What Are Our Bounds of Habitation?

In this regular feature Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call.  Here is this week’s question:Dear Dave and T. A., Could you guys explain Acts:17:26And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;
See All... to me?Particularly the “times before appointed” and “the bounds of their habitation” part.Thanks.

Tom:

I’ll read Acts:17:26And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;
See All..., “And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;…”

Dave:

Well it goes on and it give you why, “That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.”That’s part of what Paul is preaching on Mars Hill.He had some pretty tough people there.These were the philosophers, the Stoics, the Epicureans and they came there to hear some new thing, you know and they were always exploring and thinking and he preaches Christ and the resurrection to them.But Tom, that first part that you quoted there, “…he has made of one blood all nations and men….”That’s very interesting because not too long ago people wouldn’t accept that.We have such a thing as racism and I really appreciate, if we don’t offer it, we ought to in The Berean Call.Ken Ham has a terrific message on race and he says, “There are no races.There is only one race—the human race.In fact, when a doctor examines the blood of a Japanese person, an Aborigine in Australia, or someone in the heart of Africa, or someone in the South Pacific, or someone from England, a Caucasian or whatever, the blood is exactly the same.Now you see this is an example of statements in the Bible—a scientific statement?Well, the Bible is not intending it as a scientific statement.The Bible is not a book of science, but it is simply making statements under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but it does move into the area that science now has investigated and it doesn’t make any mistakes.In fact it says things that were not known in that day.So he made of one blood all nations of men, but he determined the bounds of their habitation.That would take us back the tower of Babel when he confounded their languages and scattered them because the imagination of man’s heart is only evil continually and God said whatever they imagined they could do. And science has proved that whatever you imagine you can do.Now you can’t imagine everything.Our imagination is not unlimited.We can prove that very quickly.Try to imagine a new prime color to the rainbow.We can’t create out of nothing, but we can do incredible things with the material God has given us in his universe.So God said man is evil; he’s brilliant and he can take what I’ve given him, even the atom—he can go in there and tap the energy in the atom; he can travel through space.Man is created in the image of God; he’s got a lot of smarts and his imagination is only evil continually.We’ve got to confound the languages and scatter them.And so that’s what he did and Paul is giving us a further comment on this.He has put different groups of people, the language groups in isolated areas to prevent them from getting back together and he’s done this so they would instead of seeking to build like the tower of Babel, to seek the Lord.That’s what he wanted.Now interestingly Tom, apropos to what we were talking about you can get a book by Michael Harner, one of the world’s leading anthropologists.It’s called The Way of the Shaman.You know the book well.

Tom:

Sure, we used that when we did America, the New Sorcerer’s Apprentice, which is now called The New Spirituality.

Dave:

Right and he’s an anthropologist, not a Christian and he says you can travel around the world, you can visit these isolated people groups, language groups.They’ve had no contact with one another, separated by miles of ocean or whatever and when you investigate their witchcraft, it is identical every on the face of this earth.They may have some different fetishes, some different props that they use in their rituals, but basically underlying it, it is the same.You cannot explain it away.There is a common source of inspiration [which is] one of the evidences of the existence of Satan.We were going to talk about it in the future.Now what does man think is the solution today?The opposite of what God did.I can never forget seeing an ad inside Scientific American by Lockheed Corporation.It had a picture of the tower of Babel and it said—I almost fell out of my chair Tom.They said we are undoing the Babel effect. With our computers we are going to unite everyone, we are going to all speak the same language; we are going to bring this world back together and this is what man thinks is the solution today.And what is that leading to?One world religion and a one world government under the antichrist.So look, we have an example of how the Bible hangs together. Here’s Paul talking on Mars Hill extemporaneously and he’s not mentioning Babel, the tower of Babel.He is saying something that ties in with what God did back there at the very beginning.

Tom:

Dave, one of the things I wanted to get to but we’re out of time on this, but do you think this has anything to do with people groups who really seem to be far removed from the gospel because they’re just not interested and they turned away?You look at the Far East for example, there are whole areas that the scripture doesn’t address.

Dave:
Tom, I think the Bible says it all in Romans:1:21Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
See All...—“Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.”I believe that all those groups—people can be reached with the gospel as well.