Deep Dive - Genesis Part 3

God’s Covenant With Noah (And Us)

Genesis 9:1–7 “And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image. And you, be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.””

We see here that apparently God had intended humans to eat plants not meat, but now we are given every living thing to eat.

Also a warning is given that speaks to an early form of one of the 10 Commandments: if you shed another’s blood, then your blood will be shed by man.

But then we come to the Covenant promise:

English Standard Version Chapter 9

8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, 9 “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, 10 and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by

English Standard Version Chapter 9

8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, 9 “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, 10 and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by

As we’ve established I just love finding quotes from early Christians relating to what we are talking about and this next one is from a man named John Chrysostom, who was born in the mid-300s A.D., and devoted much of his life to writing about the interpretation of scripture.

Concerning this God’s Covenant here is Chapter 9, he says:

Ancient Faith Study Bible: Notes Chapter 9

God did not say that this massive disaster might come again to those who sin. Rather he said, “Behold, I make my

Ancient Faith Study Bible: Notes Chapter 9

God did not say that this massive disaster might come again to those who sin. Rather he said, “Behold, I make my

What I love is that he gives these synonyms for Covenant in the same thought.

Covenant - Agreement - Guarantee

We can easily forget that a “Covenant” has two sides. The classic phrase, “It takes two to tango,” well now you can remember “It takes two to Covenant.”

Continuing on in the text:

English Standard Version Chapter 9

12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: 13 I have set my

English Standard Version Chapter 9

12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: 13 I have set my

Two points I want to make here:

Covenants Have Signs Associated With Them

Covenants Have Signs Associated With Them

ark, rainbow, circumcision, bread and wine. God knows that it is easy for us to be distracted and forget things in this world, so He gives to us signs to help remember.

The Modern Misuse Is Not An Accident

Those of the world that are trying to profess sexual immorality chose this sign, and seek to co-op it for spreading their lies about our Lord’s design

Satan is always working towards an end where we are separated from our Creator for all eternity.

It has been said before, but I’ll say it again.

There is a reason they call it “Pride.”

English Standard Version Chapter 16

18  Pride goes before

English Standard Version Chapter 16

18  Pride goes before

Noah’s Descendants

English Standard Version Chapter 9

20 Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a

English Standard Version Chapter 9

20 Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a

Now I have heard all kinds of interpretations about this section, but I think the one thing that remains clear through them all is again another forerunner of one of the 10 Commandments.

Exodus Chapter 20, verse 12:

English Standard Version Chapter 20

12 “

English Standard Version Chapter 20

12 “

Ham did not honor his father, and therefore Noah cursed him.

This also shows us again this same idea that we saw with Cain last time: the patriarchs of lineage seem to prophecy the way in which their descendants will be. Not that they cannot change, but more likely because it is the nature of man not only to sin, but to wish to stay in that sin.

This brings us to the end of Noah’s life.

English Standard Version Chapter 9

28 After the flood Noah lived 350 years. 29 All the days of Noah were 950 years, and he died.

Nations Descended From Noah

Here in Chapter 10 we find another very thick section of genealogies concerning the sons of Noah.

This section stands to show just how many sons were born to the three sons following the flood, which in turn all of their sons fathered more and more sons.

Two notable names in this list are Nimrod and Peleg.

English Standard Version Chapter 10

8 Cush fathered Nimrod; he was the first on earth to be a mighty man. 9 He was a mighty

English Standard Version Chapter 10

8 Cush fathered Nimrod; he was the first on earth to be a mighty man. 9 He was a mighty

Now the famous early church scholar Jerome had the view that this designation of Nimrod being the first “Mighty Man” followed by all of these cities and lands shows that, in Jerome’s opinion, Nimrod was the first wide ruler over a large portion of the Earth’s population. Because it is in his city of Babel that our next story will take place.

This event is likely the cause of our next man to be named as he was.

English Standard Version Chapter 10

25 To Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was

English Standard Version Chapter 10

25 To Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was

Divided here is believed by some scholars to refer to the end result of the “Babel fiasco,” meaning not only divided in speech but in geography.

English Standard Version Chapter 10

32 These are the clans of the sons of Noah, according to their

English Standard Version Chapter 10

32 These are the clans of the sons of Noah, according to their

Here we see that the point of the extensive list of names and generations is to send home the point that these three men did in fact father every single nation of people that are present on the Earth from then until now.

The Tower of Babel

English Standard Version Chapter 11

Now the whole earth had one

English Standard Version Chapter 11

Now the whole earth had one

We see they come to the land of Shinar, one of the lands of our buddy Nimrod from the last chapter, and they decide to start making bricks and mortar to begin building larger and more elaborate things than they had previously been doing.

Why do they want to do this?

Three reasons:

Reach the heavens

Make a name for themselves

Not be dispersed

Then God decides to come down and take a look at this new project his creation is working on.

English Standard Version Chapter 11

5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. 6 And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” 8 So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD

English Standard Version Chapter 11

5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. 6 And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” 8 So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD

What is wrong with the picture that God sees when he arrives in Babel?

Is it that the people are working together? No.

Is it that the whole host of humanity is doing what it often does which is spend all of their time and energy on doing something that, in the end, will mean absolutely nothing, because we are being led by our own pride and short sightedness? Yes.

God said to go and multiply and fill the Earth.

We see this again in the New Testament don’t we? If you’ve been in our Sunday morning class, or if you had me last quarter in the teen class we see in the book of Acts that even though the Apostles are given the great commission to “go into all the world, preaching and teaching,” they’re all sitting in Jerusalem together still going to the same temple everyday.

That is until Stephen is martyred and the whole of the church, except the Apostles, is scattered to, as dad put it this morning, the suburbs. They begin to be scattered out into the rest of the world so that the will of God can be fulfilled.

And just as we see here that God confuses the languages of men, what was the main sign and miracle on the day of Pentacost? The sign we see continued in the New Testament as they take the Gospel to the world?

Speaking in tongues: being able to speak to one another and be understood by anyone from anywhere.

All for the sake of inviting all of creation to share in the body and blood of our savior Jesus Christ.

Shem and Terah’s Descendants

Finally we see, as we wrap up tonight, at the end of Chapter 11, the lineage from Shem to Abram.

English Standard Version Chapter 11

10 These are the generations of Shem. When Shem was 100 years old, he fathered Arpachshad two years after the flood. 11 And Shem lived after he fathered Arpachshad 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

Shem lived 502 years after the flood having sons and daughters, we can see how it would be very easy for three men to father all of the nations.

English Standard Version Chapter 11

27 Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered

English Standard Version Chapter 11

27 Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered

Here we are introduced to our next generation of major players in the larger story of Genesis.

Next week we’ll continue on starting in Chapter 12 with Abram, Sarai, and Lot.

But tonight as always we want to be sure and offer the invitation of the Lord.

The same invitation offered by those scattered from Jerusalem is still available today.

Believe in Christ Jesus as God, confess and repent from your sins and put Him on in the waters of baptism.

Or perhaps you simply needs prayers and encouragement from your spiritual family.

Whatever your need, come and make it known…