Noah: Plan of Salvation

Scripture: Genesis 9:8-17

Genesis 9:8–17 NIV

8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you 10 and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.” 12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” 17 So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”

1/14/2024

Order of Service:

Announcements

Opening Worship

Mission Moment

Prayer Requests

Prayer Song

Pastoral Prayer

Kid’s Time

Offering (Doxology and Offering Prayer)

Scripture Reading

Sermon

Closing Song

Benediction

Special Notes:

Week 2: Mission Moment

Bethel Mall

Opening Prayer:

Lord, thank You for Your mercy and grace that allow us to seek You today. As we gather to worship and honor You with our prayers, praises, and words of encouragement, open our hearts and teach us to honor You with our lives. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Noah: Plan of Salvation

Cerro Gordo Lake

Owens Lake is being refilled.

Owens Lake is a dry lake on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Inyo County, California. Unlike most dry lakes in that area that have been dry for thousands of years, Owens held significant water until 1913, when much of the Owens River was diverted into the Los Angeles Aqueduct, causing Owens Lake to dry up by 1926. In 2006, 5% of the water flow was restored. As of 2013, it is the largest single source of dust pollution in the United States.

This year, though, the water is being redirected back due to excessive rains and flooding in the last year that have caused problems in the Los Angeles area. A new stream is flowing through that desert, and new life is growing around it. One of the area developers commented that he has yet to see the desert burst into full bloom the way it is happening in other areas of California. Still, he is hopeful that he may soon be able to look out and see miles and miles of flowers growing up across what has been a barren wasteland for his entire lifetime.

There are always differences of opinion between those who favor urban areas versus those who prefer rural places. The people who grew up in the small mining towns that became ghost towns may have harbored some ill feelings toward the Los Angeles area for taking away their water supply — a precious resource in the desert. Some might even think that the recent floods they have dealt with are God’s way of giving them justice for taking their water. It may be God’s justice that they are sending the water back to where they took it from originally to keep their land safe now.

There is a sense of mercy for the cities as well. They are not stuck in perpetual flooding. Because there is a mechanism to turn the water back, they can be spared further flooding if they choose to do what is right and necessary.

Cerro Gordo is a ghost town built around a silver mine in this area. They have struggled to get water into the area for many years, and the lack of those resources kept them small even when people were living there. Some might say they have received justice because the water has been rerouted back into their area. Others might say they received mercy because it is a ghost town, and the need is no longer there. This new water source is a blessing to a few people and the wildlife in the area.

When done correctly, justice and mercy are two sides of the same coin. Justice sets things into the right relationship, and mercy promotes growth in that relationship without causing further injustice.

Last week, we discussed God’s first covenant with us: giving us a purpose to tend creation for and with Him. Today, our scripture adds to that covenant that God gives us both justice and mercy.

God’s Justice

Sin acts like a snowball rolling down a snowy mountainside. It may start small and insignificant, like ignoring a command and eating fruit from a forbidden tree. Over time, though, it grows, especially if it is not dealt with and corrected quickly and sufficiently. Within one generation, the sin of disobedience had flourished and became murder. Within the next generation, the people were boasting of the violence they did to one another.

Murder is wrong, and violence is terrible whenever it occurs because it is an act of destroying all that God has created as good. What makes this sin worse is that it was perpetrated by the very people whose sole purpose was to care for creation and help it grow. Murder is the opposite of being fruitful and multiplying, and it spits in the face of God and all that He created us to be.

So God looked down and saw Noah, one man who was not running with the rest of the crowd, as that snowball of sin became an avalanche that threatened to undo all of creation. He called Noah to tend to creation again in a plan to save a part of creation and regrow it from there.

Noah was called to help lead this first plan of salvation, not because he was without sin, but because he was willing to obey God. And that obedience was tested because God called him to build a giant boat to hold his family and a selection of animals from the area. I’m sure Noah felt it was odd to collect and put all those animals on the boat, but that was not the strangest part of this work for God. The ark itself was a new invention, and the flood threat was unimaginable because, at that time, it had never rained. The scripture tells us that instead of coming down from the sky, the water came up from the ground in springs to water the earth around them. Noah and the rest of the people living then had never experienced lightning, thunder, and torrents of raindrops from above.

Why did God send the flood? Because He could no longer tolerate the evil and injustice, the sin that had overtaken His creation. To sit back and do nothing would not only allow innocents to suffer, but it would also allow innocents to be turned into perpetrators as they sought revenge against those who sinned against them. So, as in the case of the water rerouted back to the deserted lake, this justice of God, this flood, put an end to the avalanche of sin in a world that was created very good and then gone wrong, and it restarted everything back to the beginning.

Again, justice is not about punishing wrongdoing. It is about setting things back into the right relationship. This is important to God because when the people and pieces of His world are not in the right relationship with Him and each other, they start to fall apart, and their brokenness ripples across everything they touch like shattered glass. When one part of creation hurts, we all hurt. We don’t always feel it immediately, but eventually, it affects our lives.

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God’s Mercy

That is why mercy is the other side of justice. Mercy happens when people work to grow a relationship from a healthy foundation. That is why our whole system of justice, at its best, is about more than rules. Two people may be guilty of the same crime, but the judges and juries may decide on different sentences to give them based on their situations. Those who are defiant and unrepentant typically get harsher sentences than those who recognize that they have done wrong and seek to make amends. Mercy follows after the initial sentencing date as people are routinely given parole hearings and the opportunity for a limited release back into normal life.

The ideal situation is that both the victim and the innocent party can get into at least as healthy a relationship as before the injustice occurred, if not better. The challenge we often face is when there is not enough money, time, or other resources between the victim and the guilty party to make things right again. Usually, mercy requires someone outside to intervene. Sometimes, someone outside the situation has to stand up and volunteer to pay some or all of the penalty of the guilty person so that there is a chance for redemption.

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God showed mercy by choosing Noah and asking him to build the ark so that anyone willing to heed the warnings would be saved. He did not specify that only the innocent could board the ark. He did not limit them to those with few or minor sins on their record. He only asked that they obey him, and those who did were spared the flood of justice that rained down and cleansed the earth.

Then, God did something new. He set the rainbow in the sky as a sign of his new covenant promise with Noah and all who followed after him. He promised that He would never flood the earth like that again. No matter how bad we all got, God would hold back and find other means to deal with the problem of our sins.

That was mercy because Noah and his sons sinned again shortly after they got off the ark onto dry land. The people of the world got worse over time. A lot worse. The seeds of sin and temptation within one generation sprouted in the next and bore fruit into every generation that followed. Indeed, sin flourished throughout the scripture and still today, so much so that each generation has its own weeds filling its gardens. It doesn’t matter if they are different kinds of weeds; we all have them, and they must be plucked out.

So how do we get into God’s plan of salvation, redeeming and restoring us to the purpose for which He created us: tending His creation for and with Him?

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Faithful Obedience

First, we need to be faithful to what we know. If you have a Bible or access to the internet and can find the bible online or on your phone, you have more than enough to get you started following God faithfully. If you have any trouble getting started, please come and talk with Bekah and me or come to one of our bible studies or Sunday school classes. We would love to help you get your footing and encourage you as you follow God daily. It is not easy, but God provides.

You will see in the scriptures that God actively pursues those who seek Him and guides their lives with the power of the Holy Spirit so that they are saved from the full justice we all deserve for our sins and instead are redeemed by facing the life-changing consequences with our savior beside us. God knows we cannot take on life alone, and He does not leave or forsake us.

Second, we need to be open for God to grow that good relationship He saves us into. When He scoops you up from the fires and floods, He places You on a good foundation in Christ. That is not the end of His plan for salvation, though; it is just the beginning. From the beginning with Adam and Eve, He intended to tend creation with us and help us grow in our relationship with Him and each other. The minute we decide we can handle life by ourselves is the minute we step off that solid foundation and fall back into the fiery flood again. But we don’t want to spend our lives standing still either. Nor is that God’s desire for us. Instead, He wants us to grow from that perfect foundation He has placed us on.

When we follow God in what we know and seek His presence to grow us in that saving, redeeming relationship, He will lead us into new growth in and around us that will exceed our best hopes and dreams. If we try to build our lives on our own, by our own means, expecting God to follow us and fulfill our desires, we will quickly discover that is not what salvation and redemption look like and find ourselves in need of His saving grace to get us back on His plan. If you give Him your best, He will provide the rest.

Closing Prayer

Heavenly Father,

We know that You created each of us with purpose and love, and yet we act too often as if we live only for ourselves. We think only of living for the pleasures of the flesh, power, and pride. When we consider Your purpose in our lives, we often draw a blank because we haven’t sought You out enough to know or understand it. And if we are honest, we often don’t want to give up our small lives enough to seek out the life You intend us to live. We would rather focus on not breaking a few rules than following You into saving grace and new purpose.

Thank you for seeking us out in the midst of our sins. Thank you for showing us the futility of a life without You. Thank You for judging us when our sinful nature brings harm instead of healing to those around us. Thank You for seeing more in us than we see in ourselves.

Lord, in Your mercy and grace, please forgive us and fill us with Your Spirit and Strength today as we follow the commands You have given us and seek Your presence to lead and guide us to grow closer to You today and every day.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.