noah (part 4 - where promises lead to...

NOAH (PART 4 - WHERE PROMISES LEAD TO BLESSINGS)

In week one of the account of Noah, we found this overriding biblical theme of salvation through judgment, that the justice of God highlights His mercy.

Week two we covered the theme “where faith produces righteousness.” Noah wasn't righteous because of any inherent goodness of his own, but because he believed God and faith produces righteousness, the right way of living. It’s the right way of living because it’s based upon believing what God says about how life works best. Noah believed in the unseen realities of God. It wasn’t a hope in hope. It was the conviction of things unseen. Noah believed God and the evidence of his

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faith is that he aligned his life by the word of God. Faith produces righteousness, which basically means a life that follows the right path.

Even after they entered the ark, Noah and his family still endured a storm. What was their security in that storm? God directed Noah, closed him up on the ark and saw him through the storm. Week three covered the theme “where security is providied.” Noah a n d h i s f a m i l y e n d u r i n g t h e f l o o d demonstrated the ever-present security of the gospel message to both saints and sinners.

Genesis 8:1

The Flood Subsides

8 But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark.

Matthew 6:2626 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

This again is anthropomorphic language. God didn’t forget Noah, nor does God ever forget you. This means that God will never forget a promise He has made to you in

Christ. What God says He will do He will do. But He will do it in His time, not our time. This is where promises lead to blessings -- in God’s timing. The question is, “Can you wait for God’s timing?”

Genesis 8:2-212 The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained, 3 and the waters receded from the earth continually. At the end of 150 days the waters had abated, 4 and in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. 5 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.

The waters in your life will continue to abate. Things will get better. Noah didn’t give up because He was certain of the promise of God. He knew God would fulfill His word. The promises lead to blessings when we trust God.

6 At the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made 7 and sent forth a raven. It went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth. 8 Then he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground. 9 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. 10 He waited another seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark. 11 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. 12 Then he waited another seven days and sent forth the dove, and she did not return to him anymore.

Noah does a lot of waiting in these passages. He sent out a raven and waited. He sent out a dove and waited. He waited and then sent the dove out again to do what? Wait. He waited because he had confidence that God fulfills His promises. God had given Noah a promise. God fulfills His promises to Noah and to you.

Romans 4:18-2518 In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. 20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. 22 That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” 23 But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, 24 but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, 25 who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

Psalm 138:2-3;7-8for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.3 On the day I called, you answered me; my strength of soul you increased.

7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life;you stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand delivers me.8 The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.

•The Slave Revival

Genesis 8:13-1613 In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried from off the earth. And Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry. 14 In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth had dried out. 15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Go out from the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons' wives with you. 17 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.”

This was the same commission (an instruction, command; the authority to perform a certain task or duty) that God gave Adam and Eve, to be fruitful and multiple and fill the earth. God is again showing us His mercy folded in judgment.

Noah went out and walked in the confidence of God’s blessing. God said, “God out, you and your family and be fruitful and multiply.” Noah simply walked in this blessing. God has




given us, His church, a commission to leave the ark as it where.

Matthew 28:19-2019 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Everyone’s story who was baptized last week had a similar characteristic. Did you notice what each of their stories had in common? Someone invited me, someone asked me, someone loved me, someone impacted me, etc.

John 15:88 By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.

Genesis 8:18-2218 So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives with him. 19 Every beast, every creeping thing, and every bird, everything that moves on the earth, went out by families from the ark. 20 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. 21 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. 22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”

Noah offers a sacrifice, again highlighting the holy nature of God and foreshadowing the future sacrifice of Christ.

Ephesians 5:22 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Genesis 99 And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. 2 The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. 3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. 4 But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. 5 And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.

6 “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed,for God made man in his own image.

7 And you, be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.”

8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, 9 “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you,

God’s Promises for Our ChildrenIsaiah 44:33 I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.




Isaiah 54:1313 All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children.

Psalm 102:2828 The children of your servants shall dwell secure; their offspring shall be established before you.

Acts 2:3939 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”

Genesis 17:77 And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.

Genesis 9:10-17 10 and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

“Suddenly there was a wild coming together of voices from the ship and we noticed an unusual commotion among the people about the railing,” she said. “Then the awful thing happened, the thing that will remain in my memory until the day I die.”

Dorothy listened as 1,500 people cried out to be saved, a noise she described as a horrific mixture of yells, shrieks and moans.

12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: 13 I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. 16 When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” 17 God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

God fulfills His promises. Not only does God fulfill His promises, but He leaves us clear and encouraging reminders that He fulfills His word to us. What are these reminders?

•The changed lives of people who come to know Christ

•The fulfilled prophecies of His word

•The physical church itself

•The physical rainbow when the rains subside

The rainbow is a reminder that God will fulfill His promises to us.

Can the colors of the rainbow preach the gospel?




1) RED - sinIsaiah 1:1818 “Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord:though your sins are like scarlet,

2) WHITE - purity and holiness they shall be as white as snow;though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

3) RED - the cleasing of our sins by the blood of Christ

Hebrews 9:1414 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

4) GOLD or YELLOW - the glory of God1 Peter 1:77 so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

5) BLUE/PURPLE - kingly royalty; the deity of Christ

Ezekiel 1:2626 And above the expanse over their heads there was the likeness of a throne, in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was a likeness with a human appearance.

6) GREEN - growth and restorationPsalm 23:2

2 He makes me lie down in green pastures.He leads me beside still waters.




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