The Days of Noah
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1 Peter 3:18-22; Genesis 6
Am I willing to fulfill my pledge and commit to following Christ through injustice and suffering, no matter how high the flood waters may get?
Living with my mom, I expereinced many flood waters not of my making. It was hard for my mom to keep us afloat - a limited income, a debilitating disease, loneliness and a stubbornness toward God kept our feet wet. We had no faith in God in the home. Christianity was my mom’s parents and sisters faith. God essentially died to my mom when she had a barrel racing accident, damaging some disks in her neck. She never healed, but instead deteriated. She blamed her mom and dad for not doing more. I imagine God for not healing as she would have liked. She was left behind by a boyfriend, whom the plans were to marry, but she gave him an ultimatim to chose between God or herself. Eventually my mom married my dad, who was an alcholic, and she loved to spend money. It was not a healthy combination. Their marriage was miserable and short. I never knew my dad until I left home, was an adult and my dad a recovered alcholic.
Mom was diagnosed with Chrones disease, was married and divorced seven more times and lived the rest of her life in bitterness. Bitterness, I believe, results because of a feeling that you deserve better than what you have been dealt. I believe my mom felt like she was owed by God. That she deserved better. That she deserved a little bit of happiness. A little bit of what she wanted and desired. What did she do that she deserved to suffer as she had? I can project these thoughts because I experienced what she did as a kid traveling in her wake. Kids a pretty observant. We are watching when our parents aren’t looking.
Biggest thing that continually brought the flood waters upon us was my mom’s bitterness fueled by entitlement. A belief that I deserve everything that I want and have with no consequences. It emmanates from the deep waters of feeling slighted and being owed. In the case of my mom, God owed her a better life than what He dealt her. In may case, my mom owed me a better life growing up than what she provided. My parents needed to have things together before they brought me into this world. I would have been equiped to make better choices in this life if my mom and dad had been able to stay together. Feelings of injustice, lead to anger, which leads to bitterness, which ultimately leads to entitlement - the feeling of being owed.
Why is the world on fire today? Why is there division between people? Because of the feelings of entitlement, that we are owed. Albertans hate Quebec, and vice versa, because we see each other as being owed and entitled. First Nations people, of which I am Metis, feel owed and entitled because of past abuses, the Federal reservation system, and their treatment during the Residental school era. Black people feel owed and entitled, particularly in the United States, because of the past history of the slave trade and racial segregation. What about the Asian community, particularly Japanese Canadians, who lost all they had and were placed in internment camps, during WWII, in Canada, because of the color of their skin? Women, because they have felt devalued and unappreciated for what value they can and do bring to society, whether at home or in the workforce. And now we have the vaxxed and unvaxxed, the masked and unmasked - the entitlement to safety, freedom and the right to choose. Leaders playing with our senses and rights of entitlement to divide the people and enforce an agenda. Covid is real, with real people suffering, but the motivations behind Covid are sinister, endangering lives and dividing nations and families against one another.
Do you see the flood waters? Do you feel the flood waters rising?
The writer of Hebrews has this warning for us:
Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;
We are living in a world of bitterness. A world of broken hopes, dreams, desires and expectations. Intentional and unintentional. Jealousy of that which is around us and that we want and do not have. Frustration of that which we have known as good is now called evil; and that which was evil is now called good (Isaiah 5:20). Suffering - physical, emotional, spiritual, sociatal. The cause of mans bitterness? The rejection of God and His ways (John 3:36). No man or woman will have peace, nor experience continued favor and the grace of God without embracing Christ because all are under the curse of sin and death (Romans 3:10-18).
“Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
Why was the prostitute, that Jesus refers to as a woman, addressing her with value, forgiven of her past? Because she loved Jesus and believed in Him and what He said. As a result she received peace and forgiveness by the hand of Christ because of her faith. Because the woman was forgiven much, she loved much. Why is the world on fire? Because the Prince of Peace, the God of Love, and His ways, have been rejected. How can we expect peace in this world, when there is little to no faith in Christ? Where there is faith, there will be peace, even in flood waters. Where there is forgivenss, there is love and bitterness cannot grow.
The ultimate act of suffering brought the availability of peace to humanity’s souls. The ultimate oxymoron - suffering brings peace. In the world economy suffering results in anger, bitterness and entitlement…not peace.
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.
Do I believe this to be true? Do I believe that Christ will do this? Peter was assured of this and wrote it to his readers, suffering under persecution and villification. Why was Peter sure of this? Because Jesus has dominion, He rules having conquered sin and death on the cross.
To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
Then I saw One like a slaughtered lamb standing between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders. He had seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent into all the earth. He came and took the scroll out of the right hand of the One seated on the throne.
Jesus models what it means to suffer for doing good for the right things and experiencing ultimate vindication.
Peter writes to his readers about this fact proclaiming His ultimate victory over those who once followed Him and became bitter and disobedient because of God’s glory.
For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring you to God, after being put to death in the fleshly realm but made alive in the spiritual realm.
In that state He also went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison who in the past were disobedient, when God patiently waited in the days of Noah while an ark was being prepared. In it a few—that is, eight people —were saved through water.
Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the pledge of a good conscience toward God) through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Now that He has gone into heaven, He is at God’s right hand with angels, authorities, and powers subject to Him.
Story of Noah & the Flood (Gen.6)
Saved by obeying what God said
Saved by believing what God said
Saved by getting in the ark when it began to rain & staying there
Suffering - enclosed, crowded, isolated and lonely.
Christ’s Suffering led to Victory! (1 Peter 3:18-22)
The Crucfixion - made alive to the spiritual realm through death in the physical realm
Proclaimed victory to the disobedient of Noah’s day (The Fallen Angels - the Nephilim).
For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment;
And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day—
Proclaimation of victory, not evangelism. The word “kerysso” is used “to make an announcement”, instead of the word “evangelizo” which mean evangelizes” or proclaim the Gospel of salvation.
This is in opposition to the belief ‘Deseensus as inferos’ which teaches that Jesus went to Tartarus to preach the Gospel and give the departed a second chance at salvation.
The heresy of Universalism (Rob Bell, Unitarian Church) has thus come to life - the notion that no one need suffer for eternity, as God will grant salvation to all.
Jesus and Peter teach the opposite:
then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones,
Baptism - pledge of a “clear conscious” toward God
Baptism does not save one’s soul, it is a pledge to follow Jesus as Lord and a committment of clear conscience. To bear witness of a good standing before God with belief and faith in His son. Baptism is a symbol and pledge of one’s dependence upon Jesus and following of Him.
Baptism comes up here most likely because Peter is addressing the baptism of believers and reminding them of their pledge to maintain upright lives, even amongest the struggle of a hostile environment. Just because things get difficult does not mean we have allowance to dump God’s moral and ethical instruction and command to love.
Does not remove moral filth - Peter is addressing ritual cleansing and purification rites of various religions that by doing certain rites, people would be declared clean.
Baptism does not remove the moral filth from the believer; that is something that the believer needs to confess and receive forgiveness for daily and consciously (1 Jn 1:9).
Did I make a pledge to God to obey His moral and ethical demands? To live like Christ, no matter how high the flood waters get?
Christ is now Sovereign above all persons, powers, and principalities (1 Peter 3:21-22)
He has been resurrected…as we will be.
He now rules…as we will with Him.
Repentance leads to “new life” in Him, not defiance.
What do we have to fear? Fear He who has the power of both life and death.
Stop living in fear of Covid and government mandates. How big is our God? How powerful is He? How capable is He? What does He demand? Live by faith and in the power of the Holy Spirit, not by fear.
The ultimate question that we must be firm with our answer is this: Am I willing to suffer injustice and uphold my committment to Christ to live His way, not the worlds?
As a result of Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection, we have access to God the Father and sit at His right hand in Jesus.