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Theme for 2022 is “Begin Again”
In this eight-part series we are looking at how God began everything and how God begins again.
We began with Creation - how God created a good world and wanted that goodness to spread and fill the earth.
But along with God’s goodness spreading, sin was also spreading and the earth became so corrupt that it had to be destroyed.
But we learned last week that God’s plan even through the flood was to redeem the earth and to restore a new humanity.
The problem is that humanity is divided - we have both good and evil at work in us.
Like God said to Cain - we have to rule over our own hearts and decide which influence will master us.
We have to decide what we will allow to spread and multiply on the earth.
The problem with being divided is that we are quick to judge other people, but the Bible calls us to judge ourselves first.
We have to sort it out in our own hearts and minds before we can help anyone else.
We find it easy to label people as “bad” or “good.”
But it gets confusing when “bad” people show that they have a good side or when “good” people do bad things.
The problem with our labels and categories is that we are constantly making choices and people are not always consistent in their choices.
Because we are divided and inconsistent in our choices, we cause division in families and in people groups.
We make people take sides in our divisions.
Our choices affect people around us and those who come after us.
Maybe divisions can serve a purpose?
Rather than have everyone agree on a side - and it be the wrong side - like before the flood; maybe it is good that people have different views and perspectives?
Different perspectives cause people to scatter; and while that might not always seem like a good thing, it is what God said from the beginning should happen.
So division can be both good or bad.
Maybe if we don’t call it division - what if we call it diversity?
Division is bad, but diversity is good.
How can we leverage diversity to recognize what is good and spread it throughout the earth?
Let’s follow Noah and his family to see what happened and to understand what God is doing in the earth.
We see fractures begin to develop in Noah’s family that leads to a fragmented genealogy.
Eventually they come together to build a fortified city.
But that’s when God intervenes by knocking their tower down.
He scatters them to bring them together; and that coming together is still happening.
A fractured family
Most stories of most cultures of the world portray their historical figures as heroes and only tell the parts of the story that portray them positively.
The Bible tells both sides of the story - the good and the bad.
Because the Bible is a story of redemption.
You can’t tell the story of redemption if you never tell the bad parts.
We need to know that the good and the bad are both there.
You can’t be redeemed if you don’t know what you are redeemed from.
Someone might say, “Well I thought the flood was supposed to wipe out sin and corruption on the earth?”
I think that’s the point of this story - it didn’t.
Sin also survived the flood.
Noah was a righteous man - but he wasn’t perfect.
His kids weren’t perfect either.
The flood was traumatic - Noah was under a lot of stress.
And he found a way to relieve that stress.
Noah must have heard that craft winemaking is a good hobby and a great way to relax.
Noah wasn’t breaking any rules.
There was nothing wrong with planting a vineyard.
There was nothing wrong with making wine.
There was nothing wrong with drinking the wine - in moderation of course.
But what happens next is a little bit fuzzy, because alcohol lowers your inhibitions and it is difficult to say what really happened next or why?
Suffice it to say that Noah let himself go a little too far and it was inappropriate.
Was what Noah did a sin?
We don’t know that Noah disobeyed anything that God commanded.
Sin isn’t always a specific action.
Sin begins in the heart and is more of an inclination.
Whenever we turn away from pleasing God and decide to please only ourselves - that is inclining toward sin.
Sin is a posture of the heart..
It’s easy to recognize some things as sin because we know that God tells us not to do them - like stealing or murder.
But then there are other things which are not so obvious and have more to do with our motives which only God can know - like lying or coveting.
But in the case of Noah, he wasn’t deliberately sinning, but he wasn’t modeling godly behavior either - he got careless.
He wasn’t walking away from God, but he wasn’t walking with God at that moment either.
If you are going to define sin that way, then all of us sin.
Yes.
Exactly.
We are divided in our hearts and even though we want to pursue God, we don’t do so completely or entirely.
So why is that a problem?
Because is is not just about what we are doing; it is about what we are spreading.
Our sin affects those around us.
Right in the middle of the moment when Noah is acting “out of character” his son walks in on him.
Now Ham is also a divided human being with a sinful nature.
He has a choice in this moment as to what he is going too do and how he is going to respond to what he sees his dad doing.
I guess Ham must have thought that it was funny (because he was a “real ham”) and he decides to make light of the situation.
Now there are two people “acting out of character.”
Our sin affects other people whether we know it or not.
We tell ourselves that this is our choice.
We tell ourselves that we are only hurting ourselves.
We tell ourselves that it is nobody else’s business what we do in our private lives on our own time.
But you never know who is watching....
I’m not just talking about God.
Our children are watching.
Our grandchildren are watching.
The neighbors are watching.
The people who know you are a Christian are watching.
What kind of message are you sending to them?
Well fortunately Noah’s other two sons had a moment of clarity and realized what was going on was not how they wanted their father to be known - so they covered him.
Imagine that - they literally took a blanket and covered him while averting their eyes.
What if you find that someone is having an “out of character” moment?
What is an appropriate response?
- cover them.
You can decide how you want to see that person.
Will you choose to see them according to their sin.
Or will you choose to see them as made in God’s image.
How will you choose to talk about them to others?
Will you tell both sides of the story?
Covering doesn’t mean lying for someone or hiding the truth.
It means choosing to believe the best of all options available.
It means judging the situation in light of how you would want to be judged.
What Shem and Japheth did might have minimized the damage, except for Noah’s reaction.
The curse is passed down generationally.
Noah cursed his son Ham and Ham’s descendants, specifically Canaan.
Noah is angry - and he is embarrassed - he takes it out on his son.
You could argue that Ham deserved it.
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