Dennis Tuuri

# Noah: A Story (Movie?) for Our Times

Sermon by Pastor Dennis R. Tuuri
March 23, 2014, Third Sunday in Lent

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So today’s sermon text, I’m actually going to read the missing bookends of the structure that’s on your handout for the rest of the text about the story of Noah. And so we’re going to move from Genesis 5:29–6:10 to the end of the story. So please stand for the reading of God’s word beginning at Genesis 5:29. And the one speaking here is the father of Noah. And he called his name Noah which by the way means rest.

So he called his name Noah saying this one will comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our hands because of the ground which the Lord has cursed. After he begat Noah, Lamech lived 595 years and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Lamech were 777 years and he died. And Noah was 500 years old and Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Now it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful, and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose.

And the Lord said, “My spirit shall not strive with man forever. For he is indeed flesh, yet his days shall be 120 years.” There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came into the daughters of men, and they bore children to them, those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually.

And the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and he was grieved in his heart. So the Lord said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air. For I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.

And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And now reading, jumping to the end of the story in Genesis 9:20–29. So this is the other bookend of the entire narrative. And Noah began to be a farmer and he planted a vineyard. And then he drank of the wine and was drunk and became uncovered in his tent. And Ham the father of Canaan saw the nakedness of his father and told his two brothers outside.

But Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders and went backward and covered the nakedness of their father. Their faces were turned away, and they did not see their father’s nakedness. So Noah awoke from his wine and knew what the younger son had done to him. And then he said, “Cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants he shall be to his brethren.” And he said, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem, and may Canaan be his servant.

May God enlarge Japheth and may he dwell in the tents of Shem and may Canaan be his servant. And Noah lived after the flood 350 years. So all the days of Noah were 950 years and he died. Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for this narrative story in Genesis of Noah. I thank you that to some extent many people will be thinking about this account this week and the next few weeks as the movie based upon it opens up.

Bless us, Lord God, with an understanding of the text. Help us to remember the high points of the story so that we can discern truth from error as we talk to people about this. And more importantly than that, Lord God, prepare us for discussions with neighbors and friends and coworkers who may also see the movie and maybe people we can witness to. Bless us, Lord God, to the end that we would take advantage of the focus on Noah and here in this place at this time understand the story and apply it to our lives in a transformative and missional way. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Please be seated.

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So the topic for today is Noah—a story (movie?) for our times. And the reason I chose this day, as I’ve informed you before, is that the movie I think opens generally widely this coming Friday. The movie starring Russell Crowe, done by Aronofsky—he’s the director who’s done some very interesting movies in the past. And so it seems like it’s important for us to kind of remember who Noah is, review the story a little bit, talk about it.

So the first thing we’re going to do today is to kind of look at the narrative story. And I’m going to use this large honking schematic structure I found on the internet someplace several years ago and we’ll just talk primarily about the middle. But it’s a way to kind of remember what actually is going on in the text and the emphasis that God makes. And what we’ll do after that then is talk a little bit about the movie. We really can’t talk about—I can’t talk about the movie; I haven’t seen it. But there are scripts that people are responding to and some people have seen the movie. And so it seems like there are several areas of the movie that we want to kind of talk about and prepare you for so that you can use this movie missionally to talk to your friends and neighbors.

I think it’s a great idea. Now, I haven’t seen the movie yet, but it may be a great idea to, you know, have a neighbor or a coworker, a friend that you’re witnessing to and have concern about and praying about—to take them to the movie, you know, and then go out afterwards, have dessert, coffee, talk about it. And you should be able to bring, you know, what the scriptures say about this story to bear upon it. Not just critiquing the movie—not even primarily that—but how the wonderful narrative structure of the story of Noah, the wonderful portrayal it is of the coming of Jesus to create the new world and bring in the new creation and to die for our sins on the cross and to be raised up for our life. So in the scriptures, this is what kind of the essence of the story is.

So we want to talk about that, talk about the movie a little bit and then finally we want to draw four very short simple lessons from the story. And all of this we want to place in the context of Lent. So the days are lengthening. That’s what Lent comes from. It’s just lengthened. Lent is the shortened form of that. So the days are lengthening. That’s all it means. But as a season of the church, it means a focus upon the suffering of Christ, of course, but more than that, trials and tribulations and God’s purpose in them for our lives.

Now, in the season of Lent, it’s longer than 40 days, the church season, because the Lord’s day were never seen as days of abstinence from food or this or that or the other thing or for you know focus upon trials and tribulations. The Lord’s day is a day of resurrection. So we sang a hymn that frequently is associated or at least some forms of it with Easter at the beginning of the service. Perfectly appropriate because the Lord’s day is different and it interrupts the season of Lent every week.

But we’re using the Lord’s days this season and have for several years to think about what the scriptures talk about suffering. We’ll return to James next week, but here in the story of Noah, I mean, if you think about it, the building of the ark probably took 100, 120 years. And you can imagine, and I think the movie will probably show us some of this, the kind of things that happened to Noah in the context of the community in which he lived as he built that—reproach against them and this warning that the judgment of God was coming. So suffering, you know, not 40 years, 140 plus 3. And then of course 40 days of the flood and all the rest of the narrative links this up pretty good as a message for Lent—a reminder that we have stuff on the literature distribution table.

This is something we used several years ago and really kind of promoted, but it’s still very good. These are little meditations for Lent by C.S. Lewis. And I don’t know if there are any left or not this morning already. They’re probably mostly gone. But there’s another one of these Rose Publications handouts this time out on the table and it’s Noah’s Ark. So, you know, if you snooze, you lose. So there were only 30 or 40 of them there and so they might all be gone. If they’re not, you could get one on your way out. They’re very useful. I love these little things.

And for instance, you know, Shem and Japheth were the ones from whom all people descended, right? We’re descendants of Noah. And there’s a nice little map on here that sort of shows you where Shem and Japheth—what parts of the world they spread out into on here. Lots of neat stuff on here. And these publications are primarily conservative. They wouldn’t be quite like our take would be, but they’re really good solid stuff to use in your family.

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So, let’s begin with overviewing quickly and briefly using the handout that’s been provided, the story of Noah and the ark. It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it? Don’t let it slip away.

What we find in this story is that there’s a particular form that goes on and I want to read the center part of that and note the stuff on the handout for you about that center part. But just briefly, and I’ve already said that what we read earlier are the missing bookends. So this narrative, this outline rather, picks it up after what we just read from Genesis 5 and early 6. And it leaves off the end of the story leading up to Noah’s death. And those are important bookmarks. And we’ll talk about those as probably the about the last thing we do today. We’ll go back to those two bookends and remember the structure.

And so, you know, if the beginning of the book and the end of the book is sort of set you up for then what happens, it’s an interpretation. And so it gives us one of the central themes of a book. Additionally, the center of a book and the center of a biblical narrative can also give us, you know, important information. Of course the whole thing’s important but to try to remember it as a structure particularly as we interact with people about this movie, this form can be helpful.

I would encourage you by the way, before actually going to the movie, to actually read the entire story—Genesis 5 through the end of 9. And we’ll read a few verses as we go along here from the New Testament that are commentaries that fill out the picture for us a bit on who Noah was and what he was doing.

So this particular structure, you know, begins with Noah and ends with Noah. Of course, and early in the narrative in chapter 6:10 we read about Shem and Japheth and that’s repeated at the end of this narrative. So these are like little bookends coming into and telling the story. And God, you know, we have a description of Noah’s character which we’ll come to a little bit later when we critique the movie. But we’ll look at that. And in the description of his character, this is given before the story really starts to develop and Noah finds favor in the sight of God.

The whole world had become corrupt and violent and evil. And that again—there’s something that happens toward the end of the story that will be a significant movement that will restrain evil in the world. And we’ll look at that again toward the end of the sermon today. So this is kind of how the story develops.

The ark is supposed to be built and then, matching that at the end, another reference to the ark. There’s going to be a flood announced in 6:17 and matching that down at the bottom, no flood from now on. So there’s a dramatic movement, right? So when we look at these structures, how does it start? What does it change to? And what happens in the middle is usually what creates that change in the structure.

So we go from a flood to the promise of no flood. And you know, this is—you know what we all see: that rainbow in the sky. Now by the way I should mention that on the back there are several handouts for kids to work with, color, whatever. And also that parents can use this week in family worship or just Bible time with the kids. And there’s one in there that is the last page on that—looks you may not be able to figure out exactly what it is. But, you know, it’s circular. It shows you, you know? It doesn’t show just a half rainbow, which is what we see. It shows a full 360 degree rainbow. The reason for that is this is from the perspective of heaven.

That last piece of art is designed to represent sort of some of the major things that are happening from God’s perspective, right? And so the smoke of the offering at the end of the story is coming up to God. The dove is, you know, coming from God. The rainbow is seen as full. And as we consider the story of Noah, it’s important to recognize this is the drawing I was talking about—a very important piece of scripture that ties this rainbow to something other than the promise that God says it is in the story.

So by the end of the story, we know that God hangs his bow in the sky, right? It’s a bow. That’d be a better translation. It’s not a rainbow. It’s really the same word for bow like an archer would use. And so God hangs up his heavy artillery and says he’s never going to destroy the earth again.

Well, in Ezekiel 1, when Ezekiel comes before God to be ordained, we read this: that he saw this rainbow, and it says it’s like the appearance of a rainbow or a bow in a cloud on a rainy day. So Ezekiel is taken to the throne room of God and he sees what looks like, to him, reminds him of a rainbow on a rainy day. So was the appearance of the brightness all around it. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. When I saw it, I fell on my face.

So from this heavenly perspective, we see that the rainbow is really only part of this deal. It’s a full thing. It’s the throne around God. And very specifically, Ezekiel tells us that it represents the glory of God. It’s like the glory of God. And so what we see in the heavens and think about Noah and think about this story and the promise of God is we really see the glory of God manifested, okay?

So the glory of God is manifested and Ezekiel tells us that it is this kind of full thing going on instead of what we normally think as a rainbow. So if your kids are going to color this, they’d color this like rainbow colors all around. After the flood when the colors came out, those colors represent the throne room of God and Ezekiel makes that clear.

By the way, we left Ezekiel dead there. But God then sends his spirit and raises him up. That’s just exactly what happens to us when we come into worship. We are presented with the holiness of God and our sinfulness. We fall down as dead people and he raises us up by his spirit. His spirit comes into us. The words of forgiveness are read from the scriptures and it raises us up.

And then just like in Isaiah or just like with John in the book of Revelation, so here in Ezekiel also, Ezekiel then is given a message by God to take to people. And so that’s what we’re doing right now. You’re being given a message to take to people, to take to yourself, to your families, communities, etc. And the message today has to do with the story of Noah’s Ark.

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So getting back to the text, the covenant with Noah is actually originally described first in chapter 6:18. We normally think after the—after the—uh—ark comes to rest and God gives us the rainbow as the sign of the covenant that is where it’s made. But actually it happens earlier. And so it matches up but that’s where the covenant with Noah is talked about at the beginning, at least in 6:18.

Noah puts food in the ark. And then matching that down below, there’s food outside of the ark. So we have these pairings or matchings. And then Noah is commanded to enter the ark. God tells Noah to go into the ark. And then at the end, of course, he’s commanded to leave the ark. So in both instances, you know, God commands Noah what to do. And one of the big distinguishing factors of the character of Noah is it says that whatever God said he did. It’s as simple as that. That’s the character of Noah: what God said he did.

And so here the emphasis is on the sovereignty of God. And one again, one of the handouts attached to the opening outline on your handout today shows with diagram or pictures rather for kids, what is God sovereign over in the story. And so the sovereignty of God is one of the massive themes of the story. And part of that is in seeing this command to enter the ark and then the command to exit the ark.

All right. Now, let’s actually read a little bit of the text as we look through these other matchings. So if you have your scriptures turn to Genesis 7. We’ll read, starting at verse 16. We’ll look at Genesis 7:16. And now we’ll actually read what appears from this structure at least to be sort of the center of the story. And so it’ll move into a center for us. So here we go.

So those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him and the Lord shut him in. Okay, so that’s an action by God shutting Noah in. Matching this at the end of the narrative we’ll see as we read later on that Noah opens the window of the ark. So God shuts him in, Noah opens the window and releases a bird. Then it says the flood was on the earth 40 days and the waters increased.

So here we have first of all 40 days and then the waters increased. And if we look in verse 6 of the next chapter—if you have your scriptures open, look at chapter 8:6. So it came to pass at the end of 40 days that Noah opened the window. So there’s the 40 days and just before that in verse 5: and the waters decreased continually until the 10th month. So we have in chapter 8 the waters decreasing, 40 days, Noah opening the window. And that’s reverse—the 40 days and the waters decreasing or increasing from what we read in verses 16 and 17.

So there God shuts him in, then there’s 40 days and then there’s the water increasing. So you see it’s it’s flipped. And the reason for that is to draw us to a center. So 40 days and the water increasing, the water abating, these things, you know, could be written either way. But frequently in the scriptures, they’re written in reverse in the last half of it to bring us to a central point. So that’s what we see here.

Verse 18 of chapter 7: the waters prevailed and greatly increased on the earth, and the ark moved about the surface of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. So here there’s a reference to the high hills—the mountains being covered. And matching this, in the last, in the matching section on your outline, is that the mountains are uncovered. The ark comes to rest on Mount Ararat, which is why we have Ararat as the second room as you go through the educational wing—that’s the mountain range that the ark rested on.

You know, the covenants are described in those educational rooms. You begin with the Adamic covenant, Noahic covenant, Abrahamic covenant, etc. So Ararat is the mountain associated with the Noahic covenant. And but literally here in terms of literary structure, it’s matching it up. The mountains being covered and then the mountains being uncovered. Okay.

Verse 21: All flesh died that moved on the earth. Birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth and every man. Now, I’m not going to get to the movie yet, but the movie does apparently show a universal flood, which is good. Back when I was younger, there were people that thought, well, it was just a localized flood. That’s obviously not the case here.

And another thing to point out here is, and we’ll talk about this a little later in terms of Noah’s task, that he preached righteousness and that he warned people of the judgment to come. You know, I heard Francis Chan several years ago talk here in the Portland area, and he had just released the book called Erasing Hell, and it was a response to a guy named Rob Bell who wrote a book saying that there really is no hell. And Chan talked about this story, and he said he realized as he studied the doctrine of hell and the doctrine of God’s judgment that he was trying to be a PR man for God by never talking about this stuff. Here with this movie that people’s discussions will have, we have front and center, can’t avoid it, the judgment of God killing every person apart from the eight that were saved in the ark and all the animals—and all that stuff except for those that he saved in the ark, which were a very small handful.

This morning, or yesterday, I guess it was, there was an earthslide up north of Seattle. Tragic event. Several people were killed. Houses were destroyed by earth moving, right? A lot of water and things moved. Well, imagine that on a worldwide scale. That’s what happened. That’s what this text says. The God we serve is a God who is love. But because of his love for his son and the son’s love for the father, he will not tolerate the kind of evil and wickedness that was then in the earth. He’s a God who brings judgment as a result of the love for the persons of the trinity and the love for the created order and his purpose for mankind.

Judgment is a fact. So when we talk to people about the story of Noah, I mean, it’s impossible to avoid the discussion of judgment. And you shouldn’t, you know, you shouldn’t slide away from that. That’s what Noah told people was going to happen to them. They were going to drown in the flood unless they repented.

All right, reading on. All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life—all the breath of the spirit of life, rather—and all that was on the dry land died. So again, there’s a creation reference here, right? The spirit in the nostrils—this is the spirit of God. And so God withdraws his spirit and men die. So whether you die in a flood, some kind of cataclysmic event, or whether you die in your sleep tonight, you know, the spirit is removed from your nostrils and your body dies.

Again, this is an inevitable part of talking to people about this movie. People die. Everybody dies. At the end of the narrative, the narrative—what does it say? Noah died. Everybody dies. Okay.

Verse 23: So he destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground. And see the stress on this over and over again. Both man and cattle, creeping things and birds of the air. They were destroyed from the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive. And the waters prevailed on the earth 150 days.

Then God remembered Noah and every living thing and all the animals that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters subsided. The foundations of the deep and the windows of heaven were also stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained, and the waters receded continually from the earth. At the end of the 150 days, the waters decreased.

Okay. Now that, apparently from the structure that’s laid out before you, that 150 days and then the description of God remembering Noah and what he did—reversing now the effects of the flood on the earth—that’s bookended by the 150 days and the 150 days. Numbers are very useful items when producing structures like this. So it seems to me at least that this structure sort of draws us to a central point in the narrative.

And whether you like the structure or not, just when you’re talking to people about the story of Noah and the ark, it has that kind of arc to the ark story, right? You know, the flood and then the deliverance from the flood at the end of it. And that deliverance begins to happen in the middle. And what is it in the middle that happens? God remembers Noah. God remembers Noah.

And what it does then is it tells us that isn’t just some kind of mental capacity. It’s not even that God then begins to take actions on the earth to save Noah and his family to bring them out of the ark and create the new world. So when God remembers, it’s not isolated from actions. He remembers Noah and he does things.

First lesson of going through Lent, going through trials and tribulations, going through sufferings, is the lesson of patience. God will remember you. Now, does God ever really forget about Noah or us? Of course not. Of course not. But from a perspective of the trials and the struggles we go through, it feels like God forgets us. And that’s, you know, it’s not wrong to feel that way. That feeling is a reality. And there’s a sense in which God remembers you fully when he brings you out of it and delivers you from the difficulty.

So, you know, if you go through a trial or tribulation, you feel sort of like God’s forgot you. Well, the Bible sort of uses that language. But the important thing to remember is that God will remember you. God remembered Noah after the period of time when the trial and tribulation has had its desired effect. James 1, when he creates perseverance in us and maturity, right? He remembers and he delivers us.

And so this is what the central thing that goes on in this text is: God remembering Noah and delivering him because of that. So if you want to tell the story of Noah’s Ark, it seems like that’s a very important text in the middle of it to help us to understand it.

Now, that’s also important—and we’ll talk about this at the Lord’s supper—that this is what Jesus does for us, right? We’re to take this supper as his memorial in remembrance of him. We’ll talk about that and the connection to this text. And later in the narrative, after God remembers Noah at the pivot, right? And this is what moves, you know, from the beginning of the action to the end of the action, this is what develops and matures us. This is how the story moves. It’s not just a mirror image. Things change in the bottom half, right?

God shut the door. Noah opened the window. There’s a degree of transference going on there that will become very apparent when we talk about Noah’s task after the flood had landed in a couple of minutes. But that movement—the pivot, the hinge point for it—is God remembering Noah and taking actions. When we have the supper, that’s what we do. We ask God to remember us and to remember the work of Jesus.

When they—when God gives them the sign of the covenant, the rainbow, right? He puts the rainbow in the sky, the bow in the sky, and he says he will look upon it and remember his covenant, the promise not to destroy the earth. So in the middle of the structure, we’ve got God remembering Noah, meaning that God begins to move to deliver him. And at the end of the structure, after he gets out of the ark and God establishes the covenant sign of the bow in the sky, we’ve got God remembering his covenant.

So the actions of God in remembering are at the center and they come down to culminate near the end of the narrative as well. So that’s sort of an overview of what happens in the narrative structure and it helps us to understand. And as I said, the need for patience. Noah built the ark for 120 years. 40 days of flood, 150 days. I mean, a lot of all kinds of times elapsing. But in the midst of our trials, we look for God to remember us and turn things and we anticipate that.

And when we come to the supper, we’re assured that God remembers his covenant with us made through the person and work of Jesus Christ.

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Okay. Let’s talk a little bit about the movie now. And we’ll get back to the story when we get to implications of the narrative for us for our lives. And again, this is not necessarily the movie, but it’s what representations of the movie are based upon—scripts that were read and people that have seen the movie—uh—on before.

And so again, my point in this is if you’re going to, if you’re not going to see the movie, that’s fine. But know what the culture is doing. And if people talk about it, you know, you’ll have a little bit better understanding of, and you’ll be able to enter into the conversation from a biblical perspective.

All right. Several things that they talk about. The first is Noah’s character. You know, I’m a descendant of Noah. I don’t know about you. I’m one of his, you know, people who descended from Noah. And obviously all of us did. And the first problem with the movie that appears to be what’s going to be in it is defamation of character. I would like to start a class action lawsuit after the movie premieres as a descendant of this man to restore his reputation.

You know, apparently we’re going to have a picture of Noah’s angry, plotting the murder of this or that person. I mean, I don’t want to give away any spoilers that you haven’t read about, but I don’t think his character is all that good, right? What does the Bible say about Noah? What does the Bible say about this man that God used to repopulate the earth, right? Yes, he’s a—he’s a type of Jesus, clearly, right? And the ark is a type of our salvation through baptism. And it’s a type of Jesus, right? Jesus is the ark. He’s what we have to be in union with to be saved from judgment.

But he’s a real guy, too. And so he’s an example of a guy that God uses for particular purposes. Well, what do we read about him? Well, we read that God said in Genesis 6, “I’m going to destroy the earth.” And then in verse 8 it says “but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.”

Okay. So we have a character description given here that we should want to strive to be like. Yeah, he was a just man. He wasn’t unjust. He wasn’t given to fits of anger and unjust action because of the anger. He was a just man. He knew what justice was defined by God and he strove to do that in his own life and his life with others. That’s who we should be. Noah was perfect in his generations.

This is the same word that’s used of Jacob. I talked about this last week. The sufferings that Jacob went through made him mature and perfect. What did Noah go through? By the time he builds the ark, he’s been around hundreds of years. What has he gone through? He has lived in the context of a culture that he preached to for at least 100, 120 years and didn’t get one convert except maybe the wives of his sons. That’s where Noah lived—120 years of that. And before that, as I said, Noah lived hundreds of years surrounded by people that were violently opposed to God, who hated God, who struck out at God’s image in other people.

It was so bad, you know, that God said, “I’m—I’m changing it all. I’m destroying them all.” Now, that’s got to be a huge deal for people to be that wicked, right? That’s where Noah lived. What did we say last week? You know, count it all joy—not feel like it’s joyful, but reckon it as joy because God is doing great things through it. He’s making you mature. And Noah, like Jacob, these two guys are called perfect in the Bible. That doesn’t mean they’re without sin. It means they’re mature. They’re really good. They’re great, you know, great guys who follow and walk with God. And they got that way.

The text doesn’t draw this inference, but we can. They got that way in part because of the struggles they had. Jacob with, you know, his ungodly dad—at least ungodly at the time of the narrative gives us about him—and Esau, and a brother who, you know, wasn’t so good either. And Noah, who lived in the midst of horrific evil. And the end result of that was not that Noah got bitter. The end result of that was that Noah got better, right? He became perfect, mature because of handling the suffering properly.

He wanted justice. So it wasn’t through not wanting justice. He was a just man. He hungered and thirsted for justice, for righteousness in his land. And he saw none for hundreds of years, right? And he walked with God. You know, we read in several places in the narrative, “whatever God said, Noah did.” God spoke to Noah. That’s what Noah did. He walked with God. You know, walking with Jesus means doing what he tells us to do. And he tells us what to do through the scriptures and through other people, speaking the truths of those scriptures to us in our lives. And Noah walked with God.

So Noah’s character was excellent. Unlike the movie, apparently the movie portrayal of Noah, Noah is given to us as another shining example of a godly man, a just man who walked with God and who did what God said to do.

Secondly, the movie has an evolutionary cast. We’re used to that, apparently. Noah will talk about the seven days of creation and the imagery will be evolution and “in long days” blah blah. Okay, fine. We’re ready for that. Apparently also there’s some involvement of fallen angels. And let me just say that if you ever hear people talking about the redemption of fallen angels by their actions of sacrifice, that’s not in the Bible, okay? That may be interesting science fiction, but of course that’s not in the scriptures.

Another problem is the number of people on the ark. The scriptures are quite clear about this. We’re told in First Peter 3, for instance, talking about the days of Noah when the ark was being prepared “in which a few, that is eight souls were saved through water.” Should be easy to get that down. And maybe they mess with what a soul is. I don’t know. But there are eight souls. And the scriptures clearly identify this as Noah and his wife, his three sons, and their three wives. That’s who’s in the boat. Major, you know, changes from that in the movie you’re going to see.

So why? I don’t know. Well, for plot purposes, I suppose. And the big—the biggest thing I think that I want to talk about from the movie, and this is discussion topic with people that you’re witnessing to. The movie, of course, is going to be environmentalist. I mean, you knew that just even before you knew heard anything about it, right? I mean, you know. But the emphasis I think from the movie will include man’s damage to the environment and God saving the environment. This plays a major role in the theme of the movie. And I don’t want to give away anything, but I’ve read stuff in terms of you know how that affects the character of Noah, for instance.

And now this is one that I think we need to think about without just, you know, reacting against it and saying, “Oh no, environmentalism is bad.” I believe that the Lord God has used the women’s liberation movement to mature his people in terms of understanding male-female relationships. And I believe that God is again striking a straight blow with a crooked stick. I think that the environmental movement should be seen by us as God wanting us to focus on our relationship to the created order.

Man is to exercise dominion over the earth, and that means caring for the garden, beautifying the earth and all that stuff. It is amazing—over and over and over in the story of Noah as found in the pages of scripture. It is amazing how often God talks about the rest of the plants and the animals, or the animals rather and the birds. For instance, in Genesis 6:7, the Lord said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth.” Well, then he’s destroying them. But then when Noah—when God establishes his covenant, he says the same thing. He says that he’s going to establish his covenant between him and all flesh, the animals, the creeping things, the birds.

The covenant is not just between God and Noah. Here’s what we read: “As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, every beast of the earth with you.” Okay, so God establishes his covenant with these animals. Okay, in addition to Noah. That places us in the context of a created order given by God that we’re to care for properly and mature and develop.

Environmentalism is like social justice. The problem is not that people want social justice. The problem is when you define social justice apart from the standards of God’s word and then secondly when you use unbiblical means—an authoritative civil state—to achieve those bad ends. So the goals and the methods. Environmentalism is the same way and properly understood. We’re to exercise dominion. We’re to beautify the earth. We’re not caretakers, right? We’re developers of the earth. Very important. That was man’s original task. Extend the beauty of the garden. Go all over the world. Create great things. Maybe go into the universe. So we’re not caretakers.

So our goal for a biblical relationship between us and our environment is different from what a secular view of environmentalism is. And the process for getting there, of course, is different as well. It’s to create disciples for the Lord Jesus Christ who understand their relationship to the created order. But—but please don’t just react against this stuff and then miss the tremendous opportunity that this movie gives us for talking about the role of man in the context of the earth. Now, if people reject it, they reject it. That’s okay.

But let’s get the story right and let’s look at the opportunity, right? Dennis Peacocke says, “Well, you know, you read the story on the front page of the newspaper and you see where God is plowing it up and that’s where he wants you to plow plant seeds.” This movie is where God is plowing up ground that he wants us to come along afterwards and plant seeds in people’s lives. And environmentalism is part of those seed plantings.

Over and over and over again God talks about this covenant being established with every living creature, with all flesh, with every living creature with you, with all flesh on the earth, with all flesh. This goes on over and over and over again particularly as God is establishes the covenant then at the end of the narrative. So those are a few brief statements.

And now some very brief comments on Noah’s on the last four points of the outline.

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Noah’s Times and Ours. I’ve already said it’s not, you know, obviously this is a one-off, right? This is a one-off. That’s what God promises in the covenant. He’s not going to do it again. Not going to destroy the earth in this way. However, in the scriptures, it’s used as an example of other times—times, and specifically the times in which the New Testament books were written.

Let me just read to you Second Peter 2. And this is—I’m just going to read the text here. Very little if any comments. And what I want you to think about is, you know, that these things were sort of characteristic of Noah’s day. They were characteristic of the time at which Peter wrote Second Peter. And I think that in some ways—not in perhaps quite as magnified form—I think if we think about the we live in. Some of these things are very much what we have to live in as well, okay.

So, let me just read it. Second Peter 2.

But there were also false prophets among the people even as there were false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them and bring on themselves swift destruction. Many will follow their destructive ways. because of which the way of truth will be blasphemed by covetousness. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words for a long time. Their judgment has not been idle and their destruction does not stumble. For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world but save Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness bringing in the flood on the world on the ungodly—so he compares his times to those times. And that’s what we’re doing here.

And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, later times right, into ashes—condemn them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly. So Sodom and Gomorrah is an example of the times in which God’s judgment seems to come forward. And he delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked. For that righteous man dwelling among them tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds.

Then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries. Whereas angels who are greater in power and might do not bring a reviling accusation against them before the Lord.

But those like-minded brute beasts made to be caught and destroyed speak evil of the things they do not understand and will utterly perish in their own corruption and will receive the wages of unrighteousness as those who count it pleasure to carouse in the daytime. They are spots and blemishes carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices and are cursed children. They have forsaken the right way and gone astray following the way of Balaam the son of Beor who loved the wages of unrighteousness. But he was rebuked for his iniquity.

A dumb donkey speaking with a man’s voice restrained the madness of the prophet. These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for which is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lust of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error.

And now listen. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption. For by whom a person is overcome by him also he is brought into bondage. So if we listen to them, we likewise are brought into bondage. For if after they have escaped the pollution of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning.

For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known it to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them. But it has happened to them according to the old proverb: a dog returns to his own vomit, and a sow having washed to her wallowing in the mire.

Now, the point’s a simple one. Our times are not that dissimilar, I think, from the description that’s given in Second Peter in many ways. And as the culture moves further and further away from Christ, we will live in like times as Noah. Noah had very few converts and friends, none that I can know except maybe his in-laws. But, you know, those were the times in which he lived. Those were what God gave him to work with. And God gives us a similar time today in the sense of this description from Second Peter.

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Well, what was Noah’s task and ours? Well, the scriptures tell us that Noah was a preacher of righteousness, right? It says in Second Peter 2:5, “did not spare the ancient world but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness.” So Noah’s task was to preach the righteousness and justice of God. He was to proclaim that this is who God is to people that wouldn’t hear him, but he was to proclaim it nonetheless. And he was to preach it out.

Though we don’t get that from the narrative, but this text interpreting it for us tells us that’s what he did. We’re to be preachers of righteousness. We’re to confront the wickedness of the days in which we live and the people in rebellion against God. We’re to be preachers of righteousness.

Secondly, Noah prepared an ark. “By faith, Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared the ark for the saving of his household by which he condemned the world.” This is Hebrews 11:7, the Hall of Fame. He prepared an ark. This is part of his preaching was to let people know judgment’s coming. You better be prepared. And Noah prepared an ark for the saving of his household.

Now, that’s the second task that he did. He built an ark. Now, I’m not encouraging prepper activity. I’m encouraging biblical prepper activity, which is that the scriptures make the relationship between the ark and the church of Jesus Christ, where we’re united by Jesus Christ through baptism and the church then becomes this ark that we’re to prepare and to work on in terms of the delivering of our households.

First Peter 3:20 sometimes—they were disobedient whom once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah while the ark was in preparation wherein few, that is eight souls were saved by water. The like figure whereunto even baptism does also save us now. Baptism saves us by uniting us with the person and work of Jesus Christ. The only place of refuge from the just judgment of God, united with Christ.

And to be united with Jesus Christ is to be united to his church. And to be united to his church is to be involved in participating in the life of a local church. Now friends, you know, we have some that we know drift away from the church. And that when they drift away from this church, they don’t necessarily—some do, but some don’t—drift into contact with another church. Now, we’re preparing a church where we want to reach people like that and say, “Hey, do you understand where you’re going with that direction in your life? You’re going into those places where the floods of God, the judgment of God will come upon those people and you will be taken away with them.”

The church of Jesus Christ is what we’re to prepare and to build and to manifest both as a witness to the world and also as the saving of our families and our culture. So that was Noah’s task. We’re to preach the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, which baptism unites us to. And that only in that union with the death and resurrection of Jesus is safety to be found.

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Noah’s Rule and Ours. When Noah comes out of the ark, what is the first thing he does? He builds an altar and he worships—an ascension offering, a burnt offering. God smells it and is pleased and establishes the covenant and says, “This is the sign of the covenant. I’m not going to destroy the earth anymore. My bow’s in the sky.”

Response to Noah’s worship. And then God tells Noah immediately, right, in the context of that worship setting, God tells Noah, “From now on, if man sheds other men’s blood, if you kill a man, he should be executed. By man, shall his blood be taken as well.”

Now, it’s interesting in the Bible, you know, that early in the narrative God said—and we read it—that their thoughts were evil continually. And then late in the narrative, God says in making this promise that they’re evil from their youth. Similar language, thoughts of men are evil, intentionally evil, but it says from their youth. So the transition that seems to have happened is God is now establishing a means by which the iniquity of man, which is found in all men—all men are sinners—will be cut off and restrained. And that means is the death penalty. Now by the death penalty, it means civil governance.

Noah was given rule in a way that mankind had never been given before. And brothers and sisters, this is part of our thing as well. Noah had a task in preparation. Then he had a task as he came out of the ark. And the task was to worship. And on the basis of his knowing that the sacrifice of God’s son—which we would know is Jesus—that through that sacrifice, this is what saved him. The first thing he does, he comes out, confesses himself a sinner. He burns a sacrificial animal, indicating, “This is me. I know I’m a sinner. I know I’m saved by grace. None of this was my works.” And on the basis of that God establishes rule and authority with him. He tells him, “From now on establish civil governance. It will be a restraint on evil.”

That’s what Romans tells. It’s to restrain evil. And so if the church refuses to enter into proper judgments and discernments, to make evaluations of people, and then in the case of either church court or civil courts, make pronouncements and judgments, we back away from the new thing that was given to restrain evil. And when the church moves away from being properly judging and discerning and making those judgments known, then the culture slides more and more into evil.

You see, so Noah’s rule was established on the basis of what had happened and the basis of Noah being humble in approaching God in worship through a through another entity representing eventually Jesus. That humble person is given rule and authority in the context of the world. And the story of Noah is not that we shouldn’t do anything in the earth. It’s actually that we should do more things now than prior to the flood. Civil government is now part of that rule and authority.

Now, the only thing civil government can do is restrain evil, right? It’s preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ that really transforms people. And so that’s our ultimate hope. But in the meantime, we’re also to exercise civil rule as Noah was given civil rule. And as a result of that, evil is restrained. Evil is restrained.

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And then finally, Noah’s Rest and Ours. Boy, I’m really sorry I’ve gone so long. Noah’s rest and ours. This is why I read those two bookends. Noah’s name—it means literally rest. And the prophecy is that Noah would bring comfort to his people.

Now, matching that at the end, that’s what we would expect to find, right? That’s what we expect to find. And there’s a word here that messes it up for us. It’s the word drunk. It says that Noah planted a vineyard and drank wine and became drunk and uncovered himself in his tent or slept in his tent. Well, the word drunk there—it could mean drunk. But it’s the same word that’s used in Genesis 43. Listen now. I’m sorry, that’s the wrong text. Genesis 43. You remember Joseph and his brothers. They finally have family reunion and everything’s great. And we read in verse 34 of that text. And he took servings to them from his brothers from before him. But Benjamin’s serving was five times as much as any of theirs. So they drank and they were merry with him. They drank and were merry with him. That word merry is the same word.

They don’t translate it drunk there because the context says, “No, they couldn’t have been getting drunk. This is Joseph. This is his brothers.” Yeah, they’re being merry. God gives us wine to make our hearts merry. But they’re not being drunk. And I think the same thing’s true here at the end of the tale. Noah has given his people rest. And he enters into rest. And he does that through drinking the stuff we’re going to drink here in a couple of minutes. Nothing wrong with drinking a little wine, feeling relaxed from the wine, and then going to sleep in your tent.

Now, things then happen. Things happen. And this is part of the narrative of the movie as well. Let me just say very briefly—maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll save it for next week. My interpretation of the incident with Ham. I will give you next week. That’s a teaser because, you know, I don’t know if many of you know. You read this stuff but there’s a lot of speculation about what Ham was doing in that tent. And I’ll tell you what I think next week. But that reminds us that we’re still dealing with sinful people, right? So the story doesn’t end with no sin in the world. There’s still sin in the world. And what is the nature of the sin? It’s rebellion against authority, one way or the other.

But the story ends with Noah accomplishing what his name was meant to and what the prophecy was made about him: to bring comfort to his people. And the picture of that is doing just what we do here, to drink wine and to rejoice and to rest in the finished work of the one whose blood is portrayed to us in this wine.

So, you know, Noah’s times were not that dissimilar from ours. Noah’s tasks were one that we should take up: build the church, right? Proclaim righteousness, preach the gospel to the world in which we live. Noah’s rule is linked to Noah’s worship, right? And that’s what we’re supposed to do. We’re supposed to worship God and recognize that we’re saved by grace through faith. And then on the basis of that acknowledgement of who we are, God grants to us authority in the context of the land to rule, make judgments and discernments. And as we move through that narrative, we come to the missing bookends. We come to rest and joy in the person and work of Jesus.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for today. Thank you for this wonderful opportunity that this movie brings us. We take this gift from your hand knowing that you give us good gifts. We pray that people wouldn’t stumble because of this movie, Lord God, in any way. But we do pray that some of us would use the movie to witness to our neighbors, to talk to them about the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, the sacrifice that paid the price for our sins and brought us into rest and joy in you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.