Today’s Readings
Context
It's a familiar story, one known even by those who do not grow up in the church. Noah. The Ark. The Flood. A Rainbow. It's been the subject of movies and paintings and children's books. But the story has been turned into something that it is not - an adventure story. It is a story of judgment and salvation.
In Genesis 6:5-7, God decides to judge the world with a cataclysmic flood because of the wickedness of mankind. He finds one righteous man, Noah, and saves humanity through him and his family. They build the ark and God brings the animals. The rains come and the waters rise. Then God sends the rainbow as a promise that he will never destroy the world by flood again, and Noah and his family start over.
What we learn from this is two key lessons. First, the heart of man is not trustworthy. It is deceitful and leads us to sin. Second, God is a holy God and he does judge sin. He is kind and loving but there is a time at which his wrath reaches its limit and is poured out on the world.
In Genesis 6:5-7, God decides to judge the world with a cataclysmic flood because of the wickedness of mankind. He finds one righteous man, Noah, and saves humanity through him and his family. They build the ark and God brings the animals. The rains come and the waters rise. Then God sends the rainbow as a promise that he will never destroy the world by flood again, and Noah and his family start over.
What we learn from this is two key lessons. First, the heart of man is not trustworthy. It is deceitful and leads us to sin. Second, God is a holy God and he does judge sin. He is kind and loving but there is a time at which his wrath reaches its limit and is poured out on the world.
Devotional - God Starts Over
"Follow your heart."The world tells you that the only true guide for right and wrong is your own heart, your own mind, your own conscience. You must do what you think is right. But the Bible tells us a very different story and the tragic episode of the Flood is a prime example of why we cannot trust our own hearts.
"If it comes from within you, it can't be wrong."
"Only you can know what is best for you."
Adam and Eve plunged the world into sin and that sin spread rapidly. We know very little about that world because it was destroyed, but we know it was wicked. The best description of it was given in Genesis 6:5.
The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
That statement doesn't leave much wiggle room, does it? Every intention (not just some but every) of the thoughts of man's heart was only (not a partially, but fully, ONLY) evil continually (not just some of the time, but always). Not a flattering portrait of humanity there, is it? And because of that wickedness God brought terrible judgment on them, destroying all but 8 people on earth. He does not ignore human rebellion.
That was a time of extremity for human sin, but the wickedness of the human heart of always a reality. Other scriptures make it clear that while the world has not always been as evil as the world was at the time of the Flood, our hearts have always been deceitful. Jeremiah 17:9 makes it clear.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?
Romans 3 culls several quotes from the prophets and from Psalms to describe the sinfulness of man and paints an unflattering picture. Proverbs 28:26 sums it all up.
Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.
We are flawed, broken by sin, unable to handle life on our own. Our sin has marred the image of God, rendered our consciences ineffective and left us unable to trust ourselves or rely on our own emotions or hearts. We are broken and we need to be fixed. If we follow our own ways it leads to destruction and to judgment, as it did the people in the days of Noah.
:But our God is a God of salvation. He saved Noah, providing a boat in which he could be protected from the judgment that would come. You and I likewise have a place of protection from the judgment that is coming, a place not built by human hands but constructed by the love of God and matchless work of Christ on the Cross. Because of that work, we are safe inside instead of being locked outside facing the flood of God's wrath.
Praise God!
:But our God is a God of salvation. He saved Noah, providing a boat in which he could be protected from the judgment that would come. You and I likewise have a place of protection from the judgment that is coming, a place not built by human hands but constructed by the love of God and matchless work of Christ on the Cross. Because of that work, we are safe inside instead of being locked outside facing the flood of God's wrath.
Praise God!
Thank you, God, that though I am a sinner, broken, depraved, desrving of hell, in Christ you have prepared a place for me in glory that will last forever.
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