Salvation through Judgment
Notes
Transcript
Text: Genesis 6-8.
Because we are covering such a large portion of Scripture today, we’ll just read it and study it by sections rather than reading it straight through.
As we begin, let me read again Hebrews 11:7 which so nicely summarizes this story:
7 By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in godly fear built an ark to save his family. By faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
PRAY
Introduction
God has graciously blessed Sarah and me with 4 children, and although we may be biased, they are really cute kids.
One of the hardest things to come to terms with as a parent is the sinfulness of the child you have brought into the world. For many parents, it is hard to admit that their adorable little baby is a sinner in need of rescue.
Many people have the idea that children are born as a blank slate with nothing either good or bad, and that the sin that they choose is only due to their environment. But if that were the case, we would expect to find some perfect people somewhere who perfectly love God and others.
But even if we didn’t already know of our child’s sin nature from Scripture, it should be clear to us by the time they’re about 1.5 - 2 years old. Probably every parent here can remember a time when you gave your adorable toddler a command and they looked at you, and understood what you said, and did the exact opposite.
Who taught them to do that? Did you have to teach your kids to rebel or disobey you? Or was it their older siblings or some other family member? They just sat them down and said, “Ok, when Mom and Dad tell you to do something, you do the opposite.” No, of course not.
That sin came out of their own heart. They rebelled because they are by nature a rebel. And they, like we, have inherited that sinful nature from Adam. And because of our sin, we are all deserving of God’s wrath and eternal punishment.
Total Depravity
The Bible consistently teaches the doctrine of total depravity, and it is especially clear here in this passage. Total depravity does not mean that every person is as bad as they could be, but that every part of every person has been corrupted by sin. Our minds, wills, and emotions, every part of our being, is enslaved to sin from the moment of our conception. David said in Psalm 51:5, “Surely I was brought forth in iniquity; I was sinful when my mother conceived me.”
5 Surely I was brought forth in iniquity; I was sinful when my mother conceived me.
This doctrine also shows us that we are unable to work our way to God. We cannot be saved or in any way move toward God simply by an act of our will or desire. God must initiate our restoration if we are to have any hope at all. We are completely and utterly dependent on His work of grace and mercy in our lives.
And yet we are responsible to trust and love and obey Him, even though we are unable to do so. The fact that I have no taste for the glory of God does not absolve me of guilt for not enjoying and delighting in Him. I have robbed God of His glory and I have no way to pay Him back.
Illustration: Picture this:
It’s as if I were a peasant standing before a majestic King, and I took His beautiful crown off and smashed it and destroyed it and stomped all over it. That’s what sin is like - robbing God of His glory and stomping all over it. And I’ve done this not once, but thousands of times.
The more we understand how awful and heinous our sin is, the more we will understand just how righteous and just God is to punish sin with eternal judgment. We have trampled what is infinitely and eternally valuable, and the only way for God’s glory to be upheld and our sin to be paid is with eternal punishment.
In the story of the Flood, we see God’s judgment against sin on full display as He wipes out the whole world. We also see God’s grace and mercy on display in His dealing with Noah and His gracious preservation of Noah’s family and some of every kind of animal.
So in these chapters we see both God’s judgment and His mercy, His justice and His kindness. God justly punishes sin as it deserves, but He also graciously chooses to save one family from judgment.
The Multiplication of Mankind (6:1-4)
The Multiplication of Mankind (6:1-4)
1 Now when men began to multiply on the face of the earth and daughters were born to them,
2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they took as wives whomever they chose.
3 So the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days shall be 120 years.”
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and afterward as well—when the sons of God had relations with the daughters of men. And they bore them children who became the mighty men of old, men of renown.
As God had commanded them, people were being fruitful and multiplying and filling up the earth. But they are filling the earth with selfish and sinful people rather than worshipers and imitators of God.
And we have this strange account here of the “sons of God” who bore children with the daughters of men. Many people are overly fascinated with this account, and whole books have been written on who these Nephilim are, but since Moses didn’t give much space to their history, I won’t either, except to tell you what I think the right view is:
The phrase “sons of God” is often used to refer to angelic or other spiritual beings, members of the heavenly host. Some of these heavenly beings in some way took on human form and produced human offspring with human women. And this took place not only before the flood but also afterwards, because we read again of the Nephilim in Numbers when Israel is getting ready to enter the promised land. They are the giants that the Israelites were afraid of.
If you’d like to learn more about this strange story, there are plenty of resources out there, and I’d be happy to share more information as well, but that’s not the main point of this story, and it is wise for us not to get sidetracked from the main story here. These heavenly beings and their hybrid children were not even the main problem or the reason for the Flood.
In v. 3 God hints that something is wrong in the world when He says that His Spirit will not contend with man forever and that his days will be 120 years. These 120 years may refer to the time left before the Flood, but more likely refer to the lifespan of people after the Flood. Even today, it is rare for people to live longer than 120 years.
And then in v. 5-7 the problem becomes clear:
The Multiplication of Sin (6:5-7)
The Multiplication of Sin (6:5-7)
5 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great upon the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was altogether evil all the time.
At the beginning, God had looked upon His creation back in Gen 1:31 and saw that everything was very good indeed, but He now looks upon all His creation and sees that everything is wrong. It has been corrupted, ruined, destroyed.
And worst of all, the people God had made to live in fellowship with Him and represent Him to the world were ignoring Him and living for themselves.
Man’s wickedness was great. And every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was altogether evil all the time.
This does not mean that everyone was as bad as they could be or that nothing they did conformed to God’s standards, but that every part of their nature was corrupt and that even the good things they did were not motivated by love for God and others but were done out of selfish desire.
Because of the corruption of sin, people cannot do the right thing for the right reason. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God (Rom 8:8). They may do some right things, but they are not motivated by love for God, and so even the good they do is detestable to God.
6 And the LORD regretted that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart.
Verse 6 tells us that God was grieved by their sin. Though God does not experience emotions the same way we do, since He never changes, the Bible still affirms for us that our sin grieves God. More than it hurts anyone else, sin hurts God. David said, “Against You, You only I have sinned.”
And because of sin, God determined to bring judgment on the whole world.
7 So the LORD said, “I will blot out man, whom I have created, from the face of the earth—every man and beast and crawling creature and bird of the air—for I am grieved that I have made them.”
“The earth is the LORD’s, and the fullness thereof, the world and all who dwell therein,” says David in Psalm 24:1. God is the Creator and therefore the owner of all things, and He has the right to do what He wants with what belongs to Him.
And because He is holy and just, He must judge and punish sin. He must uphold the glory of His name.
But the LORD is also gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. He was incredibly kind and patient in allowing people to go on living as long as they did in their sinful rebellion against Him. And He chose to show His favor especially to one man and his family.
God’s Grace to Noah (6:8-7:16)
God’s Grace to Noah (6:8-7:16)
The story of Noah is an incredible story of God’s wrath and judgment, and yet it is also an amazing story of God’s grace and mercy. God did not owe salvation to anyone or anything, and He could have justly wiped out all of His creation. But He chose to rescue Noah and his family as well as some of every kind of animal.
8 Noah, however, found favor in the eyes of the LORD.
The story of Noah begins with the grace of God. This is so important to understand. In its very nature, grace or favor is an undeserved gift from God. It is not something we can earn or deserve.
God initiated this relationship with Noah by giving Noah His grace. Before any mention of his faith or righteousness or obedience, Noah received God’s favor. God set His grace on Noah, and only because of that was Noah rescued.
God did not owe Noah salvation. God was under no obligation to rescue anyone.
Noah was a sinner just like everyone else. He was just like the people in v. 5 with great wickedness and evil thoughts. And apart from God’s grace, Noah also deserved to perish in the Flood.
If you don’t believe me, look at chapter 8 verse 21:
21 When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, He said in His heart, “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from his youth. And never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done.
After the Flood, after all the “bad” people had died, God says that people’s hearts are still evil from youth. Well, there’s no one there but Noah and his family, meaning that they too were sinners deserving of God’s judgment. And if you still don’t believe me, look what Noah did at the end of chapter 9. We won’t go there today, but we’ll get there in a couple of weeks. Noah was a sinner just like everyone else.
The difference in his life was God’s grace. God set His favor on Noah in a special way that He did not do for others. He chose to rescue Noah and his family and not anyone else, even though He could have. (God can do what He wants to do)
God set His grace or favor on Noah. And it is now in this context that we read that…
9 This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation; Noah walked with God. 10 And Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
Here and also at the beginning of ch. 7 we read of Noah’s righteousness. And it may be easy for us to conclude that God saved Noah because Noah was righteous and everyone else was bad. But that doesn’t fit what the text here tells us nor what the whole Bible reveals.
Noah’s righteousness was not the cause of God’s choice to show him favor; rather, God’s favor to Noah is the cause of his righteousness.
When we read the word “righteous” in the Old Testament, we are not talking about perfect people who never sin and always obey. We ought to know from the NT that there are no such people, other than Jesus.
Paul tells us in Romans 3:10-12,
10 As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one. 11 There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.
12 All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”
So when we read of people like Noah and Abraham and David and others in the OT being called righteous, we must understand that it doesn’t mean sinless or perfect. Rather, we are talking about God crediting righteousness to them on the basis of faith in God’s promises.
When we get to Abraham’s life, we’ll see this truth stated more clearly:
6 Abram believed the LORD, and it was credited to him as righteousness.
God gave Abraham a promise, Abraham responded in faith, and God counted him as righteous. This truth is the basis for Paul’s argument in Romans 4 that both Jews and Gentiles are saved the same way - not by earning righteousness through our good deeds, but by trusting the promise of God.
1 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, has discovered? 2 If Abraham was indeed justified by works, he had something to boast about, but not before God.
3 For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”
4 Now the wages of the worker are not credited as a gift, but as an obligation. 5 However, to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.
The point is that neither Abraham nor Noah nor anyone else (other than Christ) is counted as righteous by God on the basis of good deeds. Rather, we learn from many other portions, good deeds flow from faith.
In the case of Noah, it started with God and His choice to give Noah His grace or favor, and then Noah responded in faith, and on the basis of that faith he was counted as righteous. And that kind of faith always produces good deeds.
And Hebrews 11:7 made the same point:
7 By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in godly fear built an ark to save his family. By faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
What motivated Noah’s obedience? Faith mixed with godly fear - a proper reverence and respect for God and His Word.
And on what basis did he inherit righteousness? Again, by faith. God counted Noah as righteous because Noah believed God’s promise. And Noah showed that he believed by obeying God’s command.
So God’s grace comes first through His promise, then there is a human response of faith, and that faith leads to obedience. We must be careful to see these things in their proper order so that we do not distort the doctrine of salvation.
In our case as well, God initiates the work of salvation by graciously making known to us His promises, we respond in faith to God’s promises and are declared righteous or justified through that faith, and then that faith leads us into greater and greater obedience to God and His commands.
But this all comes because of the gracious work of God, so that God gets all the glory.
11 Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God, and full of violence. 12 And God looked upon the earth and saw that it was corrupt; for all living creatures on the earth had corrupted their ways.
Once again, God looks on the creation that was once beautiful and perfect and very good, and it is not corrupted, full of violence, and very bad.
As a result, God decided to destroy all the earth, and He makes His plan known to Noah:
13 Then God said to Noah, “The end of all living creatures has come before Me, because through them the earth is full of violence. Now behold, I will destroy both them and the earth.
And then God gives Noah instructions on how to build the Ark:
14 Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; make rooms in the ark and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 And this is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high.
16 You are to make a roof for the ark, finish its walls a cubit from the top, place a door in the side of the ark, and build lower, middle, and upper decks.
This was a massive structure. How many have seen the Ark Encounter in KY? It’s unbelievably huge. In our measurements, it’s about 450 ft long by 75 ft wide and 45 ft tall.
This would have taken dozens of years to build. At the Ark Encounter I believe they estimated 75 years. This speaks to the perseverance of Noah in obedience to God.
This wasn’t a weekend project. He couldn’t just go to Home Depot and pick up lumber and power tools. This was an incredible amount of work, and he probably didn’t have much help other than his 3 sons.
But a flood was coming:
17 And behold, I will bring floodwaters upon the earth to destroy every creature under the heavens that has the breath of life. Everything on the earth will perish.
18 But I will establish My covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you.
God was going to destroy the whole world, but He graciously made a covenant with Noah and preserved him and his family as well as animals:
19 And you are to bring two of every living creature into the ark—male and female—to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird and animal and crawling creature will come to you to be kept alive.
21 You are also to take for yourself every kind of food that is eaten and gather it as food for yourselves and for the animals.”
Rather than re-creating all the animals, God decides to preserve some to repopulate the world after the flood. Noah and his family had to gather food for themselves and the animals in addition to all the work of building the ark. This likely would have involved the wives of Noah and his sons.
22 So Noah did everything precisely as God had commanded him.
Noah was careful to obey everything God told him. Although he alone is commended for his obedience here, clearly his family was also involved in the work as well. Noah, as the leader of his family, led them in obedience to God.
1 Then the LORD said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your family, because I have found you righteous in this generation.
2 You are to take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate; a pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate; 3 and seven pairs of every kind of bird of the air, male and female, to preserve their offspring on the face of all the earth.
It appears that at this point the ark is finished and it’s time for Noah and his family and the animals to board the boat.
In just one week the flood will come:
4 For seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living thing I have made.”
Once again Noah faithfully obeys God:
5 And Noah did all that the LORD had commanded him.
100 years have passed since the end of ch. 5, and Noah is now 600 years old. His sons are now about 100 years old.
6 Now Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters came upon the earth. 7 And Noah and his wife, with his sons and their wives, entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood.
8 The clean and unclean animals, the birds, and everything that crawls along the ground 9 came to Noah to enter the ark, two by two, male and female, as God had commanded Noah.
God told Noah to take animals, and God made sure the animals arrived. In this we see God’s sovereignty over creation.
We also see God’s sovereignty over the weather:
10 And after seven days the floodwaters came upon the earth. 11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And the rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights.
The rain didn’t start until God said to, and it lasted exactly as long as He wanted it to last.
Whether we like the weather or not, God is in control of it. So to complain about the weather is to complain against God.
The next few verses restate what we’ve already seen, that Noah and his family and some of every kind of animal were on the ark.
13 On that very day Noah entered the ark, along with his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and his wife, and the three wives of his sons— 14 they and every kind of wild animal, livestock, crawling creature, bird, and winged creature. 15 They came to Noah to enter the ark, two by two of every creature with the breath of life.
16 And they entered, the male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in.
That last phrase is amazing. The LORD shut the door.
This means two things:
Noah and his family and the animals were safe inside the ark. God had shut the door and so protected them from perishing in the Flood. By shutting the door He guaranteed their salvation.
Everyone outside the ark was destined to die. The day of salvation was gone, and there was no more opportunity for repentance or salvation. It was too late. By shutting the door God guaranteed the judgment of the wicked.
And this is instructive also regarding our salvation: the Ark is a picture of Christ.
When God shuts the door,
Only those inside the ark are saved - and their salvation is secured by God Himself.
All those outside the ark will perish - and their destruction is guaranteed by God Himself.
So are you inside the ark?
The good news is that today is the day of salvation. If you’re not already on the ark, there is still time. The door is still open. So get inside before God’s judgment sweeps you away like a flood. Come to Jesus today and trust in Him.
The Destruction of the Flood (7:17-24)
The Destruction of the Flood (7:17-24)
Many people believe that this was just a local flood, but based on the text here it seems that it was a worldwide flood. And the fact that the NT uses the flood as an example of the judgment of God that is coming on the whole world also seems to indicate that:
17 For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and the waters rose and lifted the ark high above the earth. 18 So the waters continued to surge and rise greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the waters.
19 Finally, the waters completely inundated the earth, so that all the high mountains under all the heavens were covered. 20 The waters rose and covered the mountaintops to a depth of fifteen cubits.
Scientists estimate that the amount of water necessary to cover the world’s tallest mountains to this depth is about 4 times the amount of water on earth.
They are assuming of course that the mountains mentioned here were the same height before the flood as they are today, which is unlikely. The geography of the earth likely changed considerably because of the flood. Consider these words from Psalm 104:5-8
5 He set the earth on its foundations, never to be moved. 6 You covered it with the deep like a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. 7 At Your rebuke the waters fled; at the sound of Your thunder they hurried away— 8 the mountains rose and the valleys sank to the place You assigned for them—
The Psalmist believes that the mountains got taller and the valleys deeper because of the flood.
It is also possible that God miraculously removed some of the water that He used in the Flood.
Either way, the biblical evidence seems to point to a worldwide flood.
21 And every living thing that moved upon the earth perished—birds, livestock, animals, every creature that swarms upon the earth, and all mankind. 22 Of all that was on dry land, everything that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.
23 And every living thing on the face of the earth was destroyed—man and livestock, crawling creatures and birds of the air; they were blotted out from the earth, and only Noah and those with him in the ark remained. 24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth for 150 days.
The Flood accomplished God’s purpose and destroyed every living thing other than those on the ark. Only those who by faith obeyed God were saved.
The End of the Flood (8:1-22)
The End of the Flood (8:1-22)
And this flood lasted a long time. It didn’t take long for every living creature to die. Probably within a few days most creatures had died, and certainly by the time the rain ended after 40 days. But the flood lasted another 150 days.
1 But God remembered Noah and all the animals and livestock that were with him in the ark. And God sent a wind over the earth, and the waters began to subside.
2 The springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens were closed, and the rain from the sky was restrained. 3 The waters receded steadily from the earth, and after 150 days the waters had gone down.
The word wind in v. 1 is the same word as “Spirit” used in Genesis 1:2 when God’s spirit was hovering over the waters. It is almost like He is picturing a new creation, a re-creation.
And once again we see God’s providence and sovereignty over nature.
And then in the next several verses we read of the slow process of waiting for the right time to exit the ark:
4 On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. 5 And the waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.
6 After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven. It kept flying back and forth until the waters had dried up from the earth. 8 Then Noah sent out a dove to see if the waters had receded from the surface of the ground.
9 But the dove found no place to rest her foot, and she returned to him in the ark, because the waters were still covering the surface of all the earth. So he reached out his hand and brought her back inside the ark.
10 Noah waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. 11 And behold, the dove returned to him in the evening with a freshly plucked olive leaf in her beak. So Noah knew that the waters had receded from the earth. 12 And Noah waited seven more days and sent out the dove again, but this time she did not return to him.
13 In Noah’s six hundred and first year, on the first day of the first month, the waters had dried up from the earth. So Noah removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. 14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was fully dry.
They spent over one full year on the ark. And they stayed there until God told them it was time to leave:
15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Come out of the ark, you and your wife, along with your sons and their wives. 17 Bring out all the living creatures that are with you—birds, livestock, and everything that crawls upon the ground—so that they can spread out over the earth and be fruitful and multiply upon it.”
18 So Noah came out, along with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives. 19 Every living creature, every creeping thing, and every bird—everything that moves upon the earth—came out of the ark, kind by kind.
Once again, we see Noah’s faithful response of obedience to the LORD. He waited until God told him it was time, and then in obedience he brought out his family and all the animals.
And in response to God’s gracious salvation of him and his family, Noah offered a sacrifice to God.
20 Then Noah built an altar to the LORD. And taking from every kind of clean animal and clean bird, he offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, He said in His heart, “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from his youth. And never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done.
Noah didn’t deserve to be saved more than anyone else. He and his family were also sinners deserving of judgment. But God freely and graciously chose to rescue them, and Noah responded with gratitude and worship to God.
22 As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall never cease.”
Lord willing, we’ll look more at the end of ch. 8 next week as we study God’s covenant with Noah, because these last few verses really go better with the beginning of ch. 9.
So now in conclusion, let’s wrap it all together. Here are some of the big truths we see displayed in this story:
People are thoroughly sinful and depraved. Every part of man is corrupted by sin.
The wages of sin is death - people deserve God’s just punishment for their sin.
God is patient - He is slow to anger and does not punish sin as soon or as severely as it deserves.
God is holy and righteous and must punish sin - it is good and right for God to judge sin and so uphold the glory of His name.
God is sovereign over nature as well as salvation.
God is gracious and merciful and chooses to save some. He owes mercy to no one, but He chooses to save some.
Though God in His grace initiates salvation, we must exercise faith in His promises of grace.
And if we have true faith that saves, it will lead us to obey God more and more.
Faith leading to obedience is the proper response to God’s gracious Word and work.
Just as God’s judgment fell on the world in this flood nearly 4500 years ago, so His judgment will come once again and destroy all those not in the ark. Just as so many in Noah’s day were eating and drinking and enjoying all the pleasures of life, today also many are filling themselves with the world’s pleasures, not realizing that judgment is coming.
God is patient, and right now the door of the ark is still open. But there’s no guarantee that it may not close this afternoon or tomorrow or next week or in a year. Run to Christ while you can. If God is moving in you right now, turn to Christ and be saved.
Jesus Christ is the ark that God has mercifully provided to save us from His judgment coming against our sin.
Heed the warning of Romans 2:4-5:
4 Or do you disregard the riches of His kindness, tolerance, and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you to repentance?
5 But because of your hard and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
God’s judgment is coming and you must be ready.
Have you fled to Jesus for refuge? Only in Him will you be safe.
He is a great Savior.
