Okay, go back with me to Genesis
6. We've heard this so many times,
but may the Lord make it fresh and
new to us and a blessing, good news. Good news. Read verses 12 through 14 again. God looked upon the earth and
behold, it was corrupt. where 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 for them. And behold, I will destroy them
with the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood."
The story of Noah's ark is familiar. to nearly everyone, but rejected
by most. Most people, people of the world,
reject this story as an old Jewish fable or some kind of religious
allegory, fiction. Well, to reject this, you must
reject God who wrote it. To reject this is to reject the
Lord Jesus Christ who plainly spoke about this flood and warned
everyone that as in the days of Noah, so shall the coming
of the Son of Man be. And Peter, look with me at 2
Peter 3. Peter wrote of this in his last
epistle. Look at this. 2 Peter 3. This
is how serious this is, how vital it is that we know something
about this ark, or rather that we are in this ark. 2 Peter 3,
verse 3, Peter said, knowing this first, you need to know
this, that there shall come in the last days, the very last
days, scoffers ridiculing this. walking after their own lusts,
saying, Where is the promise of his coming? But since the
fathers fell asleep, all things continued as they were from the
beginning of the creation. Nothing has changed. Everything
goes on. But Peter went on to say, And this they willingly
are ignorant of, that is, rejects, they refuse to believe, that
by the word of God the heavens were of old, that is, creation.
Men and women refuse to believe that God created this earth.
That means that he owns this earth. That means he owns and
is the judge of those that he made. If you make something,
you own it. And you can do with it as you please. Well, that's
God, the Creator. And read on. And it says, they
are willingly ignorant of that the earth, verse 5, standing
out of the water and in the water, whereby the world that then was,
being overflowed with water, perished." That is, they reject
the flood. Because the story of the flood
is the story of an angry God, and we just read it, who destroyed
this world and millions of people in it. And so people willingly
reject that. They refuse to believe it. Verse
7, read this. He said, The heavens and the
earth which are now are by the same word, that is the word of
God, kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of
judgment and perdition of ungodly men. That is, God is going to
destroy this world by fire. There's nothing more ridiculed
than that today. Look back at 2 Peter 2. And this is spoken of throughout
the scriptures, the flood. Verse 5 says, 2 Peter 2.5, God
spared not the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person,
a preacher of righteousness. Noah was a preacher. Noah preached
righteousness. Whose righteousness? God's righteousness. That God is holy. And God will
by no means clear the guilty. That God will punish sin. That God is angry with the wicked. That's what he preached. And
God will punish sin. You cannot know God unless you
first know God is holy. That's the God of the Bible.
That's not the God men are preaching today. And so they reject this. Sin. Sin. God hates it. And He said the
earth is full of it. He said, I will destroy it. Go
back some more to 1 Peter 3. Look at 1 Peter 3. And these verses are so misunderstood,
but you know them. 1 Peter 3 says in verse 18 that Christ hath once suffered for
sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us, that
is, God's people. That's who Peter was writing
to. to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by
the Spirit, by the Holy Spirit, by which, by the Holy Spirit,
he went and preached unto the spirits in prison." Meaning,
those that are now in hell, but verse 20, read this, they were
sometime, at one time, unbelievers, disobedient. when once the long-suffering
of God waited in the days of Noah." That is, Christ, through
the Holy Spirit, preached the gospel through Noah to those
people who are now damned. And it says that while the ark
was preparing, verse 20, just a few, Eight souls were saved
by water. Now read on. The like figure,
whereunto even baptism doth also now save us, not the putting
away of the flesh. In other words, the filth of
the flesh. In other words, baptism doesn't
save you. Nothing we do saves us. Jesus
Christ is the Savior. Baptism is confessing Jesus Christ. It's the answer of a good conscience
toward God. It's the resurrection of Jesus
Christ who has gone into heaven. Christ is our ark. That's what he's saying. And
we're saved by him. One more, okay? Hebrews 11. Hebrews
11. This flood is spoken of throughout
the Scripture. Noah and the flood. Hebrews 11,
and I want you to mark this because we'll come back to it. Hebrews
11, verse 7, by faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen
as yet, that is, rain, judgment, moved with fear, prepared an
ark for the saving of his house. By the witch, by this ark, he
condemned the world, but he became heir of the righteousness, which
is by faith. And then I just quoted to you
what our Lord said in Matthew 24. As in the days of Noah, so
shall the coming of the Son of Man be. For they were eating
and drinking, marrying and giving and married, and knew not until
the flood came and took them all away. So shall the coming
of the Son of Man be. Two shall be in a field, one
taken, the other one left. Two on the house top, one taken,
the other one left." That's what our Lord said. Words of truth
and soberness. This is the truth and it's serious. You need to be in this That ark
of Noah, only those in that ark were saved. Those outside the
ark perished. This couldn't be a plainer mission.
Only those in Jesus Christ are saved. Those outside of Jesus
Christ are damned. It couldn't be any plainer. In a minute, I'll tell us what
it means to be in Christ. Now go back to Genesis 6. Here's
the story. Genesis chapter 6. They have
a description of the world. We've already read it. It said
that people multiplied on the face of the earth. There were
millions of persons on the earth at that time. Well populated.
Verse 2, the women were fair to look at. Beautiful women.
All of this sounds very contemporary, very current. Beautiful women. The earth was well populated. Beautiful women. Verse 4, giants
in the earth. Gigantic men. Men who were mighty
men. Powerful men. Well-known celebrities. athletes and so on and so forth.
Back in chapter 4, it spoke of their talents in artistry and
musicians and this and that and the other. Does it sound familiar? All right, here is God's condemnation
of the world. Nowhere does it say that God
loves everybody. Totally to the contrary. to the
contrary. It does not say God loved everyone. But God saw, verse 5, the wickedness
of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of
the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually, or every
day, or whatever he could think up that was corrupt and evil. That's what he did. And down in verse 11 and 13,
the Lord said the earth is filled with violence. Violence. Do you note that? That is what particularly marked
the world then. And God said, I'm going to destroy
this violent place. Does that sound familiar? About
all we see today is And it has corrupted His way upon the earth. His way? What is His way? This
is His way. This is it. Christ is His way. Be well. And men have corrupted
His way. Hold the truth in unrighteousness. Twisted and corrupted. And God
said, I will destroy. Not, I might. And it wasn't a
warning. God wasn't warning people. He
was promising. I will destroy. I will destroy. And that's what God said of the
world 4,500 years ago. That's when the flood took place. 4,500 years ago, that's what
God said of the world then, and that's what God says of the world
today. In Psalm 14, God looked down
upon the children of men to see if there were any that didn't
understand, any that didn't seek after God. He said, they all
together become filthy. We only have to look around and
look within to know something about that. But Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. In the midst of all that sin
and perversion and corruption and violence, it says, Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord. One man and his family. We're
going to see that. But it could read, but God was
gracious to Noah. Was Noah better than anyone else?
Is that why? No, no, look over at chapter
9 with me. Chapter 9, this is after the
flood. This is after God has destroyed
all flesh except Noah's family. Chapter, I'm sorry, chapter 8,
verse 21. The Lord smelled a sweet savor,
that is, Noah sacrificed animals as a picture of Christ crucified.
And God smelled a sweet savor, and the Lord said in his heart,
I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake, for
the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." He's
born evil. Now, Noah was born a sinner. Noah wasn't better than anyone
else. God wasn't gracious to Noah because Noah was better
than anyone else, but Noah was born a sinner like everyone else. But in time, Noah was born of
God. He must be born from above. He must be born again. And Noah,
in time, was born of God. That is, God made him a new creature. God revealed himself to him.
God loved Noah. God chose Noah. God revealed
himself to Noah. God warned Noah. God revealed
Christ to Noah, the ark. That's who this ark represents.
And that's what God is and does to everyone that finds grace
in his eyes. Everyone God chooses has found
grace in His eyes. Everyone God loves has found
grace in the eyes of the Lord. Go back to Hebrews 11. Did I
tell you to keep that place? Back in Hebrews 11. Let's just
look at this just a second. Hebrews 11. Just as Noah, the
way God dealt with Noah is the way that God deals with all of
His elect, all those whom He purposes to say. By faith, Noah,
it says in verse 7, being warned of God. Our Lord said to Noah in chapter
6, Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me. I'm going
to destroy all flesh. But you've found grace in my
eye. I'm going to show you salvation. I'm going to put you in a vessel
of mercy. I'm going to save you, Noah.
I'm going to show you the way to be saved. Noah was warned
of God. Noah heard the truth of God. Why weren't there more people
in that ark? Why weren't more people just trying to get into that
ark? Because they didn't believe God.
They didn't believe God was holy. They didn't believe God would
punish sin. They didn't believe God was going to destroy the
world. They didn't believe God. One time our Lord said, many
are called. So many people, millions of people. Paul wrote, have they
not all heard? Yes, verily, they have all heard.
The sound of God's Word has gone throughout the world. They've
all heard. Well, why don't more people come
to Christ? Because they don't believe God.
They don't believe God. And there are so many false preachers
who have told them that God won't punish sin. That God loves them. And they believe that. So what's
the fear? What's the fear? Noah heard the
truth. Noah heard of the true God. Noah
heard of the true God and the true ark. He heard it from God. And you and I, everyone in this
room tonight, has found grace in the eyes of the Lord, because
you're hearing about the true God. Not the God of men's imagination,
but the true and living God. And you're going to hear the
only way of salvation. But only God can put us in that
way. And we have found grace. What
I do want us to know, and never take it for granted, We have
found grace if we're sitting here listening to the truth. Not many people hear it. Those
who have, reject it. That's why this building's not
full. Noah was warned of God, it says,
of things not seen as yet. What does it say? in the beginning
of this chapter. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. In other words, Noah
believed God. God warned Noah, and Noah believed
things he didn't see. God he didn't see. He believed.
No one will unless God gives us this faith. Noah had never
seen rain. Neither had anybody on the earth
seen it rain. It had never rained before. A
mist came up from the earth and watered the earth. And God said,
I'm going to send so much water out of the sky, rain, that it's
going to flood the whole earth and destroy all. And no one believed
that. God said, I'm going to rain fire. You know who said fire and brimstone? It wasn't some itinerant, crazy,
wild preacher on the street corner holding a sign up. It was Jesus
Christ. He's the one who said that. Fire and brimstone. Well, things
not seen. Noah believed God because God
gave him the faith to believe. And read on. And Noah moved with
fear. Faith without works is dead.
Noah moved with fear. That is, Noah feared God. The fear of the Lord is the beginning
of wisdom. The fear of the Lord. Why did
he fear God? Because God is holy. That's why. And Noah was a sinner. That's
why you'll find Noah sacrificing that animal as soon as he hit
the ground, when that ark was landed. is a picture of Christ. He knew it. He's a sinner like
everyone else. And the only reason that he was
saved was because of that ark, because of that blood. Noah prepared
an ark. Look at verse 7. Noah prepared
an ark for the saving of his house. Noah found grace in the
eyes of the Lord. And if you and I have found grace
in the eyes of the Lord, God has spoken to us. Like Noah,
God has warned us. Like Noah, God has revealed Himself,
the true God, to us. Like Noah, God has given us faith. By grace He is saved through
faith. And it's not of yourself. It's the gift of God. God has
created His fear in our heart. God has showed us His salvation.
Make an ark. Believe an ark. Go back to the
text now. Genesis 2. So, Noah found grace
and so have all of God's people. believe God and fear God and
know Christ is the way. Now, look at verse 18. Not only is the ark a picture
of Christ, but Noah himself is. Verse 18, God says to Noah, with
thee will I establish my covenant. I'm going to make this, I've
made this agreement, this covenant with you, Noah. And thou shalt
come into the ark, thou and thy sons and thy wife and thy sons'
wives with thee, and every living thing of all flesh." And he goes
on to say, "'Noah, with you I've made this covenant, and every
one and every thing that's with you I'm going to save.'" Every
one with you in that ark, I'm going to save. You're the means
of keeping them alive. Noah represents the Lord Jesus
Christ, the covenant head, whom God made this covenant with before
the world began and sent him to this earth to save a lot of
people, save them. All right, now let's look at
this ark. This is wonderful. This is wonderful. I enjoyed
it so much for the 100th time at least. The ark is Jesus Christ. That's who this ark is. You know,
many if not most of you came up in religion, didn't you? Methodist or Southern Baptist
or Catholic or whatever, didn't you? Came up in religion. And
you heard this story of Noah's Ark, didn't you? Let me ask you, and I have asked
some of you before, did you hear Jesus Christ mentioned in the
story of that ark? Was his name ever brought up?
Wasn't it just a story about Noah's great faith and some sweet,
sentimental story of how God saved all the animals? That's
all it was, wasn't it? Now, you know. You know what
this is about. Moses wrote this book. The Lord
had Moses record this book. And our Lord Jesus Christ said,
Moses wrote a faith. It's all about me. I'm the ark. That ark is Jesus Christ. Jesus
Christ is the salvation of God. Listen to what Peter preached.
He said, neither is there salvation in any other. For there's none
other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be
saved. There's only one way to be saved,
and that's Jesus Christ. It will be like Noah, by the
sovereign electing love and grace of our God. If we are saved,
it will be by God revealing Himself to us that we might fear Him. If we are saved, it will be by
the grace of God, He putting us in Jesus Christ, to be saved. Of God, Paul wrote to the Corinthians,
of God are you in Christ. If you are found And that day,
in Jesus Christ, that's the grace of God. You've found grace in
the eyes of God. Now look at the ark. Verse 14. Wonderful, wonderful. That's
His name in it. Wonderful. Verse 14. God said,
Make thee an ark of gopher wood. What is gopher wood? Gopher wood
was a very common, ordinary wood. Some say it's cypress wood. Some
say it's cedar wood. Whatever kind of wood it was,
it was wood that was very common. And yet, it was incorruptible
wood. It was impervious to decay and
rot, like the cypress. Brother Greg Elmquist took me
to see the oldest tree in North America down outside of Orlando. You saw it. There were two of
them. I don't know how big around they were, but they were huge.
Cypress tree growing in the water. Evergreen. Planted by the rivers of water.
That's Psalm 1, isn't it? But anyway, that cypress wood,
they grow in water. That's where they grow. And it
is a common tree. And yet it is incorruptible. It is impervious to rot and decay. And that's a picture of our Lord
Jesus Christ being made flesh and dwelling amongst us. He was
made in the likeness of sinful flesh. God was manifest in the
flesh. Great is the mystery of God.
God became a man, but He was a sinless man. Incorruptible. He put on flesh. He came. The word ark doesn't mean ship. Ark doesn't mean boat. It means
a chest. It means a vessel. Ark, like
the ark of the covenant. That's exactly what it means.
The same word. This ark was not a sailing vessel. But it was a sailing ship, but
it was a vessel just to hold, like you would hold jewels and
treasure for safekeeping. John Gill pointed out that actually
the ark didn't go very far. It was created right outside
of the Garden of Eden where Noah lived and in the valley. And
then when the flood was over, it was rested on the Mount Ararat,
who was just right beside it. It didn't go very far. It didn't need to. So where it
began is where it ended, except higher. What a picture that is. The ark, though, Christ, in Him
are hid all the treasures, and in Him are hid His people whom
God calls His peculiar treasure, a vessel of God's mercy, gopher
wood. Christ is that ark. And you know, when Noah was making
that ark, you know, there were ships back then. There were oceans. Okay? There were sailing vessels.
And men were very gifted and talented back then, so they made
some beautiful ships. Much to be admired. When Noah
made this ark, this big, looked like a barge, 450 feet long,
75 feet wide and 45 feet tall, they scoffed at this thing. They
mocked and ridiculed this thing. It won't sail, let alone probably
won't float. Like the tabernacle in the wilderness,
that tent, remember? And God said, this is my salvation. And the world passed by and scoffed
at that plain brown tent. But that's the only way. Well, look at it. Verse 15, this
is the fashion of it. The length of the ark shall be
300 cubits, and the breadth of it 50 cubits, and the height
of it 30 cubits. And what did Paul say in Ephesians? That he prayed that we might
know something of the love of God. He says that we might know
something of the length, the height, the breadth, and the
depth of the love of God. That's where the love of God
is. The length which God goes to save His people. The breadth,
how wide is His mercy. The height, how far, how high
it will reach. And three stories in that ark. Verse 16, there was a window.
One window. One window. What's that? Well, that's the light. There's
only one source of light in that ark. Christ said, I am the light. Whatever light men may think
they have, if it's not knowing Christ and through Him,
their life is darkness. Christ said, I'm the light. I'm
the light. One source of light. And it's
above all, in a cubit above all. And the door, verse 16, the door
of the ark, set in the side of it. One door. One way in. We just looked at that, didn't
we? A narrow gate, a straight way. Christ is the door. He said,
I am the door by me if any man enters. I am the door. Christ is the way to God. Christ is the way of salvation.
Christ is the door. And three stories. Look at it. Lower, second, and third stories.
Shout them out. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. These three are one art, one
cry. Oh my, look at this. And God
said in verse 14, He said, you make that art and you pitch it
with that and without. Did you think I was going to
skip right by that? This is the key to this whole
story here. Pitch. Pitch that ark within
and without, God said. Pitch. Pitch. What's pitch? Well, it was a tar substance. It was a sticky substance. It was actually the blood of
that cypress tree. Or pine tree. Whatever tree that
ark was made of. It was the blood, the sap that
came from that tree. And God said to Noah, you take
that pitch. that pine tar, that resin, rosin,
and you cover that ark all over the outside of it, and you cover
that ark on the inside of it. Pitch. So that when God opens
the windows of heaven and pours out his wrath upon the world,
not one drop of water will touch one person inside that ark because
of the pitch. The pitch. And that pitch represents
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is the blood that makes the
atonement. You know, the word atonement
is the word pitch. The exact same word. Pitch. Atonement. When I see
the blood, God says, Not one, not one bit of my wrath will
come upon you. I will pass over you. It's the
blood that maketh atonement for the soul. And so like Noah, every
sinner in Christ is saved by Christ. Christ bore the wrath
of God like that ark bore the rain and the storm against it,
and it withheld that wrath and all inside were saved because
it was pitched. It didn't spring a leak. And God said, I made my covenant
with you. Look down at verse 18. He said,
I made my covenant with you and you shall come into the ark.
You shall come. Thou and thy sons and thy wife
and thy sons' wives with thee, they shall come." Verse 20, "...the
fowls, the cattle, the creeping thing, everything after its kind,
two of every sort, shall come unto thee to keep them alive."
What did our Lord say? This is the Father's will. That
everyone that the Father hath given me, all that the Father
hath given me, shall come unto me. And he said, of two of every
living thing, God has a people out of every tribe, kindred,
nation, and tongue under heaven. And they shall all be taught
of God, and they'll all come to Christ and be found in him. Found in him. And look at this,
verse 21. I'll wrap this up. God said to
Noah, 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." In other words, Noah had all the food that was needed.
He was the provider. The ark was full of food. There was an abundance of good
things in that ark to sustain the lives of everyone in it.
And Scripture says, it pleased the Father that in Christ should
all fullness dwell. In Him, He is our bread. He is our water. He is our meat. He is our drink. He is our all
and in all. He is our life. Christ is that art. Noah found
grace. But you know who else found grace
in the eyes of the Lord? Noah's family. Noah's family. Noah found grace and his house
found grace because they had a father who knew the Lord. How blessed that man's wife was,
Noah's wife. How blessed his children were. How blessed were his sons. How
blessed were his daughters-in-law. Their father and father-in-law
knew the Lord. And he warned them. being the
faithful and true father that he was, he warned them. He warned
all his children. That ark was his life. A hundred
years he worked on that ark. Not a part of his life, that
ark was his life. That ark was his conversation
every day. What they heard him talk about
was the ark. Perhaps they got tired of hearing
their father talk about that ark, or their father-in-law talk
about that ark. And they wanted to talk about other things. But
he would say to them, boys, the finest houses are going to be
underwater soon. Daughters, the finest horses
and chariots are all going to be underwater soon. It's this
ark. It's this ark. That was his conversation. That ark was his life. And they
found grace because their father had them working on that ark.
I know he did. If you're a father and you have
work to do, your sons and daughters are going to be involved, aren't
they? Well, he had them working on that ark. Oh my, what a privilege, huh?
To be about these things, to have our children. We raise our
children in here in the fear and admonition of the Lord, teaching
them about this art, about Christ, hoping, praying, wishing that
they'll be in that art. No, it didn't know. Well, God
did tell them. He did tell them. And I'm sure
He had His doubts, especially those boys. But anyway, My father
was always talking about that ark. That ark was his life. And bless God, one day, they were all in that ark. They
were all in that ark. He didn't have a very big congregation,
did he? But was he thankful? Seven people. His family. His family. What grace they found
in the eyes of the Lord. And if those sons and daughters-in-law
and his wife did not understand before why Noah was always talking
about that ark, why Noah was so consumed by that ark, they
did when the rain started falling down. And they were so glad.
Now they knew. Now they knew. salvation in the ark. That ark
is the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed is the man, blessed is
the woman who has found grace in the eyes of the Lord to know
who God is, to fear God, be warned of God, given faith to believe,
to see that Christ is that salvation of God. Our Lord, thank You for Your
Word. Forgive the poor preacher of it. Thy Word is Your power,
not our ability to preach it or divide it, but Your Holy Spirit. Not by might, not by power, but
by Thy Spirit. Your Word is like a hammer, like
a fire, like a sword. You use it as you see fit. The
Holy Spirit, the wind, blows where it listeth. No, we pray
it might be for our salvation, salvation of this house, our
families, our children, our loved ones, Lord. We pray for Your
glory, for Your honor that in that day we might be found in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Until then, we pray that You
might keep the door of the ark open and bring Your sheep into
it. It's in Christ's name we're met
here tonight. Give thanks. Amen. You're dismissed.