But God Remembered

Let's pray now and ask God the Spirit to open this text to us that we might see what He has for us today, what He has to teach us today. So let's pray. Lord God of heaven and earth, we come to you now because it's only by your grace that we will understand anything. We recognize that in our natural state we are blind, we are darkened, we are futile in our thinking, but because of the redemption that has come to us in Jesus and the fact that you have bought us and called us to him, we now have the book before us, the book of life that just opens up all of the world and the proper interpretations of everything to us.

And yet, Father, in your grace, we need you to teach us each what this says to us now. So help us as we look into your word. Help us for your glory and our good. In Jesus' name, amen. A number of years ago, our three oldest grandsons were at our house, Ryan, Austin, Tyler. and of course we were reading bedtime stories and we were on Noah's Ark. And so we read the story of Noah's Ark to them and this was the first time they'd ever heard the story.

They'd never heard it before. Well, the storybook, the Bible storybook chapter ended with Noah and the animals on the ark in the midst of the flood. and I asked the question, what do you think happens next? And the excitement mounted and one of them just said, do they fall off the ship? Well, what did happen? You know what happened. You've known what happened since you were two years old because this story is so familiar to us.

And I would say a more important question is, Why did God record this story and its particular details? Why is it here? Now, you recall that last week we began to answer that question. Last week we started to understand why God has included this in His Scriptures Why this story Why this detail And you recall as we saw in the last few weeks that the corruption of the earth by mankind had become so vast that it appeared that God's purpose of defeating Satan's seed and raising up the conquering seed of the woman, it appeared that that purpose had been thwarted, had been defeated.

But, as we noted, the Toledot, Remember, there's ten of them in this book. The book of Noah says, essentially, that God accomplishes his purposes through a righteous man who saves humanity and ushers in a new world. And we saw last week that he accomplishes that purpose through the judgment of the world and the salvation of Noah and his family. But the story is not over.

As the story moves on, it adds more color to the theme. When we last saw our heroes, they were in the ship. They were in this ark tossed about by the fury of a catastrophic flood. How does God fulfill His purpose? How in chapter 8, as we look at that, how does He fulfill His purpose through this righteous man? We get a little more nuance, a little more color, a little more expansion of the theme.

And here's what we find in chapter 8, that He fulfills His purposes by His faithfulness and His grace. Alright? As we move into the story and we see the whole purpose of this, that God accomplishes His purpose of conquering Satan's seed and raising up a people who will rule the earth, He is not thwarted. He accomplishes that purpose through saving of a righteous man and entering into a new world.

How does he do that with that man? We see in chapter 8 he does it two means, faithfulness and grace. Let's look at chapter 8. Beginning in verse 1, you follow as I read. But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth and the water subsided.

The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed. The rain from the heavens was restrained. and the waters receded from the earth continually. At the end of 150 days, the waters had abated. And in the seventh month on the 17th day of the month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat And the waters continued to abate until the tenth month In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.

At the end of forty days, Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made and sent forth a raven. It went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth. Then he sent forth a dove from him to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground. But the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth.

So he put out his hand and took her and brought her into the ark with him. He waited another seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark. And the dove came back to him in the evening, and behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth. Then he waited another seven days and sent forth the dove, and she did not return to him anymore.

In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth. And Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry. In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth had dried out. Then God said to Noah, Go out from the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your sons' wives with you.

Bring out with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh, birds and animals and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, that they may swarm on the earth and be fruitful and multiply on the earth. So Noah went out and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him. Every beast, every creeping thing, and every bird, everything that moves on the ark went out by families from the ark.

Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains seed time and harvest cold and heat summer and winter day and night shall not cease Here then is the next act in our story What do we see here We understand first of all that God fulfills his purpose by his faithfulness God will accomplish his purpose, he will fulfill his purpose by his faithfulness.

You notice the first verse of this chapter, but God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were in the ark? What's going on here? What's that all about? Did God bring catastrophe on the earth and for 150 days forget about them? And then suddenly he goes, oh, oh yeah, I forgot there's those people in that ark on the water.

Is that what he says? No, that's not what that means. It doesn't mean that God forgot and then suddenly said, oh yeah, those folks down there, I better do something about that. That is not what that term remembered means. We can see its use in the Scripture. There's tons of the use of this word in this way throughout the Old Testament.

Let's just look at three passages so you get kind of a flavor of what that means, but God remembered Noah. Look at Genesis chapter 19, verse 29. This is after Abraham had pleaded with God for the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. And it says in Genesis 19, verse 29, So it was that when God destroyed the cities of the valley, note, God remembered Abraham and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow when he overthrew the cities in which Lot had lived.

God remembered Abraham. It doesn't mean that God suddenly recalled Abraham. It means God had made a commitment to Abraham about saving Lot and whoever might be righteous in those cities. He was going to act because of that commitment. Look at Exodus chapter 2, verse 24. Exodus chapter 2, verse 24.

Same wording. And God heard their groaning. This is speaking of the children of Israel and Egypt. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. Again, it doesn't mean that God forgot about the covenant and suddenly after 400 years said, oh, that's right, I made a covenant with those people. It means that God is now going to act because of a commitment that he had made to those folks.

Exodus chapter 32, verse 13. In the midst of Moses' plea to God not to wipe out the people of Israel, Moses made this argument. He says to God, Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self and said to them, I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring and they shall inherit it forever.

Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants. Alright, remember that. In other words, it's not a mental recall, but rather acting towards someone because of a previous commitment. To remember is to act because I've made a commitment to you. And God had made a commitment to Noah. Remember in chapter 6, verse 18.

But I will establish My covenant with you and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons and your wife, and your sons' wives with you. I will watch over you. He remembered them because of that previous commitment. It combines the idea of faithful love and timely intervention. So thus when God remembered Noah, he remained faithful to his promise to him and his family to keep them from destruction.

So when it says that God remembered Noah and the livestock and the beasts in the ark, it doesn't mean he suddenly recalled those poor people being tossed by the waves. Rather, he was now going to act because of the commitment that he had made to them. He was going to be faithful to what he had promised. And God faithfully kept that promise to Noah by intervening now and ending the flood.

If you read these chapters all at once, you see there's this big build-up, okay? There's this great big build-up to the climax, and now right here, chapter 8, verse 1, is the hinge. And then the rest of the story comes, and it's just the opposite, receding from what we just saw. And so what we see now is the flood abating. Whereas before it was rising, we come to chapter 8, verse 1, there's the hinge.

Now everything starts abating. All right? So we see then that on the seventh month, the ark comes to rest in the Ararat Mountains. Probably somewhere in this area of northwestern Iraq, Soviet Union, Turkey, up in that neck of the woods. By the way, I don't care if anybody discovers Noah's Ark. I believe the word of God whether they ever find it or not It is intriguing but it not necessary all right So on the seventh month the ark comes to rest in the Ararat Mountains Three months later, the mountaintops become visible.

Ship runs aground, but it isn't until three months later that they see the mountaintops. In a little over a month, that is 40 days, Noah sends out a raven. It goes to and fro. It flies out, it comes back. It flies out, it comes back. It flies out, it comes back.

We don't know how many times. But until one time, that raven doesn't come back. Quite possibly, that being a bird that feeds on flesh, found lots to eat. And so he didn't come back. Then Noah sends out a dove over a 14-day period. He sends the dove out.

She comes back. He waits seven days. Sends her out again. She comes back with an olive branch in her beak. Sends her out. waits seven days, and then sends her out again, and she doesn't come back. That's interesting, isn't it?

And I think the writer does this on purpose. It's interesting that in these first few verses, up to verse 5, we have months covered, right? We have whole months covered in those first five verses. All of a sudden, it's as if everything slows down, and we focus in on Noah and a couple birds. And we spend how many verses on Noah and those birds? Right?

Why do you think he does it? This is a question I had as I studied this. Why in the world do we go from covering all these months with these verses and all of a sudden we slow down and we're just talking about Noah and two birds? What's happening there? Why does the writer do that? Well, I think one of the reasons why is to show how Noah witnessed the slow, unfailing, unfolding, progressive unfolding of God's promise.

Alright? It's just to show that he waited. He kept sending these things out. They kept coming back. He waited as the promise of God slowly but surely unfolded. Eleven months after the adventure started, Noah removes the cover, comes out on deck, and looks around.

He sees that the surface is dry, But he does not leave the ark. Not until the end of the 12th month did Noah leave and only at God invitation So if you add up all the numbers he was in that ark for a little bit over one year Talk about cabin fever Especially when you share the cabin with a bunch of animals. Wow. And after that long year in the ark, Noah and his family step out into a new world.

Why? And by the way, they don't step out until God tells them. When he removed the cover from the ark, it says the ground was dried out. But they stayed in that ark for another month until God said, it's time to leave. All because God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him. That's why they could step out.

Because God had remembered. God had been faithful. Now do you notice how Noah, please note how Noah responds to God's faithfulness. Noah responds to the faithfulness of God with faith. he responds to the faithfulness of God with faith all right he continues to respond by faith this is the character of Noah Noah is a man who lives by faith remember when God commanded him to build the ark how did he respond he responded by faith If we looked and saw how all those words of obedience were really expressions of faith.

As he did what God told him to do, believing that what God said was true. And faith fuels here his patience and his hope. They sat in the ark even after Noah could see dry ground. They sat in that ark in hope, knowing that God would ultimately rescue them. Even after a weary year in the ark, even after Noah sees evidence of new life outside, even after all of that, he does not move a foot outside of that ark until God tells him to go.

This is faith. He does not move until God says. He takes God at His word By the way that the idea of faith all right Taking God at his word all right Do you understand that? Too many people misuse the word faith. It's not faith that they usually talk about. It's foolishness, all right?

It's foolishness. I know of Christian institutions who have said, we're going to go into this multimillion dollar debt, But we have faith that God will help us pay that off. Based on what? That's not faith. What is faith? Faith is taking God at his word.

If God says so, and it seems impossible. If God says so, and you believe it, that's faith. So, faith is not just this leap in the dark. I will leap in the dark. If God says jump. Alright?

I will leap in the dark if God says jump. But if He doesn't say jump, then it's foolishness. You follow? Moses built an ark even though he'd never seen a flood. A huge thing. We looked at the dimensions a few weeks ago.

This huge thing in the middle of these plains when he'd never seen a flood. That would have been foolishness except for one thing. What? God told him to. So here he acts in faith. Through this whole thing he acts in faith.

They're in that ark. Knowing that God will rescue them. Why? Because he said he would. He was faithful to them. They respond in faith.

Now why is all this here? Well, you've already probably started to connect some dots. But let's think about that together. Consider the original audience. Who is the original audience here? Who is the original audience?

It's the Israelites, are they not? And where are they headed? They're headed to a new land, are they not? The promised land. The land that God had told them He was going to give them. A new world, if you will.

What must they do? They must believe. They must go. Believing that God will keep His promises. This is why this is here. But it's not just for them.

What about you? What about you who struggle day after day in the work world, losing steam as you watch your life ebb away? Well, you see, that's a pretty graphic way of putting it, isn't it, Pastor? I'm telling you, I was helping Lee, and Lee and Lydia bought a house, and so we all were showing up yesterday to tear out walls and tear out floors, and wow, after Lee said this morning, yeah, Tim was there for about half a day, and I'm thinking, half a day?

Was it only half a day? Because it sure doesn't feel like a half a day. At one point, I took a step and went through the floor. Yeah, you older people are going, oh. Because you know what that does. You're 59, your foot hits the ground underneath the floor, and it's like this jar.

It's like a shock. You young people, you'll know someday. But the point is, you go to work every day, and you see and feel your life ebbing away. Right? And you're still showing up for work. and man, it's just harder and harder and harder and harder. What about you who have difficult marriages, maybe even facing fear and confusion?

Sometimes, folks, honestly, I about weep when I sit with folks and try to help them sort out some things and as I talked to someone like this last week and it just broke my heart and you say, man, this is hard. Fear and confusion here. It's hard. And some of you, what about you who this year is going to learn that you have a terminal illness? What about you?

What about all of us who day after day live in a fallen world, seeing the cruelty, the never-ending violence, the heartache that just comes with living in a fallen world, and the older you get, the more you see it. What about that? Do you believe that God is taking you to a new world? Do you lose hope when it seems that the unfolding of His promises just seems so slow?

Will His purpose be thwarted or will He remember you? Surely He will remember you. He will surely act faithfully toward you and keep His promises If you ever read the book of 2 Corinthians if you ever want to get inside the head of the Apostle Paul read 2 Corinthians It the book that tells you the most about the man from the inside And in the very first chapter, he writes that the trials were so intense for him that he at one point despaired even of life.

Now you talk about being low. You come to chapter 4, He uses terminology like hard-pressed, but not crushed. Right? Persecuted, but not abandoned. He uses this terminology that says, man, this is tough. And after talking about this sparing even of life and all these difficulties, he wrote these words.

For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not yes and no, but in Him it is always yes. For all the promises of God find their yes in Him. I love that. For all the promises of God find their yes in Him. That is why it is through Him that we utter our amen to God for His glory. Do you see what he's saying?

Here's Jesus. He's the guarantee. all of the promises of God are yes in Christ. How do you know that this is not just this grueling, fallen world in which there is ever going to be any relief? We know it because there's a new world coming. And I know that because God nailed His Son to the cross and raised Him from the dead so that all the promises of God are yes in Christ.

He will never renege. and so how do I know that God is faithful I know it because of his son and God will accomplish his purposes because he is faithful in fulfilling them now that's not all that we read we come to the last few verses verses 20-22 we see now the family and all the animals in the ark step out into this new world and here I think you need to understand that God fulfills his purpose by His grace. He fulfills His purpose by His grace. What is it that Noah does?

What is the very first act in this new world What is it It worship It worship After this marvelous revelation of God faithfulness Noah's first impulse was worship. Notice, as the story begins, Noah builds an ark. As the story starts winding down to its conclusion, Noah builds an altar. and this offering he has expresses reverence devotion and even atonement because it is a burnt offering now of course Moses is using terminology from where he's living and putting it back that back down there in that previous age but he wants you to get the story Moses offers a burnt offering Turn over to Leviticus chapter 1 if you want to know the significance of a burnt offering.

A burnt offering was the whole animal. Leviticus chapter 1, let's just read the first nine verses. This talks about a bullock and then later on something from the herd. Then we'll talk about sheep or goats and then birds. Same thing, get the idea. Verse 1, Leviticus 1.

The Lord called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When any one of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of livestock from the herd or from the flock. If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish. He shall bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting, that he may be accepted before the Lord.

He shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him. What he's doing there is symbolically transferring his guilt and his sin to this offering. And then that animal dies in his place. You see? Alright? And it will be an atonement for him.

Then he shall kill the bull before the Lord. And Aaron's sons, the priests, shall bring the blood and throw the blood against the sides of the altar that is at the entrance of the tent of meeting. And he shall flay the burnt offering and cut it into pieces. And the sons of Aaron and the priests shall put fire on the altar and arrange wood on the fire And Aaron sons the priests shall arrange the pieces the head and the fat and the wood that is on the fire and on the altar But its entrails and its legs he shall wash with water And the priest shall burn all of it on the altar as a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

Now look, since serious business, something has to die. And over and over and over again, they get that picture. Here we find Noah entering into this new world knowing that everything still is not right, offering a burnt offering to the Lord. And it says that it was an aroma pleasing to him, which is the Old Testament way of saying that God accepted that.

It was accepted by him. And the text indicates that because Noah made that sacrifice, God's intention, God says something in his heart. Note that. It says, And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.

While the earth remains seed time and harvest cold and heat summer and winter, day and night shall not cease. Because of that offering, God makes this promise in his heart. You say, what? Just the burning of an animal makes God say, I'm not going to destroy the earth with a flood? Well, remember what we heard today in Romans chapter 3. Turn there again.

Romans chapter 3. apostle paul gives us an idea of what's what's happening back then even in that burnt offering that we see in leviticus chapter 1 how could an animal being slain make atonement for a man's sin here's why chapter 3 verse 24 all of us who have sinned are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation, that is, as a propitiation. It makes God kind towards you. His wrath is appeased.

Whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness. Because in His divine forbearance... He had passed over former sins. He's talking about before Jesus died. He had not killed people for their sins.

Why? He passed over that. Why? Because he was looking forward to what those sacrifices pointed towards, which was the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus. It was to show His righteousness at the present time so that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. He still remains just.

Do you understand that? God cannot overlook sin. He passed over sin, it says. But He showed that He was still just because He punished the sin of His people in His Son. You see? And so, Noah offered a sacrifice that pointed to Christ.

God spares the earth because of Noah's righteousness and now on the basis of this sacrifice resolves not to destroy the earth like this again. Now I want you to see something though. It's important to see this before we get to chapter 9 next week. Noah does not know this yet. This is what God has intended in his heart. It is not public yet.

But we get an insight into the heart of God. And at this point, you must see the grace of God. for one thing there's the flood has made no fundamental change in humanity why look at verse 21 and when the lord smelled the pleasing aroma the lord sent his heart i will never again curse the ground because of man for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth he's not looking back. He's looking forward now.

He's looking now. The intention of our hearts are evil from youth. The flood, which shows the holiness of God, has not made a fundamental change in humanity. Sin is still passed on. And yet God purposes never to curse the ground again because of man's sin. Now, you may be asking, what about chapter 3, verse 17?

He curses the ground there. Why does it say? Because we are all living under the curse. We still die. Well, this is a different word. It essentially means to treat the earth with contempt.

God will never again treat the earth with contempt by bringing a universal flood He will never again bring about that kind of universal disaster He does not abolish disasters by the way We still have floods, right? We still have floods around here. But they're not the universal wipe-everything-out-man kind of floods, are they? They're not that way anymore.

He does not abolish disasters. He localizes them and he gives us the ability to have foresight to deal with them. As you see with Joseph later on in this book where Joseph prepares Egypt for years of famine. But despite man's sin, he will never again strike down every living creature like this. The regularity of the seasons he mentions here is a constant reminder of the grace of God.

You ever thought about that? Have you ever thought about the fact that there's winter and fall and summer and spring? Not in that order. But you have the continual movement of the seasons that ought to remind you over and over the grace of God. Because now he's not going to interrupt that. Now notice, he says, I will not do this. he was not he's not going to do this until the world ends you hear a hint here that God does not rule out universal judgment because another universal judgment is coming but it's not going to be like this one God will never wipe out the human race by means of a flood now look what you must see here is God is going to accomplish his purposes not only by his faithfulness but by his grace not only by judgment but by grace God accomplishes his purposes by grace that purpose of conquering the Satan seed with the woman's seed and his people ruling the earth like they should that purpose will be accomplished by the grace of God God has promised never to destroy mankind with a catastrophic flood again.

And you find grace in that promise. And God will use grace to conquer Satan. You see instead of destroying mankind what does he do He offers his son I don know if you grasp this but from that universal destruction of mankind all the way up until now, God is gracious. And now he offers his son day after day, day after day, year after year, century after century.

He's offered His Son. He is gracious. Instead of bringing judgment, He remains gracious, holding off judgment. Why? So that you will repent. Some will scoff, and they'll take such grace to mean that God will never judge.

Do we hear those words? Do you hear the echo of those words today? God will never judge. God's not that kind of a God. And even Peter knew that was coming. Peter had it in his own day.

Turn to 2 Peter for a moment. 2 Peter 3. The very same thing was said in the Apostle Peter's day. We don't see any judgment. Look, the world's going on and on and on. There's been no judgment.

God doesn't judge. Listen to what Peter says. 2 Peter 3, verse 4. They will say, these people, where is the promise of His coming? for ever since the fathers fell asleep all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation for they deliberately overlook this fact that the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of god and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished but by the same word the heavens and earth that now exists are stored up for fire being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly he said they've forgotten there was a flood and they don't know there's another catastrophic judgment coming but he doesn't end there but do not overlook this one fact beloved that with the lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years this is one day now don't Don't take that out of context.

The only thing he's saying by that is this. Time does not weigh heavily on God. It's all the same to him. A thousand years is like a day, or a day is like a thousand years. Time does not weigh heavily on God The Lord is not slow to fulfill His promises Some count slowness but is what Patient towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

Don't think that the grace of God does not mean judgment. Don't think that because God is not judging now, the judgment is not coming now is the time now is where he's being patient now is where he says you yet have time you still have time some of you here some of you here i i'm i'm convinced of it some of you here today have just gone jolly your jolly way through life thinking well you know god he's not going to do anything yes he will don't think that because you've lived a good life and you've had good things, that God has not forgotten about judgment. He has not forgotten.

But He's being gracious to you. He's giving you the opportunity to repent, to embrace His Son by faith. So you see, God does accomplish His purpose. He does it through faithfulness. He's still doing it through faithfulness. He's still doing it through grace.

He's going to accomplish His purpose. His purpose will not be thwarted. But friends, see that God will judge the wicked with severe and catastrophic judgment. He promised He'll never do it again by a flood. But He warns us that another different catastrophe awaits the wicked. And like then, He will do it in order to start life over with a worshiping community.

Have you ever thought about that? We're going to start life over in the new world as a pure worshiping community. As we stand around the throne of the Lamb and sing. And in the midst of judgment, He will prove faithful in keeping His promise of complete salvation to His people. But until then, He graciously offers you His Son. you can find refuge by faith in His Son.

You know, the flood gives you some measure of God's desire for holiness in this world, does it not? It tells you how much... God will do to maintain holiness in this world. But that is nothing compared to what He did to His Son. He sacrificed His Son. That's how important holiness is to Him in this world.

He's going to accomplish it through His Son. God will be faithful. God will be gracious. And through it all, He will accomplish His purpose. Father, thank You for Your Word. We're thankful that You are faithful and gracious.

We are thankful that You show that to us over and over again. Lord, I pray today if there's any who are here who have never embraced Jesus and found refuge in Him by faith, I pray that they will have listened. They will understand that even though God seems slow, He is patient. grant that we pray for your glory in Jesus name Amen