- Alright here we are,
Genesis, Lesson number 21. For those of you who are
following along in your own bibles and not watching on the screen, you would open your bibles
to Genesis chapter 6. That's where we're at, Genesis chapter 6. As I do every week, we
kind of do a little review, kinda compress some of the information that we've had so far. So in our last lesson, we
reviewed the millennium between Adam and Noah. So you think I'm going
slow 'cause I'm just doin a few verses, but we
actually covered a millennium of time when we talked about
the material in Genesis. And so what we did is, there
was an end to Adams record, remember I said the patriarchs,
the various characters in that pre-deluviant, pre-flood
time, are keeping track, are writing if you wish. And so there is the end of Adam's record of his own generations,
that's Genesis 5:1. So up to Genesis 5:1,
you have Adam writing and describing what's going on. And then the beginning of Noah's record in Genesis 5, verse 2. Noah summarizes Adam's life. So you start in chapter five and, just like any other writer, he summarizes what happened before, a couple of verses, and then he moves ahead
and he links, if you wish, together the 10 patriarchs through whom the original promise of God was carried from generation to generation. So we reviewed these last
time looking at their ages, remember we went through
the ages so-and-so lived for 500 years, so-and-so
lived for 900 years, y'know? What Noah is doing is he's tracing the generations of the patriarchs through that millennium, alright? And I also said to you, you know there's a couple of ideas here that you need to keep in mind. One of them is that the
Bible does not focus on social development or history per se. I mean there's history there, but it has not been written
to give us the history of man. It has been written to give us the history of how God's promise to man was fulfilled throughout the ages. So there's history happening and nations are rising and falling,
inventions are being made, cities and countries are
at war with each other and all that stuff is going on. And archeologists and historians are discovering this
and writing about this. The Bible is not interested
in that necessarily. It's interested in giving us the thread of the promise of a Savior made to Adam and how that promise was
fulfilled throughout history. And so it just names major
characters along the way. Like relay, if you want, like a relay. Like one handed off the promise to another and then that one did in time and handed off the promise to another. And the bible only follows
that particular line. And once in a while it gives information about what's going on in that society at that particular time only as a way of giving some background to
the story that it's telling. But the main story that it's telling is how did the promise,
how was it fulfilled from generation to generation from Adam all the way to the
birth of Jesus Christ. Okay, the other thing I reminded you of is, when you're reading Genesis, think of a movie, think of camera angles. There's the close up shot,
then there's the wide shot, and then there's subplots. So you've got the close
up, when the writers are talking about a particular character and they're giving a lot of
detail about that character, and then there's the wide
shot where the Bible is giving like 10 patriarchs over a millennium, that's like a wide shot. And then you've got subplots. One subplot is how the promise
was given and maintained from generation to generation,
the seed of promise. And then there's another subplot, and that's the constant war between the children of the seed of promise and the children of Satan. So the Bible doesn't give
you any stage information. It doesn't say, "Okay
now we're gonna switch to a wide shot and now we're gonna". You have to kinda know that
that's what's going on. And if you do, it makes it
a little bit less confusing. So tonight we're gonna go from a wide shot of the seed of promise
over the span of 1000 years to a close up view of one single man through whom that promise was preserved during the worst calamity the Earth has or will ever suffer,
until the end of time. The worst calamity the
Earth has ever suffered until the end of time when
the heavens and the Earth will be destroyed happened at the flood. Yeah, there are bad things happening, volcanoes, mudslides, so on and so forth, but none of these modern
things comes even close to the catastrophe that was visited upon the Earth with the great flood. So lets go to Noah here. I'm not gonna read out of Genesis, I'm reading a passage out
of Matthew here, verse 24. Chapter 24, verses 37, 39, and I'll tell you why I'm reading this. So lets just read that, Matthew 24. Jesus is the one who's speaking, he says, "For the coming of the Son of Man "will be just like the days of Noah. "For as in those days before the flood, "they were eating and drinking, "marrying and giving in marriage, "until the day that Noah entered the ark, "and they did not understand
until the flood came "and took them all away; "so will the coming of the Son of Man be." Now, there are a lot of
people that believe that Jesus is the Son of God, they
believe that He's the Messiah. And they believe that His Word is contained in the New Testament. But many times, these very same people doubt the historocity of the global flood. In other words, they believe
Jesus is the Son of God but they don't really
believe in the flood. "Oh, that's just a myth,
that's just a thing, that's just mythology,
that's just mythology." And the reason I read this
particular passage here, is that the New Testament
records that Jesus not only referred to the flood as an accurate historical fact, but He urged his disciples to study it in order to be prepared for
His own coming in the future. So don't say, "Well I believe that Jesus the Son of God and He's the Messiah and His Word is God's Word." Don't say that and then
in the same breath say, "But the flood, that's just a myth that's just an ancient thing, that's not really true." Because if you say that, you're saying, "Well the Son of God,
He said it was true." The inspired writers quoting Jesus, they said that He said
this was a true thing. And Noah was not a mythological character, he was a real person,
and this flood was a true historical catastrophe. And so, I can't be there,
at the time of the flood, none of us can. We don't have any pictures of the event. Isn't that amazing, nowadays,
if you don't have a picture of it, if somebody hasn't
gotten it on their cell phone or something like that,
we don't think it's true. So we don't have any pictures, but I do have an eye witness, that's Noah, who wrote about it, and I have his words confirmed by Jesus, who's the Son of God. So for me, this is enough to convince me that when we speak of Noah and the flood, we're talking about an accurate account of an historical event. I believe it, why? Not only
because the bible says so, but even in the bible Jesus
Himself refers to the flood. So now, lets switch back to
Genesis six, one to four. It says, "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; and they took wives "for themselves whoever they chose. "Then the Lord said, "My
Spirit shall not strive "with man forever,
because he also is flesh; "nevertheless his days shall be
one hundred and twenty years. "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." This passage, oh man, this passage. Lots been said about
this particular passage. A lot of people... This is a very controversial passage and it can be interpreted in several ways. So lets do that, lets look
at the main interpretations that have been given to this passage. Interpretation number one is that angels took women as wives
and produced children, and these children were
like the seed of Satan. I actually read a book a little while back just about angels, it was just angels. A long book, nearly 400 pages, it had only one topic and that was angels. And in this particular book, the writer believed that
this was the accurate interpretation of this passage. His point was fallen angels
in the service of Satan, with the purpose of destroying mankind, with the purpose of sowing
wickedness on Earth, took women as, human women, as well there's only one kind
of woman, is a human one. [audience chuckles] There are a lot of jokes there but we won't make them, okay? And so they they became, they took them as wives. In other words, they
became intimate with them and bore children, you know? So there's lots to say for
this particular interpretation. The term "sons of God"
that is written in Genesis, that term when it's used
always referred to angels in the Old Testament and
was translated this way in the Septuagint and Josephus and a lot of early church writers. I don't know if I've got it here. In Jude, for example, verse
six in the New Testament, Jude writes about this, he says, "And angels who did not
keep their own domain "but abandoned their proper abode, "He has kept in eternal
bonds under darkness "for the judgment of the great day." And so some people think
that that passage there, in Jude six, they didn't keep their place in the spirit world, they left their place in the spirit world, they went to Earth, and so on and so forth. They believe that Jude
six somehow is coupled with Genesis, that these
are comparative passages. I'm not telling you
that this is what it is, I'm just telling you this
is one interpretation and this is the reason why people come to this particular conclusion. Angels took women as wives
to produce evil seed. Another interpretation is that the descendants of Seth,
who was a righteous man, we know that Seth was a righteous man, sons of God, righteous man, began to marry the descendants of Cain,
who were unrighteous. And these unions between believers and unbelievers produced wicked offspring. In other words, it began
to dilute the righteousness of the line of Seth, and thereby corrupted the population of that time. Another interpretation
is that demonic forces possessed the descendants of Cain and these individuals took
women and produced equally possessed children who
were powerfully wicked. I've tried to think of some
other way that you could, some other conclusion, but these are pretty much the three main ideas if you go through
commentaries and other writers and scholars, there's only three things. If you're waiting for me
to jump on one of them, I'm not gonna do it. Because they all have something to offer. But I will tell you one thing, whichever interpretation you use, you end up at the same place. You end up at the same place. Super powerful and wicked beings began to inhabit the Earth and raise the level of evil of violence
to intolerable levels. The Nethilim that they're talking about, giants, they were giants,
just like Goliath, from Gath, was from a family of giants. Well the Nethilim, the Hebrew, talks about individuals who were
giants at these times. So these verses here are given to explain how these people came. How did we get such
powerfully wicked people? Well these verses here
are there to explain that. These people, the other
thing about this verse, is that these wicked, powerful people were lionized by the
population of that time in ungodly songs and fables and myths and so on and so forth. So, just like Bonnie and Clyde. We all know Bonnie and Clyde, the depression era of bankrobbers, the husband and wife team of bankrobbers. And what were they? They were bankrobbers, they were thieves, they were murderers, they were criminals. What's so surprising that
a woman can be a criminal. Women and men can be criminals. And what did they do? They robbed banks, they shot people, they killed people, they
tried to evade the law. But what did the media do with them? They lionized them, the myth about Bonnie and Clyde and so on and so forth. Even during their own lifetime. You know the idea, oh they're
stealing from the rich banks and they're giving to the poor. No they weren't, they were
bank robbing for themselves. They weren't starting a
social service program, it wasn't a benevolence program. And then give it another 40 or 50 years and what does Hollywood do? Well Hollywood goes
back and resurrects this and who do you get, you get, what's his name, the
actor, Warren Beatty and another lovely looking
actress and they portray If you've ever seen an actual picture of Bonnie and Clyde, not
the best lookin people. [audience chuckles] Not the best lookin Good thing it was the era of
radio, you know what I'm sayin? [audience laughs] Cause if there woulda
been TV in those days, they wouldn't have been heroes. Ugly people can't be
heroes, it's just sad, you know how that is. [laughter continues] You're welcome. I won't tell your name so
your name is not on record. Steve Howze, but um. [raucous laughter] Anyways, so I'm just trying
to give you the idea here that the very same
impetus is happening here. Wicked people doing
wicked things in society and being held up as wow these
guys are like superheroes. They're giants and so on and so forth, in song so on and so forth. So this passage is explaining
how wicked society is. At this time society
is actually applauding the wickedness in its midst. A little bit like today, don't you think? Aren't we applauding and we give trophies and awards to people who are sinful and lewd
and so on and so forth. So what's happening in this passage is that God is declaring that
there's gonna be a judgment. These bad people are doing this, society is lionizing these people, well I tell you what,
I'm not gonna take it. That's what he's saying, I'm
not gonna take it anymore. You get 120 years, imagine, we used to say I'll count to three, you know? God says I'll give you 120
years to turn it around. So we read the next
passage, five and six says, "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 was sorry that He
had made man on the earth, "and he was grieved in His heart." So there's the conclusion,
He looks at man, He sees what's going on, and He realizes these people are hopeless. Because if every intention
of the heart is evil for everyone, what's gonna
happen to that society? Well they're gonna
implode, they're just gonna end up killing each other, that's all. If it's the law of survival? You know? Survival of the fittest, well eventually most of the people are gonna be dead. They're gonna kill each
other, kill each other off. So Noah summarizes the
condition of the world which is complete anarchy,
wickedness is everywhere, people's thinking and
plans are always evil, there's no restraining power, there's no mitigation power, there's nothing. So God does not repent, you
know it says God repents, God doesn't repent of sin,
cause there's no sin in God. He changes his attitude, that's
what repentance is isn't it? When I repent, I change my attitude. Before, I would sin and
it wouldn't bother me and I would even look
for occasions to sin. If I repent, what I'm doing is I'm changing my mind about sin. I can't get rid of it altogether, I can't be perfect, but I
can change my mind about sin. I no longer want to sin, I
actually want to do what's right, even though sometimes I don't
do it for whatever reason, but in my heart God knows that I want to do the right
thing; that's repentance. Well in the same way, God's
attitude was love and mercy towards a race that
may have been imperfect but was attempting to serve him. That attitude changes,
repents, to one of judgment and righteous indignation
when that race dissolves into complete wickedness and rebellion. So He changes his attitude,
my attitude was mercy, was patience, so on and so forth. Now my attitude has
changed, now my attitude is there's gonna be a judgment cause you're not paying attention, you're not listening to
me, and so on and so forth. Now, different passages
throughout the bible give us a more detailed
view of the condition of the antediluvian, that
means before the flood, the antediluvian world that
led to its destruction. We only get this little bit in Genesis but there are other places
that talk about this time. Lemme give you a couple of them. One of them talks about the preoccupation with physical appetites at that time. Luke, chapter seven, it says, "And just as it happened
in the days of Noah, "so it will also be in the
days of the Son of Man: "they were eating, they were
drinking, they were marrying, "they were being given in
marriage until the day that "Noah entered the ark and the flood came "and destroyed them all." Someone will say, "Well
what's wrong with eating and drinking? What's
wrong with being married? What's wrong with having weddings?" And so on and so forth. There's nothing wrong with them, but this is the only
thing that's going on. There's no worship of
God, there's no service, there's just materialism, okay? In another passage, in
Genesis 6:2, it says that, "The sons of God saw
that the daughters of men "were beautiful; and they took wives "for themselves, whomever they chose." So there was satanic activity
in the physical realm. That was also taking place at that time. Another passage, in Hebrews
11 verse seven, it says, "By faith Noah, being
warned by God about things "not yet seen, in reverence
prepared an ark for the "salvation of his household,
by which he condemned "the world, and became an
heir of the righteousness "which is according to faith." So there was general disbelief. Notice, only one man and one family is told what is going
to actually take place. So a time of general disbelief. Ungodly behavior, Jude
verse 14 and 15, it says, "It was also about these men that Enoch," Enoch is one of those 10 patriarchs in the first millennium
before the flood, right? So it says, "It was also about these men "that Enoch, in the seventh
generation from Adam, "prophesied, saying,
'Behold, the Lord came with "thousands of His holy ones,
to execute judgment upon all, "and to convict all the
ungodly of all their "ungodly deeds which they
have done in an ungodly way, "and of all the harsh things
which ungodly sinners "have spoken against Him.'" This is Enoch, he's a prophet. He's talking about what's
going on during the period before the flood and he's
warning people, saying, "God is going to punish you
for what is going on here." And then one more, this took place in Genesis chapter six, verse 11. It says, "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; "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; and behold,
I am about to destroy them "with the earth.'" So just showing you a few other passages that talks about this particular time. So without God and His world, man begins a descent into
materialism, wickedness, that ultimately destroys him. Before this would happen, God
would intervene in order to save and preserve the seed of promise. Remember what I'm saying. The bottom line here of the Genesis story is how is that seed of promise preserved from one generation to another. So now he's saying this is a bad time, things are falling apart, how is God going to preserve that seed? And so we read in
chapter six, verse seven, "The Lord said, 'I will blot out man "whom I have 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.'" So this intention is
articulated here in verse seven and the extent of God's
judgment in expressed. All would perish except the marine life. Everything else is going to perish. I want you to understand Satan's tactics. He has a lot of different tactics. He's always working. And one of his tactics within society is to remove the name and the worship and the presence and the authority of God in every place where it exists. And so in our country, and I'm not gonna go off on a rant here, but in our country and
in western countries, where Christianity was the
most powerful idea at one time, is slowly being diminished. It's being dismantled, piece by piece by various groups and so on and so forth. It's out of the schools,
it's out of government, pretty soon you can't even
say what you wanna say. The attitude of society is that everything must be tolerated,
so on and so forth. So we're not crazy, you're not crazy if you think, wow there's a
lot of evil in our society. Yeah, there is a lot of evil. And what really amazes me is when like when that young guy that just killed all those people randomly and then made a video of himself. And now they're playing the video nonstop, days and days, just encouraging some other unfortunate individuals
to do the same thing. And it's when I see newspeople and talking heads on
cable wring their hands and saying, "What's
wrong? What's the answer in our society? Why is this happening?" "Thou shall not kill."
We don't say that anymore! Kids don't memorize that. My little granddaughter, Sophia, she's being taught at school, not at school but at Bible school, she's being taught to
sing the Ten Commandments. You Bible school teachers, you
know what I'm talking about? Singing the Ten Commandments. She's what, now I'm in trouble,
I can't remember her age. But anyway, she's four, four or five. She's being taught to memorize that. And somebody in the world is
gonna say oh isn't that cute. Yeah, it is cute cause she's five and she kind of fumbles
her way through it, but it's important because
what's being done is the commands of God are being sown into her heart from an early age. And so if she ever gets to a point where she's saying to herself, "Why not?" Why not, why shouldn't
I pick up this gun, or why shouldn't I sleep with that guy or why, why not? Her heart will have an
answer for that question. Her heart will have an
answer for that question. Because her parents have sown the seeds of God's word in her heart. And that's the trouble with our society, people are saying why not and
there's no answer to that, so they go ahead and do
what they want to do. Alright, teaching class
not a preaching class but. Alright so verse eight, it says, "But Noah found favor in
the eyes of the Lord." So this is the final verse in
Noah's record and his account. He only writes of himself
that he found God's grace and for this reason was spared judgment. Now, in other places, we learn
several things about Noah. So lets get a little close up and find some stuff out about Noah, shall we? First of all, we find out that he was obedient, in four different places, in Genesis six and seven
and so on and so forth. Said that Noah did everything
that God had commanded him. He was an obedient person. He had only one wife, Genesis 7:3, and that's amazing because, at that time, polygamy was rampant. He was a preacher, second
Peter, 2:5 talks about that. Now, no one was ever
converted by his preaching. He preached for 120 years. Except three of his sons
that came into the ark. He had more children than that, but only three of his children. So sometimes if you wonder, "Boy I tried so hard with my kids, I got five kids, only
two obeyed the gospel." You know, I always tell
them Jesus had 12 apostles and only 11 of them stuck
with him. One dropped out. So Noah was a preacher, but he wasn't successful, very successful. He was a man of faith who
withstood the pressure of society and discouragement
of a failed ministry. But he continued to do God's
will. He hung in there. He was a master builder
because he constructed the great structure of the arc
and it did survive the flood. And then after the flood, he was the first to offer sacrifice and begin anew, the line of those who
called upon the Lord. He also became a farmer,
we find out about that, he plants a vineyard. He planted a vineyard,
he got drunk on the wine. Oh man, I could preach
on that a long time. People say, "Wow he got drunk
on the wine why'd he do that?" Yeah, how would you like the whole world to be destroyed around you and
everything killed around you? And then you get off the boat a year later and everything's dead around you. And you're stuck on the boat
with your wife for a year, just think about that. [audience laughs] They didn't say anything about Mrs. Noah. [all laugh] Anyways, all kidding aside, the reason that they put
this in here, I think, the spirit, to show us
that Noah was just a man. He was just a person. He
was just, he wasn't a, he wasn't some sort of super
man, he wasn't an angel, he was just a man, and he was
probably pretty discouraged. And what people do at times
when they're discouraged, instead of going to God,
they find other things to comfort themselves, whether it be music or drugs, or booze, or sex, or whatever. It just shows us that Noah was just a man with ordinary human weaknesses. And he was considered
a righteous man by God. Just and perfect, walked with God, doesn't mean he was without
error or imperfection, we saw that just before. It means that his heart was turned to God and God offered this man
His grace and became, and because of grace and mercy, he was considered fully acceptable to God. And as a matter of fact,
it's the first time the idea of grace is
mentioned in the bible and demonstrated in a person. Noah wasn't perfect but he was
found righteous nevertheless. That's why I think that
we skip over that verse where he got drunk on the wine. That's only a way of saying
this is not a perfect guy. And yet, the Bible says
but he was a righteous guy. Remember what I said, my
sermon on Sunday night. I said I'm a husband. I'm
not a perfect husband, but I am a faithful one. So I am a Christian. I'm
not a perfect Christian, but I am a faithful one. And then in verse nine, 10, Got to move a little quickly here it says, "These are the records of
the generations of Noah. "Noah was a righteous man,
blameless in his time; "Noah walked with God. Noah became "the father of three sons:
Shem, Ham, and Japheth." So there begins the account
of the sons of Noah, and so they begin by kind of tying their record to the previous one. These words here are words
written by Noah's son. They take over the
narrative at this point. Verses 11 to 13, "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; for all the 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; "and behold, I am about to
destroy them on the earth." So this is another summary statement about the condition of the world. 120 years previously Noah
preached about the conditions and now his sons are recounting how the conditions had not
changed despite the preaching. There's also a mention that the earth would be destroyed along with all men. So the point is that the same people say, 'oh it was only a local flood' and they just blew it up
into a worldwide flood. But the Bible says that the
entire Earth was covered and this statement is confirmed by the New Testament writers as well, II Peter 3:6, for example. The problem is easily
settled with the thought that if God can create the universe, it's a very small matter for Him to cover one single planet with water. So let me just, gimme
another three minutes here, let me finish out. So Noah completes his testimony by linking together the 10
patriarchs from Adam to himself. He describes the state of the world as it has been dominated by wicked people somehow produced through
Satan's influence. We're not sure exactly how, but we know Satan's been working here. He refers to himself only as one who finds grace in God's eyes,
nothing about his work, nothing about his perseverance. He knows that God establishes
a specific period of time when He will take judgment on the Earth. And then his sons pick up the narrative and they confirm that the
world has ignored the warning and they begin to describe
the results of God's judgment. We're gonna leave off there and pick up next time with the flood. So let me give you a
couple of lessons here. Lesson one, perseverance not perfection. God knows that we can't be perfect, we can't be without fault,
we can't be sinless. But He doesn't even ask us, He doesn't ask us this
because it's impossible. He does look for us to
offer what we can do and what is humanly possible
despite our weakness and that is that we keep on keeping on. That's what He asks us. Noah persevered in his belief. And that perseverance was
expressed in cooperation with God to do his will. He built the boat! And I'm not saying there weren't some days when he was saying, "This boat. This blankety blank boat. Man I'm getting fed up with this boat!" But he built it anyways,
just like we say sometimes, you know Christianity is pretty hard. But I'm not quitting. Like Peter said. Jesus said to the apostles,
"Are you guys gonna quit too?" and Peter said, "Well
Lord, where we gonna go?" I have that feeling sometimes, you know? Lord, there's nowhere to go. This is the best offer we've got. Lesson number two, we
don't have 120 years. They had 120 years, we
don't have 120 years. Imagine knowing that judgment would be in exactly 120 years from today. We don't know when the judgment is coming, it could be today, it could be 120 years, it could be 120 centuries. The only thing we know for sure is that we don't know
when Jesus will judge us. And as a minister, boy, I'm
reminded of that all the time. You people that work in the medical field, or public security, whatever, you know what I'm talking about. My best story on this is an immigrant who lived in Montreal who
was waiting for his visa to stay in Canada so he
could go to medical school. He's waiting, he's waiting he's waiting. Finally, he gets a notification that his visa has finally come through, it's in the mail, you
know what I'm saying, and he can get his visa,
which will allow him to go to medical school and stay in Canada, I don't know what country he was from, but he'll be able to stay in Canada. So he leaves his house,
and in the mailbox, like a community mailbox that has a bunch of them down the street, he's walkin down the street, and a helicoptor lost
power and fell on him and killed him in the middle of the day. It's tragic for him, but you
know what I'm trying to say? You don't know. A little blood vessel pops
in your brain, see ya. We don't have 120 years,
we just have today. And the question I'm always asking myself before I go to bed, am I
good, am I alright, Lord? Then last lesson, God can punish us now. Some people say, well you
know He'll punish me later. Maybe I'll go to Hell, maybe I won't, but God can punish us now. A lot of times when your life
is spinning out of control sometimes you need to ask
yourself, am I misbehaving? Is there something I need to change? Always a good question to ask. Alright, that's it. Thank you very much for your attention.
