Today we will look at a story most of us have heard since childhood. Perhaps you sat wide-eyed as a Sunday School teacher used a flannel graph to depict how Noah built the ark and saved his family and the animals.
Or maybe you were introduced to the thrilling story through a picture like this.
What is this story really about? Does it have a message deeper than what is evident on the surface? What we learned as children is true: Noah obeyed God, built the ark, and saved himself, his family, and the animals. But, is there more to the story than what is immediately evident? Yes, a great deal more!
I believe God intends us to connect this story to what’s gone before and what will come after. What has gone before? The Garden, Adam and Eve yielding to Satan’s lie, and the penalty of death coming upon the human race. After that comes God’s promise that although Satan will continue to trouble us, there will be an ultimate victory over him by a representative of mankind (Jesus). (Genesis 2 and 3)
Chapters 4 and 5 of Genesis deal with the expansion of the human race through the offspring of Adam and Eve. At the end of chapter 5, we see what God is doing. Methuselah, who lived 969 years, had a son named Lamec who had a son named Noah.
During all these hundreds, perhaps thousands of years since the creation of the Garden of Eden mankind has greatly increased and become very wicked. Genesis 6: 5-7 “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 on evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. And 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 the birds of the sky; for I am sorry I have made them.'”
This is the continuation of what began in Eden. Sin brings judgment and serious consequences. God is just and disobedience brings justice. Sin is always an affront to our Holy God. But, God is as loving as He is holy and has a plan and a promise.
Enter Noah. “But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.” Genesis 6:8 Next comes God’s plan and His promise. “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. Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; with rooms, and you shall cover it inside and out with pitch.'” Genesis 6: 13-14.
At this point, Noah and his sons get to work on God’s plan. The ship will be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet tall. God plans to save Noah, his family, and enough animals and creatures to start over and ultimately fulfill the promise He made to Satan. It will take Noah about 100 years to build the ark and receive God’s promise.
Noah trusted God and that trust, that faith, resulted in Noah and his family receiving the promise of his faithful God. Notice what Hebrews 11:7 says about Noah, “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.”
Because of Noah’s faith, God included him in His plan. What is God’s plan? Redemption. He plans to save all who come to Him by faith and restore Eden, where all the faithful can live eternally.
ALL OF GOD’S PROMISES ARE VITALLY CONNECTED TO HIS PLAN OF REDEMPTION.
Jesus is the ultimate mediator of God’s redemptive plan. He said of himself, The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which is lost.” In His last moments on the cross, He said, “It is finished,” meaning He had completed His part in the Father’s plan to save those who will trust Him. God raised Him from the dead to verify and confirm Jesus’ obedience guaranteed eternal life to all who put their trust in Him.
But what happens before Jesus is born? There are over two thousand years between Noah and the flood and the coming of our Savior. How is God going to redeem mankind and what promises is He going to make to move from the flood to the manger in Bethlehem?
God will make a promise to Abram, a person we know as Abraham.
Think about it.
What did this lesson tell you about God?
In what way did the lesson stretch your thinking about why God makes promises?
How do you see this lesson affecting the way you think, and the way you live?