Battle For The Truth (Part 45)

Genesis 9:8-17, “And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, (9) And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you; (10) And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth. (11) And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth. (12) And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: (13) I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. (14) And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: (15) And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. (16) And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth. (17) And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth."

Introduction

The time has come for Noah and his family to leave the ark. Although I believe the sun was shining, I also believe there were a few clouds slowly moving across the blue sky. As stated in the previous message, parting the ark must have been simultaneously exciting and intimidating. Now the text does not give us detailed description, but the world that Noah and his family was entering was vastly different than the world they had last seen. It must have been exciting to see the changes to the terrestrial landscape: mountains had been pushed up higher and extended further, valleys were deeper, and great canyons such as the Grand Canyon had formed. In addition, the sky was different. The previous watery canopy in the sky that used to exist was now gone and the sun was more brilliant, and the intensity of its heat was more acute.

At the same time, it must have been intimidating to see the evidence of death and destruction all around them. Truly, the old world has passed, and a new world has dawned.

The Covenant

V.7-11, “And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, (9) And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you; (10) And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth. (11) And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.”

We saw in 8:20-22, that out of reverence and thanksgiving, “Noah built an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.” This act of worship pleased God, and He responded with this first of many covenants in Scripture. Biblically speaking, a covenant may be defined as “a contractual arrangement between God and a person, or between human beings, which required binding action from one or both parties; one party often had higher status in the arrangement.” Clearly, God is the party of higher status. Also, based on the fact that God already said in 8:21, that “...the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth,”it would be safe to say that without this covenant the earth would have been liable to one catastrophic judgment after another. Amen somebody.

For this reason, this covenant, known as the Noahic Covenant is unilateral and unconditional because the promises contained in it are not dependent on human obedience. God reiterates twice, saying “my covenant,” leaving absolutely no doubt as to His ownership of this covenant. From this point forward, God will make several more covenants and become known as the God who keeps covenant. Deuteronomy 7:9, says, “Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations;” Amen somebody.

Side Note: When I pause and meditate on the significance of this covenant, I am truly blown away. Why do I say this? Glad you asked. A covenant or promise is only as good as the ability of the party that’s making it to fulfill it and their trustworthiness to stand by their word. When man establishes a covenant or makes a promise, you cannot completely depend on it being fulfilled, because man and circumstances are prone to change. The court dockets are full of civil and corporate cases involving a breach of promise. Amen somebody. And I am in awe when I think about Who is making this covenant before us—it is none other than God. The same God of Genesis 1:1, who “In the beginning created heaven and earth.” Who said “light be”and “light was.” I love the way the psalmist put it in Psalm 33:9. The palmist said, “For He spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.” The same God who made Adam and Eve, placed them in His Garden of Eden, and blessed them to enjoy it and eat of every tree in the Garden except one—the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For eating of that tree would cause certain death. Well, you know what happened, Adam and Eve disobeyed and found out the hard way that God really does tell the truth. For they immediately died spiritually and eventually died physically. Nevertheless, in the midst of judgment, God made a promise. God promised that through the “Seed of the woman,” He would send a Redeemer to destroy the devil and redeem fallen man back to a right relationship to Himself. From that time forward, Satan has attempted to thwart God’s promise. When Cain killed his brother Able, and God cursed him for his crime, it seemed like all hope was gone, until God replaced Abel with Seth and the promise was revived. Then as man grew more corrupt, and “...every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually,” God determined to destroy the world that He created. Nevertheless, one man, Noah, who was of the line of Seth and walked with God like his great-grandfather Enoch, “found grace in the eyes of the Lord.” The same God who brought the flood is now making a covenant with Noah, his family, and all creatures of the earth. I am talking about that God.

Saints, what we see here on full display is God’s Love, Amazing Grace, Tender Mercy, Compassion, and Lovingkindness towards fallen man. Seeing how God demonstrated His love towards fallen man must have been shocking to the angels of heaven. Because, when Lucifer and the angels that followed him rebelled against God, God cast them out of heaven and condemned them to hell. Yet, when man rebelled, God had compassion on him and set in motion a plan of redemption. This caused David to write in Psalm 8:3-9:

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; (4) What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? (5) For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. (6) Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: (7) All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; (8) The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. (9) O LORD our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” In fact, regarding this matter of God’s gracious love for man, Peter says in 1 Peter 1:12 that, “...the angels desire to look into.” What a mighty we God we serve! Amen somebody. Let me move on.

The token

V.12-17, “And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: (13) I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. (14) And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: (15) And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. (16) And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth. (17) And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.”

Considering all that Noah and his family have witnessed and the changes in the climate, it would have been terrifying for man going forward each time it began to rain. After all, they had only seen rain once and that one rainfall destroyed everything, and everybody not found in the ark. Thus, now that clouds and rainfall will be part of the regular hydration cycle for the planet, God gave the rainbow as a token or sign of His covenant with man and beasts alike to not destroy the world again by a flood of water. Referring to the rainbow God said, “I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.” This is not to suggest that God is capable of forgetting, but only as an assurance to man that God is faithful to His word. Amen somebody.

Side Note: Today, the rainbow is very popular among certain groups that have adopted or hijacked it as a symbol of their ungodly lifestyle. They have a flag that is the rainbow in all its brilliant colors. These group’s claim of God’s rainbow is so intense that it has caused Christians and Jews alike to shy away from its use and simply ignore its ungodly redefinition. Now I am not suggesting that we start a culture or religious war over the ungodly use of the rainbow; however, we should not hesitate to articulate the biblical truth behind the rainbow and embrace it for what it is—a token of God’s gracious and merciful promise not to destroy the world again by water. Notice that He stipulated that He would not do it again using water. For the next time God will destroy the world by fire. We find this truth in 2 Peter 3:10-12, “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. (11) Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, (12) Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?” Amen somebody.

Conclusion

Let me close with this. I think we need to hit the pause button right here. Because, we have covered a lot of history, from Creation to the Flood, and now Post Flood. And the same question remains that we initially started with—is God’s word true or not? Was Noah a real person? Is it true that Noah, his wife, their three sons [Shem, Ham, and Japheth] and their three wives are the only remaining humans on earth or not? This is a critical question and far too often, we tend to rush by and assume that people (especially our children) believe it is true. Whereas in reality, many adults and children think that it is only a story, like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a fictional story. The fact is that the rest of redemptive history rides on whether these things are true. Understand that we cannot get to Jesus without going through Noah. For the promised Seed of the woman flows from Seth, through Noah, through Abraham, through Isaac, through Jacob, through Judah, through David, through Mary, through Christ. Amen somebody. There is an unbroken chain of truth from the Book Genesis to the Book of Revelation. Through them all, God remains faithful and true to His word. For Numbers 23:19, declares, “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?” “For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.” (2 Corinthians 1:20) And, Jesus, the Incarnate Word of God declared that “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.” The same Jesus who in John 2:19, made a promise to his enemies, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” They thought He was referring to the temple made of stone, but He was referring to “...the temple of His body.” The same Jesus began to teach His disciples “...that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” Hearing these words, His disciples began to be sad and troubled, but Jesus said unto them, “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. (2) In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. (3) And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. (4) And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. (5) Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? (6) Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” The same Jesus who hung on Calvary’s Cross until man’s sin debt was paid, died, and was buried in a borrowed tomb, and three days later rose from the dead and declared that “...all power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.” Affirming His identity as the Only Begotten Son of God, and that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Since these things are faithful and true, we may comfort one another with these words and warn others that they will not be able to escape the judgment of God, who has promised through His prophets and apostles that this world is doomed for destruction. And, as it was as in the days of Noah where the only survivors of the flood waters were in the ark, the only survivors of this world’s coming destruction are those who are in Christ. For His promises are true and trustworthy. Amen somebody. I love the way Bro. Russell K. Carter, expressed it in his 1886 hymn, Standing on the Promises:

Standing on the promises of Christ my King, Through eternal ages let His praises ring, Glory in the highest, I will shout and sing, Standing on the promises of God.

Refrain: Standing, standing, Standing on the promises of God my Savior; Standing, standing, I’m standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises that cannot fail, When the howling storms of doubt and fear assail, By the living Word of God I shall prevail, Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises I now can see Perfect, present cleansing in the blood for me; Standing in the liberty where Christ makes free, Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises of Christ the Lord, Bound to Him eternally by love’s strong cord, Overcoming daily with the Spirit’s sword, Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises I cannot fall, List’ning every moment to the Spirit’s call, Resting in my Savior as my all in all, Standing on the promises of God.

So, until next time, may the Lord God bless and keep you is my earnest prayer. Amen.