GEOGRAPHICAL DISPERSEMENT (PART 1)

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

Genesis 11:8-9

This is the account of Shem, Ham and Japheth, Noah’s sons, who themselves had sons after the flood.

The sons of Japheth:

Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshek and Tiras.

The sons of Gomer:

Ashkenaz, Riphath and Togarmah.

The sons of Javan:

Elishah, Tarshish, the Kittites and the Rodanites. (From these the maritime peoples spread out into their territories by their clans within their nations, each with its own language.)

Genesis 10:1-5

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

In yesterday’s message, we saw where the opening verses of Genesis, chapter 11 actually contain an event that happened before what we read in chapter 10, the confusion of language caused by God and then the subsequent scattering of the people in Babel (11:8-9).

Today, we go back to chapter 10 where we find where the offspring of Noah’s sons – Japheth, Ham, and Shem – ending up geographically after the Babel dispersing. For the next three days, we’ll cover each son’s lineage, beginning today with Japheth. Look again at our passage here:

This is the account of Shem, Ham and Japheth, Noah’s sons, who themselves had sons after the flood.

The sons of Japheth:

Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshek and Tiras.

The sons of Gomer:

Ashkenaz, Riphath and Togarmah.

The sons of Javan:

Elishah, Tarshish, the Kittites and the Rodanites. (From these the maritime peoples spread out into their territories by their clans within their nations, each with its own language.)  Genesis 10:1-5

Before we get into this, we need to remember what happened at the end of chapter 9 before Noah passed away.

You’ll remember that after making wine off the fresh grapes he grew from the earth after the flood, Noah became drunk and ended up lying naked in his tent. We discussed how nakedness was considered shameful going all the way back to Eden’s garden after the fall and so there was Noah, passed out and unable to cover himself.

The scriptures told us that Ham was the first to see his father exposed but instead of taking action, he went to tell his other two brothers. Hearing what had transpired, Japheth and Shem took a garment and laid it over their shoulders before backing into their father’s tent so they weren’t laying eyes on him and covering up his nakedness.

When Noah came around and learned what had happened, you’ll remember that he wished blessings on Japheth and Shem but cursed Ham, swearing consequences would come upon his son Canaan, who we know would be the progenitor of the Canaanite nation.

Okay, with that recap, we enter into chapter 10 and look first at one of the two blessed sons, Japheth. We read where he had seven sons: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshek and Tiras with two of them, Gomer and Javan, going on to have sons of their own. Of interest, each of the sons mentioned born from Japheth - Gomer and Javan - are referred to as nations and this chapter in Genesis is under the overall title, “The Table of Nations”.

Our scripture passage today also tells us something else about this particular clan. For we read where they were “maritime peoples” (think seagoing) who “spread out into their territories by their clans within their nations”, each having “its own language”. These descendants of Japheth would go out into a large part of Europe and Asia which fulfilled Noah’s wish that God would “extend Japheth’s territory” (9:27). Later populations who will be born out of the line of Japheth and the Japhethites would include the Macedonians, Greeks, Romans, and Persians, most of which were powerful empires in biblical times.  

Tomorrow, we’ll look at the descendants of Ham.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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CLEAR WISDOM FROM BABEL

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth." Genesis 9:1

Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth."

But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The Lord said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."

So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

Genesis 11:1-9

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

After the flood, God blessed Noah and his sons and gave them direction. They were to "be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth" (Genesis 9:1). We know that disobedience and evil living had led to the great, creation vanquishing flood in the first place and as we see in today’s passage, it didn’t take long for God’s people to begin to settle back into their sinful ways once again. Look again at the first nine verses of Genesis, chapter 11:

Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth."

But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The Lord said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."

So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

The Bible is one hundred percent inerrant in its content. There is no disputing this but we sometimes find things not exactly in chronological order and these verses in chapter 11 are one example, thus why we are covering this before looking at chapter 10 and the documented scattering that we read about in verse 9 in today’s text.

As the start of our passage today, we find that the "whole world had one language and a common speech." This commonality among the descendants of Noah was not what led man to get in trouble in and of itself but it was a contributing factor in them conspiring to disobey God and set up a city where they would seek to "make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth". In other words, mankind sought to bring glory and honor to themselves which caused the Lord to voice the following concern:

"If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.”

And so the scriptures tell us that God did something to avert this from happening. We read where He "confused their language" so they could not understand one another before scattering them “over the face of the earth”. This act of God led to the city being named “Babel” because it was there that the Lord “confused the language of the whole world”.

It’s interesting that we still often use a word that rival this ancient city’s name, the word “babble”. It describes language that is unintelligible but what is understandable are three clear points of wisdom we can draw from this story to apply to our living today:

First, the language God gives us is only useful when we use it toward His purpose, not our own.

One could say that there are more ways for people to communicate with one another in this age than in any time in history, to include software and apps that translate languages we don’t speak, and yet, we seem to communicate just as badly as ever. Let’s not believe that this is by accident for God will often confuse discourse on any matters that are centered on His honor and glory. It started at Babel and it still continues today.

Second, when we decide to be disobedient, God still will get His way.

Despite the people’s desire to do their own thing and make a city where they would settle and not disperse, God had the final say and His will was still done as the people’s language was confused before being scattered. Rest assured He will do the same thing to us in the places where we resist and reject Him in our lives.

Finally, the third bit of wisdom from this passage is this:

Success will only occur if we are carrying out the will of God.

The descendants of Noah would have been successful in constructing the city if it had been God’s will for them to do so but it wasn’t and so their self-centered efforts failed badly.

Conversely, it was God’s will for Noah to build the ark that would carry him, his family, and the prescribed number of creatures to safety during the flood. And that plan was carried out to fruition because it was all God’s plan.

In life, we need to always seek the will of our Lord and then do what He wills us to do, remembering that He never calls us to something He isn’t going to bring us through.

In closing, what a blessing it is for us to have the Holy Bible and the accounts of God’s people as they succeeded and failed. For the entirety of the scriptures gives us a ripe opportunity to read and learn from the accomplishments and mistakes of the past.

In the Word of God, we won’t ever find babble when we are in Him and under the leading of the blessed Holy Spirit. Both will always speak clear wisdom and direction into our hearts and minds so we can apply it with the goal of living in a way that is pleasing in the Lord’s sight.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

WHEN YOU SEE SOMETHING, DO SOMETHING

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the whole earth.

Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father’s naked body. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked.

When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, he said,

“Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers.”

He also said, “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend Japheth’s territory; may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be the slave of Japheth.”

After the flood Noah lived 350 years. Noah lived a total of 950 years, and then he died.

Genesis 9:18-28

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

In the closing verses of Genesis, chapter 9, we find an interesting passage, the last one detailing a part of Noah’s life. It’s one we rarely find anyone talking about with this important biblical figure as most of what people know is connected to the ark and great flood.

Before we look at these verses, it’s important to return to the Garden of Eden where we’ll find important context. You may remember these words from when we studied there:

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”

He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”

And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”

The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”

The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” Genesis 3:6-13

The very first consequence for eating the God-forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was that Adam and Even felt shame for their nakedness, so much so that they fashioned coverings out of fig leaves and then hid, fearing God seeing them exposed.

From this point on, nakedness was looked upon as taboo and later in the scriptures, it became code for sexual sinfulness. We’re looking at this matter because we’re about to see the second place in the Bible where nakedness comes into play and that’s in the story of Noah. Look at the closing verses of chapter 9:

The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the whole earth.

Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father’s naked body. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked.

When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, he said,

“Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers.”

He also said, “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend Japheth’s territory; may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be the slave of Japheth.”

After the flood Noah lived 350 years. Noah lived a total of 950 years, and then he died. Vv.18-28

We pick up with Noah after he and his family, which included his three sons and their wives, re-inhabited the earth. You’ll remember that God has commanded them to be fruitful, multiply, and increase in number (v.7) and its obvious this had happened as we see that at least Ham had children now. More on that in a minute.

Noah, who the scriptures tell us was a “man of the soil”, had got to work planting “a vineyard” and it’s obvious that he was successful because he literally got to drink the fruits of his labor. We read where he had become drunk on some of the wine to the point of falling asleep in his tent naked. 

The first to see this was Noah’s youngest son, Ham, and instead of taking action to cover his father and remove the disgraceful nakedness, he instead went to tell his other brothers, Shem and Japheth. The scriptures tell us that they “took a garment and laid it across their shoulders” before walking in “backward” to cover “their father’s naked body”. As they did this, they made sure “their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked” and dishonor him.

Well, Noah eventually came around and “awoke from his wine”, and we read where he “found out what” Ham had done and was far from happy. We know this from his words, laced with anger:

“Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers.”

“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend Japheth’s territory; may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be the slave of Japheth.”

Now, we don’t know why Noah condemned Canaan, Ham’s son, instead of his father but that’s what happened. The descendants of Ham’s son would be known as the Canaanites and we know they became a sinful people dedicated to false gods and idols, enemies of the Lord God Almighty. We can see where their wicked roots were planted through Noah’s curse.

Conversely, we find Noah praising the Lord and wishing blessings on his other two sons, Seth and Japeth. Both sons and their descendants would reign and rule over Canaan and his family line...and as we follow the history of the Israelites in the Old Testament, we see where this indeed happened.

As I read this story, I can’t help but think it could have all ended up differently if Ham just would have done something when he saw something was wrong. He could have just as easily done what Seth and Japheth eventually did on his own merit, honoring his father and covering his shameful nakedness. Had he done so, Noah would have commended him and no curse would have been warranted.

Today, we often see sinfulness and wickedness happening, things we should take action on and address but we’re many time too much like Ham, going to tell someone else and then watching them do what we should have done in the first place. Our Savior Jesus never hesitated to confront sin and its practitioners head on and as Christians, we need to follow His lead.

When you see something, do something, especially when the Holy Spirit is leading you to do so.  

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

LIFE IN THE BLOOD

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. And for your lifeblood, I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.”

“Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind. As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”

Genesis 9:4-7

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

After leaving the ark, constructing an altar and presenting burnt offerings to Lord, and then receiving a covenant from Him that mankind would never again be destroyed like it was in the flood, we see in today’s passage that Noah and his family received an important command that was to be followed, one centered on blood. Look again at those words here:

“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. And for your lifeblood, I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.”

“Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind. As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.” Vv.4-7

Just prior to these verses, we found God say this regarding to the food on the earth:

“Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you.” v.3

So putting this together, Noah and his family could eat everything that “lives and moves about” however they couldn’t “eat meat” that still had “lifeblood still in it”. Anyone who was disobedient to this command would face punishment.

So what was so precious about blood?

We can fast forward to the Book of Leviticus for the answer. Look at these words from God found in chapter 17, verses 10 through 12:

“‘I will set My face against any Israelite or any foreigner residing among them who eats blood, and I will cut them off from the people. For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life. Therefore I say to the Israelites, “None of you may eat blood, nor may any foreigner residing among you eat blood.”

Here, we find our Lord making it clear about the value of the blood for in it is the “life” of any “creature” and the Maker of all things values the life He gives. It’s of critical importance to Him and it’s to be important to us as well.

In regard to life and the blood, go back to Genesis chapter 4 where the sin of Adam and Eve found its way into the behavior of their children. You’ll remember that Cain, jealous that his brother received God’s favor over him for presented offerings, lured Abel into a field and killed him. After he tried to cover up what he had done, God said this to the killer:

“What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.” Genesis 4:10

Abel’s lifeblood, spilled out by Cain, cried out to God and revealed itself “from the ground”.

And this leads us to the greatest life of all, the eternal life that any sinner gains when they believe in Jesus as Savior. This life is sealed by the blood of the unblemished Lamb who came to be a living sacrifice and take away the sin of the world (John 1:29). Here’s what Jesus had to say in the sixth chapter of John’s Gospel:

“Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” Vv.53-54

Here, we are reminded of the beauty found in communion, the sacrament observed in the church in remembrance of Christ, as He commanded.

The bread is His body broken for us (1 Corinthians 11:24 NKJV) while His blood (the wine or juice) represents the “new covenant” in His blood (v.25). This new covenant was God’s promise of everlasting life through the One who shed His lifeblood so we could have life forever.

Indeed, the scriptures declare that there is unique and special power in blood and it is to be cherished and honored, especially when it comes to the blood of Jesus. For it is the life of a creature, a life given first and foremost by the Creator of all living things.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

GOD'S PROMISE IN A RAINBOW

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.”

“I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth." And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between Me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between Me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."

So God said to Noah, "This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth."

Genesis 9:1-3, 8-17

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

God commanded Noah to build an ark and inhabit it with his family and "seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth" (Genesis 7:2-3). Obedient and faithful to God, Noah carried out his tasking as God opened the "floodgates of heaven" in sending rain for 40 days and 40 nights, flooding all the earth for 150 days and wiping out every living creature that wasn’t in the ark. Today, our scripture picks up after the flood as we turn to Genesis, chapter 9. Look again at those words here:

Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.”

“I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth." And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between Me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between Me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."

So God said to Noah, "This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth." Vv. 1-3, 8-17

Here, we find God first blessing Noah, his sons and their families, urging them to "be fruitful and increase in number" in order to "fill the earth". To the humans who would reestablish humanity, we read where God gave them dominion over “all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea”. Needing food to eat, the Lord provided “everything” that lived and moved’. No prohibitions were placed on what they consume.

And with that, we find God make an important promise:

“I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth."

Everything on earth had just been wiped out, drowned by the massive flood that covered even the mountain tops, but God made a promise that it would never happen again and we know that He never breaks a promise.

Now, God could have stopped there and everything would have been fine. No one could have questioned Him for not going further with any action. But as we see in the scriptures, our Lord decided to establish a perpetual reminder of the important vow that He had made, a magnificently, beautiful sign that we still get to see today. Look at these words from God:

"This is the sign of the covenant I am making between Me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between Me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."

"This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth."

Although this would not be the first covenant or promise God would establish, it was His first and possibly the most important one because it dealt with everything He had created more than just a select group. The flood had brought annihilation and extermination of everything that had breath on earth. God’s covenant promised it would be the last time it would happen. And this would have been awesome enough, but God wasn’t done yet. He wanted to make sure He left a sign of His promise and thus the rainbow came to be.

I don’t know about you but I love rainbows and always have even before I discovered how they came to be. There’s something simply fascinating and beautiful about them as they arc across the sky after a time of rainfall displaying their beautiful array of colors, ever reminding us that He loves us and will never seek to totally eliminate His created things.

So next time you see a rainbow, look up, and give thanks to God while remembering that He first revealed it to Noah and his family at the dawn of a renewed humanity, and has shown it ever since.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

AN EXPRESSION OF THANKSGIVING

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him.

By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.

Then God said to Noah, “Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives. Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”

So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives. All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds—everything that moves on land—came out of the ark, one kind after another.

Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it.

The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart:

“Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.

“As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”

Genesis 8:12-22

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

In the opening verses of Genesis, chapter 8, we saw where the flood waters began to recede from the earth, an event that wasn’t a fast process.

First, the waters dropped below the mountain tops, allowing Noah’s ark to come to rest “on the mountains of Ararat (v.5). There was then a long period of time before Noah could check to see if it was safe to exit the ark and return to the earth safely.

How long?

Well, we know that Noah was 600 years old when “the floodwaters came on the earth” (Genesis 7:6) and as we see in today’s passage, he was in the first month of his 601st year when the water had finally “dried up from the earth”. We read where he sent the same dove out who had returned to the ark with an olive leaf seven days earlier, a sign that life had once again begun coming to life on the earth, but this time it “did not return to him”.

And so knowing it was now safe for everyone and everything to soon exit the ark, Noah “removed the covering” and indeed “saw that the surface of the ground was dry”. The scriptures tell us that “the earth” became “completely dry” by the “twenty-seventh day of the second month”.

It was at that time that we read where God gave the following command to Noah:

“Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives. Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”

It’s important to note that it was God who appointed the time for Noah, his family, and all the prescribed living creatures to enter the ark and then appointed the time for them to disembark so to “multiply on the earth” and “be fruitful and increase in number on it”. When we stay connected to the Lord God Almighty and commit to Him with full obedience, we will move in accordance with His perfect will, always in the place He wants us to be, at the time He wants us to be there, to carry out the purposes that He wants us to accomplish.

With God’s blessing, the scriptures tell us that “Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives” as well as “all the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds”, transiting “one kind after another”.

Note the first thing that Noah did. He didn’t get to work building a home for his wife so they could have shelter. Nor did he immediately go looking for food so to have a good meal after so many months at sea. No, the first thing we find Noah doing is constructing “an altar to the Lord” before “taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds” he loaded on the ark and placing them on the altar as “burnt offerings” to the Lord.

God had saved Noah and his family as well as the animals on the ark. Through all of them, He would start to populate the earth anew. And so Noah, with a heart full of gratitude and thanksgiving, brought burnt offerings to honor his Lord. Of interest, this was the very first burnt offering in the Bible and it was a definite forerunner of what was to come in the Law.

For when we fast forward in the Old Testament to the first chapter of the Book of Leviticus, we find this in verse 9:

“It is a burnt offering, a food offering, an aroma pleasing to the Lord.”

Now, the Hebrew word for burnt offering means to ascend and in the case of the burnt offering, this referred to the smoke that would rise up from the altar. We read in the Leviticus verse where this smoke rising up would be “an aroma pleasing to the Lord”.

With that, we come back to our passage and read where the smoke from Noah’s burnt offerings rose from the altar and was “smelled” by “the Lord” who spoke these words out of His pleasure:

“Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.

“As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”

We serve a God who never goes back on a promise and here, we vowed to never “destroy all living creatures” as He had just done before. It’s important to note here that all creatures of the earth were destined to destruction and the penalty of Hell before God sent His Son Jesus out of love so that whosoever would believe in Him wouldn’t perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). I can’t but help but think that some of God’s desire to save people from everlasting death and damnation was born out of this promise He made to Noah, a promise that we will soon see marked by the visual sign of the rainbow.

That’s coming up but let’s not leave this message today without a critical takeaway.

For we have a lot to learn from Noah and his actions in this passage. Without hesitation, he built an altar and immediately brought worship and tribute to God through the burnt offerings. All this was born out of a spirit of thanks and praise for all that God had done.

Question: How well do we show God our thanks for the things He does for us every day?

I wonder if we’re not guilty more times than not of forgetting to give the Lord our praise, taking for granted all the little things He blesses us with.

For every breath is a gift. We should give thanks.

Every heartbeat is a gift. We should give thanks.

Every time we take a step or our brain allows us to think or we can use our hands to work, eat, perform personal hygiene, and/or serve others. We should give thanks.

The truth of the matter is that we have reasons to express gratitude to God each and every day. Let’s not miss one opportunity to let Him know how much we appreciate His goodness and provision.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

THE SIGN OF RENEWED LIFE

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In Christ, Mark

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and He sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.

Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.

After forty days, Noah opened a window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.

Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark.

He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth.

Genesis 8:1-11

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Forty days and forty nights. More than a month of rain fell as God opened up the heavens and flooded the earth with so much water that the tops of the highest mountains were submerged. No living creature on land survived, each having their breath taken away by the Maker who had granted it.

As we turn to the opening verses of Genesis, chapter 8, we learn what happened when the rains stopped and how God initiated His plans for life to be renewed on the earth. Look again at those words here:

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and He sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.

Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.

After forty days, Noah opened a window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.

Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark.

He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. Vv.1-11

Everyone and everything on the ark was a part of God’s restoration plan to repopulate the world and as He “remembered” them all, “He sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded...steadily from the earth”.

Now this wasn’t a quick process like you might experience if a sink is full of water and you remove the stopper from the drain. No, the scriptures tell is that it was a “hundred and fifty days” before “the water had gone down”, a period of nearly five months. During all this time and up to the “seventeenth day of the seventh month”, Noah’s ark remained afloat before coming “to rest on the mountains of Ararat:”. And there it sat as the “waters continued to recede until the tenth month” when the “tops of the mountains” finally became visible again. That tells us that there was still a lot of water flooding the earth that had to subside before anyone could be on dry ground again.

God’s Word tells us that forty days later, “Noah opened a window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven”, which flew “back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth”. Then, we read where Noah “sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground” which would indicate the earth was once again inhabitable. Unfortunately, things weren’t quite ready yet because “the dove could find nowhere to perch” on “the surface of the earth” and so “it returned to Noah in the ark”.

Seven days later, Noah once again dispatched the “dove from the ark” and when it returned this time, it had “a freshly plucked olive leaf” firmly “in its beak”. This let Noah know that “the water had receded from the earth”. The freshly plucked olive leaf was a sign that things had begun to grow once again upon the devastated earth. Indeed, God was about to make all things new again and restore life, starting with Noah, his family, and the animals on the ark.

Today, Christians have their own version of the olive leaf carrying dove in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son who He sent to be the Savior of the world.

Like in the days of Noah, the world today is becoming increasingly wicked and by the time we reach the end of days as detailed in the Book of Revelation, evil and sin will dominate the earth just before the final judgment that comes when Jesus returns. The scriptures are clear that this event will culminate with the total destruction of Heaven and earth as we know it.

Thankfully, God has made a way for people to be saved from the sure destruction and eternal damnation of Hell, something we could liken to the great floodwaters that wiped out humanity. For when a person places their belief in Jesus, they are assured safety and eternal life, sealed and protected much like Noah, his family, and the animals were while on the ark.

And so when we look at this story of Noah and how God removed the waters to allow renewed life, believers need to look to the cross, a place of death where they see Jesus crucified, but then visit an empty tomb three days later to be reminded how God brought eternal life for all sinners out of the death and subsequent resurrection of His Son.

Whether the olive leaf or the empty tomb, we see signs of how the Lord restores and renews life and this truth should always bring us to a place of thanksgiving and praise, now and forever.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

BREATH TAKEN AWAY

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Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

In Christ, Mark

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk

** Like posts and send friend requests to the author of The Christian Walk, Mark Cummings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mark.cummings.733?ref=tn_tnmn

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.

Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.

Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.

Genesis 7:17-24

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

The time had come for God’s judgment.

After shutting a 600 year old Noah and his family in the ark along with all the living creatures He had prescribed, the Lord brought unrelenting rain on the earth. The scriptures tell us He unleashed “springs of the great deep” and opened “the floodgates of Heaven” on “the seventeenth day of the second month” and the downpour of water would go on for forty days and nights (Genesis 7:11-12).

We know God did this so to “wipe from the face of the earth every living creature” He had made (Genesis 7:4) or to put it another way, He was set on removing the breath from everything He breathed life into through drowning. As we look at the closing verses of Genesis, chapter 7, we see where He did just that. Look again at those words here:

For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.

Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.

Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days. Vv.17-24

As the waters rose, so did the ark as it floated on the surface. Note that even “the high mountains under the entire heavens” were covered to a depth of “more than fifteen cubits” which was equal to about 23 feet. This was so the ark wouldn’t run aground. “

Eventually,  “every living thing that moved on land perished” and this included all the “birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind”. If there was anything “on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils”, it drowned in the great flood and all living things “on the face of the earth” were wiped out.  

Therefore, the only survivors were Noah “those with him in the ark” along with the sea creatures who would have easily survived in the floodwaters.

Here, we find a classic model of this classic truth:

It is the Lord who gives and the Lord who takes away.

In this case, He had granted the gift of life to mankind who then abused the privilege they had been given. And although they had been created in God’s image, they chose to live in wickedness instead of His righteousness. And so God took away their blessing by taking their breath, His breath from them.

We should learn from this today for God has the ultimate authority and sovereignty to do what He wants, when He wants to, especially when His people choose to willfully sin against Him and in doing so, become His enemies. The scriptures are full of examples where the people of the Lord intentionally disobeyed His commands and when they did so, He showed there were consequences for doing so. There should never be a moment when we believe He can’t do the same in present times, even going as far as snatching the very breath away from someone He first gave it to.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

ALWAYS PREPARING FOR WHAT'S TO COME

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Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.

In Christ, Mark

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** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”

And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.

Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.

In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.

On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord shut him in.

Genesis 7:1-16

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

God was fed up with the way mankind had allowed sin to dominate. The scriptures tell us that the earth was corrupt and full of violence, leaving the Maker and Master of all living things to regret creating men and women in the first place (Genesis 6:6, 11-12).

And so He set a plan to hit the reset button on humanity, sharing His intentions with a righteous man named Noah:

“I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.” 6:13

And with that, God gave Noah very specific instructions on building the ark that would serve to protect and save him, his wife, and his sons and their wives from a great flood that God was going to bring (6:14-16). Anything not on the ark, all living creatures that the Lord breathed life into, would perish in the floodwaters. Everything on earth was going to perish (6:17).

Along with his family, Noah was told to “bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you”. This would include “two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground”. Additionally, Noah was ordered to “take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them” (6:19-21).

In response to God's demand, Noah “did everything just as God commanded” (6:22).

Here, we find God showing how He works to prepare His beloved people for what’s to come. All one needs to do is submit to Him in obedience, just as Noah did.

As we turn to chapter 7, we see that the time had come for Noah and his family to enter the ark, loaded with all the living creatures God demanded. This also included “seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth”. The great flooding of the earth would begin in “seven days” as God would “send rain” pouring down “for forty days and forty nights” in order to “wipe from the face of the earth every living creature” He had made.

We learn that all this happened when Noah was 600 years old. And as the time approached for the great flood, it’s interesting that we actually read about what the rest of mankind was doing during this run up to the 40 days and nights of rain through the words of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament. In verses 37 through 39 of chapter 24, here’s what we find:

“As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.”

Here, in talking about His second coming and how there would be many people destined for destruction because they had not believed in Him, Jesus proclaims that the wicked people of Noah’s day were “eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark. They knew nothing about their looming demise until “the flood came and took them all away”.

In the end translation, only eight people survived God’s judgment and they, along with the other living creatures loaded on the ark, would be fruitful and multiply the earth once again as God would make all things new.

One more important part of this story involves what happened after Noah and his family had done what the Lord commanded, loading the ark with the creatures as ordered before getting onboard themselves. And with that, it was the Lord who then shut them in. He sealed their survival before He would cause “all the springs of the great deep” to “burst forth” and “the floodgates of the heavens” to open. After the 40 days and nights of rainfall, they would end up the sole survivors, all because God had prepared them for what was to come.

Today, our Lord is still in the business of preparing His cherished children for what’s to come, whether it comes to salvation and eternal life or for other matters. All believers should believe and trust in this truth, ever seeking to go and do what the Lord desires with the goal of accomplishing His purposes. As in the days of Noah, He will never let down those who turn to Him in obedience and faith.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.