Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to Growing in Grace with Pastor Victor Morrison. This is a ministry of First Baptist Church located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas. We are praying that God will bless you as you listen to this message.
Speaker: If you would like additional information on worship times and ministries at FBC Columbus, you can find out more at our website, fbccolumbustx.org. And now, take your copy of God's timeless Word as Pastor Victor gives today's message.
Speaker: Welcome to Growing Grace. This is Victor Morrison. I have the joy of serving as the pastor at First Baptist Church in Columbus, Texas. I'm glad you're listening today. Has the flood during the days of Noah ever seemed harsh to you?
Speaker: Perhaps you've not taken the time to really understand the importance of Genesis chapter 6 verses 1 through 8. I consider this passage to be the biblical key to understanding why such a global flood was necessary.
Speaker: Unparalleled wickedness began to engulf the entire world. It was intentional as well as continual. It just wouldn't stop. Two specific sins began to flourish above the others, sexual corruption and physical violence.
Speaker: The final strike, however, was when fallen angels began to reproduce upon the earth. This would take things to a whole new level. God had to act quickly to prevent an even worse scenario.
Speaker: Jude wrote about it in verses five and six, and the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains and under the gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day.
Speaker: i want you to listen as we go verse by verse through Genesis 6, verses 1 through 8. We're going to walk through the darkest period this planet has ever known.
Speaker: This passage will help you, though, understand why God had to act decisively. Of course, we're going to be getting to Noah's Ark, but not quite in this one. Hopefully, our next message will be on Noah's Ark.
Speaker: But Noah's Ark, you remember, was a massive ship built at God's command that saved Noah, his family, and representatives of every kind of land-dependent, air-breathing animal from the global flood that took place over 4,300 years ago.
Speaker: three hundred years ago The ark was 510 feet long, 85 feet wide, and 51 feet high. And it housed the several thousand animals that God brought to Noah.
Speaker: The global flood lasted about one year. The ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat, according to Genesis 8-4. And Noah's family, with all the animals that were saved from the flood, eventually spread throughout the world.
Speaker: Although there are many interpretations of Genesis 6, 1-8, we're going to focus upon the main things that are also the plain things.
Speaker: This passage is a great key to understanding why such destruction was necessary. Let me read it. When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive and they took as their wives any they chose.
Speaker: Then the Lord said, my spirit shall not abide in man forever. Verse 1. his days shall be a hundred and twenty years the nephphalem we're on the earth in those days and also afterward when the sons of god came in to the daughters of man and they boreed children to them these where the mighty men who were of old the men of renown the lord saw That the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
Speaker: And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, i will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.
Speaker: But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. lets Let's ask the Lord to speak to us. Lord, please help us understand why the flood was so necessary.
Speaker: In Jesus' name we pray, amen. I want to begin with verse 1. I think what it is a picture of here is the global growth that was taking place.
Speaker: As we enter into this sixth chapter of Genesis, the descendants of Adam thus far were obeying the Lord's clear command, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
Speaker: That was what God had commanded them in chapter 1, verse 28. It was stated often in the previous chapter, chapter 5, that each generation within the line of Seth had other sons and daughters.
Speaker: That same clause there is repeated over and over in chapter 5, verse 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, 17. 19, 22, 26, 30, over and over we hear those same words that the line of Seth had other sons and daughters, had other sons and daughters, had other sons and daughters.
Speaker: But something changed, something catastrophic changed in verse two. It was at this point that something terrible went wrong. Fallen angels left their proper dwelling as they took a similar downward course like Eve, seeing what was attractive to them and taking whatever they wanted.
Speaker: In other words, these demonic beings first possessed human males, then procreated through women. This greatly displeased God.
Speaker: So he punished these fallen ones as recorded in passages like 1 Peter 3, verses 19 through 20. Let me read that passage just so you get a little more context beyond just what we're reading here.
Speaker: But in chapter 3, verses 19 and 20, it says, "...in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison," because they formerly did not obey when God's patience waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being prepared in which a few, that is eight persons, were brought safely through water.
Speaker: So we hear there that something took place and some are being punished. 2 Peter 2, verses four and five gives us yet a little more information. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept in until the judgment, if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly."
Speaker: So I just wanted you to know that there are other verses, other passages. Of course, the Jude verses 6 and 7 I read earlier. But so far, just two verses into this chapter, we see global growth, everything's going fine.
Speaker: But then the demonic disaster. When something happens, when the fallen fallen angels begin to disobey and to move out of their normal dwelling,
Speaker: Let's also go to verse 3 in our text, Genesis chapter 6. Since was such serious and rebellion.
Speaker: since this was such a serious and evil departure from god's original plan god took drastic measures to limit the impact of the rebellion There are two basic views of verse three.
Speaker: One interpretation understands this was a limit placed upon man's average lifespan from some 900 years to a little over 100 years of life, specifically 120 years or a seven-fold reduction imposed upon mankind.
Speaker: Another interpretation, however, understands this to be a limit for all of life upon the earth since 120 years would have been the amount of time until the flood was poured out to destroy all life upon the earth.
Speaker: But what I want you to see, either way you go with either interpretation, the plain thing, the main thing is that life was going to face a limitation now.
Speaker: Then we go to verse 4, and we meet a group of nasty Nephilim. The word Nephilim is often translated as giants. The term itself means fallen ones.
Speaker: These were the offspring of the demonized marriages that I referred to earlier. Older translations use that term, giants. This unsanctioned union produced children who were strong, but who used their size and their might in evil ways, just like, well, Nimrod in Genesis chapter 10, verses 8, 9, and 10.
Speaker: We will see this more in the next verse, Genesis chapter 6 and verse 5. But if one takes a brief glimpse, a little bit down the road to verse 11 of chapter 6, here's what it says.
Speaker: Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence. I think that what it's doing, it's uncovering two kinds of wickedness that characterized the evil that was prevalent upon the earth at that time, namely sexual corruption and physical violence.
Speaker: Both were very serious in God's eyes, and he took it very seriously. And so that's why he had to go to these extreme measures. Some believe that these were tyrants who forced their way upon others and built harems.
Speaker: But let's move on to verse five, because we still have quite a bit of territory to cover biblically. Verse five introduces us to this worldwide wickedness.
Speaker: Worldwide wickedness, when it says, the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
Speaker: Some well-meaning people today may question why God destroyed all of humanity in the days of Noah. He had good reason. Not only had some of the fallen angels departed from their abode and produce a hybrid race of giants, but humanity had slipped into total depravity.
Speaker: This was serious. So man's wickedness, it says, was global. When it says wickedness was great in the earth, man's wickedness was um not only global, it was also intentional.
Speaker: Intentional, every intention. of his heart was continually toward wickedness and evil. That word intention there in the Hebrew means forming.
Speaker: So constantly in their minds, they were forming how to commit more and more wickedness. And God was witness to the whole thing. So his wickedness was global and intentional, but notice also that it was quite internal.
Speaker: And I think that's what burdened and grieved God's heart the most. The thoughts of his heart, it says, was only evil. Can you imagine? There's no good thoughts whatsoever.
Speaker: Only evil, always. Because that's when he says that it's evil continually. So I thought, man, it's like it's continual, it's internal, it is intentional, and it's global.
Speaker: And God says, i cannot stand idly by and watch mankind self-destruct. So what we see in verse six is we get an inside look.
Speaker: Look at God's heart. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart. Let me ask you a question.
Speaker: I mean, just generally speaking, how do we respond when we're disappointed with the behavior of someone that we love? Aren't we grieved?
Speaker: Notice the heart of God in response to this defiance and rebellion against him. He was patient toward humanity since it had been, well, about 1600 years since he had created adam and Eve.
Speaker: And there are two Hebrew words here that describe his disappointment.
Speaker: It had a great impact upon him. The ESV uses the word regretted first, followed by the word grieved second. The first word in Hebrew is nakam.
Speaker: It means to regret. It means a sigh, regret. It means sorrow or even pity. It refers not to having made a mistake, but rather to a deep pain, watching his creation self-destruct.
Speaker: Such sadness are in these verses. But then you go to the second Hebrew term. It's atzab, it's grief, it's hurt, it's pain.
Speaker: It can't even be translated anger. reinforcing the impact that all of this had upon the heart of a God who loves us so much that out of the whole entire universe, only on earth,
Speaker: Did he make it where mankind could survive? This is the only place. This was the exceptional planet. How come that happened? It happened because God loves us, because God wants us to survive, because God has a plan for us. And that's the only reason why our planet was different.
Speaker: But God saw everything just beginning to blow up. This word comes from a root meaning to carve. So when it says at sab, when it says that his heart was grieved, you know what it means?
Speaker: It means it was carving, it was carving the very heart and core of God's heart. Just like we carve a pumpkin when it comes October. Well, that's the same kind of thing.
Speaker: Only mankind was cutting away at the inner core of the heart of God that loved him so much. So let's move to verse 7 because it's an important verse.
Speaker: Verse 7 tells us about a catastrophic consequence. What happened because of all these things? Because God's heart was so grieved and man's life was so wicked.
Speaker: Verse 7 says, so the lord said i will blot out man whom i've created from the face of the land men and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens for i am sorry that i've made them wow Look first at the prudence of God's judgment.
Speaker: God's judgment was not just something he decided off the cuff. This was a slow thing that he he watched where it was headed. He could already see in advance the trajectory of where this was going with all the wickedness.
Speaker: And so it says, "'So the Lord said, I will.'" That's the thing I'm not sure that we understand you know as mankind. Do we understand that God has a plan?
Speaker: He has a will. He's the master designer of everything. It's why it all works the way he wanted it to work. He put it where we can survive here.
Speaker: But now we're seeing the other side of God's prudence, where God is also holy. And so God's holiness demands justice. God's righteousness demands that he punish what's happening.
Speaker: And so we see the punishment within God's judgment. He says, I will blot out men whom I have created. This was not a fun thing for God.
Speaker: This was something that had to be done because he's just, because he does the right thing and the righteous thing. But notice the parameters around God's judgment.
Speaker: He could have just snapped his fingers. He could have just spoken the word and the entire planet would have been gone. It would have been evaporated into nothing. But notice the parameters that he placed around his own judgment.
Speaker: Upon the face of the land, man and animals. There's no mention, by the way, of the sea creatures sea creatures in his judgment. But then I saw not just the prudence of his judgment and the punishment within it, the parameters around it but I also saw the pain before God's judgment.
Speaker: He says, for I'm sorry that I've made them. Those are astounding words, aren't they? I'm sorry that I've made them. He saw what we did with all of his gifts, with everything he had blessed us with. He saw it and he says, I'm sorry that I've made them.
Speaker: But you know what? God still had hope. God still says, you know, here's what I'm going to do. What a glorious transition is made in the biblical record as the focus shifts from man's sin to God's grace.
Speaker: I thank God that Romans 5.20 declares the truth when it says, where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. You see, Noah feared God and was a righteous man, blameless in his generation.
Speaker: Noah walked with God. Those things are spoken of in Genesis chapter six and verse nine. We're not quite there, but we will get there and we will take the time that is necessary.
Speaker: But he was not spared because of his works. Did you catch that? Let's read it again. where it says, ah but Noah found favor.
Speaker: In other noah found <unk> in other words, he and his family were saved from the impending destruction by grace through faith, just like Hebrews 11, seven clarifies.
Speaker: Ephesians two, verses eight and nine is a a principle of acceptance by grace through faith in any generation, from that that generation in Noah's day to our generation in our day, and even beyond our day, if the Lord tarries.
Speaker: You see, the mirror of God's word reveals to humanity the truth. The truth about our sin in Romans chapter 3, verses 10 through 17, where it says, none are righteous, no, not one.
Speaker: And then it points eventually to the justification that we can have through Christ. It mentions the cross and the propitiation where Jesus' offering of his life In substitute for our punishment, the Father was pleased.
Speaker: The Father looked upon Christ's sacrifice and said, that is sufficient because Jesus had never sinned. And that's why it made all the difference.
Speaker: Aren't you glad that even given this circumstance, this dire circumstance that is described here in Romans 6, verses one through eight,
Speaker: that even though we threw our worst at God, he tossed back toward us a lifeline to pull us forward. And the lifeline was grace. The lifeline was take hold of this rope by faith and my grace will pull you toward me.
Speaker: Let me review what we've studied today. I know it's hard. I know it's not common to talk about these kind of things. Maybe it's the first time you even heard of these things. I just want to assure you something as a pastor.
Speaker: i want you to I want to assure you that my desire is not to be radical. My desire is always to be biblical. And so that's why I try really hard to go through the original languages, to go see what other Bible scholars who've spent their whole life studying God's Word, what have they come up with? I know how unusual this teaching is, but I want to review it one more time. And I want you to look closely if you do have a Bible in front of you. If not, maybe you can listen to this podcast again and you can look at it slowly and think about it.
Speaker: But remember what we saw in verse one, man was doing exactly as he was told. There was global growth as mankind was saying, okay, God told us to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
Speaker: And that's exactly what was happening. And nothing was wrong right there. But then in verse two, even though many men on the face of the earth at that time, they had already veered off. We remember Whenever Cain slew his brother Abel, and then how God replaced Abel with Seth, another child was given to Adam and Eve.
Speaker: But just know that even though man had been sinful, Something else was taking place in verse two, a demonic disaster where these that are called the sons of God saw the daughters of man were attractive and they began to take them as wives.
Speaker: And then it just keeps on going as later it'll talk about the Nephilim. But God had to do something. So he began to limit lifespan or he began to think, okay, I'm going to make a limit to how long I'm going to be patient with this.
Speaker: And so he decided on 120 years. Some scholars have said that's exactly the amount of time until God sent the flood. But he does limit life the way, and and you know what? All during that time, it didn't change.
Speaker: There was no repentance. Even though Noah preached to his generation, they would not listen to him. And so God's limitation upon life, as they knew it back then, it it was limited.
Speaker: We see in verse four, those giants, the children that were from the um fallen angels who possessed men's bodies and then procreated through women. It's a terrible thing to think about. I know, I realize that.
Speaker: But I'm trying to help you understand the significance of the flood. This had to take place. Something's changed now. You don't just have a holy God and you have sinful mankind that's broken and fallen. You've got it in between now.
Speaker: You've got fallen angels wanting to make things worse. And so God says, I can't sit back. And so there was worldwide wickedness on top of all of this.
Speaker: It wouldn't stop. And so God's heart was so burdened. He was grieved at the way we were responding to a wonderful planet with so many incredible gifts that he had given to mankind.
Speaker: And so there was the catastrophic consequence when the Lord said, I will blot out man whom I created from the face of the land, man and animals.
Speaker: And then he says, for I'm sorry that I made them. Can you imagine you know bringing that much grief to God's heart? I wonder today as you're listening, perhaps you have a teenage daughter, teenage son, or maybe a young adult daughter, a young adult son.
Speaker: You know that pain, don't you? You know what it's like when you see them when they're little and you want to do anything you can to help them. And then you watch them turn away from all that you've tried to teach them. It was a sad time for God, but he had to do it because he's holy and he's righteous.
Speaker: He's just. And so he had to punish the evil. But notice the the lifeline. Notice that he says in verse eight, ah But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. oh man.
Speaker: Where would we we be without amazing grace? Without God thinking of a way that we didn't have to earn it. God just gave it. But he gave it in response to those who trust him, to those who will say, i will believe what God has promised. I will take him at his word. I will put my faith and trust in him. Wow. Wow.
Speaker: What a glorious grace that we have in Christ. And I'm so thankful for verses like Ephesians chapter two, verses eight and nine. I'm also thankful for verse 10 in Ephesians chapter two, because right after he speaks of being saved by grace through faith, you know what he says next in verse 10?
Speaker: He says, I've still got a plan. I've still got a plan. He said, the plan that I have, I'm going to be working it out all your days. And all I want you to do is to walk in that plan that I have for your life. Well, I want you to walk in that plan. i want you to understand that you can trust our creator. You can trust our redeemer.
Speaker: They're so trustworthy. So let's go to the Father in prayer and let's conclude our time together today. Lord, We believe in your grace so much, we chose to call the name of this broadcast Growing in Grace.
Speaker: Lord, please help my friends to continue to grow in grace, to understand grace, to understand that, Lord, we're the ones who fouled up this world. We we broke it.
Speaker: You made it so beautiful and so perfect. So many things were right about it. But it is sin, our sin, that has caused such damage. But in the midst of all the wreckage, we see grace.
Speaker: We see that you have a plan of salvation, that you sent your only son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He came, he lived a perfect life. He perfectly obeyed you, Father.
Speaker: And you said when Jesus died on the cross, that was enough for you, that you would allow his atonement, his blood sacrificial atonement on that cross to cover for all of our sins. Wow.
Speaker: Hallelujah. What a Savior. Thank you, Lord, for who you are and for how you work. So bless us, oh God, that we might grow in that grace, that we might come to know better who you are, that we could see you in your fullness. We love you. We thank you for first loving us. In Jesus' name we pray.
Speaker: Amen. Thank you so much for being with us today on Growing in Grace.
Speaker: This is a ministry of First Baptist Church located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas.
