Walking With God in a Wicked World

[0:00] it says make a joyful noise. And I have to believe that by the power of the Holy Spirit, He makes that a joyful noise to God on our behalf.

[0:17] Isn't that a wonderful thing to know that you can offer this whether you can carry a tune in a bucket or not? Isn't the point? That you're singing out. We take it, right? We'll take it.

[0:28] It's wonderful. Amen. Alright, beloved. We are in the book of Genesis together. You are the dear ones of Almighty God.

[0:42] You are His dear ones. And I want you to feel the full wonder of the miracle of your new birth in the Lord Jesus Christ and the reality that God loves you in His Son and sees you as He sees His Son.

[1:02] Righteous and holy and spotless. That is a wonder of wonders, is it not? The Gospel is so simple that it's easy to miss. And we don't want to complicate even though profound reality that God sees us in His Son and loves us in His Son so that we stand holy and righteous, not with a righteousness of our own, but a righteousness purchased for us and credited to us, imputed to us by God's good grace.

[1:35] Well, this morning, we're going to be dealing with the topic walking with God in a wicked world. Walking with God in a wicked world.

[1:46] We're going to focus on Genesis 6, 9 through God willing, chapter 7, verse 5. Now, I know my folks that are here with me say He'll never make it, but I will.

[2:00] In the grace of God, I will get through that material. But I want to start reading at the beginning of verse 6 and take in more of the context of what we've covered so far. So let's read that together.

[2:12] Genesis 6, 1 begins, Now it came about when men began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful.

[2:25] They took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. Then the Lord said, My spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he is also flesh. Nevertheless, his days shall be 120 years.

[2:39] Now the Nephilim were on the earth in those days. And also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.

[2:53] Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The Lord then was sorry that he had made man on the earth and he was grieved in his heart.

[3:09] The Lord said, I will blot out man whom I've created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky, for I am sorry that I have made them. But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

[3:23] These then are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man. Blameless in his time, Noah walked with God.

[3:34] Noah became the father of three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God and the earth was filled with violence. God looked on the earth and behold, it was corrupt.

[3:48] For all flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth. Then God said to Noah, The end of all flesh has come before me, for the earth is filled with violence because of them.

[3:59] And behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth. Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood. You shall make the ark with rooms and shall cover it inside and out with pitch.

[4:12] This is how you shall make it. The length of the ark, 300 cubits. Its breadth, 50 cubits. And its height, 30 cubits.

[4:23] You shall make a window for the ark and finish it to a cubit from the top. Set the door of the ark in the side of it. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks.

[4:35] Behold, I, even I, am bringing the flood of water upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life from under heaven.

[4:48] Everything that is on the earth shall perish. But I will establish my covenant with you. And you shall enter the ark.

[5:00] You, your sons, and your wife. And your sons' wives with you. And every living thing of all flesh. You shall bring two of every kind into the ark to keep them alive with you.

[5:15] They shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind and of the animals after their kind. Of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind too.

[5:28] Of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. As for you, take for yourself some of all food which is edible and gather it to yourself and it shall be for food for you and for them.

[5:47] Thus Noah did. According to all that God had commanded him, so he did. Then the Lord said to Noah, Enter the ark.

[5:59] You and all your household, for you alone I have seen to be righteous before me in this time. You shall take with you of every clean animal by sevens.

[6:13] A male and his female. And of the animals that are not clean, two. A male and his female. Also of the birds of the sky by sevens.

[6:26] Male and female. To keep offspring alive on the face of all the earth. For after seven more days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights.

[6:44] And I will blot out from the face of the land every living thing that I have made. And Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him.

[7:00] Now beloved, what we're seeing in this passage of Scripture is nothing short of God contrasting godly Noah with the godless society he lives in.

[7:12] This is so instructive for us as we look into, now listen, not only the character of Noah himself and glean something of the way of instruction for our character as we follow the Lord.

[7:25] But even more importantly, there's something else here that's revealed about God the Father that we need to take in. We're going to talk about that because that's what's being highlighted in Noah's life.

[7:38] Noah is not the hero of the story. The ark is not the central feature of the story. There is something else here that we need to see that is the main theme being communicated from the first page of the Bible to its last page and everything in between.

[7:55] That's what we want to zero in on. Nevertheless, we are seeing a spiritual contrast being highlighted for us. It's a spiritual contrast between two different heart attitudes.

[8:07] Two different lifestyles being lived out as a result of those heart attitudes. One lifestyle exposes the hearts of rebellious unbelievers. Who are suppressing the truth of God and about God in a wicked living.

[8:26] Continuing wicked living. A very different lifestyle reveals the hearts of righteous believers who are obeying the truth of God as they live a life to please Him.

[8:40] Everything about what we see in Noah's life is blessed by the Lord as Noah seeks to make his life about pleasing God even though he is completely surrounded by nothing even closely resembling what he's trying to be or live out in his life.

[9:00] So he has no other help. He has no other regard for the goodness of God save his relationship with some of the people who are living longer, who love the Lord, who will go off the scene just before the flood.

[9:16] People like Enoch, people like Methuselah, they will go off the scene. They will die before the flood actually comes. So that only righteous Noah and his immediate family are going to be preserved by God's grace and mercy.

[9:32] So two different lifestyles, two different heart attitudes. One reflected by righteous Noah, the other reflected by millions of people living in a godless society.

[9:44] In chapter 6, verses 8 and 9 and then chapter 7, verse 5, we see these bookends that deal with Noah. But Noah found favor in terms of our passage this morning.

[9:56] Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. And now we're going to deal with the records of Noah. Noah was a righteous man. Noah was a blameless man. Noah walked with God.

[10:07] Three important descriptors of his character and his relationship with the Lord. Then you jump over to chapter 7, verse 5 and see the next bookend. This is an inclusio.

[10:19] This is bracketing and framing the passage for us. 7, verse 5, Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him. Now what we need to see is that the behavioral righteousness of Noah in chapter 7, verse 5 is born out of what we see said about him in chapter 6, verse 9, 8 and 9.

[10:44] He found favor in the eyes of the Lord. He was a righteous man, a blameless man, and Noah walked with the Lord. And so in 7, verse 5, he then did according to all that God commanded him.

[10:54] Isn't that what we just read in 1 John? If we say that we know him, then we will keep his commandments. And in keeping his commandments, we need to live a life that reflects that word working in our heart.

[11:08] That's exactly what we see here in the Old Testament. Now I'm going to ask you, here's the quiz. How were people in the Old Testament saved? Was it any different than the way we are saved according to the New Testament faith in Jesus?

[11:21] No different. It's still salvation by faith, by grace through faith. Who is Noah looking to to save him? God. Who's he trusting in terms of God's promise to send the deliverer?

[11:35] God. It's by faith in God. It's exactly the same way that you and I are saved. That hasn't changed. God didn't make a way for Old Testament saints to be saved different from what he makes for us, right?

[11:48] So it's all about faith in God. Noah was looking forward to that time when God would send his promised one. What do we do? We come over here in our time and we look back on the same thing Noah was looking forward to.

[12:04] We look back on because now we have that fuller revelation in the New Testament. Right? This is what we do. So Noah was a righteous man in the same way that we are made righteous by faith, by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

[12:19] I don't want that to trip you up. There are many cults out there. There's a lot of false teaching out there that wants to do all these funky things with the Old Testament line of salvation that distinguishes it from the New Testament.

[12:33] We need to allow the New Testament to help us interpret the fuller revelation to interpret what we see going on in the Old Testament. So these are the bookends of what's going on. These bookends help identify the theme of this spiritual contrast, the lifestyles of Noah and society as Noah begins to build the ark and just before he enters the ark.

[12:56] So it's a theme. Here it is. It's a theme that carries us through Noah's life so that Noah's life begins to open up to us the greater reality and the greater theme of what?

[13:11] God's faithfulness. We don't want to get hung up on the ark and we don't want to get hung up on making Noah the hero because Noah's what he is because of God.

[13:23] The ark is what it is because of God. Whose idea was the ark? Yeah. Why do you think they're going to give us all the dimensions? Noah, here's what I want you to do because you never could have conceived of this in your little brain.

[13:38] Smart as you are. I'm going to tell you what needs to be done. And so just obey. Just trust me. You don't have to understand. We'll get there in a minute and I'll tell you. How would he envision a boat like that?

[13:50] There's no way. But the Lord knew. And so Noah, you just need to be faithful. And so what we're seeing here is a theme of God's faithfulness. Then we see Noah's faithful response to God's faithfulness.

[14:07] And that carries us through the passage. God's faithfulness and Noah's response to God carries us through this passage. So we don't make more of Noah or the ark than we should and we make much of God and His goodness to save anybody in this time.

[14:26] Just like in our time. It's a miracle of God's grace He saves anybody because none of us deserve what He gives. We can say it this way, beloved. A believer's faith and obedience are evidence of God's justifying grace.

[14:43] Amen? His favor makes us righteous. There is no righteous living apart from God working righteousness in us. The righteousness of His Son.

[14:54] And so what we live out is something that God is doing in. I'll say that again in a moment. So we see the Lord's saving heart in His relationship with Noah.

[15:08] And we see it expressed especially, look at chapter 6, verses 17 and 18. Behold, God says, I, even I.

[15:19] What a wonderful claiming reality for the Lord here. Behold, I, even I, am bringing the flood of water upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life from under heaven.

[15:35] Everything that is on the earth shall perish. Now at this moment, that's going to take my breath away if I'm standing there and I'm knowing, I'm listening to this, right? But look what God hastens to say.

[15:46] But, but, I will establish My covenant with you. Ah! And you shall enter the ark.

[15:57] You and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you. God said, I'm going to make a way. I'm going to make a way to save you out of what I'm going to do. Along the way, we also see God's judgment against sinners in their unbelief and disobedience.

[16:13] If you look with me at verse 11. Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God and the earth was filled with violence. The word violence there, I've told you before when we've looked at this, the word violence there is the Hebrew word, Hamas.

[16:30] That's what that word is. Hamas. God looked on the earth and behold, it was corrupt for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.

[16:42] Then God said to Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me for the earth is filled with violence because of them. And behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth.

[16:54] Then if you look at verse 17 that we just read, even I am bringing the flood water. I'm going to destroy everything. It will all perish. Then in verse 19, of every living thing, of all the flesh, you shall bring two of every kind in the ark to keep them alive with you, male and female.

[17:12] I'm going to do a great work here. There is going to be salvation, but there's going to be great judgment as well. And then in chapter 7, verse 4, I'm going to send rain.

[17:26] That rain's going to come for 40 days and 40 nights. And what's going to happen as a result is I'm going to blot out everything. I'm going to wipe out everything from the face of the land, every living thing that I have made.

[17:41] This is judgment. So friends, look, the ark itself is an impressive marvel. Is it not? How many of you have been able to see it at the museum?

[17:52] Oh, isn't it something? Suzanne and I can't wait to get there. We want to go so badly to see that thing. The ark is an impressive marvel. Noah. Noah in his life standing against the unrestrained evil of his day.

[18:08] That's impressive, is it not? When we think, this is why we rehearsed so carefully several sermons prior to this pointing out God's direction on just how bad things were.

[18:21] We wanted to put that bad up there and make sure that we understood what Noah was living in and what he was facing because what it does is highlight the mercy and grace of God that any human being could live faithfully under that kind of pressure.

[18:35] That's a marvel of God's grace, is it not? This is what this is about. As marvelous as the ark itself is, as incredible as Noah's character is, the focus of this passage and the real marvel is God's saving grace at work in Noah's heart.

[18:56] That's the marvel. That's the marvel about you. What is the best thing about you? It is the work of Almighty God's saving grace in your heart to make you a new creature in His Son.

[19:13] God remade you with a new nature and that nature is the nature of His Son. What a marvel. That's what we're walking around with.

[19:23] That's who we are on this earth. And when we go to glory, that will all become evident. It will all be made manifest in ways beyond what we can even imagine.

[19:37] It's a wonderful truth, isn't it? Now what I'm saying in all of this, the focus of the passage, the real or the greatest or the highest marvel of all of this that we want to hold on to is God's saving grace at work in Noah's heart.

[19:50] Now I'm going to step over here and give you a little aside. One of the things that we want to make sure we're doing, whether we're homeschooling or whether your kids go to public school or private school, it doesn't matter, is you raise your kids in the Lord.

[20:02] As you try to influence your grandchildren in the Lord, husband and wife, one of the things that you want to keep in mind as you deal with these stories, these true narratives from the Bible, is you always want to help your kids be grounded in the greater reality of what the passage is teaching them about God.

[20:23] Don't let David and Goliath become a story about how courageous David was and what a great guy he was. The hero of the story of David and Goliath is David's God.

[20:36] And that's exactly what David says, doesn't he? David says, in the name of my God I come against you, Philistine. And God gave David the grace to slay an enemy much larger than himself.

[20:49] What do you think that's the picture of spiritually? God slaying the giant of sin in our lives. This is about the faithfulness of God. And so parents, as you're teaching your kids and raising your kids in these stories of the Bible, make sure that the heroes and highlights are always pointing to the greater work of God working in these people's lives to help them with whatever it is they're facing.

[21:14] Let God be the hero. Let God be the focus of the passage. Amen? Alright, you follow me on that. Okay, that didn't cost you anything and that did not take off my time. That clock stops when I do that.

[21:26] So, let's move on together and talk about this. The matter for us then to take into our hearts this morning is this. Here it is. And I can actually put this up here. The saving favor of the Lord works in us to produce the sanctifying fear of the Lord.

[21:49] That is what we're seeing. If you want me to boil it all down for you in this passage, what we are seeing in the way of God saving favor on Noah's life, favoring him. What does it say in verse 8?

[22:00] But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. That does not mean that Noah was walking around one day and looking around and he discovered it. He discovered. No, it means that he went to the Lord and what he then saw in the Lord.

[22:14] What he saw faithfully at work in the Lord was this wonderful favor toward Noah that he did not deserve. This was a work of God's grace.

[22:26] And in that favor working in his life, it produced this sanctifying fear, this high and holy reverence for God that Noah then lived out in his life.

[22:36] That, in a sentence, is what this passage is all about. We see this over and over and over in the Bible so it shouldn't be any shock to us because God loves and favors us in his son Jesus.

[22:50] As New Testament states, we can love and follow him. He does the work in us and what God is working in us, we then work out in faithfulness.

[23:02] That's in Philippians 2, 1 and 2. Alright? So here's what I'm doing in the way of what we're going to focus on today. I'm highlighting three spiritual blessings of God's saving favor worked in Noah's heart and revealed in Noah's walk with God.

[23:21] That's what we're seeing. Again, another way of saying that God is working in and what God is working in, Noah is working out in response to God. Alright? So, let's look at this first one, this first blessing, this first spiritual blessing that God is working in Noah that Noah then might respond in faithfulness to God and live in the favor of the Lord.

[23:46] Reflecting that favor in how he lives his life. The first one is God works righteousness in Noah. God works righteousness in Noah.

[23:57] Right away, we have God giving us his perfect assessment of the character in life of Noah contrasted with everyone else.

[24:08] It's really something. And so, here's what God is showing us about the character of Noah as God is working that character of the Lord Jesus in Noah's life.

[24:22] This is the character of God being worked in Noah's life as an operation of God's divine favor. His undeserved holy favor in his life.

[24:33] We see here, Noah, first of all, found favor. Noah found favor, saving grace in his God. That's verse 8.

[24:45] And this favor of God characterized or defined Noah's lifestyle. His lifestyle. Here's another way that I can say this. Noah was God's man and he lived like it.

[24:59] You know, we spent some time yesterday and ladies, I want you to know we had the most we've ever had here. Greg, how many did we have? We had 23 men here yesterday.

[25:11] They basically filled up this middle section with the tables and all. And you know what we do when we come in? I basically preach. So they got a double whammy.

[25:23] You know, I can't apologize. It's what I do. I'm a preacher. So these guys come and you know, they sit under the Word. They sit under the Word. They sit here and allow themselves to have the Word of God fill their souls and challenge their souls in what it means to be churchmen.

[25:41] To be manly men. And this is exactly what we're seeing worked out in Noah's life as a man. This is a beautiful character portrait of a man who is walking with his God.

[25:55] Noah was God's man and he lived like it. He found favor in the sight of the Lord. The second thing that we can say about Noah's character, he was righteous before his God. This is another work of God's grace.

[26:07] It means simply that Noah was upright, devoted to God from his heart. Heart holiness defined Noah. And it bleeds into the next one which speaks of the issue of his personal integrity.

[26:21] Noah was a man who was concerned about living for the goodness and glory of God even when no one was looking. So this was not hypocrisy. This was a man who wanted to live for God.

[26:33] So he was blameless before his God. Verse 9. Noah's attitude and approach to life reflected his spiritual integrity and faithfulness. This was all a work that God was working in so that Noah could work it out in the way that he spoke, the way he lived, the priorities of his life, how he used his time across the board.

[26:56] And then finally, number four, towards the bottom of the screen, Noah walked with his God. He was like Enoch in that Noah lived to please God so that he humbly pursued a sincere and pure life with the Lord.

[27:12] Noah was a very humble man. He's like Moses. This reminds me a lot of the character of Moses. And it's not any surprise that we would see in other godly men and women in the Bible this similar outworking of a character that reflects their God.

[27:29] Here's one of the ways the Scripture speaks to this issue of righteousness that God works in our life. I want you to see this. The righteousness of the blameless will make his way straight.

[27:42] Do you see the connection there between what God is working in and what you work out? But the wicked, the wicked, in their heart, wickedness, rebellious, will fall, will fall by his own wickedness.

[27:58] So this is an iniquity that is within, an inner man iniquity that then leads to an outer man life of wicked living. Behavioral iniquity.

[28:11] The opposite is true with Noah. This is a man who is living in a righteousness in his own life that God is working in and that righteousness works itself out in how Noah speaks, how he lives, and how he goes about what he does.

[28:26] Moses is writing then to this original audience in the book of Genesis. He's writing here in this passage to emphasize the extreme wickedness surrounding and oppressing Noah, but more importantly, Moses is emphasizing how the Lord's grace kept Noah so that Noah was able to live faithfully to the Lord.

[28:47] Again, I'm just going to say it over and over throughout this message. This is about showing us God's faithfulness. Now look, folks, sometimes life can get to the place where it can be really, really hard to trust that God is being faithful to you and that he's being good to you.

[29:03] You may say in your heart, I know that God is supposed to be good. I know he is good, but right now it doesn't feel like he's being good to me. And I think that Noah probably had times when he was tempted with things like this.

[29:16] Given the poisonous nature, the caustic atmosphere that Noah lived in, I wonder if there were times he was tempted to feel that way. It would be hard for him to recognize the goodness of God in society beyond the fact that these people were breathing God's air.

[29:34] They were getting to marry, but they didn't recognize any of that. And here Noah is living in the midst of it. Very, very difficult reality. Some of you probably have work environments where you're surrounded with unbelievers and you see the outworking of that unbelief and rebellion constantly, do you not?

[29:53] Can it oftentimes be very challenging to you to be in an environment like that? You're constantly having these temptations thrown in your face. You're constantly having to think through what is wise for me to say and do in these contexts.

[30:09] Why? Because one thing, you're concerned, you don't want to offend people unnecessarily, right? I don't want people to be offended with Jeff, but if Jesus offends them through Jeff, right?

[30:23] What can I do? I'm living for my Lord. If Jesus offends you in my life, you've got a different problem than if Jeff is offending you. I'll ask you to forgive me for Jeff offending you.

[30:38] Every time. If I find out, I'll ask you to forgive me. But you know what I'm not asking forgiveness for? That Jesus is a stumbling block to you. Are you with me? Okay, I need to know if you're following that.

[30:51] Because that's not harsh. That's loving. You want to put Jesus forward, not Jeff forward. And if putting Jesus forward becomes offensive to them, they've got a problem with Jesus, not with you.

[31:04] But if when you're doing that, more of you comes through, anger, pride, selfishness, looking down, now we've got to go back and say, hey, forgive me for that, man.

[31:15] I probably said the right things, but I said it in such a wrong way and with a bad attitude. And that's just not right. Please forgive me for that. Can I take another shot at it? You ever had to do that?

[31:26] This is what I'm talking about. Noah was faithful to God because God was working in Noah's life. And I've said it and said it again. The deep evil that we're talking about here is not the main point of the passage.

[31:40] It's important. But the deep evil is not the main point. The evil serves simply as the darkened backdrop to the contrasting light of God's goodness.

[31:52] We cannot afford to miss God's goodness. He's being good to Noah. He's being good to Noah's family. Noah lived in response to God's grace on his life.

[32:02] And so responding to God by keeping God's commands was Noah's way of life. You hear that? This wasn't something Noah had to get up every day and kind of, you know, make himself do.

[32:14] This was something that Noah got up every day and lived in because it was who he was. More and more, it was who he was. And it's essential for us to compare this with our own walk with God because we're saved also by the same grace through faith in God's Redeemer.

[32:33] We live in a wicked world. We live in a world that hates God. The world is seeking to press us into its mold. And we're called on by the Lord to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which we've been called.

[32:48] So as we follow the narrative of Noah's life, we see the faithfulness of the Lord working, a response of faithfulness in Noah. That's how it works. All right? I'll put this up here for you.

[32:59] Noah is not shaped by his world. His life is increasingly and consistently shaped by his humble heart and by his eagerly obedient responses to God.

[33:12] It's true of Noah, even though the societal situation couldn't be more threatening and wicked. We saw that again in verses 11 down through 13. You just see the earth was corrupt in the sight of God.

[33:26] That means that it's a perfect assessment. You can't get any higher than the evaluation that God is making on what's going on. And God said, it is so corrupt.

[33:39] It is filled with Hamas. Violence. God is looking down on the earth and behold what he sees as, here it is again, you see the repetition, corrupt.

[33:54] All flesh had corrupted all, all across the entire globe. And so God said, I'm going to destroy every single bit of it. That's the terrible reality of what constitutes Noah's neighborhood.

[34:08] That's the hood he lived in. It's not good. Into this dark world where everybody's immersed in this violence and corruption and wicked living. God blesses Noah. How does he bless him?

[34:20] Listen to this. He gives him three sons. Have you ever heard anybody say, oh, we're not going to have children. We could never bring children. Christians, we could never bring children in such a bad world.

[34:30] You ever heard that? You ever heard that? That is, that is as opposite of what you read in the Bible as it can be. Have babies. Bring them up in the Lord and pray that God saves them.

[34:41] All right? You have permission now. Get busy. This is what God says. He blesses Noah into this terrible, terrible reality with three sons.

[34:56] Look at verse 10 with me if you would. Noah became the father of three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And if you've read ahead in the Scriptures, you know how that's going to turn out.

[35:08] This is a statement in verse 10 of promise. What do you mean? Well, God promised that he would continue a godly line and from that godly bloodline would come his deliverer. Noah is in this line, so he needs to have some sons.

[35:22] And so he's having sons. God's preserving the line of promise through Noah. It's just exactly as Lamech prayed in chapter 5, 29, verse 29.

[35:34] Look at that with me. We have Lamech in verse 28 living 100. Lamech lived 182 years and then he became the father of a son.

[35:46] Oh, whose son? He called him Noah. So this is Noah's dad. And this is what Lamech prophesied. This one will give us rest from our work and from the toil of our hands arising from the ground which the Lord has cursed.

[36:01] That's both a physical blessing of comfort as well as a spiritual one coming through this man, Noah. Noah will be used to bring rest and comfort.

[36:12] Now we've seen also in verse 3 that God has prescribed 120 years before the flood is supposed to hit the earth.

[36:24] 120 years. In verse 14 the Lord lays out His instructions for God to save Noah and his immediate family.

[36:36] Now here's the question. In all this passage, why just Noah's immediate family? Why is that? Why is it that we're looking at this and seeing just these people saved?

[36:55] Well, we know that there was a gospel preaching going on during this time. We know that. You sure? Yeah. There were godly men who were calling on these people, this godless society to repent, to turn to God in faith before the Lord brought this terrible judgment on.

[37:14] And people would laugh and mock. The Bible says they just went on marrying and giving in marriage and just partying as though nothing was coming. We see all of this in 1 Peter 3.20.

[37:25] And I think I have this where we can, yeah, let's look at it there. 1 Peter 3.20, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah.

[37:37] God was patient in the days of Noah. Well, what's God waiting for? Waiting for what? And the answer comes back, what? For people to repent and turn to the Lord.

[37:52] 2 Peter 2.5, God preserved Noah. That's a great word. God preserved Noah. Notice the designation.

[38:03] A preacher of righteousness. What are we saying? Noah preached. He wasn't silent. Noah is not doing this. Look, Noah is not working on the ark for all these decades and keeping to himself and going, whoo, whoo, whoo, they're going to get it.

[38:22] They're really going to get it. And then go to the next thing. And then get up the next day, Mark, and just do it again. No. Noah is preaching and begging these people to repent.

[38:32] He's a preacher of righteousness. Noah has a compassionate heart from the Lord to see these people saved, folks. And so what we see in Noah is reflected 100,000 times more in the heart of Almighty God.

[38:47] The compassion of Noah is simply a reflection, a dim reflection of the grace and mercy of God. And that's what we see in the ark. It's an instrument of salvation. Just like this wooden thing.

[38:59] Right? An instrument of salvation. Does Noah understand everything about the ark and what it's going to do? Nope. Not yet. Do we understand everything there is to know about the cross?

[39:13] We know what God wants us to know, don't we? And it's enough for men to be saved. It was enough for Noah to be saved. Noah preached the truth. He proclaimed the truth and salvation of God to his wicked generation.

[39:26] But that's not all. If you jump over again, go all the way back to the back of the Bible just before Revelation. If you would, please, to the little book of Jude.

[39:37] Jude has one chapter. That's what we call it. One chapter. And you see this entry in the New Testament. Beginning in verse 14.

[39:50] It was also about these men that Enoch, this is the time of Noah now, Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of His holy ones to execute judgment upon all and to convict all the ungodly of their ungodly deeds which they've done in an ungodly way.

[40:13] You see that ungodly throughout that? And of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him. And what he's saying here is that Enoch preached. He prophesied.

[40:25] Enoch, just like Noah, was constantly sharing the truth of God. He warned the ungodly of God's coming judgment in God's Redeemer who we know to be Christ.

[40:37] So he preached to expose the growing ungodliness in his society. What I'm saying to you is this. From the beginning, God has always raised up his preachers of righteousness.

[40:52] And it is incumbent upon his preachers of righteousness to preach that righteousness. And we do a great disservice to God, to His truth, and to His people when we make it about us, when we make it about our stories, when we make it about giving comic relief to people, or whatever else it is that distracts God's preachers from preaching God's truth.

[41:15] Amen. We are called to preach the truth of God. That is what sets men's and women's souls free. And so we cannot afford to let that be watered down in any way.

[41:27] We need to preach the saving grace of God in Christ. Noah and Enoch lived faithfully to God and they walked with God. And they were surrounded by this perverseness.

[41:40] They lived godly lives. The second blessing that we want to see God doing in Noah's life is a readiness. We talked about this a little bit yesterday in the men's meeting.

[41:51] We talked about how God has called men to an alertness, a spiritual alertness and readiness that is the precursor and preparation for godly action.

[42:04] We are not just preppers. We are not just some kind of glorified holy preppers. all of our alertness and awareness and discipline as men, as godly men, is aimed at the reality of us being prepared for action.

[42:21] To be men of action. Men who will by proposition and by desire to see these things headed off move into issues and areas of spiritual life among our families and among this church family in order to see God's grace reign.

[42:39] to see God's truth win the day. And so all of our preparedness as men, as spiritual men, is with the idea that that preparedness makes us ready for action.

[42:51] Alright, you with me? That's what's going on here. By the way, I just saw PJ here. He had to be out on business. We recorded it. So for those of you guys who weren't here, we did record it yesterday for you with all the slides and stuff that we used.

[43:05] So that's, Suzanne, is that online yet? Yep, all good. So there you go. That's a commercial. That's your only commercial break you're going to get. Now we're back.

[43:16] The second blessing, God is working readiness in Noah. Again, if you look with me at verse 13, I know we're wearing this section out. Then God said to Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me for the earth is filled with violence because of them and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth.

[43:34] So what does he do then? As a result of that, make for yourself an ark of gopher wood. This is what I want you to do. I'm about to destroy them with the earth.

[43:47] Notice that. Man has corrupted what God made and so God is going to use what he made to destroy them.

[44:00] That's the way God says it works. And so that's what he's going to do. He's moving these people through the reality that you've made your choice and now I'm going to give you over to what you've chosen.

[44:14] And that's a principle that we live by. We ask the question, what does it even look like for God to do this? How and exactly when is all that going to happen that he's going to destroy in this manner?

[44:27] Well, what God is telling Noah has no precedent and no parallel in human history. Nothing like what God is going to do has ever happened on the earth before.

[44:40] Ever. So Noah has no precedent. He just has to trust God. Now rehearse for me with me some of the explicit directions the Lord gives to Noah because all of this is based on the rain and the flooding that's to come which no one's ever seen.

[45:01] It's not going to come for many more decades. And so we get some of these details if you'll look at it with me here in verse 14. You're going to make this ark. A lot of commentators thought that gopher wood is not a kind of tree.

[45:14] It's not a kind of wood per se. It's the result of what you get when you process wood in a certain way so that it's better preserved and hardened for a certain task.

[45:27] And that made sense to me because I've never seen a gopher tree. All right? You know, I thought, well, maybe there are gopher trees around that area but I couldn't find that anywhere either.

[45:40] So you're going to make the ark with rooms and then you're going to cover it with pitch. All right? Now, these are details. He didn't have to tell us this. He didn't have to give us all this in the Bible. He could have just said that I told the guy to make a big boat and he made it.

[45:54] This is how you shall make it. You're going to make it 300 cubits in length, 50 cubits this way, height 30 cubits. Man, look, this is huge.

[46:05] You're going to make a window. You're going to put a door in it. It's going to have three decks. This thing is going to be humongous. And so, look at this.

[46:17] I'll put this picture up here for you. You guys have seen this before. There she goes. This is perhaps the best rendition that we have of this. 450 feet long, 75 feet high, 45 feet wide with three separate levels, each of them being at least 15 feet high.

[46:41] Each of them. Most of you have ceilings in your house that are 8 feet, 9 feet maybe. This is 15 feet. Each one of them. Each one of these decks, 15 feet high.

[46:53] This will give you some perspective. That's something, isn't it? And then this one. So, it was more than three stories high.

[47:09] Now, Noah doesn't have anything to compare this to. So, this isn't about what Noah can see. This isn't even necessarily about what Noah can understand. Although, I do believe at this time there's probably what, what did I say?

[47:24] There's probably about 1,000, what was it? Yeah, about 1,650 years. have gone by from Adam to the flood.

[47:35] About 1,600 years or so have gone by since Adam to the flood. And so, in that time while sin has been continuing to go and we see how bad it is, I think people were really, really smart at this time.

[47:50] I think we have suffered under the effects of sin now for a long, long time and we don't have the same intellectual capacity now that people had back then. Just look at what he did.

[48:00] Look at what these people accomplished. We look back on ancient civilizations and it would blow your mind to see some of the things that we've been discovering lately about how sophisticated the plumbing was.

[48:12] How sophisticated some of the architecture. I mean, we have concrete. Roman concrete is better than the stuff we make today. Incredible. These people were smart.

[48:23] Smart people. And so, we see this happening in Noah's life as he makes the ark. He didn't have to understand it. He just had to be faithful. And so, he's taking God at his word and he's obeying the Lord's instructions.

[48:35] Now, look, I'm not going to elaborate a lot on the ark. There's a lot of reliable sources that are out there through, if you don't have them yet, Answers in Genesis and the Institute for Creation Research are two of my favorites.

[48:47] And they have a ton of stuff on the ark. I have books at home that literally are that thick on just the flood. Just the flood. There are books you can open up that are as wide as this pulpit that fold out and show you all kinds of scientific dimensions and stuff about the ark.

[49:05] There are technical papers that nerdy engineers, no offense to my engineer brothers, have made that I can't even read because I can't understand them, that talk about the science of the ark in the water.

[49:19] It is amazing what we have in the way of those resources. So I recommend those to you through those ministries. But we do need to understand why Moses is sharing these specific details with his readers originally and with us.

[49:33] So this information does a simple thing. It simply tells us that Noah and his work on the ark of God were all real. This is a real boat.

[49:45] It was really built. And it did what God said it would do. And we could take it at face value as being genuine. The fact that we can't find the thing, I don't have any issue with that.

[49:58] That doesn't mean it didn't exist. We can't find the ark of the covenant either, no matter what Raiders of the Lost Ark says. We can't find it. But that doesn't mean that it's not there.

[50:11] This information tells us it was all real. Now, God says this to Noah. We can see this in our holy imagination here. Noah, build me a humongous boat.

[50:22] That's your part. Obey me and live. Now for God's part. Look at verse 17. I, even I, am bringing the flood of water upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life from under heaven.

[50:38] Everything that is on the earth shall perish, but I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall enter the ark, you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you.

[50:54] I will do this. If it breathes, it will die. That's one side of what we're reading here. But if judgment was all there was, it would leave us without any hope.

[51:10] I wouldn't be up here preaching the gospel because there would be no gospel. gospel. We are sinners in need of God's grace. We are in need of His mercy. We are in need of His forgiveness, just like Noah and all the people of his day were.

[51:25] But the little word at the beginning of verse 18 is packed with hope. What God can do with one word in the scripture is astounding to me as a preacher of righteousness.

[51:38] all six translations I consulted began the sentence with this one little word in verse 18.

[51:49] Here it is. I'll put it up here. But. But. We've made a big deal of this before in other sermons and other places in the Bible because we see it in other places. What does he say?

[52:00] But I, I will, I will establish my covenant with you. This is what I will do.

[52:11] I will take the initiative. I will seize the moment of your need and I will establish my covenant with you, Noah. Just you.

[52:23] This is the first time in scripture that God has struck a covenant with someone. And what are we talking about here? Well, this covenant is binding, a binding spiritual contract God initiates with Noah.

[52:39] And that initiation part is so important. In other words, God obligates himself to save and provide for Noah. And then God calls Noah to fellowship and faithfulness by telling Noah how to respond.

[52:51] So God establishes this covenant. He makes a way for this covenant to be binding on him as well as Noah. And then he tells Noah, now here's how you're to live in response to what I'm establishing with you.

[53:04] Does that pattern sound a little bit familiar to you? Does that sound a little familiar? Here's what I'm going to do in order to establish a covenant with you.

[53:14] Here's what I'm going to do. And now I'm going to tell you how to respond to that. It's God's faithfulness doing everything. It's why we can preach this gospel as a gospel of grace.

[53:29] Undeserved favor. Done for us, to us, through us, and in us. It's a marvelous thing. And as we preach that gospel and worship under that gospel, where do we go with it?

[53:42] Where does it take us? It takes us to the place of dropping to our knees and saying to God, it really is all about the love of your heart for sinners. I can't take any glory for my salvation.

[53:55] Amen? Isn't this what we want to proclaim and make clear to people? It's all about the Lord. A binding spiritual contract.

[54:08] It's a very familiar pattern. What is the greatest expression of God's covenant to save and provide for sinners? The cross. The cross. And we could just take a minute to rehearse that together.

[54:21] What does the Bible say? But Jesus, He was pierced through for our transgressions. Ours. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him.

[54:34] And by His scourging we are healed. My servant will justify the many as He will bear their iniquities. That's the gospel, isn't it? And how do we respond to God establishing that wonderful truth of covenant life in His Son?

[54:54] How do we respond to that? Now, believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. I told you before, how did Noah respond?

[55:06] How did Noah respond? Thus, Noah did. He believed. He had to believe before he could get to work. And then Noah did according to all that God had commanded him, so he did.

[55:23] And that's a saving faith responding in faithfulness. A saving faith responding in faithfulness. And so the work is going to prove hard, man.

[55:36] It's going to prove long, dangerous. God makes clear the stakes of Noah's obedience. What does he say to Noah? And you shall enter, notice this, look at your text, and you shall enter the ark, you and your sons and your wife and your sons wives.

[55:52] So that's the human stake relying on Noah's obedience. It's his family. Gentlemen, did you hear me say yesterday, as we were teaching and moving through that verse together, did you hear me talk about what's at stake in your obedience or lack of it as a shepherd in your family?

[56:11] And what it means for Grace Church if you don't take seriously the spiritual mandate that God has put on you to be a disciple maker, starting with your family and working its way out.

[56:21] Right? Guys, you remember that? If Noah isn't obedient, look how many people are going to be negatively impacted by his disobedience. But because Noah is proving faithful to God, God is blessing Noah's life and the grace that God is working in his life, it becomes like an umbrella of grace for other people around him.

[56:46] And that's the way it works. Even unbelievers throughout the Bible, even unbelievers who have united themselves not necessarily in faith to God, but in camaraderie or friendship with those who love God, by extension in the grace working in their lives as a person or as Israel, those people are blessed.

[57:09] Think of the Kenites. Right? God didn't destroy the Kenites because the Kenites were nice to the Israelites as they were wandering. And so God said, hey, I'm fixing to send some people over to kill Amalek.

[57:23] We're going to wipe them off the face of the planet. And so you Kenites, you need to get out of Dodge before we get there or you'll be with them. But because you were nice, we'll let you go. You see what I'm saying?

[57:35] So just by being nice to Israel and drawing near to Israel, even though they didn't believe in Israel's God, God was gracious to them. You see this? Your children, if they're unbelieving, are blessed by God's grace working through your life.

[57:47] You see that? I didn't say saved, I said blessed. Your blessed in faith. And you see what happens when they leave and they get out from underneath that if they don't walk with the Lord.

[58:03] It's a heart-wrenching thing to behold. Noah's blessing that he's receiving from God is then extending and becoming a blessing in the lives of the people around him.

[58:15] And so we have to believe since these people are being saved, that these people also eventually at some point came to faith. Sharing Noah's faith in God and God saved them.

[58:27] Look at verses 19 and 20. Of every living thing of all flesh you shall bring two of every kind in the ark and keep them alive with you. Okay, so we got two of every kind, male and female, and then he spells it out.

[58:38] We're going to have birds, we're going to have animals, we're going to have creeping things all coming in to the ark and you're going to gather food for all of you guys and it's going to be great. We're going to see this wonderful salvation.

[58:50] Now what that does is spell out the stake for the animals as it relates to Noah's obedience. Even the creation is going to be blessed by the faithfulness of this man.

[59:02] Wow, what a great, great mercy of God. All the fleshly distractions, demonic deceptions going on around him. What if Noah had looked to the world to define his priorities for him?

[59:16] Boy, what a mess. If Noah had compromised his heavenly mindness by setting his mind on earthly things, if he'd gotten fearful, if he'd put his eyes on the world and gotten fearful, and said, you know what, I ain't going to work today.

[59:33] I think I'm just going to stay home. Lock the door. Bring me some more arrows from my bow. Get a couple spears. Call them in here. Get the family in here.

[59:44] We're just going to hunker down for a while. He didn't do that. He did not live in fear. He lived in faith, didn't he? Not by sight, by faith.

[59:56] Boy, the lessons. And what does that tell us about God? It's exactly what he says. God will preserve his people in righteousness. That is a promise.

[60:09] He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you were able, but with the temptation show you the way through. He is faithful. That's what the verse says.

[60:20] God is faithful. And he will provide a way of escape also. Because he's faithful. If you'll look to him. Noah's not a hypocrite.

[60:34] I'll give you this last one real quickly. This last one real quickly. He's working repentance in Noah. Noah's willingness to obey God shows in his repentant heart.

[60:47] I showed you this earlier in verse 9. These are the records of the genealogies or generations of Noah. So this is what is known in Hebrew as a told dot section.

[60:59] There are a number of these told dots throughout Genesis that are markers for what is to follow. And so this is a way of saying what now follows and then we're going to get down the road a little bit and it's going to be what follows from the life of and then we're going to have that record of what's going on.

[61:21] There are a number of these throughout Genesis and here's one of them and it's a major marker of change in the text. Now we're going to shift to another focus in someone's life.

[61:32] And in this one it's Noah. In chapter 6 verse 9 these are the records of he was a righteous man a blameless man and he walked with God. If you look at verse 22 thus Noah did in other words he was faithful according to all that God had commanded him Noah did and then I showed you chapter 7 verse 5 Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him his obedience is following on his heart for God that's what it is and so folks look living repentantly is a lifestyle it's not a one off we are continuing to repent throughout the day as God makes us aware of sin in our life that we need to turn away from and put on the righteousness of Christ in that regard that situation or circumstance and the Lord is faithful to do that as we walk with him remember Noah is a sinner he's a sinner like you like me we're not exalting

[62:37] Noah as someone who never sinned he did sin but he lived in repentance before the Lord Noah needs exactly what we need to live faithfully in his walk with the Lord he needs grace he needs God's favor on his life so Noah is practiced in walking with God by faith it's what defines him he's learning and he's growing he's hearing and he's heeding he's a doer of the word he's a doer of the word so here's what I want to leave you with I want to leave you with three characteristics of Noah's walk with God because they're instructive and encouraging for us again this is something that you can do as you do character studies in the Bible that's a very good thing to do just always remember that whatever you're seeing in the way of godly character being worked out in one of these people in the Bible male or female always look behind that and remember

[63:38] God is working a work of grace by his faithfulness in this person's life so that we can see God's character reflected in them and so who gets the glory God not the character God that's what we want so that's what we're seeing here the first of these three look at this one Noah chose to listen how important is that oh man that's where we start in our walk with God we humbly listen here's another word for this please mark it in your Bible write it in your notes humility and a teachable spirit people like that listen they listen to God and they listen to others and when I say listen to others I don't mean listen to nonsense and lies and take it in I'm talking about people giving people the benefit and blessing of listening to them taking time to hear them

[64:39] Noah trained his heart to hear the voice of the Lord very important that we follow that with this statement we listen to God through the Bible where he speaks God speaks to us through scripture we don't have God speaking to us in direct address like we see happening in Noah's life Noah listen up I'm going to tell you exactly what you want to do and then you see these quotation marks!

[65:07] verse 15 this is how you today through what he has already said and written in the Bible let's say amen amen alright number two Noah chose to believe he listened and he believed he took God at his word and then number three Noah chose to obey he committed his heart to do he was a he leader of God's word not just a hearer so Noah didn't live his relationship with the Lord in some kind of weird bubble some kind of spiritual bubble that insulated him from everything Noah had to deal with the sin coming at him constantly he did not live perfectly we know Noah was a sinner he lived faithfully he lived faithfully there's a difference walking with

[66:11] God is about loving God with all of your heart mind soul and strength right this is what Jesus gave us so this is the last thing I'll say here hearing trusting and obeying are ways we express our love for God and our walk with God in a wicked world there it is if you want to walk away with what this is about we hear we trust we obey because those are ways we express our love to Christ in our walk with him in a wicked world thank God by his grace we can do that let's pray together father we thank you for your grace and mercy in our lives and we thank you for the opportunity that we have as believers to be encouraged to be built up in the scripture I thank you for those who visited with us today and pray that your blessing from your word is on their lives and they'll be able to leave here literally spiritually filled up to the fullness of

[67:15] Jesus Christ in their understanding that they will feel like they sat down and had a wonderful and full meal of the grace and truth of the Lord as it has been brought from the life of Noah as we've looked you're about to bring to him and his family as they enter the ark and you bring the water upon the earth we look to you as we look to the cross of Jesus to be that ark of our salvation that place where we run and find Jesus hanging on the cross paying for our sins and then to see him raised up and the tomb empty promising us that one day we will join him in the resurrection and we will live for you and with you forever thank you God for the blessings of this certain hope may you bless your people and may they go out today encouraged and built up in the faith once for all delivered to the saints in

[68:24] Jesus name we pray!