"Noah" Sermon: Hebrews 11:7

“Noah”

[Hebrews 11:7]

August 4, 2013 Second Reformed Church

            “The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Genesis 6:5, ESV).

            By the time Noah and his family came along, his was the only family of believers on the earth.  Biblical scholars guesstimate there were between three million and one thousand million people on the earth at the time Noah lived – but there was only one family of believers.

            “These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God. And Noah had three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth” (Genesis 6:9-10, ESV).

            And the author of Hebrews tells us:  “By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.”

            We find four doctrines in this morning’s text:

            First, faith involves receiving as true and believing what God has said concerning unseen things.

            Second, obedience to God flows from faith.

            Third, obedience to God condemns the world.

            Fourth, our righteousness is received through faith alone.

First, faith involves receiving as true and believing what God has said concerning unseen things.

“By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen,”

Let us again remember the two prongs of faith mentioned in the first verse of this chapter:  “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1, ESV). 

We saw this verse talks about faith being “the assurance of things hoped for” and “the conviction of things not seen,” and we understood that to mean:

First, faith receives the Word of God, the history and promises and witnesses statements therein, and believes with absolute certainty that everything that God has promised and said will come about, will come to pass, exactly as it has been given to us and received by us in faith.

Second, faith receives the Word of God, the history and promises and witnesses statements therein, and believes with absolute conviction based on the evidence we have received that things that are spoken of which are not seen by us, either by difference of time, or because such are invisible to our eyes have happened, will happen, and do exist, exactly as they have been given to us and received by us in faith.

It is the second prong, in particular, that we are looking at here.

We read, “Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, ‘I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch. This is how you are to make it: the length of the ark 300 cubits, its breadth 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits. Make a roof for the ark, and finish it to a cubit above, and set the door of the ark in its side. Make it with lower, second, and third decks. For behold, I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life under heaven. Everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female. Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground, according to its kind, two of every sort shall come in to you to keep them alive. Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten, and store it up. It shall serve as food for you and for them.’ Noah did this; he did all that God commanded him” (Genesis 6:9-22, ESV).

God told Noah that He was enraged at the world’s sin, and He was going to kill all the humans and animals in the world except for Noah, his family, and the animals God told him to collect.  God said He was going to cause a world-wide flood to drown everyone, so Noah was to build an ark big enough for his family and the animals God told him to collect, and God would save them through the flood.

Some of us are familiar with Bill Cosby’s routine about this discussion God and Noah had – in Cosby’s version, Noah is absolutely shocked and confused and disbelieving – it’s a very funny bit – but the real Noah, received the very Word of God from the mouth of God that He was going to kill all of the humans and animals, except for those God told Noah to save, that God commanded Noah to build an ark – a big ship – in which God would keep them safe, and the real Noah heard the evidence of the very Word of God from the mouth of God, and he believed with absolute conviction that these things would come to pass exactly as God had spoken, even though he didn’t see them and didn’t know when they would come to pass.

Can we imagine being Noah?  Can we imagine setting about this work – trusting God – working for one hundred and twenty years on the ark until it was finished?  How strong was his faith to receive this word from God and work for one hundred and twenty years with no sign that anything was going to happen?

Noah worked and saw his neighbors continuing to sin, continuing to flaunt their rebellion against God, not caring what Noah said, the warnings he would give, disbelieving his story that God came to him and spoke to him of a world-wide flood.  Noah worked, surely being made fun of – people scoffing at the crazy old man building a ship for the day when God would flood the world.  And God didn’t give Noah a date for the beginning of the flood, so he had to be alert at all times.

But remember, Noah’s faith was not irrational – it was not a “leap of faith,” as some call it – it was based on the evidence – it was based on the Word of God spoken to him and Noah’s knowledge of the character of God – the Holy God, the Just God, the God Who cannot tolerate sin in His presence, the God Who loves His people.

Do you understand that we have far more evidence of the coming judgment than Noah did?  We have the whole Word of God – written down for us to read and hear read and preached.  And if we read it, we can know God and the salvation He brings and the way that God is bringing all sin and evil to an end to His Glory in the Kingdom – in the restored Creation.

What does Jesus tell us?  “For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (Matthew 24:37-39, ESV).

Jesus tells us the judgment is coming for us, just like it was for the people in the days of Noah.  He tells us that the world will be ignorant of the coming judgment of God, despite the preaching of the Word of God, just like it was in the days of Noah.  And we are called to believe by faith and to be alert, just as Noah was.

            Second, obedience to God flows from faith.

“in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household.”

The Almighty God came to Noah, told him that He was going to kill all of the humans and all of the animals, except for Noah’s family and the animals God told him to save.  And God told Noah to build and ark – in which God would save Noah’s family and the animals.  And we read, “Noah did this; he did all that God commanded him.”

Noah received the Word of God by faith and that faithful reception of the Word resulted in obedient action.  Noah did not just receive the Word of God and think about it – no, he got to work on building an ark.

Have you ever considered what was involved in this obedience?  We are told that Noah’s sons joined him in building the ark.  His sons honored their father and believed that he had received the Word of God, which they had not heard, and they did what he asked of them.

Noah and his sons spent one hundred and twenty years building the ark – that’s a lot of time to spend on a project.  I doubt many of us here have spent that kind of time on completing anything – not even for God.  How were Noah and his sons supporting their families?  It’s unlikely they have saved up one hundred and twenty years of vacation time at work, and they still would have needed money to care and provide for their families.

This was one hundred and twenty years of physical labor – cutting, shaping, sawing, lifting, carrying, hammering, and so forth.  What if they got sick or injured?  It was a small crew working on the ship.  It was intense work for, what it to us, an unimaginable amount of time.

Not only that – they would have needed extra money to pay for tools and the repair of tools, to pay for wood and pitch, to pay for trees that were cut down and milled for the ark.  All the supplies to build the ark and all the food they had to store up to feed themselves and the animals while they were in the ark cost money.

And then there was the psychological toll of being ridiculed, laughed at, mocked – losing whatever station and respect they had with their neighbors as they went about this “crazy project.”  The attacks of the ungodly, even if it was only words, must have worn on them. 

But they believed by faith in the Word of God and that compelled them to action.  God promised to save His people through the water, and they believed by faith.

And this is for us a type of God’s salvation of the elect:  just as God chose Noah and his family to save through the waters of the flood, so God chose a people for Himself to save through Jesus, and symbolized that through the sign and seal of baptism:

“For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him” (1 Peter 3:18-22, ESV).

We have been saved by Christ’s Work, which we receive through faith, as a gift.  Knowing that we are now reconciled to God – made right with God – is our faith spurring us on to action?  How hard are you willing to work to obey the God Who came to earth in the person of Jesus, lived a perfect life under God’s Law, was put to death for the sins of all those who would ever believe, physically rose from the dead  and ascended back to His throne.  Is there anything we can say is too much for God to ask?  Is there any sin we can find an excuse for?

            Third, obedience to God condemns the world.

“By this he condemned the world”

How can this be so?   How did obeying God condemn the world?

It may be helpful to note that Noah was a minister – a pastor.  In Peter’s second letter, he writes concerning those whom God has punished as examples of the final judgment – as proof that if God brought judgment against these others in times past, it is only logical, given the character of God, that the final judgment would really occur – and here he calls Noah “a herald of righteousness” – in other words – a preacher:  “if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;” (2 Peter 2:5-6, ESV).

It is inconceivable that the “herald of righteousness” would not proclaim the salvation of God through faith and, “immediately,” through the ark that he was building.  Noah was known as the person who preached God’s Word – surely he would have continued to do so during the building of the ark.  Such preaching would have condemned the sin of the world and called them to repentance and faith in God’s salvation.

But even if Noah was silent for the one hundred and twenty years they built the ark, people would have asked why they ark was being built, and the answer – that God was outraged at the sin of humanity and was bringing a world-wide flood upon all those who did not repent and believe – would condemn all those who did not repent and believe.  It was the Word of God, delivered by Noah, that revealed that the world was condemned already.

As Jesus said, “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (John 3:18, ESV).

So, the very building of the ark and the collection of the animals according to the Word of God would have condemned the world in their unbelief.

It would have also humiliated them in their sins – bringing them to light – exposing their sin and darkness and not allowing them to hide in the shadows any longer.

The Word of God that Noah and his family received would have made them vigilant in the work – believing that all that God said would come to pass.  Seeing the Hand of God ready to kill the rest of humanity would reinforce Noah’s family’s desire to do all that God had put before them.  It would also strengthen them against their carnal fear – their fear that they might be wrong and the world be right – no, seeing the world squirm in the light of the Gospel would strengthen Noah’s family, and it would help them to check their own sins all the more and all the more fully.  Knowing what was coming for the world, they would seek after holiness all the more, not wanting to be found committing cosmic treason again their Savior.

Consider your favorite sin – don’t blurt it out.  If someone suddenly found out what it was, you and I would squirm and make excuses – would we not?  We would feel the condemnation for our sins – even though we are forgiven in Christ Jesus – we would feel the shame and wish we had not been found out – though God already knew.  As Mark Heard sang, “Don’t worry, nobody’s watching you but God.”

It is at least a sign of hope if we squirm at being found out about our sin – there is a chance we will repent and believe and strive to sin no more until that day when we are brought into glory.  But woe to those who do not squirm – to those who laughed at Noah and challenged God to drown them.

Have you ever been with someone who said, “If there is a God, let Him do such-and-so to me”?  Fear for a person who says – or thinks – like that.

We are to be witnesses to the Gospel through obedience, and God uses our obedience to show the world that it is condemned by God.  Yet, we are to be ever vigilant to call people to faith and repentance that they would not be condemned.  And we ought to watch ourselves as believers, not that our salvation can be lost – it is a gift from God – but we ought to mourn when we sin.

            Fourth, our righteousness is received through faith alone.

            “and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.”

            “Then the LORD said to Noah, ‘Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate, and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate, and seven pairs of the birds of the heavens also, male and female, to keep their offspring alive on the face of all the earth. For in seven days I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and every living thing that I have made I will blot out from the face of the ground.’ And Noah did all that the LORD had commanded him.

            “Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters came upon the earth. And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood. Of clean animals, and of animals that are not clean, and of birds, and of everything that creeps on the ground, two and two, male and female, went into the ark with Noah, as God had commanded Noah. And after seven days the waters of the flood came upon the earth.

            “In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. And rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights. On the very same day Noah and his sons, Shem and Ham and Japheth, and Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark, they and every beast, according to its kind, and all the livestock according to their kinds, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, according to its kind, and every bird, according to its kind, every winged creature. They went into the ark with Noah, two and two of all flesh in which there was the breath of life. And those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him. And the LORD shut him in” (Genesis 7:1-16, ESV).

            The time was complete, and God told Noah to bring the animals and his family into the ark.  And once they had all gotten into the ark, God closed the door to the ark and sealed it to their salvation – as we know – after the rain ended and the waters subsided, Noah and his family and all the animals came out of the ark to repopulate the world, and God set the rainbow in the sky to remind Him and humanity of the covenant that God had made never again to destroy the world by water.

            Notice:  God shut the door to the ark and sealed it for the journey.  Their salvation was a gift and the act of God.  They didn’t earn salvation by being obedient or being sinless – they were sinners.

            So, how do we understand God saying that Noah inherited righteousness through faith?  What is righteousness?  It is the perfect keeping of God’s Law.  What mere human being has ever merited or earned righteousness?  No one.  All merely human born people are sinners.

            Notice:  Noah inherited righteousness through faith.  Noah received righteousness through faith – remember, we said that faith is like the gutters and leaders on your house or apartment – faith is not a good work – it receives what it is given and brings it to where it belongs – like rain in a gutter.  And the righteousness that Noah received was definitely not his own, because we are told that he inherited it.  Someone left it to him and he received it and it was credited to him as if it were his own.

            Paul wrote, “Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for ‘The righteous shall live by faith’” (Galatians 3:11, ESV).  So, here is New Testament confirmation that it is not possible for a fallen human being to be justified before God – to earn a perfect keeping of the Law before God – instead, righteousness is received through faith.

            As we have seen, in Christ’s Work on the cross, our sins were imputed to Him – they were credited to Him, and His Righteousness was imputed to all those who will ever believe – His Righteousness – His perfect keeping of the Law – was credited to believers, so we are now right with God – our debt is paid, and we have inherited righteousness.

            So, the only Person Noah could have inherited righteousness from is Jesus.  As we continue to see, the ultimate end of faith is Christ and the reception of His Gospel.  Thus, the history of Noah is for us today.

We are to receive as true and believe by faith what God has said concerning unseen things.  In this morning’s text, we are specifically reminded of the last judgment, which we have not seen, but every man and women who has ever lived will go through.  Let us live believing that we will be judged, and our only salvation is through Jesus Alone.

            Let us purpose that obedience to God will flow from our faith.  Let us not be satisfied with attending worship.  Let us do something about it.  Let us know what God has said and follow Him in all obedience out of love for what He has done for us.

            Let us understand that when we are obedient to God, the world is condemned.  Let us live as believers that others would see us and know something is wrong, if they have not received salvation through Jesus.  And let us convict others – and even ourselves – of sin.  Let us have a passion for the salvation of the lost and act on it.

            Let us remember and understand that our righteousness is received through faith alone.  We have merited God’s Wrath.  We have nothing to bring, no excuse to give, no way to be right, except through the wondrous gift of salvation through Jesus Christ Alone.  All honor and glory and praise are His.

            So, let us pray:

            Almighty God, we thank You for the history of Noah.  We ask that You would help us to receive the unseen things that You have promised in faith, believing that hope that is seen is not hope, and that You are ever-faithful.  Help us to be obedient to all You have commanded us, that we would have joy in giving You glory, and help us to love the world – that we would proclaim Your Gospel so that all your people would repent and believe.  We thank You for choosing us to be Your sons and daughters and for making us righteous through Jesus for Your Sake.  For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.