In Hebrews 11, verse 7, it says,
By faith Noah, that will be the title of our lesson this morning,
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." The Hebrew brethren, those believers
who were natural descendants of Abraham, true sons of Abraham
by natural genealogy, who had been saved by God's grace, they
were receiving pressure from all sides. to stop trusting the
Lord Jesus Christ, to turn from faith in Christ back to the law
that was given under the Mosaic Covenant and to the observance
of days and months and years. And throughout this letter, we're
encouraged along with them by seeing God's faithfulness towards
those who put their trust in Him alone. I want to show you
three things this morning about some of the things we see here
in this verse. First of all, how faith comes
to the believer. Secondly, fruit of true faith. And thirdly, faith's reward.
How faith comes to the believer. Fruit of true faith. And faith's
reward. Now we're told here in this verse
that by faith Noah being warned of God of things not seen as
yet. over in Genesis 6. If you'll
turn over there with me. Genesis chapter 6 and 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 now that
was the case with Noah himself outside of the Lord's mercy and
grace Just as it was of everyone there But verse 8 tells us but
Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord Now look down at
verse 13 and God said unto Noah We're told he warned Noah. Now
here's what he said. 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.
Room shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and
without with pitch. For sake of time, look down at
verse 17. 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 thou wife and thy sons wives
with thee How does faith come? What are we told in Scripture?
How faith comes. Romans 10.17 says, Faith cometh
by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Noah was warned
of God, we're told. God came to Noah and warned him.
And that is illustrated throughout the 11th chapter of Hebrews.
There in verse 8, it says, Abraham was called of God Verse 11, it
says, Sarah, if you look down at the last phrase there, it
says, she judged him faithful who had promised. Why is that
important to note? Well, we're expressly told throughout
the Hebrew letter that God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, is
the one by whom God has spoken unto us. And it's impossible
to believe God without hearing Him, without hearing Him speak
in the heart, through the preaching of His Word, through the reading
of His Word. He is the sum and substance of
all God's Word, of everything God has to say to you and I.
And this truth is emphasized throughout the letter here for
good reason. The Judaizers were attempting
to turn the brethren from Christ the Word back to the prophets. Not because they heard Christ
by the mouth of the prophets, and as believers in that their
day did, but merely out of a historical vain tradition, because this
was their people, this was their tradition. And so the letter,
the Hebrew letter begins by teaching us that God's Son is the Word
in whom God's spoken. Back there when we first started
this lesson, In Hebrews 1.1 it said, God spake in times past
unto the fathers by the prophets, but he has now spoken to us by
his Son. This letter begins, the first
note that sounded in this Hebrew letter is, this is my Son, hear
ye him. Don't turn back from him, hear
him. And then the Pharisees also would attempt to have them turn
back to the ceremonies, to the Law, to the Old Covenant, and
all of those things, and to prove that Christ the Lord was preeminently
better than the Law. The Law spoke of Him and pointed
to Him and is fulfilled in Him. It came from Him. It has its
glory in Him. And to show that, We're told
all through the first chapter that he's better than the angels
because that's how God gave it to Moses at the hand of angels. And so they're saying, the Scriptures
are telling us he's even higher than the angels. If he's higher
than the angels who gave the law, he must be the one who gave
that law. Then in chapter 2 verse 1 says,
Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things
which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip.
If that word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression
and disobedience received a just recompense of reward, how are
we going to escape if we neglect so great salvation which at first
began to be spoken by the Lord? and was confirmed unto us by
them that heard him, God himself also bearing witness with signs
and wonders. No sinner can believe without
hearing Christ Jesus the Lord. That's the theme of this book. He's the one we've got to hear.
He's the one we've got to come through. And we've got to hear
Him. We've got to hear Him preach. We've got to hear what God says
about Him in His Word. There's no salvation apart from
God's Son, no salvation apart from the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the reason this word exists.
He's the one whom every word glorifies. He's the one in whom
all the promises of God are yay and amen. There's no doubt about
it. They're yes and amen in Him. I was reading this week, Horatius
Bonner wrote this, and he said, when I hear it said, that such
and such do not believe the doctrines of sovereign grace and substitution,
but they love the Lord and are saved." He said, I wonder and
I ask, what then was the Bible written for? Is it not the infallible
expression of the mind of God? Is it not the standard of truth?
Are we to believe what appeals to us and deny the rest? God
forbid, God's Word declares the oneness of truth and condemns
every departure from the truth as a direct attack on God Himself. He says, do not tell me that
a man's heart is right with God when his head contains a creed
of error and denies the person and work of the Redeemer. But
this Word of God is concerning things not seen yet. You see
that there? What did verse 1 teach us of
Hebrews 11? Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Have you ever had the
thought that if you could hear God speak in some way, in some
different manner than He speaks to us now, if you could hear
Him speak like some of the Old Testament saints heard Him speak
in some miraculous way, have you ever had the thought that
if you heard Him speak that way, you'd believe Him? I might come
more apt to believe if I heard Him speak that way. Noah had
never seen God destroy all the flesh on earth. He'd never seen
God destroy man and wipe him off the face of the earth. But
he believed God would do it. We've never seen God's judgment
that He tells us is coming. But by faith, we believe it's
coming. It's coming. Noah had never seen rain before. It never rained on the earth
at that time. And Noah received this warning
from God, and he had no idea what a flood even looked like. He couldn't imagine what this
ark looked like. He had the pattern of it. God
gave him the pattern of it, told him how to build it. And he could
see it in his mind's eye, but he hadn't seen it. Noah had no idea how he was going
to be saved in an ark. This thing's 450 feet long, 75
feet wide, 45 feet high. How am I going to shut the door
on this thing? How am I going to get in there and close the
door? But he believed God. He believed God, and God told
him what he needed to know. God told him exactly what he
needed to know, and he believed God. And that's what the believer
does. We have what God tells us, and we believe what God tells
us. And what God don't tell us, I
just believe God will take care of it. He'll take care of it.
I trust Him. He said, with thee I'll establish
my covenant. When we behold our just due and
those whom God destroys in wrath, but we find grace in the eyes
of God. When covenant grace says, thou
shalt come into the ark, That's what causes a man to believe
God. It causes him to believe God. And it's not the manner
in which God speaks. Faith comes because it's God
speaking the revelation of His Son in the heart. That's what
it is. It's God speaking the revelation
of His Son in our heart. Now let's look here secondly.
It says, Noah believed God. So let's see what the fruits
of this faith are. Noah believed God prior to this. But Noah not only professed to
believe God, but he diligently sought God. Diligently seeking
God is never moving away from trusting Him alone, from trusting
His Son alone, from trusting His salvation alone. And that's
the reason for this whole letter. This whole Hebrew letter is to
teach us there's nothing better than Christ. Not the prophets,
not the angels, not Moses, not Joshua, not a Sabbath day, or
a temporal land such as Canaan, or an earthly priest, or our
sacrifices, or ceremonies, no tabernacle, no offering, no satisfaction
with God, no sanctification with God. Christ is all. He's everything. And Noah, this wasn't a zeal
without knowledge. We'll see this here. This was
a true understanding of God and what true faith really is and
what it really does. But look here, I want you to
see something. I want you to notice these action verbs here
in this verse. By faith, Noah moved with fear. By faith, Noah prepared an ark. By faith, Noah saved his house. By faith, Noah condemned the
world. Fruit grows, doesn't it? Have
you ever seen fruit on a fruit tree or in a vegetable garden? When that tomato comes out on
a tomato plant, it's small, but it grows, doesn't it? It grows. Living things live and they move
and they grow. Noah moved with fear. Godly fear
has to do with with understanding God's holy and he requires perfect
righteousness It has something to do with understanding the
power of God to save and to destroy And it has to do with understanding
that he's God he's God and I'm nothing I'm nobody I can't question
him And because of a fear of God, Noah couldn't join himself
to those unbelievers around him. He couldn't go back and join
himself with them. These folks were idolaters, self-righteous
people, adulterers. They were immoral people. And
he couldn't leave and go and join in with these legalists
or these lawless people. He couldn't do it. He believed God. He couldn't
do it any more than light can join itself with darkness, or
an unbeliever can join himself with a believer. It just couldn't
be done. There's no fear of God before
the eyes of an unbeliever. He doesn't fear God. He can go
anywhere and take up with anybody, and they're all buddies. But a believer can't do that.
He's moved with fear. And Noah, having the promises
of God, having these precious promises of God of exactly what
was going to take place, he moved with fear. He was shown great
grace and he moved with fear. And he laid aside anything he
might have thought. anything that these people might
have said to him, anything, any outside influence that would
have come between him and God, he laid all of that aside and
wouldn't look to it at all. When a believer has been made
perfectly holy in Christ, now listen, when a believer has been
made perfectly holy in Christ, Look at 2 Corinthians chapter
7. When a believer has been made
perfectly holy in Christ, having received the promises of God,
sanctified by Him who sanctifies, brought into union with Christ
through faith, our separation from this world and our union
with Christ our holiness is in the fear of Him. That is the
fear of God in the new nature. Look here at verse 1. Having
therefore these promises. You can go back in chapter 6
and read all the promises there of God. Same kind of promises
He made to Abraham, I mean to Noah. The promises were I'm going
to destroy all this flesh, but I'm going to put you in the ark.
Noah, I made a covenant with you. I'm not going to destroy
you." And because God had spoken to him in the heart, and because
Noah believed God and moved with fear, he couldn't go back and
join himself with those folks. And it says here, "...having
therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves
from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness
in the fear of God." The perfection of holiness in you and I is growing
in understanding that going back to the filthiness of our flesh,
going back to those things, that's not believing on God. That's not holiness. Perfecting
holiness is looking steadfastly on Him who is our holiness. And
that only comes about, the phrase I want you to see here, brethren,
is it's in the fear of God. There's no other way. It's in
godly reverence, godly awe, to be in amazement at Him. That's
the only motivation a believer has. By faith, it says there in our
text that Noah prepared the ark as God commanded. He prepared
the ark just like God commanded him to. Christ, you know, is a type of
the ark, a beautiful picture of the ark. And to understand
the fruit of this faith here, I think we have to understand
and look at just exactly how boldly and beautifully Christ
is a picture of the ark. Because God coming to Noah and
telling Noah about this ark. God didn't ask Noah for anything. God didn't suggest anything.
He told Noah exactly what this ark was going to look like. Exactly
what the dimensions of it were going to be. And we see a figure
there of God providing His Son before man knew anything about
it. That this is how I'm going to
save in Him. And then He comes. And he told
the size of this ark, teaching us something of our Holy Redeemer,
of Christ our Lord, our ark. The magnitude of His person,
the holiness of His person, and the vast encompassing height
and width and depth and length of the salvation that He accomplished.
God shut Noah up in that ark. He came to him, and when he told
Noah, Noah, you're going in that ark. I made a covenant with you.
I'm going to destroy this world, but I'm putting you in that ark.
And it says, Noah, believe God? Noah, as far as God's concerned,
Noah's in that ark already. God's not going to let Noah not
get in that ark. He's going to be in that ark
before that flood comes. God put a people in the ark.
Just like He came and said, Noah, this is my covenant with you.
This is my covenant with you. Thou shalt go into the ark. And inside the ark, that was
the place, that was the refuge for Noah. That was the place
where Noah and his family and those animals, clean and unclean,
Jew and Gentile, bond or free, male or female, All the family
of God is saved, one place, and that's in the ark, in Christ
Jesus the Lord. And then that ark, God shut him
in that ark, closed the door. And that ark was covered in pits,
within and without. No, no rain, no floodwaters could
get in there to them at all because that pitch kept it out. That
pitch has something to do with the justification and the righteousness,
the atonement of Christ Jesus our Lord. Because of His blood,
because of what He accomplished, God's wrath can't get into us.
It can't get in. His justice won't be brought
up before us because when that rain came down on that ark and
the floodwaters broke from underneath, That ark was baptized, as it
were, engulfed, encompassed in the flood. Just as Christ, when
He hung on that cross, was encompassed, baptized in the wrath and justice
of God, totally immersed in it. But in Christ, because He put
a people in Christ, when that flood subsided, you know where
that ark was when that flood went away? That ark was on the
top of a high, high mountain. You know where God's people ended
up after Christ withstood all of the wrath and justice of God
and was raised again? You know where He ended up and
where you ended up? In the highest mountain of all,
in Mount Zion. That's where we ended up, in
the ark. Now, let's look at what Noah
believed God. This is what Noah believed. I
don't know if Noah saw that ark like we just looked at it, but
I know this, Noah trusted the Lord the same way we look at
that ark and say we trust Christ. He trusted the Lord the same
way. He trusted Him the same way. And faith is not slothful. Faith is not lazy. You know what
Noah did as soon as the Lord told him to prepare that ark?
He went to preparing it. He proved he believed God. He
went to preparing that ark. If you believe God, don't sit
around waiting for the flood to come. Don't sit around waiting
for God to come back again a second time and for Him to pour out
His justice. It's too late then. When the
flood started coming, they were in the ark then. And faith is
not a one-time or a part-time or a some-time deal. Faith is
a lifetime. You know how long Noah was building
that ark? 120 years. building that ark. You're thinking, in that 120
years, you reckon anybody came up to him and looked at him and
looked at that ark and said, Noah, you know, I think what
I'd do if I was you is I'd add a room out here on the side of
it. No, that's not what the Lord said. I'm not going that route. Well, you know what you could
do, Noah, if you really want to be through with that, quit
wasting your time on it, you come over here and join us. You
don't have to make it near as big as you're planning on making
it. He didn't add to it. He didn't take away from it.
Faith doesn't add to Christ or take away from Christ. Faith
doesn't hear scoffers that say, oh, why do you keep building
that ark? It has never rained. How is this thing even supposed
to work? We've never even seen anything
look quite like this before. How is this thing going to float? And Noah just kept right on.
He just kept right on building it because he trusted God. That's
what faith does. Faith doesn't stop. Faith doesn't,
faith may, it may be weak. It may be stumbling, may be slow
at times, but it's always headed in the same direction. Always
looking to Christ, the author and finisher of our faith. Just
as Noah, always continuing on. And it can't be turned off by
scoffers. Faith doesn't draw back. It doesn't draw back. They couldn't get him to go back.
He was committed to what he was doing. You know, it was a little
short time here that the Hebrews, brethren, had started believing
the Lord, had trusted the Lord. And already, in the early church,
we see folks trying to turn them back, turn them away. But the
Hebrew writer is saying, look at Noah. Look at Noah. Look at
the promise Noah had from God. He believed God. He didn't see
these things either. But he believed God and he kept
going. And the Hebrew writer is telling you and I the same
thing. We're not of them that draw back unto perdition to be
destroyed in the flood. True faith is like Noah's faith.
It continues. And you know what happened? The
more Noah continued in that faith, Continue trusting God every season
little by little He had more reason to trust the Lord alone. I Was when I was younger, I was
about I think 13 or 14 Some friends of me and some friends decided
that that we'd build a log cabin and so we went out cleared some
land and And that part was just, we didn't know if we'd keep going,
because it just wasn't any fun. We had to go out there and clear
us out a spot, you know, and that was hard work. Briars and
all kinds of little saplings and things we had to get cleared
out, you know. Well, then we got out there and
took our saws and all our little hand saws with us and all that,
you know, and we began to, we cut down some pretty good, you
know, pretty good trees for a bunch of 13, 14 year olds. I mean,
it was a nice tree and the cabin was going to be 15 feet wide
and 20 feet long. And we about given up on it,
but we cut, started cutting those, those trees. And when you start
seeing them big trees fall, boy, it just kind of revived us. You
know, we got to working a little harder, a little faster, a little
more confident. We might get this thing built.
And then we, we came back, you know, day after day, week after
week. And we got that first round of
logs in place, you know, got it up about three logs high.
That thing began to take shape a little bit more. We began to
think, we're going to do this. We're going to build this thing.
And boy, by the end, we were tired. We were worn out. I don't
know how many months we worked on this thing. We were tired,
just tired. But man, we got the roof on it,
got it in the dry. And we had them logs built up.
Now all we had to do was pitch it. We took just clay mud. and pine straw and water, mixed
it all up together and we just splattered it in between those
logs, you know. But that part of the job just
went by like that because we was at the end and we just couldn't
wait to get inside and enjoy it. Well, every day that Noah
sat out there and worked on that art, it just became a little
more took shape a little more and a little more to it. And
he saw it a little more and a little more. And that's what a believer
does in faith. You start out weak, a little
more, you hear of him. Here a line, there a line, here
a little, there a little. And you begin to see him more
and more. And you begin to realize, he is my salvation. He's my salvation. That's what faith is. It's continuing
in him. And by faith, Noah saved his
household. Noah was the instrument God used
to save his household. His three sons and their wives
all went in there together. And the Lord shut them up in
there, in that ark. We continue in Christ by faith. Trusting Him. Talking to our
children about Him. Praying to the Lord that He'll
save them. And by God's grace, that's how
He's going to save His whole household. It's through this
Gospel. Through using sinners like you
and me that believe Him and trust Him. And by faith, Noah condemned
the world. It says ungodly men around him. They couldn't say anything against
him. He wasn't doing anything to provoke
them. He wasn't doing anything to join
in with sin with them. This old fellow out there just
keeps on plugging away, working on that boat. And he preached the gospel to
them. Kept preaching the gospel to them. Anytime somebody would
come up and talk to him about it, he'd tell them everything he
knew. And one day, Noah's going to
rise in judgment, just like the children of Nineveh rise up in
judgment. Because when they heard Jonah
preach the gospel, they repented. They turned and believed him.
And these folks that were left that didn't believe him, one
day they'll be brought into judgment. Noah will be brought forth to
testify, to be a witness. I told them. I told them everything
you told me to tell them. and they be condemned. Well,
Genesis back there, I'll just tell you this. Genesis 6.22,
it said, Thus did Noah according to all that God commanded him,
so did he. We saw there in verse 6 of chapter
11, Without faith it's impossible to please God. For he that cometh
to God must believe that he is, and he's a rewarder of them that
diligently seek him. What's the reward? That's my
third point. What's the reward? What's the
reward God gives to the believer? Look at verse 7. Look there at
the very end. By faith Noah became heir of
the righteousness which is by faith. That perfect obedience
of Christ which God imputes unto all who believe on His Son. God's
righteousness is called an inheritance because it's by the will of the
Father. It's called an inheritance because
it's to His children. It's called an inheritance because
it's free. It's absolutely free. And God
put Noah in Christ and He closed the door. And Christ bore the
reign of justice. And when the wrath ceased, Noah
rested in the ark on top of the highest mountain. Week in and
week out, I'm delivering God's warning to you. And every time
I stand here, I make it my one purpose to set forth the ark,
Christ our salvation. And I keep hammering away just
like Noah did when he was literally out there building. I'm just
plugging away. Your parents plugging away, just
precept upon precept, line upon line. Will you be slothful like
the rest of those folks that were sitting around Moses? around
Noah, will you be turned back? I can't think of anything sadder
than for my children to die and meet me in judgment. And God
to bring me before Him, having never
told them the truth. Will you stand with Christ against
this evil world? Or will Christ and His children
rise up in judgment against you? Are you God's son? God's daughter? His heir? Join heirs with Christ
the Lord? A flood's coming. A flood's coming. It may not be 120 years. I don't
know when it is. And if I could scare you with
it into Christ, I'd scare you with it into Him. But I pray
God come to you and speak His Word. Give you a heart to believe
Him. and shut you up in that ark,
and you'll be found resting in Him for all eternity through
faith. That's my prayer. That's my prayer. It's not a... It's not a... It's just something we do, coming
here each week. There's some meaning to it. There's
a reason we come here. And it's because Of the ark. Of course, the ark. We believe
what God's told us. Really believe Him. It's the
evidence of things not yet seen. We believe Him. By faith. And
I pray. Oh, I pray for you. When that water and that flood
is over, it's all subsided and it's all gone away as you be
there in the ark in Mount Zion. Not Mount Ararat, but on top
of Mount Zion with Him forever. All right.