The Flood Ends (Genesis 8)

The Flood Ends (Genesis 8) A. The Flood shows that unchecked sin will not go forever unjudged; it rathers builds up a treasure of wrath. ROM 2:5. 1. When men provoke God far enough, it may well be too far for a stay of judgment. c/w 2CH 36:16; PRO 29:1. 2. God says of such times, “I will ease me of mine adversaries...” (ISA 1:24). 3. Sin having been judged, God's wrath was now appeased and it gave way to mercy. c/w HAB 3:2. 4. When God's wrath against His elect's sin was satisfied by Christ, the Old Testament of condemnation gave way to a New Testament of the spirit, life and liberty. GAL 3:13; 2CO 3:6-8. B. Noah had been sealed up in a dark place while sin was being washed away. 1. “Noah remains alive, and this is all; he is, in effect, buried alive---cooped up in a close place...” (Matthew Henry Commentary) 2. But Noah (and company) remain not in their “grave.” They surely come forth as heirs of life and a new world. 3. This figures our salvation by the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. 1PE 3:19-21. a. All those with Noah were “dead” and “buried” with him. c/w ROM 7:4; GAL 2:20. b. All those with Noah came out of that “tomb” to life and a new world. c/w COL 2:13; EPH 2:6. c. Mark that Noah's experience was not a figure of our baptism. (1) It was an anticipative figure of the saving work of Christ. (2) Baptism is a commemorative figure of the same thing. (3) Both Noah's “burial” and our baptism speak of the saving of sinners from common judgment unto a new world by the righteousness of one via judgmental death, burial and resurrection. ROM 5:19; 4:25. C. It is written that “...God REMEMBERED Noah...” GEN 8:1. 1. This was the faith and hope of the Lord Jesus---that the Father would not forget Him in the grave. ACT 2:27. 2. Men may forget their loved ones or their fellows in prison, but not God. GEN 40:23 ct/w PSA 69:33; ISA 61:1; 49:15. 3. It is only our skewed view of God's love for us that leads us to think that He has forgotten us. PSA 77:8-10 c/w ROM 8:38-39. 4. God is not the one who forgets those bound with Him in covenant. It is we who do the forgetting. PSA 106:7, 13, 21, 45. 5. God's part in being forgetful is relative to our sins (HEB 10:16-17) and it is our part, upon conversion, to forget their allure. PHIL 3:13-15. 6. God not only remembered Noah, but also “...every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark...” (GEN 8:1). a. Though the brutes have no soul, yet He has an eye to them, too. JON 4:11; LUK 12:6-7. b. Somewhere between animal-rights extremism and animal cruelty is the measure of a righteous man. PRO 12:10. D. “...and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged.” GEN 8:1. 1. God alone has power over wind and waves. 2. Christ exercised this power as an expression of His deity. MAT 8:26-27. The Flood Ends 8-5-18 Page 1 of 2 E. The waters decreased; the ark rested; and eventually Noah sent out a raven and a dove to look for hope. GEN 8:3-12. 1. Consider the significance of the raven and the dove. a. The raven went forth first; the dove later. b. The raven is a bird which feeds on death. c. The law went forth first and similarly feeds on death. ROM 7:10; 2CO 3:7. d. The raven goes “to and fro” looking for something to devour, like the devil (for whose benefit the law works condemnation). 1PE 5:8-9. e. The raven brings no assurance of the appeasement of God's wrath or of a new world. Neither does the law. ROM 7:5, 9. f. By contrast, the dove is sent forth and brings back hope. The dove is the one who brings assurance of appeasement, life and a new world. (1) The Holy Spirit is seen to appear as a dove. LUK 3:22. (2) The gospel is the testament of the Spirit. 2CO 3:8. (3) It is the gospel of the N.T. that brings hope and assurance of life, not the law. 2CO 3:6. (4) Sadly, many continue to spiritually send forth the raven while calling it the dove, or vainly try to hybridize the raven and the dove, and it is no wonder that the message of assurance of life and a new world is muddled. ROM 11:6. 2. Mark the curious time-stamp God has placed here. a. Forty-seven days elapsed from the time that proof of a viable new world was first visible (tops of the mountains seen, v. 5) until the dove returned with comfort and hope of a new world. GEN 8:5-11. b. Christ died on the day of the Jewish passover. JOH 19:14. (1) Christ rested for 3 days and 3 nights in the grave. MAT 12:40. (2) Christ resurrected, which is the first visible evidence that a new world awaits all those counted with Him. (3) Pentecost was a feast that was to be held 50 days from the Passover. EXO 34; LEV 23; DEU 16. (4) At Pentecost, 47 days after Christ's resurrection, the Dove of God came with assurance and hope. ACT 2:1-4. The Flood Ends 8-5-18 Page 2 of 2