Sermon Tone Analysis

Friday, my wife, my youngest daughter and myself went to Williamstown, KY.

We went there to go and tour the Ark Encounter, that was built and opened to the public July 7, 2016.

(SHOW FIRST 4 PICTURES)

TALK ABOUT THE LEVEL OF DETAIL AND INSIGHTFUL THOUGHT PUT INTO THE ARK.

(Of how it showed a very plausible way that Noah and his family may have carried out this Biblical fact!

From the storage of the animals, the feeding and watering methods, the ventilation methods and gathering fresh water, to the storage system and living quarters, etc!)

There are over 270 other similar stories around the globe, from multiple civilizations and cultures, that tell of an almost identical story of a great flood and of a boat with the animals on it!

If this account was a myth or story, do you really think that so many civilizations would have documented its existence?

Now before we ever left to drive up to the exhibit, on Friday, I had a thought that popped into my head early that morning and then as the day went on, the thought just grew!

That thought dealt with the “whys” and “whats” about the great flood and the account of Noah and his family and the ark.

Why did God send the flood?

What did the flood represent?

What did the ark represent?

What did Noah and his family represent?

What did the rainbow represent?

This morning, I would like to briefly talk with you about the subject of the great flood and the ark, as found in Genesis chapters 6-9.

I am not going to teach on the flood and what all happened, but rather, I am going to give you a broad understanding of this factual, Biblical account and then show how it is a “type” of another Biblical and factual account that took place millenniums after the flood!

Is everyone clear on what is meant by the word “type” from the Biblical perspective?

Especially, since I and others use this word and its meaning quite often!

TYPE - The word "type" is generally used to denote a resemblance between something present and something future, which is called the "antitype."

OK, so what happened at the time of the great flood in Genesis.

(What I mean is, why did the flood take place?)

READ , .

READ

OK, so can everyone see the “why”, that God sent the flood?

OK, so can everyone see the “why”, that God sent the flood?

“The Lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and He saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil.

“

God destroyed the earth and its inhabitants, because everything and everyone on it, had been given over to evil and violence!

In fact, in verse 12, the Bible says, “for everyone on earth was corrupt”, with the exception of a righteous man, called Noah.

As the Bible states, “Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God.”

Noah, as described here as “blameless”, was not “sinless”, but rather, it refers to him as being good quality and moral goodness.

The Bible clearly tells us that “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God”.

So, Noah was not sinless, but he was a man that walked close to God and was thus found morally good in the eyes of God.

So, God sent the flood to destroy the wickedness of mankind, right?

What then does the flood represent?

The flood represents the righteous JUDGEMENT of God!

God found the hearts of all living beings to be corrupt and wicked and against Him and His ways!

So God, who is perfect and just and Holy, pronounced judgement upon them!

And many people who read of this account, or other accounts similar to it, will say, “How could a God that is supposed to be loving, do something like this?

Just wipe out an entire world, because of their faults!”

Well, there are a few things to this, that need to be mentioned.

First, we are not privy to all of the information that goes with this situation, except that God declared they were ALL wicked, evil and corrupt!

The Bible tells us that we can see only the outward appearances of mankind, but God looks onto the heart of men!

In other words, God sees what really exists inside of you and me!

And also, God tells us that His thoughts are not our thoughts, neither are our ways, His ways!

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so also are His ways higher than our ways and His thoughts are higher than our thoughts!

The Bible also mentions that it “broke the heart of God” as to the condition of mankind!

Just 600 years after the garden incident and the level of sickness that the disease of sin had brought about and what it done to God’s creation, BROKE HIS HEART!

This shows us something that we see more and more clearly about Yahweh, as we read further and further into the OT and NT.

HE LOVES US and He desires fellowship (intimate fellowship) with us!

It was never and still is not, His desire to destroy us!

Listen to what the Bible tells us in ,

It is here that I will make a VERY IMPORTANT statement about the judgement of God.

God’s judgement is sent upon mankind, not out of ill will, hate or malicious intent towards us, but rather, He sends His judgement upon us in order to bring about repentance from us!

The judgement of God was always given to bring about repentance from the people and thus enable healing and deliverance!

Just as the passage in II Peter that we just read stated, “but that all should turn to repentance.”

Look here, if you or I (apart from the perfect love of God within us, as His true children), despised someone or a group of people, (whom we owed NOTHING to) and their annihilation had absolutely NO repercussions upon us and we answered to NO one about their ultimate demise and destruction; do you honestly think that we would plead with them to repent and turn back to us, if we despised them?!

NO, we may have the shred of goodness within us to say to the people something similar, as to what Paul said in , “You had better eat and drink tonight, for tomorrow you’re gonna die” and then the very next day, we would wipe them off of the face of the earth!

Point being, without perfect love, such as God shows, the only reason that you or I would issue judgement on someone who was wicked and evil towards us, would be for their ultimate destruction; not to bring them to repentance and draw them closer to us, right?!

MOST PEOPLE WOULD BE JUST BITING AT THE BIT TO HIT THE “NUKE” BUTTON AND DESTROY THEM!

God’s word is clear about why He issues judgement, as we find in ,

It is very clear here, as throughout the Word of God, that His perfect and divine judgement is given, to bring people to repentance and turn completely to Him!

Just like when God sent Jonah to warn the people at Nineveh about their wicked ways, He gave them 40 days to repent and turn to God, or else, God was pronouncing judgement upon them and was going to destroy them.

The people repented and turned to God and He withheld judgement!

(Although 40 years later they turned back to their wicked way and the judgement came in full measure!)

In the flood story, here in , God actually gave the people 120 years to repent and turn from their ways!

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY YEARS to repent!!

Do you think that 120 years is enough time to repent and turn back to God?

Peter mentions, in , “God waited patiently in the days of Noah, while the ark was being built.

In the ark a few people,only eight souls, were saved through water.

God waited patiently for the people.

(God could have just supernaturally protected Noah and his family from the flood, like He supernaturally protected Shadrach, Meshach and Abednigo, in the fiery furnace) and sent the flood instantly and wiped them all out!

God was giving time for repentance before the judgement came forth!

Look here, my wife and I would not just say to our daughters when they were small, “We are getting ready to take the paddle (THE DORA THE EXPLORER PADDLE, no less) and wear you out, just because we want to impute pain to you!” (Although, looking back, maybe we should have done that a little more often!)

But, no, we would pronounce judgement to our girls for wrong doing, in order that they would turn from their wrong ways (repent) and thus lead them into a life that was blessed with character and health and longevity, due to their understanding of obedience!

God does the same thing with judgement, He uses it to bring people to repentance and to turn wholly to Him, thus saving them!

So, the flood was a “type” of the judgement of God and it was given to bring about repentance for the people.

(A source of cleansing and removing the sickness of sin that had spread.)

And that is also part of judgement, it is to correct those whom are already Hi

And according to , the flood is also a “type” for water baptism.

In the flood, 8 people were carried, (by their faith) in and out of the waters of God’s judgement and brought to safety.

In baptism, the believer is brought, by faith, in and out of the water, and into salvation, thus having escaped the judgement of God.

Not salvation by the washing externally of the water (the act of baptism itself), as Peter mentions, but by the response to God from a clean conscience, which comes from their faith in the death and the resurrection of Jesus!

The faith of the believer, through the grace of God, in the finished works of Yeshua, Himself, is what cleanses a person and truly gives them salvation!

The ark, that carried Noah and his family to safety, is a “type” of redemption and salvation that would come millenniums later; a pure and perfect source of redemption and salvation, for all who would believe!

The ark was a means of redemption, in that it was a covering for those who entered by faith.

It was the tool that ransomed Noah and his family from destruction and brought them to safety.

In speaking of the ark as a type for redemption, it helps that we all have the same understanding as to what redemption means, right?

Redemption, large and in part, means to buy back, to ransom to cover.

Well, in , God tells Noah, “Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.

Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch.”

The Hebrew word used here for “pitch”, (which is like tar), is the word, “kō·fěr”, and although is does refer to a substance like asphalt, it also has another primary meaning, which is a “RANSOM, A REDEMPTION PRICE, A COVERING”!

In other words, it is like God was saying, “I am going to put a covering, a ransom about you and keep you for myself and protected from my righteous judgement!

The ark was also a “type” of salvation, in that, they entered into it and it SAVED them it protected them from the death and destruction, that came through the judgement of God, against sin.

Salvation, after all, from the Christian perspective, refers to deliverance from sin and its consequences.

And what does the Word of God say that the consequence of sin is?

“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Noah and his family were delivered from the penalty of death due to sin, through the ark.

And the rainbow that God sent, as a covenant promise to never destroy the world again with a flood, it serves as a “type” for another mark, or seal that God would send in the future.

Just as God gave the rainbow as covenant sign, that is, a seal that He placed in the sky as a reminder of His covenant to us, so He would one day place another seal upon that which He had come into agreement with, through the means of salvation!