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I’m going to invite you to Genesis chapter five. That’s where we’re going to be together today. Genesis chapter five, which is an interesting section of scripture because it’s going to deal a little bit with genealogy. I’ll dive into that in a minute. But Genesis Chapter five is a really following the theme of what the the first four chapters remind us of in our humanity. Remember I told you the tendency is as human beings, when we we see someone else make a mistake, we can say to ourselves, well, I’m not like them. I can learn from that mistake. I’ll show you how much better I am than they are. And obviously I’ll have it all together. But when you read Genesis, these first five chapters, what you discover is that there’s this repetition in the heart of humanity that is depraved apart from the Lord. And unless we turn to the Lord, we live for our glory rather than His glory. And when we live for our glory, it’s to the destruction of others. Because. Because what winds up happening is in living for our glory, our God becomes our self-made pleasure, and we end up treating people like tools to serve our needs rather than use our life for God’s glory to bless others and in Genesis chapter five, it continues to to follow that theme of wickedness in the world. But it wants to identify the goodness of God. If we remind ourselves of the purpose of the Book of Genesis, when we remember this was written by a man who was a fugitive from the law.
His name was Moses. He was called to go back to Egypt to set God’s people free, the Hebrew people from slavery. And Moses was supposed to go to the greatest world power at the time, the greatest leader in the greatest world power at the time, and say, let God’s people go. And Moses is concerned in doing something like that. But in in going before them and declaring this, he finds ultimately their freedom is brought. God had to bring some plagues on the back end of that. But some freedom is brought and as they walk into this new life they’re trying to find discover who they are in light of this God that set them free. What gives them any worth or value at all, and how are they to live their lives? And what we discover in this passage of Scripture is their identity is not rooted in what they do or what’s been done to them, but rather in who God is and the fact that he has created them for a purpose. And in Genesis chapter five, it starts off that way by refreshing us to the very same things God said to us in the book of Genesis and excuse me, in the chapter one of the Book of Genesis, where God created mankind in the Garden of Eden.
And it says in the first two verses, This is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God, male and female. He created them and blessed them and named them man when they created him. When we look at when we look at the way that God has designed us in this book, it’s reminding us of of the goodness of who God is, despite who we are. And this is a wonderful reminder because when you get to Genesis chapter five, after you see what humanity has done repeatedly in these first four chapters, we might say to ourselves, okay, God, enough already. You should probably give up on us, right? Because, I mean, why in the world would you continue to give us hope and freedom and grace and and the opportunity for forgiveness in you? And what we find is that our our lives are not determined by what we do, but determined by who God is. The character of God is what gives us the opportunity to experience grace. And his character is not contingent upon us, but contingent upon him. And God is faithful to what He says and who He is and what he promises. And in Genesis chapter five, it’s that refreshment place of reminding us we were made for a purpose. Don’t lose sight of that. And also that purpose is able to be discovered in the consistency of who God is.
And don’t lose sight of that because the world will try to oppress you. It will try to mold you into being about and living your life for a purpose contrary to the reason God created you. And there is no ultimate hope or freedom in that, that your true freedom is only found in the place in which you were designed for the intention which God has created you. So it’s not until your life is surrendered to that purpose that you truly are free. And so when your life is given over to the Lord, you’re able to live that way. And in Genesis, chapter five and Genesis chapter six, the story of the Noahic flood begins here. And it’s a picture for the people of Israel who were brought out of slavery, and they’re now walking with God and they need reminded and they’re reminded here through a narrative that life isn’t always easy and they know this, but life isn’t going to continue to be easy. There’s challenges that are before you and the world’s going to try to press you. But we’re called to be faithful to the Lord. And the reason we can be faithful is because of who God is. So Genesis five and six become this reminder of being faithful no matter what. Don’t let circumstances determine who you are. Let God determine who you are. Let God speak into your life and the goodness of who he is and allow your life to surrender to him.
Now, in order to walk that kind of life, you need to be confident in who the Lord is and who you are in light of who the Lord is. God teach me about you. That when life presses around me rather than lean into it, I lean into who you are so that I may be faithful as you have been faithful to me. And God begins to teach that story to us through genealogy. When any time I read the Bible in genealogy or genealogy, I just bust through this real quick. I like to read through the Bible every year. And my one of my favorites too, getting chapters done is getting to Chronicles because it starts off with eight chapters of genealogy. I’m like, read eight chapters today. They go through the Bible genealogy. When we look at genealogy, we sometimes have a different picture of genealogy than what the Lord’s intentions are for genealogy. When we look at genealogy, we’re often thinking about who we are, right? Where do I come from? What am I about? What is my DNA makeup? Where are my people from? Right? We learn about that. We also might ask the question, Who in my history is famous and who am I? History is infamous, right? Who do we want to keep in the closet? And who do we want to tell people about? You know, like.
And so we look at genealogy from a manmade perspective. But but God’s purpose in genealogy is is not to promote our intentions, but rather to reveal his. And God uses genealogy for a totally different reason. God is using genealogy and Genesis five and throughout the Bible to show His faithfulness to the promises that he’s given us. In fact, when you think about the wickedness of the world and life, trying to press you into something contrary to what God desires, looking at his goodness, we discover in point number one in your notes. God fulfills his promises. Look at Seth or see Seth through Genesis five and six. We’re going to look at really four characters and each character is going to teach us a different aspect of the nature of God, which helps us as people lean into the goodness of who God is, despite what happens in the world around us. And Seth becomes that first figure in in Genesis chapter five, verse three, it says, When Adam and Eve had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness after his image and named him Seth. The days of Adam after he had fathered Seth were 800 years and he had other sons and daughters. Thus, all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died. It becomes very obvious that when you read Genesis chapter five, people are very old. They give new definition to the word old.
These people got so old that they just dried up into dust and blew away. That’s how old these people are. But some people look at this and be like, Is this even possible? How does this happen? I’m going to tell you, I don’t know. I have no idea. Like 930 years is what it says. Do they count years different than maybe. Right. And this is before the flood. Did people somehow have some sort of hyperbaric chamber that allowed them to live longer than others? Perhaps? I don’t know. But it just says 930 years. That’s what I do know, right? 930 years. That’s how long Adam lived. And then it goes on to share more genealogy and impressing you more with how long people live. So it talks about so-and-so begot so-and-so, so-and-so begot so-and-so. But but what it wants to highlight for you here is is not the idea of man, but rather the idea of God in this. Because all man gets in. Genesis Chapter five is just a hyphen. That’s what we are in this story. You’re born and you die. There’s a hyphen in between that’s called life. And that’s what these people lived. But we have no idea what happened in their life because it doesn’t tell us. Right. That’s and the point is to say the idea is not about you, but about looking to the Lord, because that’s what encourages us to follow the Lord in life.
And what God is doing in this story is He’s showing us the line of Seth. And the reason he’s showing us the line of Seth is because God wants us to recognize that he’s still faithful to his promises, despite what we do as people. That is important to us every day because I promise you today you might go out and do something. You probably will if you haven’t already and you feel like you failed, you did something to blow it. You you lost your temper. You acted in a way you didn’t want to. You feel guilty. You feel shamed. And the best part about the Lord and all of this is God is faithful to who he is. God is gracious. God fulfills his promises. His response to you is not contingent upon who you are, but who he is. And so God, in delivering these promises to us, in Scripture matters to us because you’re not going to you don’t run out as long as you have today. You have the opportunity now you don’t want to take advantage of today because all you’re promised is this moment. But if you have this moment, seek God’s face. Because when you learn who God is, he is gracious, He is forgiving, He is good. He wants you to walk with him. And Seth is that example. And the reason I say that is when you follow the story of Adam and Eve, what you find is God gives a promise to Adam and Eve after they sinned, after they blew it, they run and they hide from God.
God is the one that pursues them. God is the one that offers forgiveness to them. God is the one that rips off the the fig leaves, which is a symbol of religion and and God puts on them to them loincloths, which is a symbol of priestly garments. It’s God who gives us the opportunity to connect to him, not us. And in Genesis 315, in Our Sin, he promises Adam and Eve that he will bring a deliverer who will crush the head of the serpent, which is representative of of Satan and sin and death. And so Jesus is saying or the Lord is saying, He will bring a deliverer that will crush all evil and bring us forgiveness in him, bring us freedom in him that we could walk with him. And through that, then Adam and Eve have Cain and Abel. But we discover Cain kills Abel. You’re four people into history and they’re already killing each other. And Cain kills Abel. And now Eve realizes, Oh, no, neither of these two can be the Messiah because one’s dead and the other is awful. Right? Like, what are we going to do? And then Seth comes into the picture and is through the line of Seth at the promise of the Messiah continues to be reminded to us.
And so he’s showing us the lineage of Seth to tell us that God is going to be faithful to His promises. God’s intentions and bringing this lineage isn’t to communicate about the greatness of man, but rather the greatness of of God. That’s why we are a hyphen in the story. And when you get to stories like or passages in the Bible like the Gospel of Luke, you’ll discover in Luke chapter three, it gives you the genealogy of Jesus. And in Luke chapter three, verse 38, it traces that genealogy all the way back to Seth and to Adam and the purpose. It’s not to talk about how great we are, but the faithful hand of God. When you think about the pressure of the world, the adversity that you face, you need something to be consistent, to endure. It’s the faithful hand of God. God is faithful and Seth becomes Thatrillioneminder not just Seth. In this genealogy, we also come to a place to learn about another character. This is Bible trivia question for you for just a minute before you tell your point. Number two, who is the oldest person to ever live in the Bible? Who made it to the oldest age? Methuselah. Methuselah. Methuselah is the oldest person to ever live in the Bible, right? I mean, God, God could be the oldest for certain because he has no beginning or end of days. Right. But but Methuselah is the oldest human being to live on Earth.
And when Methuselah walked this earth, it tells us in scripture he lived 969 years, 969 years. That is a that is he endures more than 200 presidential elections. That’s how much this guy had to go through in life. Methuselah lived a long time. And in Genesis chapter five, verse 25, it says, When Methuselah had lived 187 years, he fathered Lamech. When Lamech had lived 182 years, he fathered a son. And he called his name Noah. Right. And you know where this goes. You know the story of Noah. At least I think you probably know the story of Noah. And by the way, no matter where you find yourself from this point forward in life, this is not a wonderful children’s story to paint on children’s walls. This is the people drown. This is not a this is not a happy moment. Every time I see this in some like, nursery somewhere, you see all these animals just looking out their their boat all happy about life. They are going through a world flood. Right. This is not a celebrate moment. Right. But but here’s here’s Noah. And it tells you about Methuselah. It starts to mark his life, Right. 187 years. He has a kid. That’s that’s a I don’t recommend that today. Don’t wait that long to have kids. 182 years. And his his son Lamech has a kid. So if you’re if you’re doing some math real quick, that’s 369 years.
Okay. 369 years. Now, if you jump for a minute to Genesis chapter seven, verse 11, you see in the 600th year of Noah’s life in the second month of the seventh day of the month, on that day, all the fountains of the great deep burst forth and the windows of heaven were opened. Right? That’s when the flood happens. When Noah is 600 years old, the way he celebrates is is a massive flood. And when you add those years together, 600 to 369, you get 969 years, 969 years, which is exactly the age of Methuselah. Point number two, in your notes, God is patient. See Methuselah when it talks about the oldest person to ever live in the Bible being Methuselah, The Bible is not just saying that, just to say this, right? It’s not it’s not giving this age just for us to be okay. That was that. But rather but rather it’s trying to identify for us something important about the life of Methuselah and Methuselah. His name literally translates or it loosely translates. After him comes judgment. It literally translates with him comes the sword. And here’s what Methuselah represents. Methuselah represents the judgment of God. God is saying, look at the end of Methuselah’s life. I’m bringing my judgment. I’m bringing my judgment. And the fact that Methuselah is the longest man to walk, the longest or the oldest man to walk on the face of the earth, it’s saying to us, and God is incredibly patient.
It’s incredibly patient. And Methuselah, his dad is Enoch. We’ll look at in just a minute. Enoch was a godly individual and Enoch and being a godly individual, he he proclaimed the Lord. It tells us that in the Bible, in the Book of Jude, that he was a prophet. He talked about the Lord, and no doubt he communicated this to his family. And and when you read about names in the Bible, oftentimes names are a reflection of people’s relationships to the Lord. Either someone’s name becomes a declaration to all of God’s people or someone’s name is a representation of their relationship to God. And Methusula is the same. He is a declaration, a proclamation. Enoch is a prophet. Methuselah becomes this declaration of what God is going to do. He’s going to bring his judgment, but at the same time, he’s patient. He’s incredibly patient. I think if someone were to break into your house and you were to look at that person, you’d be like, Put that down. Don’t take that. Or in like 969 years, I might do something about it. That is that is incredibly patient for someone to break into your house and to do that. And here we’re going to find in Genesis chapter six how wicked humanity has become. It literally tells us in verse five and six that they’re destroying what God has created.
And how does God respond to this? God certainly going to be just as a judge, but he’s also a patient. He’s incredibly patient. Methuselah’s life ends the year of the flood because after Methuselah comes the judgment and Methuselah becomes this marker for people to to take serious who they are in light of who God is and walk to honor him rather than live for their own glory. Even in the New Testament today, it says for us in Second Peter three nine, God is the same. He’s the same God. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promises as some count slowness. God is faithful to his promises. Butrillionather in that in his patience, He’s teaching us something. It says. But his patience toward you not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. God’s hope is that our heart would turn to Him. God’s desire for you in this moment is that we would walk with him. But here’s here’s what we learn about the length of the days of the people in Methuselah’s Day is that if God gives us all the time in the world, we don’t get better. Because the problem isn’t time. The problem is the heart and what God desires for you this morning. The reason you have today is God’s desire is for you to walk with Him in relationship. What God desires from you more than anything is your heart.
I hope. I hope for you. This morning is like being in a church and worshiping with the Lord that you didn’t walk through the doors feeling guilty like, Oh, I got to owe God something. You know, there’s nothing in your life that you’re going to give to God that he can’t do for himself except for God desires your heart. And if you give God your heart, He. Transforms your life. But in order to to give God our heart, especially in a in a wicked world, there are things about the nature of God that are important for us to learn, so that when we give our lives over to the Lord that we we know that we we can trust in Him. The first is that God fulfills his promise. The second is that God is patient with us, that God knows He’s not surprised by our behavior. God knows the wickedness that rests in our heart. But yet God pursued us and gave his life for us anyway. That there may be times where you might disappoint yourself and you think, Oh man, I blew it again. But rather than look within yourself, look to the character of who God is, because it’s that character that truly transforms us. God fulfills His promises. And God is patient. Third is this God is dependable. See Enoch. God is dependable. See Enoch, just before Methuselah. We have a man named Enoch, and he was the father of Methuselah.
And what he does within the context of this story is important. He’s like, the only guy that really doesn’t just get a hyphen. It tells us something about him. But what it tells us about him isn’t very long. It just says something simplistic about him. But the simplistic thing about him, if I could say at the end of my life, if people just said this about me, I would be completely pleased with with the way my life has gone. Because what Enoch represents for us is how all of us should live in light of who God is because of his dependability. Enoch says in Genesis chapter five, verse 2021, when Enoch had lived 65 years, he fathered Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after he fathered Methuselah 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were 365 years. Enoch walked with God and he was not for God. Took him. So Hebrews. Hebrews also emphasizes a look at Hebrews in just a minute. But people look at the story of Enoch and they’re like, Did he just, like, vanish? It’s like magic. Enoch Here he did. What’s being communicated is like he was just raptured up into God’s presence. He was like, so, so godly. He just floats away. So try that today. Okay. This is what Enoch does. Walk with God so closely. You just decide when you want to be done and you float to heaven.
This is what’s happening in this. God takes him with him. But. But what it says about his life. He. He walks with the Lord. He walks with God. And the reason we could say that Enoch walks with God is out of all the things that He could depend on, he finds God most dependable. After all, God is the one who made him for his purposes. Enoch walks with God. I love the image of the idea of of walking. I find it incredibly freeing to just make my life about this one pursuit. It’s like what the apostle Paul said in Philippians chapter three. This one thing I count everything as dung for one purpose, and that is to know Christ Jesus, my Lord. The Apostle Paul says he abandons all religion in Philippians chapter three. It’s him laying off his religious life and living for one pursuit, which is to know Christ Jesus as Lord. Can I, can I tell you this morning, God. God made you for one purpose to know Him. And in knowing him, you will honor him with your life because no one can look at the goodness of who God is and how He transforms your life and and forgives you and pursues you and even gives his own life for you and not respond to that and and your love for God. It should be demonstrated in how you love others. In verse John four.
It tells us that if you truly love God, it’s reflected in how you behave because what you truly believe is seen in how you live. And so in knowing God, if God gets your heart, he transforms your life, that we would walk with him. So when you wake up tomorrow, you don’t have to stress about everything in this world. Here’s what you need to do. Seek the Lord in what He desires for you. I have people every once in a while ask me the question like they look at the trajectory of America and people were growing concerned. I feel like people were growing more concerned than we have in the past. And people ask me, what does the Bible say about this? Right? They want me to get out my flip charts and go through the book of Revelation like I’ve got every detail figured out or something and and like what’s going to happen to us? And it’s like it’s it’s the same thing that’s been happening since Genesis, man. Like, like, so. So what are you going to do about it? Well, I mean, I guess I got two options I could build. I could build a bunker and hide until it’s all over, right? Or I could do what Enoch did in the scripture, right? If I wake up tomorrow and I’m the only Christian on the planet, or I wake up and there’s 8 billion of us, I’m still just going to follow Jesus.
That’s what I want to do with my life. I want to be who Jesus called me to be, despite what other people do or don’t do. It’s great if you become encouraging in that process with me, but if you don’t want to do that, I’m just bent that the rest of my life will be this. This is who I this is who I want to be. I want to know God as God desires to make himself known in my life. That’s why, Enoch says, the simplification of life. Just walk with him. I love it. It means I don’t have to worry about tomorrow. I don’t have to worry about ten years from now. If I had some crystal ball and can see ten years out in front of me what life was going to be like, I would break it. I don’t want to do that. That’s too stressful. I can’t even handle knowing what the whole week is, right? Like, all I need to know is just follow Jesus in it. That’s fantastic. He’s. He knows the course of my life if I just walk with him. I saw this beautifully illustrated in my in my mom. My mom’s a little bit of a panicker sometimes. And you know, my my family, we have a handful of people in my family. And so sometimes when she comes to visit, she she sort of stresses at times when like we open the van doors and let the the caged animals out.
And when we do that, though, I have found she she does the same thing consistently. And I think it’s a very good picture of the Lord, not the panic part. But but she gets out and she looks for the youngest kid because she’s always worried the youngest kid is going to run out into the street. And she says the same thing to them. She says, I’m an old lady. That’s how she describes herself. I’m not telling you that. That’s what she says. I’m an old lady. I don’t know if I can get across the street. Will you help me? And then the little kids all excited. They get to be this little hero helping grandma across the street. But. But she’ll take their hand and she’ll go across. And we know what she’s doing. Like she knows how to cross the street. She’s. She’s she’s got plenty of years left to do that. Right. And but but what she’s acknowledging is the child. At the child could just run out into the street without without her hands, something bad could happen. But she knows where to go and she knows how to get them there safely. All they have to do is be willing to walk. All they have to do is take her hand. And guys, it’s the same thing with us in the Lord. Enoch is in a he’s in a life of chaos and the world around him is evil and he’s living for God’s glory.
He’s a prophet in the Lord. It tells us in the Book of Jude, but his life is just marked by this. He wants to be faithful as God is faithful to him. He wants to be faithful to the Lord. Can I tell you this morning that’s what God wants from you. He just wants you to faithfully walk with him. Now, I know for some of us, that’s a that’s a difficult thought to wrap our head around because maybe some of us we’ve come from a background where we’ve had a religious upbringing and we found out that the foundation of that is not secure, that we can’t we couldn’t trust in it. And so we come into a church this morning and we think to ourselves, well, what can I trust in? But can I can I tell you, in Christianity, sometimes when you’ve been lied to, you feel like, man, you can’t trust anything ever again. But in Christianity, God has given us really two foundations that things rest upon, and everything is built from there. And it is this the Word of God and the identity of Jesus, and more specifically, the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. I mean, Jesus said in John 14 six, I am the way, the truth and the life. He identified himself. Right? And then he prayed in John 17, sanctify them through truth.
Thy word is truth, which says to us, if God’s word can be trusted and Jesus is who he says he is, that’s the foundation that you need to to walk with the Lord. And as you walk with the Lord, you may have some uncertainties, but the Lord, the Lord will shape that. We encourage that. Here, ask questions is how you grow. If you’re curious, that’s the best time to ask questions because that’s where God’s people learn and we grow. We’re by nature curious people. We like to learn how the areas that we’re curious in. So being inquisitive people when it comes to God’s word, like I have questions about why people live so long, I don’t think I get the answer in Scripture. But one day when I get to heaven, we’re going to figure this out, right? Why is this happening in Genesis Chapter five? But ask questions. God is dependable. See Enoch in Hebrews chapter 11, it says to us by faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death. He was not found because God had taken him now before he was taken. He was commended as having pleased God and without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. You’ve got to trust. He’s going to get you across the street.
Belief is demonstrated in behavior. In fact, it’s not a belief until it’s demonstrated in how you act. It’s just simply knowledge before that. But the way, you know, if you truly believe it is, if you’re walking in it. If you truly trust in what God says, you will follow him. Point number four, then, is this God is gracious. God is gracious. See, Noah. God is gracious. See, Noah. And the way we’re going to see God’s grace is to add a whole lot of crazy before we talk about the gracious hand of God. I tell you, when you read the book of Genesis, Genesis chapter six, the first four verses Genesis chapter six, some of the most craziest stuff in all the Bible. I would say out of all the chapters in the Bible that that make theologians scratch their head. Genesis chapter six is one that is at the top. This is where you get Sons of God, Daughters of Man and the Nephilim, right? Sons of God, Daughters of man. And whatever this group is, it’s important to know that whatever they are, that it leads God to bring the noahic flood. So there’s something terrible happening that God produces. The noahic flood out of this as judgment towards towards what’s taking place here. Now, when it comes to understanding Sons of God, daughters of men, this is where people geek out. Some people do. People that really are like conspiracy theorists, they go down some wormholes, come back at say some crazy things to you and go back into this.
They like see this as like 80% of the Bible talking about these people. I will tell you, there are certain things in Christianity that have a closed fist over like these. These are core to who we are. The Trinity, the identity of Jesus, the inerrancy of scripture, what the gospel is. These these things we treat with a with a closed hand in Christianity, it’s the root of our identity. But then there are other things that you can speculate at. You can study, but you want to keep it with an open hand. And I will tell you, this passage of Scripture is more of an open handed place, but we’ll look at how far the crazy goes. Okay? Genesis Chapter six, Verse one. When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the Sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive, and they took as their wives and as any they chose. Then the Lord said, My spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh. His days shall be 120 years. Let me stop here and I’ll come back to this. Verse four, when he talks about the idea of man now only living for 120 years, there’s two ways that this is interpreted and not dogmatic on either.
You can take whatever you want, but but one is at this point when God says 120 years, he’s either saying the Noahic flood is going to happen in 20 years and he’s cutting life off or after the flood, people aren’t going to live past 120 years. He’s shortening the lifespan. No one, no one I could say or should say, I don’t think dogmatically knows for sure. Some say it could even be both. It could be that God’s at 120 years bringing the flood and saying no one’s going to live beyond 120 years. And that’s what God’s given us in this passage of Scripture. But the reason he’s saying this is because the judgment he’s bringing, because of verse one and two with the Sons of God and the daughters of men. Then in verse four, it says, The Nephilim were on the earth in those days. And also afterward, when the Sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them, they were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown. So not only are the Sons of God, daughters of men, important to talk about some sort of understanding, you also from this get this these people group called the Nephilim. So what what is this? Right? I’m going to give you some possibilities. The more I’ve studied this and I’ve spent more time on this than I care to admit, but the more you study this, the more I find I get like this.
I don’t know. I have no clue. I have no clue what this is. But here’s some possibilities you can look at if you want to tell me where I’m wrong and correct me later. All right. One is angels that breed with humans. And there’s there is some passages in the Bible. Second Peter, chapter two, verse four and five, Jude verse six, that talk about angels going beyond the borders of what God created them for, doing something that God decided to bind them up. Right for judgment and for a future judgment judgment one day. So their angels have done something that has caused God to bind them. And it’s related to this passage, right? Some say, well, it’s because they procreated with ladies, right? They crossed a line here and they procreated. I That sounds crazy to me. I don’t buy that. You know, some people do. And if you do, that’s all right. But in Matthew chapter 22, verse 30, there was a question posed to Jesus where he was asked, Are we married in heaven? And Jesus said, No, you’re neither given nor taken in marriage. You’re going to be like the angels. Well, and Jesus’s prescription of marriage. Marriage is created for intimacy. Intimacy is what births people, right? Like. And so in the confines of God’s purpose for for marriage, then it would go to say, in heaven there’s not procreation.
And angels therefore are not procreating either. We’re like the angels. He’s acknowledging there’s no giving in marriage nor intimacy and procreation. And in fact, I would say angels aren’t really gendered, like they’re neither male nor female. They’re angels, right? We humans are male and female. We’re different than angels. So that is a possibility, people say, or and I want to go through these quickly. I don’t want to waste time here, but some think it’s from the line of Seth. Like the Sons of God are line of Seth. Daughters of men are the line of. Came and they’re marrying one another. And that’s not what God wants, because the godly line of Seth is godly and the line of Cain is not godly. That’s there’s nowhere in scripture that says everyone in Cain’s line was forever ungodly and everyone in line was forever godly. Right? Or there’s not a place that says and they can’t intermarry like they can’t marry each other. That’s just it’s made up in the text. Nor does it tell us Sons of God and daughters of men are specifically from those two lineage. You have to just extrapolate that the other thought Some think Sons of God are kings because they are treated with this this identity of of of being some sort of better than everyone else. And so they they say sons of God are is this recognition of kings and kings are being treated as these sons of God and they’re they’re marrying some say in polygamy that they take the wives at the end of verse two, whoever they want.
Right. And so God is condemning that practice or the first night of refusal where kings in this day could go into a bride’s first night of her wedding and bring her to the King’s Chamber rather than let her be with her husband. The king always got the first night of refusal, and God is judging that. Some say it’s just polygamy that God is judging here. Some say the sons of God, typically in the Old Testament, it points to angels, but some say but in the religions around it actually points to religious leaders. And so they’re treated special. And so they’re acknowledged this way. And so they’re they’re marrying whoever they want. And and some go forwards to say and because the angels are thrown into darkness or some of the angels are because of this bound up that the angels are demonically influencing these people and they’re teaching a false religion that’s being promoted and propagated and populated on the earth, that that’s the possibility of what’s happening. And I look at all that and say, I don’t know, I don’t know. And then and then from there you have the Nephilim, and there’s really two views with the Nephilim. If they’re from angels and they procreate with human beings, it creates like a whole different race.
I had a teacher in in Bible college that used to teach the students that they thought this is where demons come from. And his argument was, up until this point, there’s no mention of demons. But after this, there’s mention of demons because they’re given these souls that never die. They go forever. They’re not angels, they’re not humans, but they’re demons. That’s what he would say. And I would be like, Yeah, the Bible doesn’t talk about demons, but you only have six chapters, right? This is not something that’s unfolded yet. Right? And so if you believe that there are spiritual beings procreated with humans and created that, some people think that’s where demons come from or, or the Nephilim are just a race of people that were birthed out of a physically from these priestly religious teachers of a false religion and and they’re respected and revered from these false groups. That’s the other view. I would say, out of all those views also, there’s a third option. And I thought out of all the things you can throw in here, why not this there, the explanation of Sasquatch, right? Like the Nephilim are still alive today. We just got to find them there in Washington. So if anyone pins one down, maybe they know the answer to this text. I have no idea. But. But whatever is happening here, it’s the reason God brings his judgment on the earth. And the results you see in verse five, The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that look at this.
Every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil. Every intention was only evil. Continually, when I when I think about the weight of that passage, every intention of man’s heart was evil only. What does it take for people to get to that place? Can I just tell you, it’s not as far as we often think it is. We give this perception or thought of evil as just this absolute dark, you know, pitchfork position where people come at you with things and blood dripping evil, right? That’s not the way evil is seen in scripture. When you even go back to the Garden of Eden and you think about the way that Satan appeared in the Garden of Eden. Not Pitchfork, not red with horns. Second Corinthians 11 tells us he’s an angel of light. Same thing with Adam and Eve. Their decision was wicked and wrong, but. But the way that they got there sometimes from our I may not even be appear to be evil because we don’t always know what’s happening in the heart. But the reason evil was was produced is because both in Satan and in Adam and Eve, they lived for their glory rather than God’s glory. What got Satan kicked out of heaven was to try to rise to the position of God.
He wanted to be like God. And he brought that lie to the Garden of Eden, to Adam and Eve. You can be like God, meaning life becomes about you and you declare right and wrong and it is for your glory. But any time we use life for our glory, we treat other people like tools to their destruction and ultimately the destruction of our own soul. We live for our glory. It’s the destruction of others. But when we live for God’s glory, it’s to the blessing of others. Evil is the the masking of the glory of really what what our life pursuit is about. Is it for our own self made pleasure. Anytime we live life for our glory, that’s what we’re living for is waking up whatever makes me happy. My pleasure. How I can live this to my advantage. Because life is about me and we live for our pleasure. We ultimately use people as tools to serve us. And in the end, it’s destruction to humanity. But what you’re reminded of in the beginning of Genesis, chapter five. We’re created for God’s glory, made in His image. The only way we walk that path is to surrender ourselves to him. The only way to true freedom is to align our hearts with Him. Even in this world today, like any time we live for our glory, it’s to the demise or destruction of the image of God and other people.
I would say today in America, the unsafest place for someone to be is in the womb of a mother. I don’t say that to try to be mean or demeaning, but but there’s a need within our society to see that every human being is made in the image of God. And with that becomes it’s sacred of how we use our life to the glory of others, to to to the glory of God, to the benefit of others. And so he’s saying in this Genesis passage that everyone would turn away from the Lord, that they’re seeking their own glory, and in so doing, it becomes destructive In verse six, And the Lord God regretted that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals, creeping things and birds of the heavens. For I am sorry that I have made him. Verse six. When it talks about God regretting, it’s not saying, Look, God thinks he made a mistake or it’s not saying really that that God is shocked by our behavior. God knows everything we’re going to do before we do it. And God doesn’t make mistakes, but rather what it’s saying is it’s acknowledging that God has allowed us to make decisions that that upset God, but he still permitted the decision to be made. So so God knows the purpose.
He created us. God knew the decision we were going to make and God still allowed us to make it. But it doesn’t mean God had to like it. God regretted that. And then it says in this passage something interesting. It grieved him and the idea of grieving. To think that God’s heart can grieve over our actions is an incredible thought, but one that that it would grieve God but to what it says about God’s heart towards us. See, God could have at any point of our sin. God could have been done with us. God doesn’t owe us anything. He doesn’t owe us tomorrow. He’s not obligated to give us anything. The only thing God would give us if God was being fair is His justice. But the idea that God has grieved in this passage, and I think this is one of the most important words in all this section of scripture is it’s acknowledging that God has knitted his heart to us. God has chosen from our creation in the Garden of Eden to knit his heart to us and in knitting his heart to us. He’s saying that despite what we do, God, God is walking life with us to to love us and ultimately to give his life for us. It’s revealing the heart of God towards us in our sin. That God loves us. And in verse eight, we see this in Noah that Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.
Look, it’s not saying that Noah impressed God with who He was, but rather the idea of favor is grace. It’s saying Noah found God’s grace. No, it was no longer looking at himself. Or taking the influence, marching orders from the world around him. He was seeing the hand of God. Enoch, his father, Methuselah and Lamech into Noah. Noah. Noah is hearing about the grace of God. Sees the grace of God. Turns to the grace of God in his life. God is gracious towards us in our brokenness. In fact, it goes on and says, Make yourself an ark of gopher wood, make rooms in the ark and cover it inside and out with the pitch. This is how you’re to make it. The length of the ark is 300 cubits, which is 450ft long. Its breadth 50 cubits, 75ft wide, its high height, 30 cubits, 45ft high. For behold, I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life under heaven. Everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish my covenant with you. And you shall come into the ark. You, your sons, your wife and your sons wives with you. I don’t have a whole lot of time to walk through this. But let me let me just say a few things quickly. You know, it comes to judgment.
I find people have this tendency to reject a God who is a judge. And I think for a few reasons. One is because we tend to elevate ourselves and diminish God. We tend to act like God owes us something and that he needs to march to our orders rather than His, when in reality God owes us nothing. The other reason I think that we don’t like the judgment of God is because, well, in suburban America we appreciate our comforts and we don’t want to risk losing our comforts. Right? God have certain things until I get uncomfortable and then let’s stop. We kind of treat God like a side item sometimes rather than the king of all. But but can I encourage you and just remind us that to some parts of the world, maybe not in comfortable America, but to some parts of the world, the judgment of God is one of the most hope filled thoughts that they cling to because darkness loves to prey on the weak and it takes advantage of when it finds opportunity. And for some people, the hope that continues to move them forward every day is to know that God is a just judge and that one day he will right all wrongs and that justice is what makes him good. And they cling to that. Has the same thing. True with the Lord in the days of Noah. 969 years. God’s patiently declaring to them.
God grieves with them. In fact, in Ephesians chapter four, verse 30, it reminds us, even today, do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God. Today is the day. Do not turn from the Lord but walk with him the same way they grieved God in the flood. We can grieve God today. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God. It tells you God wants to work in your life to walk with you as he does in the life of Enoch. He grieved that. And so what we do. What we discover in in Genesis is that God knitted his heart to us. But we continue to discover throughout the Bible is that as God continues to pursue us, man constantly rejects Him. Until we get to the pinnacle of the story. When God becomes flesh and He dwells among us, and not only is is God allowing His heart to be knitted to us in this story, what we find is man once again rejects God and what ultimately happens. God’s heart is crushed for us. God knitted his heart to us and allowed his heart to be crushed, even when mankind rejects him. For what purpose? So that we could find freedom in the Lord. And when you study the the life of Jesus dying on the cross, medical professionals have examined it and they ultimately have reached the conclusion. There’s one of two ways Jesus likely died. One is either stress induced cardiac cardiomyopathy, sorry, not a roll off the tongue word.
There is stress induced cardiomyopathy and then the next one is even harder coagulation coagulopathy. There we go. Coagulopathy which basically just summarizes like this what killed Jesus so that he died of a broken heart and he did it willingly. And why would Jesus do that? For you and for me? But the battle is. And the battle rests within us. So we have a choice where you’re going to let your heart go. Because what God desires in giving you His heart is your heart in response, there’s a poem by Amy Carmichael. If you’ve not, don’t know about Amy Carmichael. She was a missionary in India. She was born in Ireland in the mid to late 1800s, moved to India, lived as a missionary, died in India in the 1950s, early 1950s. But she wrote this poem about the flame of God or flame of God, she said. And in the poem, it really is the wrestling of our heart that wonders and the greatness of who God is. But I think it’s a beautiful prayer for us. It says, Give me the love that leads the way, the faith that nothing can dismay, the hope no one disappoints tire the passion that will burn like fire. Let me not sink to be a clod. Make me thy fuel. Flame of God. Her prayer is really the wrestling within all of our souls. God, let me be for your glory.