern them, so that we can “say” or act appropriately. Amen.