Genesis 6

I guess its only natural that we should now progress to the Flood.

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Genesis 6:1-3

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We can be sure that many at first appeared to receive the warning through fear of what was coming on the earth. Yet they did not turn to God with true repentance, for they were unwilling to renounce their sins. During the time that elapsed before the coming of the Flood, their faith was tested, and they failed to endure the trial. Overcome by the prevailing unbelief, they finally joined their former associates in rejecting the solemn message.

Others were deeply convicted, and would have heeded the words of warning; but there were so many who laughed and ridiculed that they joined the rest, resisted the invitations of mercy, and were soon among the boldest and most defiant scoffers; for none are so reckless and go to such lengths in sin as do those who have once had light, but have resisted the convicting Spirit of God. Matthew 12:43-45.

With no engines or fuel tanks, the ark was easily capable of housing all the creatures that answered God’s call to safety, especially so when we remember that the vast majority of animals are dog size or smaller.  You can count the number of the large animals on your fingers.

As time passed on, with no apparent change in nature, men and women whose hearts had at times trembled with fear, began to be reassured. They reasoned, as many reason now, that nature is above the God of nature, and that her laws are so firmly established that God Himself could not change them. Reasoning that if the message of Noah were correct, nature would be turned out of her course, they made that message, in the minds of the world, a delusion – a grand deception. The people agreed that if there were any truth in what Noah had said, the men of renown, the scientists of the day, would understand the matter and harmonise with him.

Had the pre-Flood generations believed the warning, and repented of their evil deeds, the LORD would have been able to continue His protection, as He afterward did for Nineveh. Jonah 3:3-10. But by their obstinate resistance to the pricks of conscience and the warnings of God's prophets, that generation filled up the measure of their iniquity, and became ripe for self-destruction.

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Genesis 6:4

There were giants in the earth in those days.

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The early humans were a lot taller than we are now, for sin affects everything, including our body height. But Goliath and his brothers (and some basketball players today) show us what they could have been like. Goliath was "six cubits and a span" high which means that he was about 9ft 6ins tall using the 18 inch cubit!! 1 Samuel 17:4; 2 Samuel 21:18-20.

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Genesis 6:4

And also after that, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

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With the strength of their fathers and the cunning of the mothers they were indeed the most significant rebels of the time. This is one of the reasons God says not to integrate. 2 Corinthians 6:17-18. The heartache of the godly parent when the children ran wild must have been immense.

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Genesis 6:5-9

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Noah "found grace" because he accepted it. He was the only one left at the end of the one hundred and twenty years who still listened to God. Every other "Christian" was now dead, but he would not give up his trust in his Saviour. Even Methuselah (the longest lived man and Noah’s grandfather) died just before the Flood came! Noah’s father, Lamech, had died a few years before his own father, Methuselah.

Enoch, Noah’s great grandfather had been taken to heaven without dying, but this lesson had been lost by then as it has today.

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Genesis 6:9-17

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Genesis 6:18

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These others were protected and led by the Christian’s gift of grace. This is the principle:- "For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy." 1 Corinthians 7:14. To see one example of how this works read "Christiana’s Progress", the sequel to "Pilgrim’s Progress", by John Bunyan.

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Genesis 6:19-22

"And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shall you bring into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort SHALL COME TO YOU, to keep them alive. And take you to you of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to you; and it shall be for food for you, and for them."

Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.

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Put simply, it was Noah’s obedience that saved him. He did what he was told and therefore was safely in the ark when the Flood came. The members of his family were also physically saved because they followed him. And did you notice that the animals did too? Noah did not have to round them up. Angels went out to every animal and "asked" them to be saved, then led them two by two to the ark, which in itself was a marvellous sign to the unbelievers.

Here is probably a good place to think about the dinosaurs which were supposedly wiped out by a large meteor hitting the earth millions of years ago! If we discount that evolutionary theory, and realise that species are going extinct all the time, some due to circumstances and others because of man’s intervention, but all as a result of sin, we can come to a different conclusion.

Since the flood, there has been many amalgamations of beasts, as may be seen in the almost endless varieties of species of animals, and also in the range of races of men as we discussed a couple of weeks ago. The genetic pools of all creatures allow for many variations by natural selection, especially when inbreeding occurs, but there are limits. Every species of animals which God had created was preserved in the ark. The confused species that God did not create, which were the result of mutations, natural and manmade, were destroyed by the flood because they were not obedient to God’s request to board the ark. Their bones, and the way they are scattered in the earth, bear mute testimony to that. (We can see more on this subject later.)

See you all next week.

Ron

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Some of the comments in these readings are adapted from books in my library.  No recognition is given because they are not intended as authorities, but are used because they express my understanding clearly.  All the ideas expressed in these readings, right or wrong, are my own.

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Genesis 2:5-6

… the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. Back

Ezekiel 18:31-32

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Jonah 3:1-10

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