Transcription downloaded from https://sermons.cccharlotte.org/sermons/32887/genesis-71-13/.

Disclaimer: this is an automatically generated machine transcription - there may be small errors or mistranscriptions.
Please refer to the original audio if you are in any doubt.


[0:00] So we will go through chapter 7 through verse 13, so we'll read that, and then we will pray, and we'll get into the text. So chapter 7, verse 1, And Noah did, according unto all that the Lord commanded him.

[0:49] And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth. And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.

[1:02] Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of everything that creeps upon the earth. There went in two, and two, unto Noah, into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.

[1:16] And it came to pass, after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth. In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

[1:34] And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights. In the south same day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with him, into the ark.

[1:49] And Father, we thank you again for your word. We thank you for our ark, Christ, that we get to enter into. We thank you for the rest we find there, the deliverance and the salvation. And Lord, today as we look at Noah, as we look at the call you put upon his life, and we look at this actual event that took place, help us to see past what the world sees, and to see past even the, just the grandeur of it all, the idea of it all.

[2:13] All of these animals, and this large boat, and the flood, and to see past that, and to see at the heart of our Father, who loves us and has prepared a way for us. We thank you, and in Jesus' name, amen.

[2:26] So if you kind of look at the text today, you can break it down. Verses one through four is the word received. Verses five through nine is the word believed.

[2:36] And then 10 and 13, through 13, the word fulfilled. As God brings the word to Noah, Noah receives that word, he believes that word, and then the word is fulfilled.

[2:48] There's a phrase that happens over and over and over in this chapter. It's happened a few times already in chapter six. It'll happen once in chapter eight, and that is into the ark. So the theme of chapter seven is into the ark.

[3:00] That's five different times in the chapter. We won't see that again after the ark, into all the way to Exodus, that actual phrasing. And it's really just the way the Lord weaves together his scripture and his plan.

[3:17] In Exodus 25, 16 says, And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee. Speaking of the ark of the covenant. And that's what we're going to see today. God is going to put into his ark the testimony of his righteousness and of his grace.

[3:33] So what was happening right now? If you remember from verse, or chapter six, verse five says, And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

[3:49] And so that's the world that they were living in. Adam sinned and he fell. Judgment came upon the world. God said, because if you eat of the fruit, you will die.

[4:00] But Adam didn't die. They're living 900 plus years. There's no death. There's no judgment. No real consequences for sin. Or so it seems. The only death we have recorded, there's two of them.

[4:11] Right? Cain kills Abel. And then Lamech, from the descendants of Cain, kills a man. And he boasts about it. The idea being that it was probably the second death to ever take place at that time.

[4:23] But as far as longevity, they're living forever. So it seems like what God had said isn't going to come to pass. Second Peter chapter 3 verses 3 and 4 tells us about these days, which match up really well with Noah's day.

[4:37] It says, So if these people living at this time even acknowledge that creation happened, whatever they believed at that time, they're not dying.

[4:59] They're living forever. And even then, Adam is probably alive, right? Because he doesn't die until, I can't remember, we looked at it before, how many years before the flood. But they all essentially will start to die all about the same time, right before the flood here, the patriarchs in Adam's line.

[5:17] So for 900 plus years, Adam's alive. So even if I was to try and convince you, hey, you know, you need to get right with God. What's going to happen when you die? Die?

[5:27] Well, yeah, Adam sinned. Eve sinned. And death came into the world. Adam and Eve are alive. They live over on, you know, house number one on Eden Way. We know where they are.

[5:38] They're alive. There's no death. There's no judgment. And so they're scoffing at this. Noah, being second Peter here for a minute, Noah, what's he doing?

[5:50] He's doing what we're to do. He's looking forward to a promise of a new earth that's filled with righteousness. God's essentially promised Noah, I'm going to take you to a world where dwells righteousness for a little bit of time.

[6:01] When they first come off the boat, it's all good. But that's what he's looking forward to. But there's no physical sign of this, no outward sign of this. And so this is the situation that man is living in, that Noah finds himself in.

[6:18] So let's dive into the text. Verse 1 of chapter 7. And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark.

[6:29] For thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation. Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female. And of beasts that are not clean, by two, the male and his female.

[6:42] And of fowls of the air, by sevens, the male and his female. To keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth. So there's a specific way God calls Noah. But first, let's look at who's going with him here, with these animals.

[6:55] This is where the world likes to attack Noah's story, or the account, the historical account. I was reading this one thing, that's from the early 2000s. And it was this professor who said it would be impossible, completely impossible for God to bring all of those species.

[7:09] Because there's 105 million, 150 million species. Well, again, if people would just read their Bibles, what does it say in verse 3? To keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.

[7:22] What grows from a seed? A lot more than just the seed. And so, we don't need 150 species to come onto the ark, do we? We just need the seed of the sprout of each of those species.

[7:34] You just need one dog kind. You know, if you've done anything with answers in Genesis or Ken Ham, you've read about this stuff. But the Bible specifically tells us, right there, is to keep seed alive.

[7:45] So, you don't need every type of bird. You don't need every type of land, animal, species. You just need the seed of it. So, that's God's plan and God's purpose, is to bring this to Noah.

[7:59] And then verse 4 says, For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth, 40 days and 40 nights. And so, God, who is so emphatically affirmed in chapter 6, that he is wiping out all of creation, turns around and says, Well, but I'm going to spare them because of God's mercy and God's grace.

[8:20] Next week, we'll look more at what it is to be in the ark. Today, we're kind of looking at the entering into the ark. And so, it's the same with us in Christ. What it is to abide in Christ, and then what it is to enter into Christ.

[8:32] But right here, we have a Sabbath. We have these seven days that God is declaring. In seven days, this is it. You've got seven days to repent. And then, judgment is coming.

[8:43] And so, man was throwing this salvation back into God's face. God had provided us a Sabbath of repentance. And man was defiling that as well. It gives a better picture to us of when Jesus says, In the end, it shall be like the days of Noah.

[9:00] He said, they did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage until the day that Noah entered into the ark. And the flood came and destroyed them all. And so, here's God giving seven days to repent.

[9:13] Seven days that either Noah was in the ark, and it's hard to tell in the wording. He could have entered in, and then God waited seven days with the door shut and the ark sitting there. And the world going, Ha!

[9:24] The guy's in there alone with his family and a bunch of animals. What a dummy. There's no rain. There's nothing. What is this guy doing? Day four, day five, day six. This is ridiculous.

[9:35] Day seven. What was that? Is that rain? Or the seven days that Noah's resting, he's not in the ark yet, but he's there. He's done. And maybe the animals are all loaded, and him and his family are just there, just kind of waiting.

[9:48] As one last chance for the world to repent. And that's where we're fast approaching in these days of Noah, right? There's going to be a series of sevens. Seven years after the church is removed, there'll be seven years that the world has a chance to repent still.

[10:03] I mean, you hope that some of these people, as like the heavens are opened above, and the foundations are opened beneath, and like the water's getting higher and higher, you hope some of them would be like, I repent, God, save me.

[10:18] And Lord willing, there'll be those people that will be saved, that will have repented. But they're not going on the ark. And so this is the situation that the world is in, and that Noah is experiencing, as he's being thrown back in his face, what God's calling him to do.

[10:37] In verse one there, the Lord said to Noah, to come thou into all the ark. You cannot tell someone to come to a place you are not. I can't tell you all, hey, come to my house.

[10:50] After church, we're all going to have lunch. Come to my house. And you do, and I'm not there. What would you think? Well, he didn't tell us the truth, or he lied, or something happened. You wouldn't go and expect me not to be there if I said to come.

[11:02] And so you can't come to a place that you're not. And so God is approaching Noah here, and he's saying, Noah, I want you to come into the ark, but I want you to go somewhere. Well, for Noah, it's going.

[11:13] God's telling him to come. Noah's going to enter a place he's never entered before. He's going to go alone into a place he's never gone before. He's going to leave everything familiar, everything he's comfortable with.

[11:24] Even though there's sin and all of this unrighteousness, it's still all he knows. And God's telling him now, by faith, you've got to go through that door, Noah, and you have to enter that ark.

[11:35] But I'm already there. And so he's telling him to come. He's saying, I'm already there, Noah. We see the same thing with Abraham. In Acts 7, verse 2, when Stephen's giving his account before the Sanhedrin, he's rehearsing the history of Israel.

[11:49] He starts with Abraham, and he says that Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran, God said unto him, get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and come into the land which I shall show you.

[12:03] That's one of the scriptures the Lord used with planting this church. The Lord just said, hey, I'm already there. You come. Don't worry if anyone comes with you. You just come. Praise the Lord.

[12:15] Some people came with us. But it was to come. He was telling the same thing to Abraham. He says, Abraham, I'm going to bless you. I have a blessing for you. But you have to go somewhere you've never been before to receive it.

[12:27] But you're actually coming to me. I'm already there. And so, like, when we were planting the church, it was how could you not? How could you not go to where God's telling you he already is? That means if I stayed, then I wouldn't be where God is, in a sense.

[12:42] Well, God's everywhere, yes. But as far as, like, his will for your life, if God's telling you to come, that means he's there. And if you don't go, that means you don't get to experience what God has for you.

[12:54] In Christ, Jesus says, in John 6, 37, he says, all that the Father gives me shall come to me. Him that comes to me, I will in no wise cast out.

[13:05] So we have the same promise in Jesus. You say, well, we need to go to the cross. Yes. We need to go to Christ. Yes. But he's calling us, come. He's saying, you come to me. It's not somewhere that he is not.

[13:17] In Philippians 3, 9, and being found in him, just like Noah, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ.

[13:28] The righteousness, which is of God by faith. And just like the Lord looked at Noah and he said, Noah, I see you righteous before me in this generation. And so he's telling Noah to come, to come.

[13:39] Does Noah go alone? No. His family comes with him, doesn't it? Does Noah go in his own effort? Well, I mean, Noah built the ark, but, you know, we're right now in a, not a building project, but a remodeling project trying to get our house ready that we just purchased and are moving into.

[13:59] And there's things that happen that just like, this is not on schedule. Now we're behind schedule. Now we're changing the schedule. I just picture Noah, you know, when something happens, like, oh, coming home at night and his wife like, how's it going?

[14:10] I think I'm a week behind schedule. A week behind schedule? You know what that means? What about the flood? What about, you know, and every time, I'm sure, when he came home and said that, she looked at him and said, oh, Noah.

[14:21] Oh, never mind. Why didn't Noah fish while he was on the ark? He only had two worms. Oh, that's bad. So Noah, you know, God's never early and he's never late, right?

[14:37] He's right on time. He had this whole thing planned out and scheduled. And what was Noah's job to do? Well, it was to go to the lumber yard the first day and be like, I don't know what I'm doing. But as he walked in it day by day by day, God began to just continue to bring the people and to bring the resources.

[14:54] And so Noah goes into the ark and how does he go? Well, Hebrews 11, 7 tells us that by faith, Noah being warned of God, of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house, by the which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness, which is by faith.

[15:13] He became heir of the righteousness by faith. In other words, he was the chosen one to carry this faith, this righteousness, through to the new world, essentially. And so Noah goes by faith.

[15:23] He steps on the ark, looking at the things which are not seen, right? Corinthians tells us the things which are seen are temporal, the things which are not seen are eternal. And so that's what Noah's looking at.

[15:35] Belief will always lead to obedience. It has to. Faith has to have an action with it. You cannot have faith without action. Faith without works is dead.

[15:47] Faith is not a work, but faith, by its very nature of what it is, my faith in God will have a production in my life, right? We say it all the time that you only act on what you believe.

[15:59] You don't act on anything else, ever. You only act on what you believe. Even if someone forced you to do something, you're acting on the belief that you have to do it or the consequences will happen. So we only ever act on what we believe.

[16:11] And so belief always produces an action. And faith will always produce obedience. It can't be otherwise. You can't have faith in disobedience. And you can't have faith that doesn't produce an action in your life.

[16:24] And so he's received the word. The word was come, Noah. You've obeyed. You've built the ark and now the word has come. Noah receives the word and then he obeys that word. And what does it say that the result of that was?

[16:36] He says, Hey, Noah, come thou and all thy house into the ark. What didn't he say? Your family. He didn't say all your family. How old is Noah?

[16:48] 500 when he has Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Right? 600 when he goes on the ark. Shem, Ham, and Japheth all have wives. That means Noah didn't start building the ark at 500.

[17:00] He had his sons and they had wives because when God first comes to him and says, Hey, build this ark for you, your wife, your sons, and their wives, that means they're all of married age and they're married.

[17:11] So Noah was 550, 500 something when God says to build this ark. You tell me he had no kids for 500 years? None. Where's Lamech's children?

[17:23] Noah's siblings? Where's Methuselah's kids? All of these men were righteous men that said they had other sons and daughters. Where are they? Just Noah. That's it. That's it.

[17:34] And God doesn't say to Noah, you and where's your family? Where's the rest of your family? What does he give Noah responsibility for? Your house. Your house. And the principle there is we are not responsible, it's really profound, for what God does not hold us responsible for.

[17:51] We are not responsible for what God doesn't hold us responsible for. And he doesn't hold us responsible for what everybody else is doing around us, but he does hold us responsible for, especially men, what's in our home.

[18:05] He holds us responsible for our house. John, in 1 John, he says, they went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they'd been of us, they would have no doubt continued with us.

[18:16] But they went out. They might be made manifest. They were not all of us. And there are those that go out from our house, in a sense, that are no longer of us. That doesn't mean when your son or daughter gets married and they go off.

[18:29] But those who leave what your house is, right, they go out. The attitude and atmosphere of a home has a greater effect than the actions of a home.

[18:42] So, you can go to church, you can do godly things, you can do those actions, but if there's not an attitude and an atmosphere of the home, of faith, like we talked about, of surrender to the Lord, of taking those steps where faith has an action and where you are seeing that in the home, then there's not going to be an effect.

[19:04] We're told in Hebrews, chapter 4, verse 2, speaking of when Israel came out of the land, they came through the Red Sea and they're in the wilderness right now.

[19:15] And then we're told in Hebrews regarding our faith, just like those that were in the wilderness, well, they heard the good news. They heard the gospel that was preached to them at that time through Moses. But the word they heard, it had no effect, did not profit them because it wasn't mixed with faith.

[19:32] They had to respond to the word. And Noah here is responding to the word. And the effect is that it's his house that God is holding responsible for and it's his house that is being saved just the same.

[19:45] It's for us. It's just the same. And so the Lord said to Noah, come thou and all the house into the ark for you have I seen righteous before me in this generation. You remember the Philippian jailer when the earthquake happened and Paul and Silas, their stocks fall off and they rise and go free and he's about to kill himself because he thinks, oh my word, everybody's gone free.

[20:06] And they said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, we're all still here. Which is amazing because it doesn't just mean Paul and Silas, it means all the prisoners, that God had kept them all there. And he said, sirs, what must I do to be saved?

[20:18] They said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved, you and your house. There's an implication there that as we respond in faith that God will bless our homes.

[20:30] See the same thing in Corinthians when Paul says that the unbelieving children are sanctified by the believing spouse in a mixed marriage with the believing and non-believing. So it's just interesting that God, he holds us responsible for things we're responsible for, but he doesn't put on us, I think, so much of what we put on ourselves.

[20:51] What we put on ourselves what our children decide to do. That's on them. That's on them. But for me and my house, if you're going to be in it, we're going to serve the Lord. Ezekiel tells us in chapter 18, verse 20, the soul that sins, it shall die.

[21:07] The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.

[21:19] So whatever other family Noah had, and he had a lot. He must have had family reunions around this world, right? Coming down through this line of Seth, the godly seed, and then as we saw through the genealogy, and then they begat other sons and daughters, and they begat other sons and daughters.

[21:37] There are potentially thousands of people who had come through this line of Seth. We know Noah had siblings. He's 500 years old, and the only people, the only people in this day that are making it our eight souls.

[21:53] And so I don't think we really grasp the wickedness and depravity and corruption that was happening at this time. And God spares us from a lot of that. But we see it today. So much wickedness, depravity, and corruption, right?

[22:05] Being in youth ministry for the past half dozen years, seeing kids from preteen to tween to high school and aging out and seeing some of them just kind of like fall off.

[22:17] Just like, eh. And these are from good homes. But the world gets them and convinces them that there's something else out there. And it is, it's, it's, it's a small margin that you look at and go, that one got it.

[22:32] Whew. And you know what? We do all the actions that we should do. We teach the word. We go to the camps. We do everything we can. We open their mouths and shove the Holy Spirit in as hard as we can and it comes back out.

[22:45] That's what it feels like sometimes. We do everything we can. But if they don't catch it, they don't get that atmosphere. They don't catch what we're trying to present to them. And just like Noah, here they are with just a few.

[23:00] Just a few. And so there's this Sabbath of rest. And then in verse five, Noah did according to all that the Lord commanded him. The outworking of faith.

[23:12] Receives the word, believes the word, acts upon the word, and then obeys the word. And Noah was 600 years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.

[23:25] And Noah went in and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him into the ark because of the waters of the flood. What did Jesus say? All that the Father has given me, I've lost none.

[23:36] So how, however many decades they're building this thing, he's lost none. I was thinking when Derek was speaking how, man, if I had to travel that much, I mean, obviously it's God's grace.

[23:50] One trip and I'd be like, done. We went to Mexico on vacation this last year and it was like, you know, man, I was glad to get back on U.S. soil. I was thinking of how God just has different people to do different things.

[24:01] Here's Noah. One spot for decades building this boat. He didn't go anywhere. That's where he was. That's all he did. He built and built and built.

[24:12] And then God has people that are to go out and to go out and to build in other places. I'm a stay put person. That's what God's called me to be. I'm good with it. But I'm thrilled to have friends who are go places people and to support them and to be part of that and to vicariously get to live through that with them.

[24:30] But here's Noah with his sons and his wife and they're building this thing. They finally get it done. What an accomplishment. You know, it's kind of with us, the things God calls us to.

[24:42] We build them, we build them, we kind of get to a point where we're like, it's done and nobody cares. Nobody's there. Nobody's there. Like Noah's like the grand opening. They cut the ribbon and nobody cares.

[24:54] Nobody's there. Nobody's patting him on the back. But the Lord's there. The Lord's like, good job, Noah. All right, on to the next. And so Noah was walking in God's will.

[25:07] How did Noah know God's will? Well, faith plus the word equals the will of God. What do I mean by that? The word of God comes to us and as we said, we have to receive it by faith.

[25:18] It's not by works. We believe what God says to us. So specifically, I don't just mean like I was reading the Bible and it just randomly says that, you know, you should not do or should do. I'm talking like when we're in the word, we're seeking the Lord, we have a relationship with him and God specifically speaks something to you.

[25:34] Like where he says something like to me and says, I want you to go plant a church. I'm like, I don't know how to do that. I don't know where to do that. I don't know when to do that. He said, just start. Just go to the gopher lumber yard, get some wood.

[25:45] We'll figure it out after that. And so you act, you take a step in faith, you act on the word of God and that results in God's will for your life. You begin to walk out God's will in your life.

[25:57] You don't necessarily know what it's all going to look like, but as God presents his word to you, say, well, I believe that. I'm going to act on that. And as you take a step in that, that's God's will then that begins to act out in your life.

[26:07] It's like, well, I don't know what God's will is for my life. What's God speaking to you now? What's God currently speaking to you? It's like, well, he spoke to me like about this big thing, but I don't know how that's going to happen.

[26:19] Well, act on that. Take a step towards that and you'll find yourself walking in the will of God. And that's where Noah's at. And he's got everybody with him. And verse eight says, and of the clean beasts and of the beasts that are not clean and of the fowls and of everything that creeps upon the earth, there went in two and two unto Noah, into the ark, the male and the female as God had commanded him.

[26:41] So as we said before, God loves every kind of creep. He even loves the fowl. That they're all in there with him, two by two, that God provides for the keeping of his commandments.

[26:52] So what God calls Noah to do, God provides his part when Noah did his. Noah's was to respond in faith and obey and then God provided the animals. Noah didn't round him up.

[27:02] He didn't chase him down. He didn't figure this out. He just did his part, which was to build the ark and then God brought the animals. And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.

[27:17] In the 600th year of Noah's life, in the second month, the 17th day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of heaven were opened.

[27:27] We have no idea what day that actually is because I don't know if that's referring to, I mean, you can figure out what it is according to the Jewish calendar, but if it's referring to by whatever calendar they kept track of the year with before the flood, we have no idea.

[27:42] We have no idea. Sorry. And so God sends, his judgment is complete above and below. God's judgment is all-encompassing. There was no escaping it.

[27:53] Back in verse 7 where it says that Noah went in with his sons and his wife and his son's wife, they went in because of the waters of the flood, there's no alternative. Acts 4.12 says that there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.

[28:07] There's no alternative. There is nothing else. Noah wasn't going to go, well, I don't know. It's a little foolish. God, you want me to sit in there for seven days? I can hear them out there, Lord.

[28:20] They're laughing at me. There is no alternative. And it's the same for us. There's no alternative for our house. There's no other salvation. There's no other name under heaven except Jesus. And so Noah brings everybody in to this ark.

[28:37] And the rain was upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights back down in verse 12. 40 days, 40 nights. Moses is on the mountain 40 days, 40 nights.

[28:47] Jesus is in the wilderness 40 days and 40 nights. They're in the wilderness for 40 years. 40 is a sign of God's judgment that's coming upon this world.

[28:59] In the selfsame day, verse 13, entered Noah and Shem and Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah and Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with him into the ark.

[29:10] In the selfsame day, that wording there means the day of substance. In the day of substance. In the fulfillment of the day. So either, again, either Noah's in the ark and he's been in there seven days or there's a seven day rest period and then he goes in the ark.

[29:25] Either way, that in the day that God has specifically planned. It's like, you know, Scripture says, it's appointed unto man once to die and then the judgment. There's one day for that.

[29:37] Well, there's one day for everything else in your life that God has a plan for if we would walk in his will. You know, I like reading about a lot of the old guys in the faith.

[29:48] You know, the Hudson Taylors, the George Mullers and the Spurgeons. The guys that are dead and I don't have to worry about them doing something stupid and ruining their testimony and being like, oh man, you know, that's too bad.

[30:01] And they have such a depth to them where a lot of the writing today is so shallow. It's so market driven. But they have a lot of substance to them.

[30:14] And in reading them, you know, you find that the heart and faith that they had, there's a lot of action with that. There's a lot there that they acted upon in their lives.

[30:25] It doesn't look like the actions of today. It doesn't look super flamboyant and exciting. They don't blog about it. They don't make websites about it. I mean, you think of Hudson Taylor who started Inland China Missions, you know, and his thing was just, hey, can you trust God here?

[30:40] Great. Go to China and trust God to provide for you. We're not going to give you any money. Just go. You know, the faith they acted upon was huge. But it all started with something small. And for Noah, it was something as small as the Lord saying, this is the day.

[30:54] Today is the day of salvation. If you'll hear his voice, harden not your heart. He says, come on, come into the ark today. And so Noah does that. He enters in.

[31:05] God is never early. He's never late. He's always right on time. We just do the next thing and he'll provide for the rest. But as we wrap up here, how did Noah enter the ark?

[31:19] He entered by faith. Noah entered by the call of God. It was God who called Noah to come in. Noah didn't on his own decide he was going to go in. He didn't kick down the door. He didn't say to his wife, hey, you know what?

[31:31] I just feel like, I feel like today's the day. That's what I feel like. Let's go into the ark today. It was by the command of God. God commanded Noah and Noah obeyed.

[31:43] It was by faith and by obedience. Those three worked together. It was by a door. Only one way in. We'll look at that next week. He went in with his whole household.

[31:54] Everybody went in that was in his household. God was faithful. He wasn't like, you know what? Ham's a jerk. He's going to be a pain after the flood. We're going to leave him home.

[32:06] No, everybody went into the ark. Everybody. With the clean and the unclean. In Christ, there's neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female, but all are new in Christ.

[32:18] The clean and the unclean can come. The creepy and the non-creepy. The foul and the non-foul. They all can come. And then God sends him in with ample provisions. Nobody's going to come up short.

[32:30] And in Christ, we're not going to come up short when we enter into our ark. You know, if you're the last one on the boat, if you're the last set of animals, he's not going to be like, whoa, sorry, don't got any unicorn food.

[32:41] Stay here. Right? They all came in. What was inside the ark? Inside the ark, the Lord was there because he said, come, didn't he? He said, come into the ark.

[32:53] Rest, grace, and comfort. Noah's name means comfort. It means rest. Lamech, when he gives that prophecy, he says, he will give us rest. He names him Noah, comfort. And then God says about Noah, you found grace in my eyes.

[33:06] There's a testimony in there, just like we saw in Exodus, where God says, I'll place a testimony in the ark. There's a testimony to God's commands, God's word, God's favor, God's grace.

[33:17] And that testimony will carry on. And it exists to this day. People still know what the ark is. It's still, that testimony exists. There's a promise, not just the promise that Noah would not be destroyed in the flood, not just the promise of a new world, but the same promise we have, that the Messiah, there's the promise, Noah carried the promise of the Messiah through the ark and into the new world so that we can sit here today and go, man, we have a promise of a new heavens and a new earth that we get to go to, hopefully today.

[33:48] This works. Let's go, Lord. The commands of God were in there. There was redemption in there. There was no other redemption except in that ark. And there was breath, the spirit of life.

[34:00] Remember how we looked at the difference between the living animals that breathe and then man that has breath. And that word is always used in the Old Testament linked with man and his spirit that has the spirit of life of God.

[34:14] And in the ark is the spirit of God. In Christ, we have that spirit. And there's salvation as we said. No other name except the name of Christ. Outside the ark, only death and judgment.

[34:25] There's nothing else out there. Inside, there's salvation and life. As Philippians reminded us, we are to be found in him. How do we enter our ark?

[34:37] Well, by faith. We receive the word. We believe the word. We act upon the word. And then we walk it out. We walk by faith and we enter into Christ. And then all those things that are in the ark, they're ours.

[34:49] Rest, grace, comfort, a family. Inside of the ark, there's the family of Christ. It's what we have right here. It's all ours to be found in him.

[35:01] And so Noah, at the end of verse 13, and his wife, and his sons, and their wives, none lost, they entered into the ark. And so my encouragement this morning for us as we close, Luke 15, speaking of the prodigal son, and when he kind of comes to his senses, he says, I will arise and go to my father and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee.

[35:29] And he arose, I like this, and came to his father. So where it seems to us, like, like, I gotta go. I gotta go to the Lord. The Lord is already there waiting and drawing us and saying, come.

[35:41] Oh, you've just come. You didn't go anywhere. You finally just came. And then the father's heart, but when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, had had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.

[35:56] And so this morning, we can go. We can go to the Lord who's calling us to come. We can enter back into rest. The ark, for us in Christ, we don't ever get off of it.

[36:09] Thank you, Jesus. We're always in it for all of eternity. We can think sometimes, well, we're gonna get to heaven, and it's gonna be great. I'll be no more sin, and it'll be perfect. Yes, that's true.

[36:20] But we will not be like Adam. We will not be set back as righteous on our own. For all of eternity, we are in Christ. For all of eternity, we are only counted worthy because of the ark we've entered into.

[36:32] There's no alternative. But there's rest. There's grace. So will we respond by faith? And if we do, the implications are limitless. Our families will be blessed.

[36:43] And for Noah, the whole world was blessed because of him. So as we do these last couple songs, just worship the Lord, respond to the Lord, respond in faith to what he's spoken to you.

[36:55] You know, what is the will of God in your life? Well, I don't know particularly, but I know this. Noah was 600 years old when the flood came. And that was a brand new season for him at that age.

[37:07] And God always has new seasons of grace that he wants to give us. Doesn't matter the age. Always desires that. And that God's word never comes aimless, does it?

[37:17] God didn't say this and he was like, oops, kidding. It will always play out. And we don't have to worry about it not playing out because we mess up. If we're walking by faith, God can correct all that.

[37:29] The lumber shortage that I'm sure happened at that time before the flood that the enemy was doing behind the scenes, Noah still got it. You know, that last set of animals that he's like, where are the aardvarks? Where are they?

[37:40] They're supposed to go on first. They're in the A group. What's going on? Noah brought, I mean, the Lord brought them and it all worked out. So, so Father, thank you so much, Lord, for your grace. Thank you for this word of yours, Lord.

[37:52] Lord, I'm loving going through Genesis. Just seeing things that I grew up with in Sunday school that were stories that I'm so thankful for, the background and the foundation and the knowledge of what those stories were made up of, the nuts and bolts.

[38:05] But to look at them, Lord, through the eyes of the Spirit, Lord, to look at them as I'm studying and to see your heart behind this, this, dare I say, silly account of a bunch of animals going onto a boat and then, Lord, to see behind it your heart of grace to look down and to say to Noah, I see you before me, righteous.

[38:28] Lord, none can stand before you. Who can stand in your presence, Lord? And yet, we do. We come boldly before the throne of grace to obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

[38:41] There's nothing that can separate us from the love of God. Neither height nor depth, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things come to come. Lord, nothing can separate us from the love that we have in Christ Jesus.

[38:53] And so, Lord, please, would you help us to remove every hindrance that keeps us from coming, Lord? When in our minds we think, I have to go, I have to leave something behind that's so familiar and comfortable, Lord, we're not leaving anything.

[39:07] We're just coming to the best place we could, into the ark. And so call us anew, Lord, into your presence. And as we go away today, Lord, in this last few moments as we sit with you, fill us afresh and speak to us specifically, Lord, what area of faith you want us to walk in that we might be the will of God and do the will of God in this world, in these last days.

[39:31]  And in Jesus' name, Amen.