Inspiration Station - The Tower of Babel Building Project

Something radical happens when we challenge the cultural narrative that making a name for ourselves should be our life goal. This episode digs into a counterintuitive truth that could transform your approach to success and legacy forever.

The Tower of Babel story provides a powerful lens through which we examine modern ambition. Those ancient builders, motivated by pride and fear of irrelevance, created an extraordinary structure – all to elevate their own reputation. Sound familiar? We explore four problematic motivations that drove their project: the desire to create a lasting name, the tendency toward isolation, the shortcutting of established methods, and the disobedience of divine guidance. Each of these motivations resonates with today's achievement-oriented culture.

What makes this conversation so compelling is how it exposes the subtle ways pride infiltrates our ambitions. Pride convinces us that our name should be paramount, that our methods are superior, and that isolation is preferable to community. Yet as the Babel story demonstrates, even remarkable unity and engineering prowess can't overcome the fundamental flaw of pride-centered motivation. When our projects are built on the foundation of self-promotion, they're destined to create confusion rather than lasting impact.

Are you constructing your own Tower of Babel? We offer three penetrating questions to help you identify pride-driven ambition in your life. Do you regularly take shortcuts because you believe your approach is better? Do you prefer isolation to community engagement? Does your name and recognition matter more than the accomplishments of those around you? Your answers might reveal whether your ambitions are building something meaningful or merely monuments to pride. The choice is yours – will you pursue making your name great, or will you align with purposes greater than yourself?

We explore the dangerous allure of making a name for ourselves and why it might be one of the worst life decisions we can make. Using the biblical Tower of Babel story, we examine how pride-driven ambition leads to division and failure rather than true fulfillment and legacy.

• The Babel Tower project was driven by pride and fear of irrelevance
• Four motivations behind Babel: creating a name, separating from others, circumventing established methods, and disobeying instructions
• Pride is a dangerous enemy we must guard against
• The power of unity and agreement was demonstrated even in this misguided project
• God responded to their pride by confounding their language and stopping the project

Are you building your own Babel Tower? Ask yourself: Do you take shortcuts because you think your way is better? Are you prone to isolation rather than community? Do you prioritize your name and legacy above others?

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
On the next episode of the Inspiration Station, I'm
going to show you why making aname for yourself could be the
worst decision you ever made inyour life.
Might not make sense right now,but it will before the episode
is done.
Thank you for watching.
We start right now.
Thank you, welcome back to theAll Purpose Pod or an All

(00:53):
Purpose Life.
Wherever you are and howeveryou're listening to, the Call Me
, mr U and the InspirationStation.
Thanks again for making us partof your week.
We definitely appreciate youguys.
We're getting a love on oursocial media platforms and on
our YouTube channel.
We're growing exponentially andwe thank you guys for that.
We're convinced that thecontent we put down here is

(01:13):
valuable and relevant to you andwe're seeing it play out.
So thank you again forlistening.
Let's jump into this, all right?
So I said from the outset thatmaking a name for yourself is
probably one of the worst thingsyou could ever do in your life.
I know there was some eye rolls.
People said how could that bepossible?
Making a name for yourself isall we can do in this life,
right?
Well, I'm going to say thatwe're wrong.

(01:33):
I grew up in a place, in aregion, in a country where
making a name for yourself wasall it was about the whole quest
, from the time we got out ofdiapers and the training pants
to wearing adult clothes orchildren's clothes.
The whole point was to make aname for yourselves, get out of
your neighborhood, do somethingimportant with your life and

(01:57):
allow your name theoretically tolive on.
Now, what you see sometimes arepeople having so many babies
they feel like that's the way tohave their name live on.
That's one route, but that'snot really what we're talking
about today.
Now there's a story that Ishare about so many times on our
podcast and if you don't readthe Bible or you don't subscribe
to biblical things, you stillknow the story because you heard

(02:20):
it so many times out of my ownmouth on this podcast and on
many shows on this brand.
But there was a story in theaccount inscripts in the book of
Genesis where they were a groupof people they were I wouldn't
call them outcasts, but they hadsome outcast tendencies, let's
just put it like that and theyhad it in their mind that they

(02:41):
were seeing so much progress andso much growth around them in
neighboring tribes and nations.
They said, in order for us topreserve our name.
We must do something drastic Inorder to preserve our name and
our great heritage.
The heritage wasn't that great,to be honest, but in their mind
it was a great legacy and whatthey wanted to do was to build a

(03:03):
tower so high that it wouldtouch heaven and, I guess, in
some ways, get God's attention.
So they were.
This proved the power ofagreement.
They came together and theyagreed on building this tower
and they built it.
They built it from the groundup and so high that it nearly

(03:26):
touched heaven, but itdefinitely got God's attention.
What was the motivation for thisproject that I call the Babel
Tower Project?
What was the motivation forthis?
It's not like in today's timewhere somebody builds a tower or
a skyscraper or a high risebecause they want to be known

(03:46):
forever.
Well, I guess maybe they'resimilar.
They want to be known foreveras making the builders the
biggest tower ever built in thisparticular city or in the
continent they live in.
It's for name sake, it's forglory, it's for bragging rights,
if you will.
It's not really a good reason tobuild a skyscraper or a tower.

(04:08):
There should be better reasonsfor that.
But man, in their lack ofinfinite wisdom, do things
because of selfish reasons.
Do things because of selfishreasons.
They do it for vain glory, theydo it to self-aggrandize
themselves or to make themselvesfeel important and valuable.

(04:29):
Well, this tribe of peopleweren't much different than the
normal human being that we knowtoday.
They had the means to build atower, and they built it.
What was the point, though?
Their rationale for building itwas as follows they wanted to
create a tower, and they builtit.
What was the point, though?
Their rationale for building itwas as follows they wanted to
create a name for themselves.
They wanted to try to sustaintheir legacy.
The people around them weregrowing so much and so big they

(04:51):
wanted to feel like they wereabout to be swallowed up, and
they felt like they were aboutto lose their culture and their
heritage, or at least becomeirrelevant.
So they wanted to stay relevantand stay above the above the
waves, so to speak.
So they built a tower to createa name for themselves, so they

(05:11):
could say you know what?
This is our legacy.
We did this.
This is about us, and we'regreater than everybody else, and
this is the level that weshould be on.
Also, the second reason why theybuilt this big tower, the Babel
Tower Project, as I call it, isbecause they wanted to separate
themselves from everybody else.
They didn't want to be a partof the growing nation.

(05:32):
They didn't want to assimilate,they didn't want to kind of
even grow into things that Godwas calling for in that region,
kind of even grow into thingsthat God was calling for in that
region.
They wanted to isolatethemselves and do their own
thing outside of everybody elseand also outside of God.
That part's important.
Anytime you build something andwe don't have his goals or his

(05:53):
heart and mind, it becomes ananti-God thing and then you have
to ask yourself what's the endresult of that work going to be?
And also the third thing Ithink was the reason why they
had this babel tower project isbecause they wanted to shortcut
or circumvent the method thatwere already set in place.
God was already doing somethingwithin the tribes and the

(06:14):
communities laws and policiesthat he was instituting in that
region with the people but theydidn't want to yield to that.
And also, in their own pride,they wanted to rise or elevate
themselves so high that Godwould have to notice them and
God would have to give themtheir props.
They wanted props from God.
Think about how prideful andarrogant that sounds.

(06:37):
They wanted God to notice themand to give them their proper
respect.
Do you recognize that, even ifyou to give them their proper
respect, do you recognize that,even if you have similar minds
to these people, you recognizethat, as long as you're
breathing, you have somethingthat belongs to him and you
belong to him?
As a result, if he takes backhis property, takes back his
breath, you cease to live, youcease to exist.

(06:59):
So you can't puff your chest upand say you know what?
I want God to give me my props.
You don't have anything withoutGod.
You don't even have propswithout God.
Another story you're going to adifferent place On top of that.
Lastly, the fourth reason why Ithink this happened is because
they were just disobeyinginstructions.
They were already being given aset of rules and policies in

(07:19):
the community and they decidedto circumvent all that stuff and
do their own thing, because thepride inside of them wanted
them to establish their owncells and just said bump
everybody else in the community.
We're for ourselves.
We're not trying to helpanybody, support anybody else.
We're going to do our own thingand just support us.
It sounds almost like racism, Iguess in a way it kind of is.

(07:42):
Well, this project fast forwardto the end of the story.
They built this tower superhigh I don't think it reached
heaven, but it was pretty closeand it got God's attention.
And what he did and a lot ofpeople would be like, oh that's
so sad.
It's not sad, grow up.
What God did was he confoundedtheir language.
That's why we call it Babel,because Babel means B-A-B-B-L-E

(08:04):
means foolish andincomprehensible.
They were on one accord andthey were on one accord, which
again speaks to the power ofunity.
They were together and whenyou're together you can do
anything.
That's the other moral of thestory, or the sub moral of the
story.
When you're unified, you're inagreement.
Nothing you can't accomplishwith somebody else.
So what God did was heconfounded their language.

(08:26):
The Bible says he made itimpossible for them to be able
to communicate with each other.
So that killed the whole pride,the pride project they were
building To build this big towerto reach heaven, because they
couldn't communicate with eachother.
So it killed the buildingproject and the point of that
was that pride was themotivating factor.

(08:50):
Maybe fear as well, but pridewas definitely the motivating
factor for why this Babel Towerproject took place.
And look what happens when youwalk in pride.
It's not going to work andthat's why pride is such a
dangerous enemy.
We need to guard against it andwatch against it.
Now ask yourself this questionAre you the kind of person that

(09:12):
takes shortcuts and circumventsmethods because you don't feel
like doing that, or you don'trespect the person in authority
over you?
Just something to think about,but answer that question for
yourself.
You got to answer for me or inthe comment section, answer for
yourself.
Are you the kind of person thatnormally takes shortcuts and
circumvents methods because youthink your way is better, or you

(09:33):
think you're smarter than theperson that's in authority over
you?
Something to think about.
Two, are you the kind of personthat's prone to isolation?
As a self-professed introvert,I get why you got to fight
against that.
I like to spend some time anddo my own thing, being alone and
meditating and that kind ofstuff.
But isolation is a bad thingfor anybody, introvert or
extrovert.
It's not a good thing.

(09:53):
Are you the kind of person thatcraves isolation?
Nine times out of 10, you'drather be alone with nobody
around you.
No community, no fellowship, nofriendships.
Are you that kind of person?
Something to think about.
And three do you feel like yourname is more important than

(10:14):
those around, you's names orwhat they're trying to
accomplish in life?
What they're trying to buildlike your name is first and
foremost and everything you dois centered on achieving the
goal of establishing your nameand making your name great.
It's just something to thinkabout those.
Those are three hard questions.
I hope you can answer them.

(10:35):
I'll drop them in the commentsection so you can take a look
at them again, but hopefullywe'll wind back.
Answer those three questionsand let me know if you're
building a Babel Tower projectin your neck of the woods.
Have a great day.
Thanks for listening.
We're out.
We'll see you next time.