Genesis chapter 6 beginning in
verse 5. And God saw that the wickedness
of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of
the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. It is the heart from which evil thoughts proceed. Adulteries and fornications and
murders. It's where sin is, it's in the
heart. And it was in them, in man, great
in the earth, and it was every imagination of the thoughts of
his heart. Only evil continually. Why is that? Why is that the
case? It has to do with what happened
in the garden. Adam sinned and he fell. And
what resulted is a depraved heart, a sin-filled heart that loves
only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that
he made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from
the face of the earth, both man and beast and the creeping thing
and the fowls of the air, for it repented me that I have made
them." Now, are things any better in our day? Are things any better
today than they were in Noah's day? There were millions of people
on the earth at this time. There was lots of advancement
from where they had been to where they were then. Just like from
where we think we've come to where we are now in our generation,
that we could look around and say that, you know, well, we've
come a long way. But there's no difference in
the heart, there's no difference then and now. In fact, the Apostle
Paul said, in the latter days it gets worse and worse. He said,
men will love pleasure more than the things of God, but they'll
have a form of godliness. Well, but Noah, Noah found grace
in the eyes of the Lord. Now be sure we get the direction
that this comes from. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. Now when the Lord, it began and
it said, God saw, the Lord looked, the Lord sees, and he saw. But Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. What is grace? It's favor. Do you merit favor? not God's
favor. It's free favor. It's God showing mercy on whom
he'll show mercy. It's favor. He found grace from
God looking to him. God showed him grace. Out of
all these people in the earth, God showed Noah grace. Now these,
verse 9, these are the generations of Noah. Noah was a just man
and perfect in his generations. That means upright. And Noah
walked with God. Which one of these came first? The grace or what we just read? The grace came first. He found
grace in the eyes of the Lord. And this is the case with Noah.
Noah was a just man. He's just in another. He's upright
and perfect in another. And what we're about to see here
in a moment, but He dealt justly with man. He dealt uprightly.
He spoke that which was truth. He was a preacher of righteousness. He was a preacher of the truth.
And He walked with God. That's what happens if you find
grace in the eyes of God. You'll deal justly with men and
uprightly with men. No more craftily, no more deceitfully,
no more with a double heart and a double mind. You speak honestly. And it says in Noah begat three
sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupted
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 with violence." It's not like that today, is
it? Not violence in the land today, is it? Why do we lock
our doors? Why do we lock our windows? Violence in the land. violence
in the land. Are we locking ourselves in or
are we locking others out? I saw a pass by someone's home
the other day and had a huge gate, huge fence and a big gate. And I asked Melinda, I said,
are they locking themselves in or are they locking everybody
else out? Violence in the land. God looked upon the earth, and
behold, it was corrupt. 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.
Now, I want you to hear this. What Noah is hearing here, Salvation
what Noah is hearing here is God is going to save Noah and
everybody else is going to be destroyed and This is how he's
gonna save Noah. He's about to tell Noah how he's
gonna be spared now the Lord is saying I'm coming and I'm
coming in vengeance upon the earth, and the end of all flesh
has come. The Lord's coming again. The
Lord has come, and he's coming again, just like he came in Noah's
day. In Noah's day. Let me get you
to turn over to Matthew. Turn over to Matthew chapter
25, chapter 24. Look at verse 36. Hold your place
there in Genesis. Verse 35, heaven and earth shall
pass away, but my words shall not pass away. But of that day
and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but
my Father only. This is the Lord speaking, the
Lord Jesus Christ speaking. But as the days of Noah were,
so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the
days that were before the flood, they were eating, drinking, marrying,
giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the
ark. and knew not until the flood came. They didn't know Noah had
entered into the ark. They didn't know till the flood
came and took them all away. And so shall also the coming
of the Son of Man be. Then shall two be in a field.
One will be taken, the other left. Two grinding at the mill. One shall be taken, the other
left. Watch therefore, for you know not what hour your Lord
doth come. Watch therefore. Who are you
watching for? Who are we watching for? Well,
let's look at this next back in Genesis 6, 14. Watch now in these next few verses
how precisely God gives Noah everything here about the ark.
Listen to this. Make thee an ark of gopher wood. Told him exactly what to make
this ark out of. And rooms shalt thou make in
the ark, and shalt pitch it within, and pitch it without. 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,
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." Now, everything
about this ark, God told him exactly what it was to look like. The exact everything that God
has to say about salvation. exact in this word it is precisely
as God gives it this is God giving to Noah the exact precise Pattern
and understanding and knowledge of who of what this art was to
be like and And in that we see, brethren, everything in these
scriptures, everything from what God began to speak all the way
up to when Christ came, after He came and He lived and He died
and He rose again, even to now. Everything that has been written
in this book has come to pass exactly as God said it would
come to pass. Everything God has said about
His Son came to pass exactly as He said it would. We see here
these measures that He gave. It's precise. Everything about
the Lord is the full measure of exactly everything that God
the Father requires. Everything that He requires for
the salvation of His people, Christ is the exact, precise
order that God requires. What He requires for satisfaction. Everything. Now, it says here,
verse 17, Genesis 6, verse 17. He says, 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. Everything. Nothing will be left.
This flood represents judgment. This flood is The wrath of God
poured out this water of judgment poured out and when he pours
it out Nothing is going to be left Absolutely all flesh is
going to die every all flesh But with thee look at verse 18
he's speaking of Noah, but with thee will I establish my covenant
Now this covenant he's talking about is when Noah comes out
of the ark, when this is all over with, and he says to him,
I won't destroy the world again with water. This is the covenant
I'll make with you and I'll put a bow in the sky, the token of
my covenant. Right here, what we have an illustration
of is God making His covenant in the heart of a sinner. writing
his everlasting word in the heart of a sinner and teaching him,
teaching us. I'm putting you in my Son. You're
in my Son. You have been in my Son. You
found grace in my sight. And you're going to come through
this flood. You're going to come through
this flood. And when you come out on the other side, it's going
to be a whole new way, a whole new world. and you're gonna be
saved. This is the covenant I make with
you. And thou shalt come into the
ark. That's where he said, this is a picture of Christ. You're
coming into, you shall be in Christ when the flood comes.
Thou and thy sons and thy wife and thy sons' wives with thee.
Now of all the multitude of people there, there's eight people here. Eight people here. And he passed
by millions. Human beings. Men, women, children. He passed them by. And it only
says Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. He put him
and his family in that ark. God chooses whom he will and
he passes by whom he will. He can do with his own whatsoever
he's pleased to do. Now if everybody's standing outside,
this is what Noah preached to the people the whole time he
was preparing this ark. Years and years and years. Noah
preached to the people and said, repent, turn to the Lord. Salvation
is in the Lord. And everybody, and Noah could
tell them, Noah could tell them, I found grace in the eyes of
the Lord. God's gonna save us by grace.
And if everybody said, I don't think it's fair for him to save
us by grace. Well, it doesn't matter what
they think's fair. What they should do is go to
God for mercy and get in the ark and ask and beg God for mercy
to let them come into the ark. God never turns away anybody
that comes to Him for mercy. He will never... The scripture
says God delights to show mercy. He delights to show mercy. Why
then do you tell me that He only saves by grace and He chooses
whom He will and He passes by whom He will? Because that is
His mercy. If He did, the rest of us, we're
all just like the multitude that He passed by. But He chose somebody. And that tells me God's gracious. He's merciful. You need mercy
and do you need grace? He says, Verse 19, 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, 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. Now, with these animals,
two of every kind, everything that's coming into this ark,
there's all different kinds of animals that's coming into this
ark. And, you know, the fact of the matter is, God saved more
animals in this ark than He did people. If we want to exalt ourselves
too highly, we ought to consider He saved more animals than He
saved people. That puts us on the same footing
with beasts of the field, if we're outside of the ark. But
of all these different kinds of animals, that tells us that
God has a people. It's a picture of the people
God saves. There's Jew, there's Gentile,
there's male, there's female, there's bond, there's free, there's
educated, there's uneducated, there's All kinds of people God
saves. It doesn't matter. It's all determined
by God's grace alone. And it says, everything there,
He said, take food in there, and thou shalt gather it to thee,
and it shall be food for thee and for them. So that when they
all came into that ark, everything they needed to eat was in the
ark. Everything they needed to survive
was in the ark. Everything we need. There's a
big difference between wants and needs. Everything we need
is in Christ. You need righteousness. It's
in Christ. You must be holy to be accepted
with God. It's in Christ. You need to be
separated from this world, higher than this world, more holy than
this world. Christ is the high way. Moses said, how is it that we
shall be separated from all the inhabitants of the earth? Shall
it not be that you go with us? That's what we need. We need
Christ to walk in the way with us. We need Him to come to us
and put us in the way. We need Him to keep us in the
way. We need Him to protect us in the way. We need for Him,
Christ the way, to deliver us into Zion, into Heaven's glory
with our God. We need everything we need is
in Him. And if we have Him, everything else we need, we'll have. Everything else that comes out
of the earth, we'll have it. We'll have it. Do you think Noah
could take everything that was there provided for him? No, he
took in there just what he needed. And he had what he needed. Alright,
and 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." How did God see Noah righteous? How did He see him righteous? He saw Noah right where He put
Noah before the world ever began. He saw Noah in Christ Jesus,
His only begotten Son, Noah's surety. And He said, and I've
seen you, Noah, righteous in the earth. And Noah, now if you're
there, and you're among all these inhabitants of the world, and
the Lord has spoken to you, and He's told you this, and you've
found favor, grace in the eyes of the Lord, And you know for
certain He's going to save you. You're going to disobey Him and
go and join yourself with everybody in this world? No. Why? He's shown you favor. He's
done something for you He hadn't done. And what are you going
to do? You're going to follow Him. Aren't you? Grace is the
only motivator of love and good works. And any desire there is
in a man to follow after the Lord is because of grace. Grace doesn't make us want to
go and join with the world. Grace makes us want to get nearer
and nearer to God. If the believer could, we'd be
shed of every bit of sin we could. We would be completely rid of
it. We don't like it. It plagues
us. It bothers us. It makes us feel
horrible. Because we don't want to dishonor
the Lord. Because everything He's done
for us, He's freely, undeservingly done for us. Grace is what makes
you want to walk after the Lord. You know when a husband and a
wife are married. If you're in love with each other,
all you husbands and wives here, you love each other. Do you have
to have something prodding you to go home to your wife? Do you
have to have something goading you to love your husband? Do you have to have somebody
coming along and checking up on you and keep making sure?
You just love them, don't you? And because you love them, you
want to do for them, you have a mutual relationship there that
is so much beyond a piece of paper that says, now, you're
legally married. I don't need that. I don't have
to have that. I know I'm married. And I love
her, and I want to do for her. She wants to do for me. Well,
the Lord said, He said, you that know the law. He said, when a
woman's married to a man, she's bound to that man as long as
she lives. So that if she's married to another
while the husband lives, she's an adulterer. But if her husband
dies by love, she's free to be married to another. And he said,
and so it is, that when Christ died, Christ came and He came. He's the lawgiver. You notice
in Romans 7, where I'm taking this illustration from, he says
the husband died, the law died. Christ came, he's the law giver. He is the one who satisfied his
own law. He came and he took everything
his law demanded himself and he died. But he's risen. And he's alive. And now Those
that died in Him are no longer married to the law. We're married
to Him. And I don't have to have a book
of commandments. I don't have to have the Ten
Commandments to make me want to serve Him and love Him and
follow Him. I like having them. I like everything
there is what's good and just and right. And if I could do
everything in that law I would have a very, very good life,
and you would too. I want to do it, but I can't. I can't do everything in there,
but I'm not depending on it. I'm not looking for holiness
in the law. I've got everything in Christ
the Lord, everything in Him. Well, I've gotten off track this
morning, So he takes everything in there. Look at chapter 7,
verse 5. And Noah did according to all
that the Lord commanded him. Noah was 600 years old when the
flood of the waters was upon the earth. And Noah went in,
his sons, his wives, his sons' wives with him into the ark because
of the waters of the flood. They went in all just as everybody
said. Look at verse 10. It came to pass after seven days
that the waters of the flood were upon the earth. And in the
600th year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventh
day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the
great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened,
and the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
And in the selfsame day, Entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and
Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and three wives
of his sons with him into the ark. They and every beast after
his kind, all the cattle after their kind, every creeping thing
that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, every fowl after
his kind, every bird of every sort." Everyone God said, get
in the ark, got in the ark. Is there any going to be left
behind? None. The Lord said, just as Lot was
in Sodom and Gomorrah, and it wasn't until Lot was brought
out of Sodom and Gomorrah that God rang down judgment on Sodom
and Gomorrah. And Noah got in this ark before
the first drop of rain fell. Don't wait to get in the ark. Don't wait to get in Christ.
Get in Christ now. Believe on Him. Believe on Him. And they went in unto Noah into
the ark, male and female, verse 17, and the flood was forty days
upon the earth, and the waters increased and bear up the ark,
and it was lifted up above the earth. That's what happened when
Christ went to Calvary. The flood of God's wrath, He
was lifted up. He said, if I be lifted up, He
said, I must be lifted up. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
To declare God just. He said, I must be lifted up.
And he was lifted up. And the flood of God's wrath
was poured out upon him. And he satisfied God. God satisfying
God. And the waters prevailed, and
were increased greatly upon the earth, and the ark went upon
the face of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly
upon the earth. Verse 21, read this with me.
And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl
and of cattle and of beasts, of every creeping thing that
creepeth upon the earth, and every man. They died. All living substance died. Well, Noah survived. Noah was in the
ark. And when the waters went away,
Noah was found in his household and they were saved because they
were in the ark. Christ is the ark. Christ the
Lord is the ark. He is the way. Those that are
in Him have been spared from the judgment, from the wrath
that was due all mankind. In type and picture, Noah He
died right there with everybody else that day. Just like when the Lord passed
through Egypt on the night of the Passover, all the firstborn
died in Egypt and in Israel. But some of the ones in Israel,
the firstborn in Israel died in a lamb, in a substitute. Get in Christ, believe on Christ. Can't you just picture them all
sitting there, just kicking up their heels, giving in marriage,
giving one another the eye, courting one another, just going about
their day-to-day. They got plans. They got things
they're doing today and going to have a big time with one another.
Maybe Moses stood up that day and said, listen, this might
be the day. enter into the ark today. And they all sat there and listened
to him and said, wish Noah would get through preaching. I got
a ball game to go watch. Wish Noah would get through preaching.
I'm going to go over here with Jubal, some of Jubal's kids.
And there's some of them over here that makes, they make, they're
good at making brass. And some of them over here make
instruments, wood instruments. I like to go listen to them play
music. I'm going to go listen to them play music this afternoon.
I wish he'd hurry up and get finished speaking. And when that
water broke up and that flood came, they looked at that ark
and it was too late. Too late then, too late then. And Lord, the Lord shut Noah
up in that ark. He shut him in that ark. and
He preserved him in that arm. I pray God will just shut you
up in Christ and preserve you in Christ.