If you would this morning turn
in your Bibles to the book of Genesis, to Genesis chapter 6. Genesis is the beginning and
somebody said it's the seed plot of the Bible. Because everything
that the Scriptures contain are given to us here in one way or
another in this first book. I'll begin reading in verse 9. These are the generations of
Noah. Noah was a just man and perfect
in his generations, and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat
three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupt before
God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked
upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt for all flesh
had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah,
The end of all flesh is come before me, for the earth is filled
with violence through them, and, behold, I will destroy them with
the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood. Rooms shalt thou make in the
ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch, and this
is the fashion which thou shalt make it of. The length of the
ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits,
and the height of it thirty cubits. A window shalt thou make to the
ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above. and the door
of the Ark shalt thou set in the side thereof, with lower,
second, and third stories shalt thou make it. And behold, I,
even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all
flesh wherein is the breath of life from under heaven, and everything
that is in the earth shall die." But with thee will I establish
my covenant, and thou shalt come into the ark, thou and thy sons
and thy wife and thy sons' wives with thee. And of every living
thing, of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the
ark, to keep them alive with thee. They shall be male and
female, of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their
kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind,
two of every sort shall come unto thee to keep them alive. And take thou unto thee of all
food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee, and
it shall be food for thee and for them.' Thus did Noah, according
to all that God commanded him, So did he. And the Lord said unto Noah,
Come thou and all thy house into the ark, for thee have I seen
righteous before me in this generation." I almost called this message
this morning a sermon for a good friend. A friend of mine told me earlier
in the week that they would be here today to hear me preach. And they have not, so I'm reminded
again of what our Lord says. He says, no man can come to me
except the Father which hath sent me draw him." But I tried to pray over the
week. I tried to pray that the Lord
would cause me to know what to say, that He would cause me to
know what to preach. And then a little later on in
the week, it dawned on me that that's virtually what I pray
every week. every week. I want to be clear. I want to be able to preach the
gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as the week went on, it seemed
like that this text kept coming back to my mind. And so I'll call this message
this morning, rather, the real Noah's Ark. You see, the Old Testament is
not simply a history book or a story book. The Old Testament
Scriptures provide for us very plain and very clear pictures
and types of the Lord Jesus Christ, of the Savior and His salvation. In the book of Hebrews, the Apostle
quotes the Messiah, who says, Then said I, Lo, I come, in the
volume of the book it is written of me, to do thy will, O God."
In the volume of this book, and he had to be talking about the
Old Testament Scriptures, he says, it is written of me, lo,
I come to do thy will, O God. And in Luke 24, it says that
Christ, gathering those disciples around them, He opened their
understanding to these same scriptures and showed them in the books
of Moses, which is what this book is, the first book of Moses,
and in the Psalms, and in the prophets, the things concerning
Himself. He even spoke to the Pharisees,
those religious but lost people. He said, you search the Scriptures,
for in them you think you have eternal life, and they are they
which testify of me. But you won't come to me that
you might have life. And then maybe the Apostle Paul
writes it about as plainly as it can be in Romans 15 when he
says this, "'For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written
for our learning, that we, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures,
might have hope.'" If you and I or anyone else ever has genuine
biblical hope, and that is surely that hope that is in Christ,
it will be through what we find in the Scriptures. In Hebrews it says that that
tabernacle of Israel in the wilderness was a figure for the time then
present. And then again it says that these
things were an example or a shadow of heavenly things. What was
said of Abraham and his family was said to be an allegory, an
earthly representation with a heavenly meaning. And many of the men,
even this Noah himself in the Old Testament, they were types
of Christ. And so were many other things
like the brazen serpent that was lifted up, or the garments
that the priest wore, or the priest himself, all these things,
even this ark in our text. This ark is a type of the Savior. And it is a type and a picture
of how He saves His people from their sins. And it is a representation
also of the kinds of people that He saves. It is a clear picture. that salvation is of the Lord. And it pictures Christ and that
salvation in a host of ways. In one way, The wood that God
commands Noah to build the ark from, rather than some other
more precious, more rare types of construction material, the
very wood pictures the humanity of Christ. Because our Savior,
in order to save us, had to be God manifest in the flesh. The Word that John says in John
1 that was with God and was at the same time God Himself is
the Word that was made flesh and dwelt among us. And this ark was made of wood,
and in the construction of it, if you listen to the dimensions
and the directions, what you find is rather than being one
such as depicted in all the Bible storybooks, it was not a vessel
of that shape and kind whatsoever, but was rather more like a long
black shoebox. It was not an ocean liner by
any stretch of the imagination, but more resembled, as I said,
a long black rectangular box. And it had no outward appearance. It had nothing about it to appeal
to human flesh or cause anybody to logically or naturally look
at it and say, if there's a flood, that's where I want to be. Absolutely
not. And neither is Christ. As a matter
of fact, the prophet that speaks, I think, most clearly about the
Lord Jesus Christ and His work, the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah
53, he describes Him in this way, For he shall grow up before
Him as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness,
and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire
him. He is despised and rejected of
men. a man of sorrows, and acquainted
with grief, and we hid, as it were, our faces from him, he
was despised, and we esteemed him not." As a matter of fact,
almost every natural picture of Christ in the Old Testament
sets forth one who has no outward appeal, no appeal to our flesh,
nothing and no one that we would ever of ourselves confident to
be our Savior. If you had been watching from
some hilltop as that camp of Israel assembled there, all those
tribes together, as if there was something very special in
the midst of their camp, you would look upon what was in the
middle of the camp that was called the tabernacle, and you would,
from what you saw, see what in the world are those people holding
that in such esteem for. All it is is a tent, a very ordinary
looking tent that is covered with badger skins, dark and weathered. And you would not by any way
of seeing have known the glory and the beauty and the wonder
of what was on the inside. And neither would you have in
this ark. And neither would you, by looking
or by natural thinking, feel that way about Christ. But not
only that, but it shows also, as so many things do, that the
only way of life for sinners is by death. The very first thing, the most
elementary thing, in the construction of that ark that God commanded
to be made of this wood was that Noah and his sons had to go out
and take life. They had to go and cut all those
trees down. If there was to be salvation
from this flood of God's judgment, If there was to be a place of
safety, if there was to be this ark, the thing that had to happen
was this that represented the humanity of Christ the Savior,
the body, this perfect body that He took upon Himself when He
came into this world, it had to be cut down. And that's why Daniel the prophet,
when he speaks of the Messiah, When he talks about the Lord
Jesus Christ, so many years before He actually came into this world,
he said of that Messiah, He shall be cut off. Because the only thing that can
save us, we are such sinners. The only thing that can rescue
us after the fall in light of what we became in our father
Adam, the only thing that can save us from this death that
is all about us and give us life is death. Did you ever stop and
think about that? If you live physically, something's
got to die. Is that not right? Oh, I know
what the trend is in our day, and I think part of it is for
this very reason. We can all become vegetarians,
and so we won't have to kill any animals, and in doing so,
we'll imagine that we can be preserved and live without the
destruction of any animals. But everything we eat has to
die if we live. If we're covered, something has
to die. If we're preserved in safety,
something has to die. And here is this message, this
proclamation all around us that the only way that we can be preserved
and saved and have life is if death is all around us. And so Noah and his sons, they
go out and the very first thing they do, they have the dimensions. And the first thing that they
now have to do is to lay the axe to the trees. And all of
these trees that make up this large vessel, they have to be
cut down. They have to die in order to
provide for this salvation. And that in order to picture
that Christ had to die for our salvation. And it shows here that salvation,
is all of God's grace. And not only that, it shows something
that men do not really want to look at in our picture, and that
is, it shows the sovereignty of God's grace. It shows in the
clearest, most unmistakable way That salvation is God's to give
or to withhold. There are none who deserve it,
so if He gives it to any, He gives it in grace. Look at what verse 8 says, "...but Noah found grace in the
eyes of the Lord." Some people read that as if to say he was
looking for it. He was the only man in this world
looking for it. And that simply shows us that
man by nature really does not know anything about grace. that he has no natural understanding
of the state and condition that we are in as sinners fallen in
Adam, and that grace is God's alone to give, and he gave it,
demonstrated it to Noah and his family. He bypassed every other man,
woman in this world. And He left them to the just
deserts of the very wickedness that He talks about here in this
place to Noah. The very wickedness in every
way that they sought to stand before God and worship God and
be accepted by God. He left them to the just desert
of their sin, which was His judgment. But He gave grace to Noah. Look down in verse 12. I don't
think I ever quite saw this like this until I was just reading
it to you in the beginning. And God looked upon the earth,
and behold, it was corrupt. Now, there's no doubt that it
was corrupt just like every sinner on it was corrupt in the sins
of their natural flesh. But that was not the chief corruption. All these preachers, religious
people that we know existed in Noah's day are just like the
great majority in our day. They were talking about external
things. They were preaching against things. But look at what it says. For
all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. just like Cain. They all followed in that way
of Cain. They corrupted the way of God,
which was that way that was represented in the sacrifice that was given
to Adam and his wife and family. They rejected and corrupted that
way and turned everyone to his own way. But God showed grace to Noah. You say, well, why did He show
grace to Noah? Because he wanted to. You know,
you can beat around, you can just have all these other different
kinds of explanations if you want to, but it always boils
down to this, because as God, He wanted to. And if you and
I ever have grace from God, It will not be because of anything
that we did, or we are, or anybody else suggested. It will be simply
because He determined to have grace upon us. But it shows us also that God's
salvation, that this salvation of God by His grace is not an
afterthought with God. As a matter of fact, when you
begin to read this, it amazes me like afresh and anew. It amazes me that before God
tells Noah anything, before he ever describes what he's to do
or any of these things, before that, it says, Noah found grace
in the eyes of the Lord. You see, salvation. this salvation
that is in Christ. It's not an afterthought with
God. It didn't begin at the cross. It didn't begin even in Noah's
day. It didn't begin in any way like
that. It is absolutely that salvation
that was initiated by God in old eternity. It is, as we read
about the ark, It is the appointing of God. It is the design of God. It is not a contingency plan,
but was even finished before the first drop of water sprang
up. That's why Christ is called in
the Revelation, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
That's why it tells us that His people were chosen in Him before
the world began and blessed with all spiritual blessings in Him
at that time, which was before time. And that's why the shepherd
of the sheep, that great shepherd of the sheep that God brought
again from the dead, It says that he did so through the blood
of the everlasting covenant. Noah found out about it this
ark in time, but God ordained it before time. And we find out
about this Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, and this salvation that's
in Him. The fact that God has made Him
the Lord our righteousness. We find out about that in time
and through His Gospel. But it was before time. Before time. You could say here
in this description of the ark that the three levels, the lower
and upper and high levels, represent the Trinity of God in salvation. That salvation is of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. We baptize in that name,
which is one. It says that God was in Christ
reconciling. It says that the Spirit takes
the things of Christ and reveals them to us. But one thing that is always
a snare to man, a stumbling block, is that like Christ, there was
only one ark. Now, I'm not saying at all. I'm
sure there were on every hand ways being demonstrated to avoid
any judgment from God, to avoid any displeasure of God, to find
the favor of God. They had left the way and corrupted
the way which was always in Christ. And here are all these ways and
all these refuges and arcs of safety of all kinds set forth
for men in that day, just like today. But there was just one arc. I don't know of anything that
is politically and religiously more incorrect in our day than
that. There is just one God, there
is just one salvation, there is just one Savior, there is
just one righteousness, there is just one way to God, and there
is no other. There is one art. In Noah's day,
if you didn't get in that ark, if you weren't found in that
place of safety, if that wasn't your salvation, you perished. You died. The apostle not long after Pentecost. Just so there was no misunderstanding
of the message, just so that men who heard him as a man who
preached by the enabling of God's Spirit, just so it was clear,
he said, neither is there salvation in any other. If you ask us whose
name we preach in, if you ask us whose name we do these miracles
in, we're not going to give you some kind of generic God, one
size fits all. Our God is Jesus Christ, whom
you crucified, and neither is there salvation in any other,
for there's none other name under heaven given among men whereby
we must be saved. That's one arc. Not, you go your
way and I'll go mine. One way. He is the way, the truth,
the life, and there is no other. Paul writing to Timothy, he says
it like this, For there is one God and one Mediator between
God and men, the Man, Christ Jesus. Just one. One ark, that means there's one
Savior. One ark, one way. And there is
no other. But amazingly, and probably the
way and the thing that is most likely to be left out by men
is the way in which it pictures Christ. Isn't that what the Apostle said? We preach Christ crucified. We don't set Him forth as some
kind of mystical being that you can imagine as you want to, or
that you can believe what anybody says about it, or that you even
have to be afraid of what people say. When Elijah was on Mount Carmel,
and here were 850 prophets of the groves unveiled there on
that mountain, he was not in any way interested in making
light to them or before those people that their gods were about
the same as his God. He mocked their gods. He said, let the God that is
God answer with fire. That's the only thing I want.
They prayed, supposedly, and they pierced themselves with
lancets till they bled. They hooped and they hollered.
They spoke in every tongue imaginable, I'm sure, and they put on a show. And Elijah simply, when nothing
happened, he prayed a prayer of about 64 words. And God caused fire to fall out
of heaven, consumed the sacrifice, bear witness that this is his
prophet, this is his way, bear witness of his power, licked
up all the water that had been poured on the sacrifices. And Elijah said, you better not
halt between two opinions. That's all there are. Man's opinion
and God's way. And this is the only way. And
it is a way that the Apostle says is summed up in this. He said to the Corinthians, he
said, when I first came to you and when I first preached to
you, this is what I preached to you. how that Christ died
according to the Scriptures. Now, the only Scriptures he had,
the only Scriptures they had, this being a letter that was
right then being written by the leadership of God's Spirit, the
only Scriptures they had were these Old Testament Scriptures. And he said, I didn't preach
to you just that Christ died. But he said, when I came unto
you in weakness and trembling and maybe not fancy words and
all, but he said, I preached unto you how that Christ died
according to the Scripture. And he went back and took these
examples, these pictures, these representations of Christ, which
is the Messiah, and he showed them in these things such as
the Ark, how Christ died according to the Scriptures. You see, the Ark, Just like Peter, when he likens
it, speaking of Moses to baptism, is a picture of salvation in
the only way a sinner can be saved, and that's through the
death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's amazing to me. It amazes
me how that He sets these things down beside each other in Scripture. He shows us judgment on the one
hand and grace on the other hand, and we don't even see it. Look
at verse 13, And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is
come before me, For the earth is filled with violence through
them, and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth." Next verse. Next word. Make thee an ark of gopher wood. There it is. The sure judgment
and wrath of God against sin, and at the same time, grace almost
in the same breath, just like we have in Christ crucified. You see, the ark, just as the
Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified does, does not set forth a salvation
that violates God's law or dishonors His holy justice, but rather
it glorifies His justice and shows how His grace always reigns
in righteousness. First of all, it shows us something
about the design of Christ's death. Now, it's just about as obvious
as it can be. That is, when the Lord opens
our eyes to see it. It's just about as obvious as
it can be that rather than being the way that men say it is, which
is that Jesus Christ died for everyone. It is and has to be
strictly as a matter of justice that he laid down his life for
the sheep. He gave his life for his people. He purchased the church with
His own blood. And that has to be clear in the
picture. When you go over in the book
of 1 Peter, Peter, without any reservations,
speaking of this ark, says, wherein fewer than eight souls." How many people did this ark save? Eight souls. And you know what? When you look at it, that's all
it was ever intended to save. I've told you this. This is what
this book says and demonstrates it again and again. The glory
of Christ is not in him seeking to save every person. The glory of Christ lies in him
actually saving those he purposed to save. If it's the purpose of God to
save every person in the world, He would have given Noah, He'd
had to give him much more than Noah, instructions to build a
much bigger ark, or many more arks. But rather, He gave this
design, He gave these instructions, and it was to save this one and
his family, called the eight persons. The eighth person. What does
that mean? Well, I'm not too good in my
math, but I remember that eight is seven plus one. Seven in this
book seems to be the number that shows completion and fullness. And the picture here is in Noah
and his family. That here is this complete family. Here is this whole household,
just like the household of Christ is spoken of as. Here is this
whole household, this whole family, this whole people, actually this
whole creation. Plus one. In union with each other. That's
Christ and His elect. Christ and His people. Christ
and these that the Father loved with an everlasting love. Noah
and his family were a part of that all flesh in themselves. They were sinners too. It wasn't
that Noah had not sinned. It wasn't that his family for
sure had not sinned. And their sins, they had to be
judged also. And they were. Because God must be just. He must punish sin. And this ark, which is a picture
of Christ and Him crucified, does just that and shows Him
to be a just God and a Savior. You see, the ark is not just
simply a picture of Christ, but truly a picture of Christ crucified. The ark was not built to be a
monument or a museum or a shrine, but it was a God-appointed refuge
from His judgment, from His wrath in the flood. So He's not telling these people
to get on this vessel for a boat ride. Because this heart was a deliverance
through the wrath of God. It was through the wrath of God
and against sin. Do you ever stop and think about
it? The same judgment, not diminished in any way, But the same judgment
that fell on all the people of the earth fell on those that
were in the ark also. When the rain came forth, or
rather really after the fountains of the earth sprung forth water
which they had not done before, It came against the ark too.
It came against Noah and his family, but it came upon them
when it came against the ark. Water. We are talking about floods
in Texas. Bad. Floods in the UK right now. Bad. But nothing like this one. Forty days, nights, the flood
upon the earth, tempest raging, consuming man, beast, plant,
whatever. And we're going to make light
of sin? We're going to make light of
God's judgment? Talk so lightly of hell, they
don't mind using the word at all if they knew they wouldn't. They'd be terrified to. And here
is judgment, equal judgment, real judgment upon all flesh. But it has come against Noah
and his family in the ark. Every wave, every drop of water,
whatever it was, that made up that flood, it beat against the
ark. And all that was due, the sins
of Christ's people. Isaiah joins them and he says,
the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. It beat against our Savior. be it against the Crucified One. And all of this, Peter rather,
speaks of. And in the flood, the judgment
of the waters passed over all flesh, even Noah and his family,
as they were in the ark. And the judgment came upon the
ark itself, just like the judgment of all who are in Christ. came against Him when He suffers there on that
cross. Hold your place and look over
in Psalm 42. Psalm 42. You listen to this. Verse 6. O my God, my soul is cast down
within me. Therefore will I remember Thee
from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites from the hill
Miser. Deep calleth unto deep at the
noise of Thy waterspouts, all Thy waves and Thy billows are
gone over me." Now, that's the psalmist talking
on the one hand, but it's also the Messiah speaking. Somebody
says, this must be one of those Messianic psalms. Yes, they all
are, because they all speak of the Messiah. Listen to this,
verse 9. I will say unto God my Rock,
why hast thou forgotten me?" Isn't that what Christ said,
something like that? My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Because that's what all of this
flood of judgment is about, that He endures on that cross when
the waves and billows of divine wrath roll over Him one after
the other until there is no more. And the sweet calm. of judgment
satisfied, of the price paid, of redemption accomplished, when
the sweet calm of peace made through the blood of His cross,
when the sweet calm of reconciliation with God comes to pass. Just as sure as that flood diminished
after the certain appointed time and came to rest on that Mount
Ararat. Why? Because the judgment was
through. And that bearing it was finished. And the God who must punish sin
and who will by no means clear the guilty, He did that to all
flesh. But He saved His people and He
showed mercy and grace to them through that substitute and Savior
Christ Jesus by placing them in Him and doing them in Him
and counting them in Him their ark. Christ Jesus. Isn't that a plain picture? I don't think I'm exaggerating
this or taking a literary license on this in any way. That's it. You see, he's a refuge for sinners. Can that be true? All the judgment of God in the
matter of my sin? You mean there is nothing left
for me to face of God's wrath? There's nothing more of the penalty
of sin to be born. There's nothing left to satisfy
and honor God in the matter of my sin. There's nothing that
is needed to bear me in a better standing before God than what
Christ is and what He's done. All thy ways. The big waves. That little spattering
of surf that comes in just before the tide ebbs again, all of them fell on his head. And they are
not ever going to fall on our head if we are in Christ. And when the waves of trial and
trouble come, they will. And we get battered
by the waves of affliction and trial and tribulation. When they come, we can be sure they're not waves
of judgment. The Bible speaks of the Lord's
people having a cross to bear. But you mark this down, there
isn't any curse in our cross, because all the curse was in
His cross. And the cross we bear, I believe,
most likely is a confession of Christ, an identification with
Christ and His people and the true gospel before this world. There was just one door. When
I read this again, I noticed that it said that God commanded
him to put that door in the side. And when that spear was thrust
into the side of the Lord Jesus Christ, and it says, out of it
flowed blood and water, when our ark was pierced, It showed, here's the door. Here's
the way to God. Here's salvation. You think those who trust just
Christ. I just never will forget what
Brother Scott Richardson said one time when a lady asked him
something about, is Christ really enough? And he said, if He's
all you've got, He is. I'm talking about this Christ,
this heart. Is He really enough? Are those
who plead His blood alone, are they really safe from their sins?
Are those who plead His righteousness alone, are they really righteous
before God, accepted by God? Are they secure? Was Noah and his family safe? Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, it says here that
when all was said and done, that God called him into the ark.
Now, Noah is described by Peter as a preacher of righteousness. And all that time, year after
year, all that time that it took to build the ark, Noah preached a message of warning. He preached a message of one
way of delivery. salvation. He worshipped God
before men and called upon them to do so in that way that God
had appointed. But God mightily, effectually called Noah and his family from
within the ark. He didn't say, now you go into
the ark. Look down at verse 1 of Genesis
7. And the Lord said unto Noah,
Come thou and all thy house into the ark. Come into the ark. It's not as if all Noah was doing
before men is like John the Baptist. Behold the Lamb of God. Behold
the ark of God. Behold the safety of God. But when God calls us, He calls
us from within this gospel of His grace. He calls us by His
Spirit to come into the ark, which is simply A revelation that we're only coming in our
experience because we've been there all the time. Been there all the time. Why? For thee have I seen righteous
before me in this generation. Like I said, Noah himself is
a type of Christ. And Noah and his family is a
type and picture of the Lord's church, His elect people. Noah, it first says, is the one
that the Lord is who is righteous, just, which is what that means,
in his generations and walks with God. Here it says, Noah
and his family. For thee have I seen righteous. There's always a constant debate
on what justification is and what righteousness is and all
this stuff till I'm weary of it myself pretty much. But as I understand it, this
is exactly what it is to be righteous before God. It is to be seen
righteous. Seen and counted so by God, in
the sight of God, before the justice of God. Seen and counted
righteous before God in His sight. In another. The Lord Jesus Christ. That's why Paul says, oh, I want
to be found in Him. Not having my own righteousness.
They're nothing but a bunch of filthy rags. But the very righteousness
of God in Christ. And then it says that God shut
the door. I don't know what Noah was doing
on the inside. He may have been scraping around
trying to find a little bit extra pitch to put, you know how he
is, we are in unbelief. But he was safe. It says, God
shut him in. Verse 16 of chapter 7, And they
went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded
him, and the Lord shut him in. That's why our keeping and our
preservation. Somebody asked me, don't you
believe in the perseverance of the saints? I say, I absolutely
do, through the preservation of the Savior. He shut them in. They are kept
and sealed and secure in the Lord Jesus Christ, kept by the
power of God through faith in Him. He says, "...of them which
thou gavest me have I lost none." Do you know why they were safe? They were safe because God commanded Noah not only to
build this ark of wood, but to pitch it, that is, tar it, something
like tar, completely all over on the outside and on the inside. And that Hebrew word there is
a word that has to do with atonement. Atonement. Which means a covering. And that's why I say he'd have
no appeal because can you just imagine this long square warehouse
looking thing with little or no roof on it? Black all over
with tar and pitch. black on the inside with tar
and pitch. But the thing that is the most
unappealing to our natural life is the thing that saved them. The blood of Christ shed for
the remission of our sins. Paul says, for you are dead,
and your life is hid with Christ in God. I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish. Spurgeon once told a story about
an ocean-going liner that set out from Liverpool, I believe
it was, to go and sail to America. And he said there were a number
of people on that. He said some people were laid back sitting
on the deck chairs, resting, and some were down below heaving,
a little seasick, and maybe afraid and fearful. He said, will they make it? Will
the one on the deck make it? Will these down below, sick and
heaving, will they make it? If the ship makes it, if this ark made it, and He's
already made it, everyone in this ark is safe. You see, that's
the other thing about Christ's death, and that is the success
of it. There was not one thing lost
in that ark through the flood. And they all walked out on the
other side. And you know what the first thing
that Noah did? He built an ark. He built an
altar. And he sacrificed some of those
animals. Oh no, here come the animal rights
people. Don't you know we've got some
of those species that are endangered? You can't. Man, this is the whole
seed pod of the new creation. You can't. Don't you know you
can't? No, don't be killing these animals. They're too important. They're
not that important. As a matter of fact, if you read
on, what you'll find out is of those animals that are regarded
clean, he said, gather seven each of
them in. And the first thing he does is
build an altar and sacrifices what God prescribes, shows again. He's just come through it now,
and he's showing again the one way that God saves sinners, by
sacrifice, by the shedding of blood, by the righteousness of
another, and he worships God. This is the real Noah's Ark.
Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This is what the Gospel says.
Come into the Ark. If you're a sinner, I'm telling
you, judgment is coming. It won't be water this time.
It will be a destruction of all that is on the earth by fire.
But, if you die before that, Judgment has already begun. Flee to the ark. Hide in this
crucified Christ. Cast off every other hope. I'll read you one bit more of
Scripture in closing. It's in Matthew 24, 36, "'But of that day and hour no
man knoweth.'" What's that? End of the world? Coming of Christ?
"'Knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father
only.'" That means all these liars and procrastinators and
sensationalizers Always dwelling on prophecy, trying to figure
out when Christ is coming. We ought to know their fakes
and frauds. But as the days of Noah were,
so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. Well, what were
they doing then? Just what we're doing. For as
in the days that were before the flood, they were eating and
drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that
Noah entered into the ark." Yesterday, when we came down
the road coming home, passed by one building that said, the
such-and-such wedding has been canceled due to an emergency. We came a little bit farther
and we saw another so-called church and there were people
all dressed up with flowers standing out in front of it. They'd just
been married. And they knew not until the flood
came and took them all away. So shall also the coming of the
Son of Man be. Just one arc. He better be our only hope, our
only salvation, our only righteousness, our only standing before God.
But if He is, we can rest. We can rest. Oh, that's not to say that once
in a while when one of those tremendous pitches came up on
that ark that Noah and his family didn't kind of shake a bit. But they were always safe. If I only have one thing to say
to my friend, That's it. Without moving a muscle, without
doing anything yourself in your heart, run to Christ. Hide in Him. Father, we thank you this day
for your wondrous salvation. For the Lord Jesus Christ, our
Ark, in whom we have been by your grace from old eternity
chosen in him, and in whom we were in his death, burial, and resurrection
as our sin bearer, and in whom we remain seated in the heaven We thank you for that full and
free salvation that's by your grace and surely not by our works. We thank you for mercy to such
sinners as we are and hope that's in Christ. Grant to us faith
whereby we might look to Him alone and find that perfect peace
and that joy that comes to us through believing on him. Bless your word to the honoring
of your own self and the salvation and comfort of your people. For
we ask it all in Christ, our great priest and mediator, and
pray in his name. Amen.