Numbers 23:15-26

¹⁵Balaam said to Balak, “Stay here beside your burnt offering while I meet the LORD over there.”

¹⁶And the LORD met with Balaam and put a message in his mouth, saying, “Return to Balak and speak what I tell you.”

¹⁷So he returned to Balak, who was standing there by his burnt offering with the princes of Moab. “What did the LORD say?” Balak asked.

¹⁸Then Balaam lifted up an oracle, saying:

“Arise, O Balak, and listen;

give ear to me, O son of Zippor.

¹⁹God is not a man, that He should lie,

or a son of man, that He should change His mind.

Does He speak and not act?

Does He promise and not fulfill?

²⁰I have indeed received a command to bless;

He has blessed, and I cannot change it.

²¹He considers no disaster for Jacob;

He sees no trouble for Israel.

The LORD their God is with them,

and the shout of the King is among them.

²²God brought them out of Egypt

with strength like a wild ox.

²³For there is no spell against Jacob

and no divination against Israel.

It will now be said of Jacob and Israel,

‘What great things God has done!’

²⁴Behold, the people rise like a lioness;

they rouse themselves like a lion,

not resting until they devour their prey

and drink the blood of the slain.”

²⁵Now Balak said to Balaam, “Then neither curse them at all nor bless them at all!”

²⁶But Balaam replied, “Did I not tell you that whatever the LORD says, I must do?”