Certainly Todd Meek and Amy Jo
is bribed. We ask God's blessings on them
as they begin their lives together. And the Lord willing, that will
be Friday evening at 630 down at the depot. And then here in
the building, 1230 Saturday, Jason and Alyssa will exchange
their vows. That will be broadcast, and you
can watch that. This is for family to be here
in the building, but for all of the rest of you, we certainly
want you to join them in this wonderful event And we're so
thankful that God has brought them together and given them
a love for each other and especially a love for the gospel of our
Lord Jesus. And we ask God's blessings upon
them as they begin a life together. Let's bow our heads. Lord, for all things we give
thanksgiving because all things come forth from your hands. And
though we confess, we are unable most of the time to see how things
will work for the good of your people working all things together. That's what you do for our good.
Yet, Lord, though our natural sight is unable to perceive these
things, yet by faith we believe God's word. And we fully believe
that even the difficulties of life, which some of your dear
people are experiencing, These things will work together with
everything for the good of those who are the called according
to your purpose. It is a blessed, blessed thing
to know, Father, that you govern all things to bring your good
and perfect will to pass, that which you have ordained All things
that you have predestinated, your wise and good providence
brings them to fruition. And Lord, your purpose shall
stand and your purpose cannot be frustrated. We bow to you
and we worship. The God who governs all things
is certainly worthy of our deepest gratitude and adoration. As we think of our nothingness,
and then we are reminded that all things are of God, Lord,
we are lost in our own nothingness, and we're lost in your infinite
greatness. Where can words ever be found,
Lord, to fully begin to express that reverence and thanksgiving
that we owe to you and which we feel deep within us. Especially are we thankful, Father,
for Your grace that You gave us in the Lord Jesus before You
made this world. Grace that blessed us with all
spiritual blessings in the Savior. Grace that sent the darling of
Your bosom, that He would lay down His life a ransom for us,
that he would give himself over to the hands of vile men to be
crucified, to be wounded and bruised and put to death on our
behalf, and that the Lord Jesus would willingly submit to endure
all the wrath of God and the stead of your people. And he
who died for us, who laid down his life, took that life again.
And he now represents us before the majesty on a high. And there
he intercedes for us. There he represents our interests. and five bleeding wounds he bears,
and they have her plead for us. Oh, thank you, Father, for full
forgiveness. Thank you for righteousness in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Especially, Lord, we're mindful
of these that we have mentioned, Judy, Sister Claire, and Marty, and Gary. Lord, we lift these up to you.
And there are others of our congregation, Lord, who are also having some
physical issues and we pray for them likewise. We ask that you
would give to each of them a steady confidence in the Lord. May they
be encouraged to know that God reigns. And for those who are
yet to have surgeries and procedures, especially for Marty and then
for Gary on Saturday, Lord, we ask that you would guide those
who shall administer tender care to these whom you love, people
you've loved from before the world was fashioned. We say of these what Mary and
Martha said of their brother Lazarus, Lord, he whom thou lovest
is sick. We commit them to your care.
For others of our congregation, Lord, we lift them up, those
who are discouraged, those who are feeble, those who are weak. Lord, we pray for them. We pray
for the two couples who shall be united in marriage this weekend. that you would shower them with
your grace and may they take a stand for the gospel of Christ
and build their home upon the solid rock foundation of the
Lord Jesus himself. We ask your blessings upon these
who have gathered this evening and for these who are watching
by way of the internet. Lord, we're thankful for the
ministry that you've given to us and many of your dear saints,
Lord, have no preacher and they watch and indicate that they're
blessed through the word that we deliver to them. And we thank
you for the privilege that you have given to this, our church,
to send forth the gospel. And you've given us multiple
opportunities down through the years, Lord, to get the truth
out. And we thank you for that. May
we always be faithful to the ministry. to execute the stewardship
you have given to us in a manner that is honoring to our God and
consistent with the gospel of your free and sovereign grace.
Now, as we open the word tonight and look into the portion of
scripture that we shall study, we ask that the spirit of grace
would cause the light of revelation and understanding to shine on
the sacred pages of this book. Lord, leave us not to ourselves,
don't leave me here alone, but may the Spirit of God use me
to speak and say those things that would be exalting, Father,
to your great name. would be magnifying to the Son
of God, would be exalting to the Spirit of grace, and would
be instructive and encouraging and words of admonishment for
the saints of God. We ask for Ethan as he goes back
to Fort Bragg that you would continue to hedge him about and
protect him from all danger and all harm. And what we ask for
him, we ask for those others who faithfully and dutifully
stand guard, as it were, to protect the freedom of this great nation.
We ask that you would hedge them about and keep them safe, and
they have a job to do. And ofttimes we may forget, but
Lord calls us to be mindful of the fact that there are those
who are even put their lives in jeopardy every day so that
we might go about our lives without fear or without worry of being
attacked by those who have no respect for our country or for
our laws. Lord, our country is in dire
need of mercy and of the gospel. We ask that you would send forth
laborers into the field. And we know that at any given
time, all those who preach the gospel are those who have been
appointed by you, instructed by you, and who are hedged about
by you. And Lord, give us freedom, give
us the ability to preach the gospel, of grace without any
compromise and without any hesitation. May we be bold in setting forth
this glorious message of the Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified
in order to satisfy your justice and save the people of your everlasting
choice. Be with us now as we open the
scriptures again. For Jesus' sake we pray. Amen. Let's go to the book of Genesis
this evening. We'll get to Genesis, try to
get into chapter 5, and basically kind of give you
an overview of chapter 5, and then the next message that I
will bring from chapter 5, the Lord willing, is going to be
about a man named Enoch. Enoch who walked with God and
the scripture says he was not for God took him. Last Wednesday we spent some
several moments in Genesis chapter 4 where we had the account of
the murder of Abel. Abel was a man who believed God,
a man who honored the Lord by bringing him an offering of blood. Abel had observed the faithfulness
of his father in offering sacrifices to God. no doubt over and over
again, most likely at the end of each week, Adam would have
done that as he beheld, and Abel would have beheld his dad doing
that and leading the family in worship. And as Abel grew, and
also his brother, whose name was Cain, as these two brothers
grew, And no doubt daughters were born to Adam and Eve as
well, but all of them, they learned the gospel from their dad. I say they learned the gospel
from their dad, but you're not gonna love the gospel unless
God teaches you. Now, God taught Abel the gospel. It wasn't only the example of
Adam, as Adam would take a first sling of the block. and then
offer it to God, because Adam was taught the gospel by God
himself, who illustrated the message of substitution and satisfaction
right at the end of Genesis, the third chapter. There we learned
of substitution. God had said to Adam in the day,
ye thereof, you'll surely die. Well, God did get death. But
it wasn't the death, it wasn't the physical death, at least
not at that time of Adam, nor was it the death of Eve, not
physical death. But he did get a physical death
because God killed animals, I suspect lambs. And then he cut those
lambs, he shed their blood, and he skinned those animals and
he made coats for our parents, not aprons as Adam and Eve had
done, which merely was no more than a loin cloth, but a full
length which pictured the covering of the soul, the covering of
the soul. Adam and Eve, they had a brightness
to them. They had a glory to them. They
had a righteousness to them that God had given them. And they
were unaffected by their nakedness before. They had no shame. But
once they, transgress God's law. Once Adam transgressed God's
law, then their eyes were opened and they realized their souls
were naked. And they were ashamed. And they
knew something had to be done. And as we have studied, therefore
they manufactured aprons for themselves. But God said, this
is not going to do. And so God robed their bodies,
and in robing their bodies, He teaches us that which He does
for sinners who are saved by His grace. He robes our souls. Our souls. There's nothing righteous
about our bodies. Our bodies are sinful. Our bodies
are corrupt. You know that, and I know that. Well, what is it about us that's
been made the righteousness of God in the Lord Jesus? Our souls
are robed in righteousness and therefore we are approved of
God. I was listening to a message
by a certain preacher and he said, we have been made acceptable
unto God. No, we haven't been made acceptable
unto God. We are accepted by God in the
Beloved. And we're accepted in His righteousness. And able believing God. He had
been instructed by his father, but now he's been instructed
by God. And believing God's word, he,
as he becomes a father, as he gets married, and he has a family,
and he is the representative of his family, and so he worships
God even as Adam worshiped God. Abel teaches us the gospel of
grace. Abel teaches us that the way
to come before God is by means of a blood sacrifice. On the
other hand, his older brother, He had also experienced the teaching,
the instruction of his father, Adam. And Cain knew he saw as
much as Abel did. But though he received the instruction
of his father, the Spirit of God didn't instruct him. You
see, the difference between the older brother Cain and the younger
brother Abel is the difference grace made. It's the difference
God made. Now, both of them were religious.
It isn't that Cain was an irreligious person or a non-religious person. He was a very religious person
and a very sincere person in his religious beliefs. But he
thought. that God would accept him on
the basis of the sacrifice or the offering that he would bring,
which was the works of his own hands. And he was wrong. And of course, here we have,
and we've said this before, and you've heard it many times prior
to this, that here are the two religions, right? Here's the
religion of Cain, which is the religion of the natural man.
And all free will works religion can ultimately be traced back
to this man Cain. You say, well, there are a bunch
of different religions out here and a bunch of different beliefs.
Really, they're all peas in the exact same pot. Because they
all believe in salvation either by the will of man, the works
of man, or the worth of man. Right? The will, the work, or
the worth of man. But the Word of God says salvation
is of the Lord. As far as man's will is concerned,
man's will is enslaved. Now, we're covered over with
so much preaching today, not in here, but out there, of free
willism. Man doesn't have free will. His
will is enslaved. It's in bondage. And man has
no self-worth. God looked down from heaven and
He said, there's none that doeth good, no, not one. And there
are no works that man can do to recommend him to God. The
will is enslaved, the works are filthy, and we have no worth,
no inherent worth. So if we're going to be saved,
we have to be saved by the free and sovereign grace of God, based
upon the merits of, the death of, the righteousness of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Man isn't free. Somebody said, Scott Richardson
said, man's got a free will just like a frog is free in the snake's
belly. Whereas free is a prisoner in
a jail cell. Jump up and down, he can take
his tin cup and rattle it against the bars, he can yell, he can
do a lot of things, but he can't get out. Man's salvation is not
dependent upon his own will. It's dependent upon the will
of God. It's dependent upon the purpose of God. It's dependent
upon the grace of God. And so here we have two men and
two religions. One the religion of grace, one
the religion of blood, one the religion of sacrifice that's
honoring and pleasing to God according to God's specific instruction. The other is false religion,
a religion based upon the works of man, the will of man, and
the worth of man. Salvations of the Lord. I had
Joe read that passage in John chapter one, because it talks
about as many as received the Lord. To them gave he the authority
or the power to become sons of God, even to them which are called
upon his name, who were born, which were born, born again.
Not a blood, and really the word is bloods, bloods. Not of your heritage. And this is one of the things
the Israelites could never swallow, that they could not be the children
of God just because they were the offspring of Abraham. That's
not the same. It's not of blood. It doesn't
run in the bloodline. It runs in the grace line. Not
of blood, nor of the will of the flesh. It's not a man's will. It's not of him that runneth,
Romans chapter nine says. It's not of him that willeth,
nor of him that runneth. Of him that exercises himself
diligently in religion. It's still not of him that willeth
or of him that runneth, but of God that showeth the mercy. It's of God. So, we get down to the fifth chapter
now. We'll leave chapter five behind,
except to say this, right toward the end of chapter five, you
have a little bit of the genealogy of this man Cain. That's really
the genealogy of the seed of the serpent, That's a little
bit of that genealogy. Now, when we get to Genesis chapter
5, here is the genealogy of our Lord Jesus. Because in Genesis
chapter 5, there are 10 men who are mentioned. And these 10 men
are in the lineage of Messiah. You see, God kept the word of
truth alive. Now, I know Abel died, but when
Abel died, the truth of God didn't die. Well, you say, well, who
preached the gospel? Who believed the gospel? After
Abel did, Adam still believed the truth. And then Adam, he gives birth
to Seth, or his wife gives birth to Seth. Now, I would say without
a doubt that, well, look at verse, go to chapter four, verse 25.
And Adam knew his wife again, and she bare a son and called
his name Seth. For God, said she, he hath appointed
me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew. So here's a man who is like a
substitute, as it were, for Abel. Abel is dead. Abel's not going
to carry on the lineage. In fact, Abel is not in the lineage
of our Lord Jesus at all. The one who is in the lineage
of our Lord Jesus after Adam was Seth. Now, I'm sure they
had many daughters, They aren't mentioned. And as we get into
chapter 5, you'll see that, look at the end of verse 4 in chapter
5. The days of Adam after he had
begotten Seth were 800 years and he begat sons and daughters. And by the way, if you want to
write this down, I may have given this to you before, most people
estimate that at this When we get to verse 4 in chapter 5,
there were 32,000 people in Adam's broad family. But the only one who is mentioned
with any significance is Seth. Why is that? Because he also
knew and loved the gospel. and here's the lineage of Messiah. It doesn't run through Abel.
You see, I'll tell you what Eve thought. When her firstborn son
came along, we know him as Cain, she thought, here's the lineage,
here is Messiah, and if he isn't the Messiah, here's the lineage
of Messiah. Wrong. This is not the lineage
of Messiah. This is not the seed of Messiah. Here's the seed of the serpent.
And she came to realize that because he came up against his
own brother and murdered him. And the blood of Abel cried out
to God. It cried out for vengeance. It
cried out for judgment upon Cain. And Cain said, my punishment's
greater than I can bear. And God gave an order, everybody
keep their hands off Cain. He's mine. I put a mark on him. I'll take care of him. Vengeance
is mine, saith the Lord. When Abel died, the truth didn't
die with him. Adam maintained the truth. Now
Adam is the very first link to Messiah. He's in the lineage
of our Lord Jesus. Not able, we would think could
be able. In fact, I would suspect that
after Adam and Eve saw how Cain sought to worship God, I bet
you Adam told Eve, honey, he doesn't know the gospel. He didn't
get that from me. Why, our son, our oldest son,
he's got a religion of works. I bet you Adam pulled him aside
and said, where'd you come up with that? Don't you see me shedding
blood? I've told you what God did. How
he covered us with robes. of lambs that He killed and shed
their blood. And this is how we've been worshiping
God. Hadn't you watched me there where
the flaming swords come together? Haven't you seen me taking a
lamb and putting it up on the altar and then God devoured it
with the fire? And I've been teaching you substitution,
the innocent dying for the guilty. Oh, Cain, where did you get this
stuff from? I'm sure Adam told him that. And I'll bet Eve then said, Well,
this isn't Messiah, and this is not the seed of Messiah, must
be Abel. And then lo and behold, Abel
is murdered. So it isn't Abel either. And the years go by. And then
another son, another son who believed the gospel, His name is Seth. And we know
from Genesis chapter five, he's in the lineage of Messiah. And each of these ten men listed
in Genesis chapter five, these are all believers. and they're
all associated with our Lord Jesus. You see, there are lots
of other kids born to Adam and Eve and to these other men who
are listed. But the names of all those other
kids aren't put down in Scripture because they have no direct relationship
to Messiah. The Bible is a book of redemption. The Bible is a book about the
salvation of sinners. And the men and the women who
are named in the Word of God are only there because of, number
one, they're friends of grace, or because they're enemies of
grace, and God would have us to be warned by putting them
in the Word of God. Everything in this Bible has
to do in some way with the Lord Jesus Christ. And these were men who loved
him. And when you get to Genesis chapter
four, chapters four and five, the only man who is significant
that stands out who didn't love the Lord is of course, Cain. Now there are others who are
mentioned, but they're the seed of the serpent. And they're only
kind of casually mentioned. But then after listing those,
the offspring of Cain, then we get into chapter five, and here's
the lineage of Messiah. These men. Remember, the book
is a book of redemption. And that which the Spirit of
God is setting forth is our Lord Jesus, and those who love him
and who are significant in his lineage. They're here at 10 links that lead us toward the Messiah,
starting with Adam, 10 links. Now, who are these 10 men? Well,
number one, it is Adam. Verse one of chapter five, this
is the book of the generations of Adam. And you know how the
New Testament begins? This is the book of the generation
of Jesus Christ. And that is significant that
this, here we have this stated this way in chapter five and
verse one, and this is the book of the generation of Jesus Christ
in Matthew chapter one, because there are only two heads. There
are only two representatives. And there's the generation of
Adam who fell in him. And then there's the generation
of Jesus Christ, men and women who are saved in him. Saved from
all eternity. Adam is the first one. He's the
first link. The second link, verse three.
Adam lived 130 years and begat a son in his own likeness after
his image and called his name Seth. Now, let me give you this. Do you remember when Adam was
formed out of the dust of the ground? God said, let us make
man in our image and in our likeness. There was an uprightness to Adam. There was a knowledge that God
gave to Adam. There was an innocence, a holiness
that God gave to Adam. He was made in the image of God. But then he fell, and that image
was distorted and twisted and blemished. And then we read now
that Adam, Adam, verse 3 of chapter 5, he begat a son in his own
likeness and in his image. Not in the image in which he
was originally made, but in the image of a fallen man. And therefore,
Seth came into this world a sinful man. A corrupt man. But he's in the lineage of Messiah. Look at verse 6. Seth lived 105 years and begat
Enos. And then we get to verse 9. And Enos lived 90 years and begat
Cain. Actually, Cainan, Cainan. He's in the lineage. He's also
called Cainan in another passage of scripture. I'll show you in
a minute. And then the next one, the fifth one, is Mahalil. Look at verse 12. And Cainan
lived 70 years and begat Mahalil. And then he bore Jared, who's
the sixth one, in verse 15. And Mahalaleel lived sixty and
five years and begat Jared. And then the seventh one is in
verse 18, and Jared lived 162 years and he begat Enoch. Now
we're not to think that these men had no kids before these. We don't know whether they had
maybe several sons and daughters before these, but these only
are the elect of God. These only are those who are
in the lineage of Messiah. And then we get, so we got Enoch,
now go down to verse 21. And Enoch lived 65 years and
begat Methuselah. And then verse 25. And Methuselah
lived 180 and seven years and begat Lamech. And then verse 29. Verse 28 says, and Lamech lived
180 and two years, and he begat a son, he called his name Noah. And here are the 10 men. Like
I said, there were many, many other sons and daughters, doubtless,
that were born to these 10 individuals. And though all were equally loved
by their mom and dad, and of course, Adam's lifetime, he lived
so long that his lifetime overlapped a lot of these. He had sons and
grandsons and great-grandsons and great-great-grandsons and
great-great-great-grandsons. I mean, he had lots of them.
His table grew fast. But all of them didn't know God. And only these selected ones. Who selected these? Well, the
Lord selected these. And He preserved them in the
truth. Go with me to the book of, look
at 1 Chronicles 1. And this lineage is so precise,
it is so exact, this messianic genealogy, that as we read this
genealogy, even in other places, there is no variation to it,
there's no change to it. The list is as precise here in
1 Chronicles chapter 1 as it is in Genesis the 5th chapter. Look here in 1 Chronicles chapter
1. Here we go. Adam, Sheth, added
an H to it, Enosh, Keman, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech,
Noah. There they are. Just like it
is in chapter 5. Go to the New Testament. Look
at Luke chapter 3. Here's one of the genealogies
of our Lord Jesus. And this is what it's leading
up to. You see, God had selected men
in the lineage of Messiah. And there are lots of other men
and women that were born to these fellas, but only these are specifically set aside to
be associated with the Lord Jesus. Look at Luke chapter 3, 36. We're going backwards here, which
was the son of Canaan, which was the son of Arphaxad, which
was the son of Shem, which was the son of Noah. And of course,
the reason the spelling is different, because the New Testament's in
Greek, and so when they translated it, appears a little different
in spelling, but these are the same individuals. So you've got
Sham, Noah, Lamech, verse 37, which was the son of Methuselah,
which was the son of Enoch, which was the son of Jared, which was
the son of Malil, which was the son of Canaan, which was the
son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of
Adam, which was the son of God. It's the same. In the mouth of
two or three witnesses, let every word be established. This hadn't
changed. Hundreds and hundreds of years
have passed, actually about Between three and four thousand years
have passed, and here it is as Luke is given the genealogy of
our Lord Jesus Christ, and he sets it forth identical to the
way that Moses did. And there's no need, you don't
have to turn to this, but in the book of Jude, And you can
go back to Genesis chapter five, but in the book of Jude, it says
in verse 14, and Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, he prophesied
of these things. What did he prophesy? False prophets. Enoch preached against false
prophets and he predicted that false prophets would rise up
He knew about Cain. He knew about the offspring of
Cain. He knew how they despised the
gospel. He knew how they introduced through
Cain the salvation of sinners by works, by worth, by the will
of man. He knew of those things. And
Scripture says it ain't a prophesied of those things. The seventh
man from Adam. Well, you can count from Adam.
He was the seventh man. Enoch was the seventh man. Adam, Seth, Enoch, Cainan, Mahalaleel,
Jared, and Enoch. He's the seventh man. And I gave these to you several
months ago, but the names of these men are significant. Adam
means red dirt. as a reminder that we came into
this world as a result of God creating us out of the dirt.
From the dirt we came to the dirt we're going. Adam begets
Seth. He's the appointed one. God maintained
truth in this world. You see, God has never left himself
without a witness. Adam was preaching the gospel,
and then Seth began to preach the gospel. And then Seth begat
Enos, which means to call. He was the one who was instrumental
in introducing public worship, the public worship of the Lord.
Right there at the end of chapter 4 of Genesis, men began to call
upon the name of the Lord. And then Enos begat Cahan. That name means possession. He
was possessed by the Lord. That is, he was the Lord's possession. He belonged to God. Belonged
to God by electing grace, just like you do if you're a believer.
You belong to God by electing grace, by redeeming grace, by
calling grace. And then, kynon beget mahalalil,
the praise of God. Who gets the praise for you believing?
He does. Mahalaleel begat Jared descending. It was said that during the lifetime
of Jared that error really became prevalent. Truth was corrupted. Things began to go downhill. Therefore, when we get to chapter
6 and verse 1, that's when the sons of God saw the daughters
of men that they were fair. Somebody sent me something, an
email, that this was demons who entered into this world and married
unbelievers, and that that's the reason we've got a demonic
race out here. That's not what this is at all.
It's believers intermarrying with unbelievers, and that's
a bad thing. Then wickedness just grew. The population back then was
exploding. Did you know that conservative
scholars of the Bible, conservative biblical men who are scientists,
they estimate the population of the world in the time of the
flood was seven billion people? Seven billion people. That's
more people than is on the earth now. And out of the seven billion
people over this earth, almost everyone was seduced by false
religion. No wonder Jared's name means
descending, things are going down fast. Kind of like today. Then Jared began Enoch. His name
means dedicated to the Lord. We'll talk about him in the next
message. Then Enoch begat Methuselah,
whose name means when he dies, the arrow of God will be sent. What is the arrow of God? Judgment.
When did Methuselah die? In the year the flood came. God
let go of the arrow of judgment. Then Methuselah begat Lamech. His name means powerful, powerful. God taught him the gospel. He
was strong in faith. He was so strong in faith when
he begat Noah, led by the Spirit of God, he named Noah this. Look at verse 29, chapter five.
This same shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands
because of the ground which the Lord had cursed. His name means
consolation. And here are the 10 men. And I'll just give you a little
bit more and then I'll stop for tonight. Did you notice the brevity
of God's word about Adam? Look again at verses 1, 2, 3,
and 4, and 5. This is the book of the generation
of Adam and the day that God created man in the likeness of
God, made he him. male and female, created he them,
and blessed them, and called their name Adam. That is, both
the man and the woman were called Adam in the day when they were
created. And Adam lived a hundred and
thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness after his
image, and called his name Seth. They had all the sons and daughters.
In your wildest imagination, do you think Adam only knew Eve,
his wife, over a 130 year period, three times? One time resulted
with Cain, second time resulted with Abel, and the third time
resulted with Seth. Oh no. They had lots of sons
and daughters. But the one whose birth was really
significant, His name is given, Seth. And the days of Adam, after
he had begotten Seth, were 800 years. And he begets sons and
daughters. And all the days that Adam lived
were 930 years, and he died. Here are five verses of Scripture. They sum up a man's life of 930
years. God sums it all up in five verses. You know what that tells me?
Man's days are really vanity, aren't they? There's so much, and I would
admit my curiosity, there's so much I'd like to know about Adam. And you would too. And it would
take volumes and volumes and volumes to record the history
of Adam. Here's all God would have us
to know. He's in the lineage of that one
who's the Savior. He's the one who got us in this
mess, but lo and behold, the grace of God, the one who got
us in this mess, Adam, he's in the lineage of the one who's
going to get us out of the mess. Isn't that something? Absolutely glorious. Yeah, there are a lot of questions
I'd like to ask brother Adam. No, God just didn't give us much
information. All we need to know is Adam,
Seth, right down the line. These men are pointing toward
somebody who's coming. That's all we need to know. They're
pointing toward the Lord Jesus Christ. Messiah, 10 ordinary
men who are sinners, but saved by grace. And they're in the lineage of
our Lord Jesus Christ. Boy, sure is a glorious book,
isn't it? Oh yes, indeed, and such a glorious
savior and a wonderful gospel. Well, let's ask God to bless
the message. Lord, we are thankful for your
word, for the privilege of opening the scriptures and at least to
some degree grasping the message of redemption, seeing our Savior
set forth in picture and type, Adam himself being a figure of
the one who was to come, even our Savior. And then to be reminded
that in the lineage of our blessed Redeemer, here are 10 men. One of them created upright,
but he sought out many inventions. But you saved him by your grace. And these other men, you saved
them. And they formed the very roots of our blessed Savior. And we see His genealogy beginning
to take shape right in Genesis chapter 5. This is the genealogy
of that one who is named in chapter 3 and verse 15 as being the seed
of the woman. Thank you Lord for the gospel
of Christ our Savior and for teaching us to look for Him on
every page of Holy Scripture. And we thank you for the understanding
you've given to us concerning His person and His wonderful
work of redemption. Dismiss us with the benediction
of your love and grace, peace and mercy, and bless as we continue
through this week. We're thankful that the steps
of a good man are ordered by the Lord. And Lord, you've ordained
our steps, and they'll end eventually in glory, where we shall take
again the image of the heavenly. And as we have borne the image
of the earth, we shall bear the image of Christ, our Savior. In His name we pray with thanksgiving
and with worship. you