Please turn in your Bibles tonight
to Luke's Gospel and the third chapter, Luke chapter 3. You'll notice in these verses, you will find a lot that says
something about which was the son of, which was the son of,
which was the son of, and it goes on for quite a while. But this is actually the earthly
genealogy of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I do imagine that if we were
able to look at each one of these characters, at each one of these
names, in this genealogy we would see something that God was picturing
for us that would come to his people through the Lord Jesus
Christ. But I just want tonight to jump
into one of these verses and notice one of these men, this
unique man that we find in verse 37. It says, which was the son of
Methuselah, which was the son of Enoch, which was the son of
Jared, which was the son of Maliel, which was the son of Canaan. The man that we meet first in
that verse, his name is Methuselah. And before we read about him
in Genesis 5, you can be turning there, but before we read about
him, I want you to think about his name. What his name actually
means. It means something like this. When he is gone, it will come. Someone else defined it in this
way. He dieth in the sending forth. Or when he dies, there shall
be an emission or sending forth of the waters upon the earth
to destroy it. The it here is the flood, or
that judgment of God that we call the flood. And this man is used to teach
us something. You know, the scripture says
that these things were written for our admonition. those of us upon whom the end
of the age shall come. They were not written for those
Old Testament saints so much, but written for those of us who
are New Testament believers. And the first thing that we notice
is this. As I said Sunday, there is a
sure judgment of God. The sure and certain judgment
of God against sin. There came a time when he did
die and the flood of God's wrath came upon all the inhabitants
of the earth. He did die, and it did come,
and that is a picture of how sure and how steadfast the promise
of God is in judgment as well as in grace. But I feel like that more than
that, He gloriously pictures the long-suffering and the mercy
of God. Turn over to Genesis chapter
5, and let's read about the actual account concerning Methuselah. In Genesis 5 and verse 21, Just as we read it there in Luke
3, it says, an Enoch lived 60 and 5 years and begat Methuselah. An Enoch walked with God after
he begat Methuselah 300 years and begat sons and daughters. We don't read about so many of
them. But God gave us this son, and
we notice in it, he says something. It says, and all the days of
Enoch were 365 years. And Enoch walked with God, and
he was not, for God took him. And Methuselah lived 187 years
and begat Lamech. And Methuselah lived, after he
begat Lamech, 702 years and begat sons and daughters. And all the
days of Methuselah, were 969 years and he died. All
the days of Methuselah were 960 years. Now we're a bit astounded if
somebody lives to be a hundred. A hundred and five, a hundred and
ten maybe. This man lived nine hundred and
sixty years. And when we read about God in
the book of Exodus, in his dealing with Moses. It says, and the
Lord passed by him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful
and gracious, long-suffering and abundant in goodness and
truth keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression
and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty. You remember Moses wanted to
know something about God's greatest glory. And it was, as it was
revealed to him, his sovereign mercy. It was the fact that,
as he says here, he's long-suffering. We read about it again in Psalm
86. He says, but thou, O Lord, art
a God full of compassion and gracious, longsuffering, and
plenteous in mercy and truth. I say that this man is a picture
of God's longsuffering because he lived the longest of any man. His name means, when he is gone,
it will come. The flood of God's judgment will
come. But God who appoints the hour
and the time and the place and the instrument of death, as I
said Sunday in Hebrews 9, 27. It is appointed unto man once
to die, and after this, the judgment. Well, this was literally true
about Methuselah. And God who sets the bounds and
the habitations of men, because judgment was to come immediately
after his death, he caused him to live the longest of any man
ever." 960 years. God waited, and he withheld judgment
in mercy. Look over in I Peter. I Peter chapter 3 and verse 20. where Peter is writing something
about this very thing, a thing he'll take up later in his next
epistle. But here he says in verse 20,
which sometime were disobedient when once the long-suffering
of God waited in the days of Noah. while the ark was a preparing
wherein few, that is eight souls, were saved by water. God extended this for nine hundred
and sixty years wherein the ark was being built, and Noah, who
is described as a preacher of righteousness, was preaching
to that generation. And the ark was built, and eight
souls were saved. Well, Eight doesn't seem like
very much in today's evangelism. But the truth is eight, and I
often have wondered about the number of eight when the number
of completion seems to be in the Bible the number seven. But this salvation, this deliverance,
depended on this seven being connected with the one, the Lord
Jesus Christ. And eight souls were saved. How many souls does God have
to save to get glory? It isn't the amount of people
that he saves, but his glory lies in this, that he saves all
he purposed to save. And not one of them shall be
lost. His glory lies in that the one
he sent, the one that entered into covenant to save this people,
He saves every one of them. He saves that complete number. Well, why did God wait as we
see Him? Why is God long-suffering, especially
when you think about it in this day and time in which we live,
where there is so much open, blatant wickedness? and ungodliness. When a man can slay 58 or 59
people and wound 500 more, and all over the world is going on
such things as this, why does God wait? Well, I'll tell you one thing.
He waits to show his sovereignty and to exercise his rule and
right over all his creatures. Men can't stop things like this. Men can't hurry the purpose of
God. Men can't get glory in anything
that's done. We think about how they have
extended the health and the age of people. Enoch, that we just read about,
he lived 365 years, and sin has brought man downhill, not uphill. God does all things. When it
pleases Him, He does all things, and yet in such things as we
find in the news in our day that we draw back at and we see that
it is such wickedness, God lifts the restraints of men to be what
they will in order to show mercy to us. You know, you read in the book
of the Revelation, it says that God sent this judgment of fire
and it scorched the earth and burned people. That's all that
judgment is. That's all that fire typifies
there. It's the judgments, the premature
judgments of God that are sent. But it says that they cursed
the God of heaven and repented not to give Him the glory. And so while all this time, the
wickedness of men, the accountability of men, multitudes of them, it
just builds and builds and builds. But all the time, man cannot
do anything that God will not let him. You think that this was an odd
event? You think it was a rare event? There is no telling how many
in this world tonight have in their heart and mind to do the
same thing. Why don't they do it? Because God restrains them. God
restrains them. We have this evidence all around
us every day, here and there, and by this deed and the other,
what's in our own hearts, the wickedness that is natural to
us if God leaves us to ourselves. He waited to carry out His eternal
purpose. His will and His plan in sending
the Savior. He always waits. It says, in the fullness of time,
God sent His Son. In the building of that ark,
in the appointed times of the sacrifices, Likewise, He had
appointed the time of the sacrifice. And nothing's going to happen
in this world that's going to hinder the coming of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and nothing is going to hinder Him from coming
or doing that which He came to do. which was to save his people
from their sins. But God, in Methuselah's day, in this
day, and every day, because there is in every age a remnant according
to the election of grace, God restrains, God carries on,
God causes this world to go on in order to save all of His people. He shows Himself long-suffering
in the salvation of His elect people, and we know this because
He said so. I guess you're being hindered
since now you've been put in prison. I guess God has let things get
a little bit out of control and now you've been cast into the
prison and there won't be these opportunities to stand and to
preach and to go into these various places. All of your evangelism
will be stopped. No. Paul says, I endure all things
for the elect's sake. I'm down here in prison. I'm
in chains. I'm in deprivation. I'm in the
cold. I'm in bondage for the elect's
sake. In other words, we know of so
many that he preached the gospel to there. to the Philippian jailer, to Onesimus. You see, that's where God's people
were, and his messenger was sent to them. And what seemed to be
wrong, what seemed to be things run amuck, that was just exactly
the purpose of God. You see, all we see God bringing
to pass and permitting in this present time is God being merciful,
being long-suffering to those He purposed to save through Christ
before the world began. Not many people today know that
God has a people. But He knows. It says, the Lord knoweth them
that are His. They're already His. They've
always been His. He's loved them with an everlasting
love. He chose them in Christ before
the foundation of the world. He gave them to His Son to be
their Savior and surety and Redeemer. Turn over to 2 Peter. 2 Peter chapter 3. 2 Peter chapter 3. Now this is
Peter. He's taken up his message again
in the second epistle. As a matter of fact, his message
is the same. And it's the same as Paul's.
And it's the same as all the other apostles. And it's the
same as every gospel preacher that's ever been. Listen to this. 2 Peter 3. This second epistle,
beloved, I now write unto you in both which I stir up your
pure minds by way of remembrance. Now let's, before we go any farther, look back over at chapter one
and verse one and see who this letter is addressed to. Simon Peter, a servant and an
apostle of Jesus Christ to them that have obtained like precious
faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ. Because of his righteousness,
they've received the gift of faith. to those that have obtained
light, precious faith." Now that's who it's written to, okay? Come
back now. Verse 2, "...that ye may be mindful
of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets,
and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and
Savior, knowing this, that there shall come in the last days scoffers
walking after their own lusts, saying, where is the promise
of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep,
all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. That's what they say. But God says it's a lie. For this, they willingly are
ignorant of. They want to deny this. They want to forget it. They
want to be willingly ignorant of that by the word of God the
heavens were of old and the earth standing out of the water and
in the water whereby the world that then was being overflowed
with water perished. They want to forget that. They
want to forget that judgment that's coming. That judgment
that is by fire this time, not by water. But the heavens and
the earth, which are now by the same word, are kept in store,
reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition
of ungodly men. They look, they say, well, it's
not coming. Hadn't come for 50 years, hadn't
come for 100 years, oh, it's not coming. Don't you imagine
that they did that in Methuselah's day? Noah, this fellow, this preacher
of righteousness has been saying, there's only one way to be saved,
there's only one way to escape, there's only one way to be delivered
from the judgment of God. You've got to get in this ark
that I'm built in. Look at verse 8. But beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord
as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. That means that all the so-called Christian numerologists, all
the prophecy schemes, all the charts and stuff, it's a bunch
of baloney. Because they cannot compute God's
time. They cannot. But notice verse
9. The Lord is not slack concerning
his promise." You see, he promised judgment
and he delivered. And he's promised mercy for some
people and he will deliver. As some men count slackness but
is long-suffering. Long-suffering. to usward. To everybody? No. But to usward. To his people. To those he gave
to Christ in that covenant. To usward, not willing that any of the usward should perish,
but that all should come to repentance. So as time goes on, the purpose of God goes on, the
long-suffering of God goes on, causes this world to stand, causes
people to be born, causes things to happen, all reserving judgment for the wicked, but showing mercy and being long-suffering
to his people. Why hasn't he come? Because he
has not brought every one of his children to repentance. As a matter of fact, because
maybe they haven't even been born yet. So it will go on until such a
time that he has ordained the consummation of all things and
that last living stone is set into this building called the
church. It says, with shoutings of grace,
grace. Longsuffering that he might be
merciful to those he purposed to save, to those that he loves,
to those that he chose before the foundation of the world.
And look at verse 15. He says, an account that the
longsuffering of our Lord is salvation. I'm so glad he waited while I
was showing myself as his enemy. I'm so glad he waited and is
continuing to wait to call out every one of his sheep, an account
that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation, even as our
beloved brother Paul, also according to the wisdom given unto him,
hath written unto you." It's the longsuffering, mercy,
grace of God. That's our salvation. In Romans chapter 9 and verse
22, it says, What if God, willing to show His wrath and to make
His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels
of wrath fitted to destruction? He waits. But it's to be merciful. and
gracious to the vessels of mercy. Then that he might make known
the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy which he had
aforeprepared unto glory, even us whom he hath called, not of
the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles. Turn to one more passage in Isaiah
chapter 30. God's long-suffering. Oh, this man Methuselah, he caused
him to live 969 years before that judgment of the flood. And now we're facing, this world
is facing the judgment by fire. And He's still the long-suffering
God. Isaiah 30 and verse 18. I'll
read it to you in closing. And therefore will the Lord wait that he may be gracious unto
you. And therefore will he be exalted
that he may have mercy upon you. For the Lord is a God of judgment. Blessed are all they that wait
upon him. We're just waiting for him. We're
waiting, looking, and we know that the reason he's not just
raining down fire on this earth right now is because he's long-suffering.
He still has some people. Christ said, if I be lifted up,
I'll draw all to me. I'll draw them to me. Oh Methuselah. I wonder how many
more of those names and persons in that genealogy. I know a number
of the women. Show us His grace. Rahab. Bathsheba. But this man, the long-suffering
of God. Our Father, we thank you tonight
for your long-suffering, which is our salvation. Your long-suffering from that
time of the covenant creation and cross and your long suffering in this
hour. May you be pleased to save our
children and save our friends and save multitudes
as it pleases you of sinners just like we are. You'll get glory, all the glory
in what you do. You exercise your sovereignty
over this world that you might extend your sovereign grace.
Thank you. We pray in Christ's name. Amen.