well as I keep telling you the
Bible is a book of salvation that's what the Bible is book
about salvation that's what it's for it's not a book of rules
by which people ought to live and if only we would wouldn't
we have a nice society it's a book of salvation and it testifies
of Christ who is Christ? what does the name Christ mean?
it means saviour There was a hymn, wasn't there? When we call him
saviour, when we call him saviour, when we call him saviour, we
call him by his name. That's what it means. He is the
saviour of sinners that God has set forth. And why do we need
a saviour? Because of sin and the character
of God. God is of purer eyes than to
behold iniquity. You cannot look upon sin. So
it's a book of salvation. and it testifies of Christ. Jesus
himself said, these scriptures, they testify of me. What an amazing
claim. The more I roll that over in
my mind, the more it staggers me. That there is a man, who
to the Pharisees didn't look like anybody, just an ordinary
man. And there he is saying, what
a claim. These scriptures, what are they
talking about? They're talking about me. Because
who is he? The Christ. the Christ, the son
of the living God, the one set forth to be the saviour of sinners. And he's set forth, salvation
is set forth in pictures, in types, in events, in people,
in places, in the scriptures. Salvation is set forth. A city
is a picture of salvation. What do you mean? The cities
of refuge are pictures of salvation. They're pictures of salvation.
The temple is a picture of salvation because everything in it speaks
of Christ and what he accomplished to save his people from their
sins, and it's no more clearly set forth than in Noah and the
Ark, the account of Noah and the Ark. people in society out
there today if they knew that we were here talking about Noah
and the Ark, well they'd say you're in the realm of myths
nobody believes that nonsense these days, you're in the realm
of myths it's a myth that is a fascinating story for people
Lucas' age, that's what it's for it's for Sunday school children,
that's what people think it's okay so long as you don't take
it seriously No. It's God's confirmation to his
people about how he saves the people of his choice from the
just penalty for their sins. That's what the story, it's not
a story, the account, the truth of Noah and the flood, that's
what it's about. It's how God confirms to his
people how he saves them, the people of his choice, from the
just penalty of their sins. It may be very familiar You may
all know it well, I might even have spoken about it on a number
of occasions, but it's like a jewel. You know, if you pick up a precious
jewel, and you know you can have a glance at it and yeah that
looks nice yes but you only really start to see how beautiful it
is as you pick it up and you rotate it in the light and you
see the way the light catches different angles of it and you
see how beautiful it is you know like a gemstone this is a gemstone
in the scriptures the scriptures are a treasure chest of jewels
that display God's grace in salvation to his people. It's a jewel that's
worth handling again and again, and rotating, not in light coming
through the windows, but in gospel light, in the light that God
shines by his spirit. It's literally true. I don't
have the slightest doubt, it's literally true. Believe me, God's
word will be vindicated in the end. Those that say it's myth,
the vast majority of people who say it's myth, God's word will
be vindicated in the end. All of the geological observations
that they say proves it cannot be true, they do nothing in actual
fact to disprove a cataclysmic worldwide flood. It's only pseudoscience
that dismisses it, and do you know why they dismiss it? the
word of God tells us, Paul wrote to the Romans chapter 1 verse
28 he's talking about people who disbelieve and the reason
They did not like to retain God in their knowledge. That's the
reason. Why don't people like to retain God in their knowledge?
I'll tell you, somebody once told me, when she was arguing
the case for evolution, and she said, I hope evolution is true,
because if it isn't, it means that I am accountable to a God
who created me, and the thought of that appalls me. Well, yes,
it should appall you. If you're outside of Christ being
accountable to the God who made you, to whom you must give an
account, that's an appalling thought, but it is true. They
didn't like to retain God in their knowledge because they
don't like what that says. It says that God is just and
holy and judge and we're sinners. Listen to this verse, Timothy,
Paul wrote this to Timothy, 1 Timothy chapter 6 verses 20 and 21. He
says this, O Timothy, Keep that which is committed
to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, now listen
to this, and oppositions of science falsely so called. Do you know
when that was written? Nearly two thousand years ago.
Paul wrote the oppositions of science falsely so-called. We're living in the day of science
falsely so-called. We're living in the day of pseudoscience. Somebody put on Facebook the
other day, there was some colourful language which I didn't like,
went with it, but he said how much he loves proper science
and how much he utterly despises the pseudoscience that's all
around us today. Everything, political correctness,
all that sort of stuff. Pseudo-science dismisses the
account of Noah because why? Because it's science? No, it's
pseudo-science. I'll tell you, just bear with
me just for a moment. It's a philosophy. It's a philosophy
of life. And it's a framework that there
is no God, that there is no intelligent design of the things that we
see, that everything happened by blind chance, And this framework,
everything that they observe, they bend and twist it until
it fits that framework. You or I, if our philosophy,
if I can call it that, is that the word of God is true, and
that what God has said is true, I tell you, everything that we
see, I can just as easily fit to my paradigm without violating
proper science in any way whatsoever. Anyway, that's enough of an aside
on that. It's by faith that we believe
God's word. By faith, through faith we understand
that the worlds were framed by the word of God. Not through
science, or pseudo-science, it's by faith, and by faith we believe
these things. So what does Noah and the Ark
testify concerning Christ and the gospel of his grace? I've
got four points. Sin, the penalty for sin, salvation
from the penalty by grace and fourthly through the means of
a refuge through the means of a refuge, a saviour, a refuge
sin first of all look at chapter six of Genesis and the first
few verses see we've already had Noah who is born to Lamech
and so there's Enoch who we saw last week was the man who walked
with God and God took him without him dying when he was three hundred
and sixty five years old when they were all living 900 years
or thereabouts Enoch had a son whose name was Methuselah and
he was the one that lived to be the oldest of all of them,
I can't remember how much, 969 years was Methuselah and he died
and Methuselah had a son Lamech, so Lamech was the grandson of
Enoch and then the son of Lamech the great grandson of Enoch was
Noah and things were getting worse and worse and worse and
Lamech was, I think there's evidence here, Lamech was a godly man
and his son was born and he called him Noah because he said the
same shall comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our
hands because of the ground which the Lord has he said there's
sin everywhere but Noah His name means comfort, that's what his
name is, rest or comfort. Noah means rest or comfort, in
a violent world, in a world full of sin. Now by the time you get
to verse 32 of chapter 5, Noah was 500 years old, and Noah had his sons, Shem, Ham, and
Japheth. And we get into chapter 6, now
let's read the state of things. It came to pass, when men began
to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born
unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that
they were fair, and they took them wives of all which they
chose. And the Lord said, My spirit
shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh,
yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. There were
giants in the earth in those days. And also after that, when
the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they
bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were
of old, men of renown. and God saw the wickedness of
man was great in the earth and that every imagination of the
thoughts of his heart was only evil continually and it repented
the Lord that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him
at his heart and the Lord said I will destroy man whom I have
created from off the face of the earth. We'll stop at that
point. The earth was populated across
the whole face of the earth, they began to multiply on the
face of the earth. How many there were, I don't
know, but it was in the millions. They lived a long time, they
lived 900 years, typically. Many, many, many, you can imagine,
many, many, many children born to them. and multiplying like
a colony of fruit flies you see them if you start off with a
pair of fruit flies and you give them the right environment and
about three weeks later there's thousands of the things you know
that kind of thing the world was populated but there was a
godly line which believed the gospel Seth was one who believed
the gospel, Enoch was one who believed there was a godly line,
a minority no doubt, the vast majority didn't, the vast majority
went the way of their own hearts, and it says when men began to
multiply I think it's meaning the children of Cain. You know
Cain and Abel was of the godly line, who believed the gospel.
Cain wasn't. He had his own religion, his
own way. And it's men, the children of Cain, they began to multiply
and they had daughters. But the sons of God, meaning
those of the godly line started to intermingle. Do you remember
what God always said to the children of Israel? Don't intermarry with
the tribes, because they will take you away from your God.
The Jebusites and the Moabites, they'll take you away from your
God. Don't intermarry with them. He'd said the same to these.
They did. They intermarried and The product of them, it was a
dilution of the gospel of God's grace. Sin was just rampant,
absolutely everywhere. It was like going through, for
example, in Wales, a couple of hundred years ago, there were
chapels everywhere and the gospel was preached everywhere. throughout
that land. Now you go there, and you see
the ruins of those chapels, but you see no trace of anybody preaching
the Gospel of Grace, practically speaking, virtually non-existent. This is what it was like then,
there'd been a complete dilution, and sin was rampant, and when
it says in verse 4, it looks like it's saying, You know, these
were great and powerful and mighty men. These giants, these men
of renown, they were giants in sin. They were men of renown
in their wickedness. That's what they were. God saw
it. Look, the very next verse, God
saw the wickedness, that it was great in the earth. That's what
these mighty men were famous for. was wickedness on a scale
that matches anything you see in the world today and the Lord
had said my spirit shall not always strive, like the flesh
and the spirit strive together in Galatians 5 in the believer
there's flesh and spirit the spirit of God and the old man
of the flesh and the two are contrary to one another and just
as these sons of God were different, you are not of this world, you're
of the heavenly kingdom there was strife between them there
was tension between them and God said my spirit will not always
strive with man for that he is also flesh He said he's going
to die, because all flesh will die. You are flesh, he said to
Adam. In the day you eat thereof you shall surely die. Dust you
are, and to dust you'll return. He's saying, yes he's wicked,
but it isn't going to go on forever because he's flesh. But he said
this, I'm also going to put another limit on it. End of verse 3.
His days shall be a hundred and twenty years. That doesn't mean
they would now only live a hundred and twenty years. They were living
nine hundred years. Noah was five hundred years when
this account starts. No, it doesn't mean that, it
means in 120 years from now, that's the deadline. There's
a deadline coming, is what he says. 120 years. And that was
the space in which Noah preached to that generation. He said,
I'm going to destroy this earth. All flesh is going to die. He
repented, it's a term that sounds a bit like man speaking, talking
about God repenting. Of course, God doesn't repent
in the sense that he changes his mind. It's from a human perspective,
it looks like God has changed what he intended to do. He hasn't
changed, it's just using that expression, the sort of expression
that people would use. God looked, and having created,
said, I'm going to stop this. The sin is so rampant, I'm going
to stop it. Do you know, where does all this
evil come from? It comes from evil hearts. Verse 5, the every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. That was God's verdict. That's
God's verdict of us all by nature in our flesh. Every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil. In other words,
only contrary to the ways of God. continually, all of the
time. Where does it come from? It comes
from the heart. Jeremiah says, the heart is deceitful
above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? Somebody
knows it. Read on. I, the Lord, search
the heart. He knows it. God sees. God sees
what we try to hide. God sees it. It's deceitful above
all things, desperately wicked, but God sees it. Jesus said in
Matthew 15 verse 19, Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts,
murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile
a man and that's you and me in our fleshly nature as we are.
Have you seen what you are? Have you seen what you are? compared
to the holiness of the God who has created and upholds all things.
Job was singled out by God as a man who in moral uprightness
was in a league of his own in his generation. But when Job
saw what he was like compared with the holiness of God, Job
said, I am vile, I abhor myself, I repent in sackcloth and ashes.
you get a glimpse from God's perspective of how repulsive
you are, then you know that's the Holy Spirit speaking to you
and showing you what you are before God. God always brings
his true people, this is the mark, God brings his true people
to know this is what I am by nature before the holiness and
justice of God. you understand that God cannot
excuse you in your sin. That God cannot ignore that sin. He cannot overlook it. He's a
purer eyes than to behold it and overlook it. He must exact
the penalty that it's due. Sin demands a penalty. The justice of God demands a
penalty for sin. And what is the penalty for sin?
God pronounced it. The soul that sins, it shall
die. In the day that you eat thereof,
in the day that you disobey me, you shall surely die. It shall
die. Eternal separation from God.
It's not talking about annihilation. talking about eternal separation
from God. Jesus said, many times, in all
the things Jesus said about the gospel, this is how he described
hell. You know they say, I haven't
counted, that our Lord Jesus Christ spoke more to those that
heard him of hell than he did of heaven. And do you know how
he described it? Weeping and gnashing of teeth. That doesn't sound like a pleasant
existence, does it? Weeping and gnashing of teeth. It's hell. But we don't believe
God. We don't believe that God would do it. God wouldn't do
such a thing. Why? Because the God that wouldn't
do such a thing is a God of your own imagination. The God of your
own imagination is an idol. That's what an idol is. Something
that you've made up in your own mind. But the word of God testifies
this, right? Learn this from the account of
Noah. In Noah's day, God had said,
verse 7, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face
of the earth. Didn't he? He has said he will eternally
punish sin. He said it. How do we know he's
going to do it? He did it then. He did it then,
and the geological record is filled with proof that he did
it. He did it then. He overflowed
the world. Everything that breathed air,
every air-breathing thing died with a very few exceptions but
he did it it says in 2nd Peter chapter 2 and verse 5 he spared
not the old world that's what we no we didn't read that chapter
but it's in the same epistle he spared not the old world but
saved Noah the eighth person what he means is that he was
one of eight the eighth person it was his family it was his
wife his three sons and their wives, eight of them all together.
Those are the only people that were saved. God did what he said.
He saved just that tiny number out of the millions that were
over the whole face of the earth. And who was Noah? It says he
was a preacher of righteousness. A preacher of righteousness.
And how did he do it? Bringing in the flood upon the
world of the ungodly. People didn't believe the warnings
then, people don't believe the warnings now turn back to the
passage that we read earlier in 2nd Peter and chapter 3 2nd
Peter chapter 3 and let me read verse 3 down to verse 7 to you
knowing this first that they shall come in the last days we're
living in the last days ever since Christ returned to glory
we've been in the last days they shall come in the last days scoffers
People who pour scorn on what God says, walking after their
own lusts and saying, where is the promise of his coming? He
said he's going to come again, but he hasn't come again, has
he? Look, here we are, 2014, nearly 2015. We've been saying
it for such a long time. You know, we're fed up of waiting.
You know, we've waited for this train long enough, it's not going
anywhere. We might as well go home. This is what Scoffers say,
where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep,
since he said those things in the beginning, all things continue
as they were from the beginning. You know, there was a branch
of science called uniformitarianism. that there was no creation, that
everything just goes on, we don't need to bother about believing
in a god, that was a very popular theory not very long ago, of
course now, even now, the big bang theory has paid to that
because virtually everybody in science and pseudoscience believes
that there was a beginning and that there is going to be an
end at some stage because it will go through the cycle of
what these things appear to go through but they've said all
things will continue as they were from the beginning for this
they willingly are ignorant of people today they don't want
to believe this they don't want to retain God in their knowledge
what are they willingly ignorant of? that the word of God by the
word of God the heavens were of old what does that mean? God
said let there be light and there was God said let there be this
and there was God said by the word of God the heavens were
of old and the earth standing out of the water and in the water
before the flood there was land and there was sea whereby the
world that then was was overflowed with the water. It was overflowed
with the water and that world perished. That world perished
because they didn't believe God. They didn't believe. Why was
it destroyed? Why did it perish? Because of
its sin and the justice of God that had to exact a penalty.
But the heavens and the earth which are now by the same word
are kept in store, not for another flood, but reserved unto fire
against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." Don't
be ignorant of these things. One day is with God as a thousand
years. Don't go saying, oh, it's been
too long. A day is as a thousand years. Eternity is outside of
time. The purposes of God are all in
the control and hands of God. Sin is as rampant today as it
was then. They were all destroyed. God
took them all away. He spared not the old world and
He won't spare this world. People didn't believe then, nor
do they believe now, but the penalty for sin is certain and
coming. Jesus said this, you know they
say, oh I believe in Jesus, but I don't believe in all that Noah
nonsense. Jesus believed in all that Noah nonsense, if you want
to put it that way. Listen to what he said, Matthew
24 verse 37. But as the days of Noah were, just like it was then so shall
also the coming of the son of man be not a flood but the coming
of the son of man for as in the days that were before the flood
when Noah was preaching righteousness for a hundred and twenty years
whilst he built the ark when he was saying you must be righteous
for without righteousness no man shall see God pursue, follow
holiness without which no man shall see God you must be righteous
and the way of righteousness being in the Lord Jesus Christ
as it was in the days of Noah before the flood they were eating
and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage just as if
things were going to go on without any interruption until the day
that Noah entered into the ark and knew not until the flood
came just like what he's saying is this day is just like that
day They're disbelieving. They're not realizing the judgment
of God is coming. It came on them. The flood came
and took them all away. So shall the coming of the Son
of Man be. Will you listen to the warning?
Or will you pay no attention? Just as they did in Noah's day.
If you do here, and pay attention, this will be your crime, what
shall I do? To be saved from the penalty
for sin. What did Noah do to be saved
from the penalty of sin? He heard God's voice, He listened
to God, and he obeyed what God said. Why was that? Was that
because Noah was an inherently better person than the millions
of others that covered the face of the planet? No. We see. Verse
8. This is the key to this verse.
This is the key to understanding these scriptures. But Noah, all
the rest will be destroyed, but Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. You must read it that way round
because that's the way it is, in the original, that's the way
it's written. It isn't that God found grace in the eyes of Noah,
it wasn't that Noah was different from all the rest and had higher
thoughts of God than all the rest, no. Noah found grace in
the eyes of the Lord. It was God that was gracious
to Noah. God was gracious to him. God
is strictly just. Yet he is gracious to sinners
for no other reason than that he's gracious. You say, what's
the greatest glory of God? What's the greatest attribute
of God? And Moses asked God, show me your glory, your greatest
glory. Ah, my power in creation. Ah,
my power in miracles. No, what did God say? this is
my greatest glory, Exodus 33, 18, I will be gracious to whom
I will be gracious and I will have compassion on whom I will
have compassion and so Paul quoting it in Romans 9 says so then it
is not of him who wills nor of him who runs but of God who shows
mercy. God is gracious, his greatest
glory is his grace And as John Newton wrote in that hymn, what
amazing grace. Amazing grace, how sweet the
sound, that saved a wretch like me. Amazing grace. All, including
Noah, deserved death. The soul that sins, it shall
die. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. There
is none righteous, no, not one. But God was gracious to Noah
and his family. and his wife and his sons and
their wives, eight of them, all together. God's grace was the
cause of Noah's obedience. God's grace. So look in verse
9, these are the generations of Noah. Noah was a just man
and perfect in his generations and Noah walked with God. Is
that because Noah was very good? No. God was gracious to him.
He was justified. How was he justified? In the
Lamb. He walked with God. Like Enoch,
he looked to Christ. Like Abel, he looked to Christ.
Abel brought a lamb. He was justified in the lamb,
the blood of the lamb that satisfied the justice of God. He looked
to the atonement that God had revealed. He looked to the lamb
that was slain from the foundation of the world who was yet to come
in time to redeem his people. He was perfect. How was he perfect?
Perfectly obeyed the law of God. No, he was perfect in sanctification
in Christ. For Christ had set him apart
in his grace. Like Enoch, he walked with God. How did he walk with God? He
walked with Christ. That's how he walked with God.
He walks with me and he talks with me, a long life's now. How
does he do that? It's through Christ, who is the Word of God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God. He walked with Christ. Noah walked
with Christ then. That's how he walked with God.
He heeded God's Word. Hebrews 11 verse 7, by faith. by what he saw with the eye of
the Spirit given to him by the Spirit of God by faith, Noah
being warned of God when everybody else heard but took no notice
he heard and it cut deep into his heart being warned of God
of things not seen as yet moved with fear, with reverence for
God who spoke and he prepared an ark, a ship, a boat to the
saving of his house by the witch he condemned the world because
they ignored him they ignored his preaching he preached for
a hundred and twenty years but they ignored it and he became
an heir of the righteousness which is by faith he acted it
was working faith you know as James says you talk about your
faith I'll tell you which faith I believe is real faith it's
faith that works you're not saved by faith You say it's by works,
it's by grace you say, through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it's the gift of God, but genuine faith works. Genuine faith believes
God. Genuine faith fears God, in a
reverential, child-to-father sense. Believes God, and it works,
and he did, and he publicly witnessed, and he preached. And even for
that rejecting world, God didn't just immediately bring the flood
on them, he gave them space of a hundred and twenty years. That's
what that, in verse three, his days shall be a hundred, he'll
have a hundred and twenty years space for repentance. He'll have
a hundred and twenty years Even for that rejecting world, God
graciously gave 120 years of time for repentance. 1 Peter
3, verse 20. The long-suffering of God waited
in the days of Noah while the ark was a-preparing. While Noah
was building the ark, God waited. And there it was. He said he
was a preacher of righteousness. And even then, the gospel call
went out. to anyone that would hear, like
it does now, like it does now. What about you hearing this?
Will you heed his voice? God is giving space for repentance
now. How was Noah then saved? This
is the fourth point. How was Noah saved from the just
penalty? sin is a reality the penalty
for sin is real the grace of God is the only means by which
sinners are saved but how? there must be a means, God just
cannot say okay I'll pluck you up off the earth and take you
out of this flood how was Noah saved from the just penalty?
the answer that the account of Noah gives us in the scriptures
speaking of Christ was that it was in a refuge that bore the
penalty that everybody else bore instead of him, with him inside
it as it bore the penalty. God tells his people how he saves
them in Christ, by Christ bearing the penalty in their place with
them united in him. It's in a refuge. God said build
a refuge. Build a refuge from the judgment
that is coming upon them. To be saved from certain destruction,
you must be in the safety of the refuge. It was this ark.
And it was quite a big ship, I mean I'll speak in terms of
feet, what was it, 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, 30 feet high, I
think that's right, 45 feet high, something like that. It was a sizable ship, even for
them, a sizable ship, enough to keep what they needed to be
kept alive, that the gene pool of all air-breathing things,
people and animals and birds, all air-breathing things, the
gene pool of all those things were preserved there, in that
ark you know we see hibernation today, we see some animals still
hibernate for the winter they find it easier just to shut their
systems down and go to sleep for the winter I believe, I've
got no scientific proof, but I believe that hibernation began
with Noah's Ark where many of the animals, if not all of the
animals were put into a state of hibernation so they didn't
need so much food, it was a state for those months that they were
in there, that's where You know, you say, oh, how on earth did
they get through all of that time? Hibernation? How does a
hedgehog, in a cold winter, a hedgehog goes to sleep in October and
wakes up in March, you know? That's how it gets through the
winter. By shutting down its body system. And its temperature
goes right down and it doesn't eat. And it's in this sleep,
which is almost a sleep of death, but then in the spring it comes
back round. Anyway, just a... What I'm trying to say is, don't
go thinking that people are going to poo-poo this and say, oh,
it's just fairy stories. It isn't! Perfectly feasible.
This ark was able to bear the force of the storm of God's judgment. Do you know how? It tells us.
It was pitched. God gives the instructions for
making the ark, verse 14 onwards. Make it of gopher wood, rooms
you'll put in it, and you'll pitch it inside. Pitch, tar,
you know, waterproof, outside and inside. Do you know what
that's speaking of? Do you know what that's picturing?
What's that testifying of Christ? It's the blood of Christ. The
pitch kept the water out. The pitch stopped the boat from
being swamped by the storm of the wrath of God's judgment.
The blood of Christ cleanses us from all sins. The blood of
Christ turns away the anger of God. The blood of Christ makes
propitiation for the sins of his people. That pitch is a picture
of Christ's blood. propitiating the wrath of God. He bore the same storm of judgment
that sin deserves. The Ark bore the same storm of
judgment that swept away every air-breathing animal and bird,
every single one, that swept everyone else away It swamped
them all and it blasted against the ark and the waves I can imagine
billowing over but it was covered in pitch inside and out and so
it was buoyant. And so the Psalms, you know the
Psalms testify of Christ? You know they do, we looked at
some little time ago. Psalm 42 verse 7. There's David
writing, but who really is writing by the Spirit of God? All thy
waves and thy billows are gone over me. This is Christ. This
is Christ speaking. Of the waves and billows of the
judgment of God going over him, the ark of God, with his people
inside him, covered by his blood. The storm of the wrath of God
is kept out by the blood of Christ, just like the pitch on the ark
kept out the water that would have drowned them as well. Christ
endured the wrath of God against sin in the place of his people
with them safe inside. So Paul writes, I am crucified
with Christ. Yet I live, yet not I, but Christ
lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of Jesus Christ,
who loved me and gave himself for me. There was only one ark,
you can imagine, a world covered with people, but there was only
one ark, only one. There weren't two, there weren't
different designs, there was one arc designed by God, only
one. There's only one salvation. There's
only one Christ. There's only one way. He is the
way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but
by Him. No man rode out that storm other
than in that one arc that God had designed. There is none other
name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.
None other name, none whatsoever. For 120 years, Noah prepared
the ark. We read it, 1 Peter 3.20. The
long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah while the
ark was preparing, and he preached righteousness. He preached the
righteousness without which no man shall see God. he called
for repentance pointing to the only refuge, what are you doing
there's no sea here what are you doing you must have lost
your mind you're building this enormous great ark you know we
sometimes see people that go and build follies that have no
purpose whatsoever they're just somebody trying to show off to
show what he could build and they must have thought Noah he's
completely bonkers listen to what he's saying and he's building
this boat miles from the sea And he preached this calling
for repentance. Some of you have heard Christ
preached for many years, many, many years, like that generation
did. Would you be saved from the wrath
to come? When the Pharisees turned up,
John the Baptist said to them, what persuaded you to flee from
the wrath to come? You must be found in Christ. That's the only salvation from
that wrath. You must be found in Christ. Just as Noah's family had to
be in the ark, you must be found in Christ. So Paul said, I want
to be found in him. not having mine own righteousness
which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of
Jesus Christ. That righteousness which is through his faith, sin
debt paid and clothed in Christ's righteousness. There's only one
way in to salvation and in that ark, how many doors were there
in the ark? One. There's just one door. There's
only one way into salvation. Jesus Christ said, I am the door. John 10 verse 9, I am the door. By me, if any man enter in, he
shall be saved. Thieves and robbers try to climb
in some other way. He is the door. He is the only
way in. The ark's one window. It only had one window. It had
one window, it speaks of God's spirit through whom the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God shines in the face of
Jesus Christ. The ark has plenty of rooms,
we could go on and on, we could make weeks and weeks of sermons
out of this but don't worry I'm not going to. The ark has plenty
of rooms in Christ. How much grace is there? How
much blessing? Paul writes to the Ephesians,
every spiritual blessing in heavenly places is in him. Room. room aplenty God called his people
to come in look at Genesis 7 verse 1 and the Lord said to Noah come
thou and all thy house into the ark for thee have I seen righteous
I've made righteous before me in this generation come into
this ark the storm of judgments coming but you're going to be
safe from it in the refuge that God had provided come in and
verse 16 of chapter 17, look at the end of it. Who shut the
door? Who shut the door of the ark?
It says the Lord shut him in. It was the Lord that shut the
door. They all went in and the Lord shut the door of the ark
and the Lord shuts all of his people up in the Lord Jesus Christ,
union with him before the world began. No wonder the Psalmist
writes, blessed is the man whom you choose and cause to approach
you. Blessed is the man you choose
and cause to approach you. Blessed is the man that you make
willing in the day of your power to come in to the ark which is
Christ and be saved from the penalty for sin. We've run out
of time. This is a gemstone of gospel
revelation, it really is. This is God telling his people,
this is how he saves his people from wrath to come. And the more
you twist it, and the more you look at it in the light, the
more it reveals intricate and blessed beauty concerning salvation. and so it is with all of God's
word concerning Christ and salvation in him these scriptures he said
are these that testify of me