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Good morning.
It sounds like all the moms and I'm going to even say most of the dads.
You felt that, right?
That resonated as truth this morning of things we don't say.
But we are excited for you guys to be here to join us today.
As we worship our Lord and Savior.
If you got your Bibles going over to Genesis, chapter six, we're going to start here in just a moment in verse nine.
I'm going to tell you as you're turning there this morning, we're going to do things a little bit differently.
We're going to read this morning together, genesis six nine through chapter nine, verse 16.
So we're going to read a lot.
I'm going to try to talk less.
And what we're going to do is we're going to build over the next several weeks as we focus on the flood.
So today is going to be giving us some groundwork as we navigate through this Bible story for us of Noah and the flood.
I do want to wish all the moms out there a very happy Mother's Day.
I hope that this afternoon is filled with rest, naps, prime rib, and whatever else your husband and kids are doing for you this afternoon.
But we do value, we do appreciate all that you do, all that you provide for, not only for your family, for the kingdom.
As we go through that every year.
As we celebrate Moms on Mother's Day, there's a reminder for me that is all real and it is this simple truth in today where we celebrate Moms this morning, Sundays are different for us.
The day that I get up to make sure that I'm definitely here for worship, for work, for part of me.
So I usually give my Mother's Day.
Gift to my wife on Saturday.
But my kids wake up and they cooked her breakfast and they had gifts.
And so all those things right as.
We celebrate but as we celebrate Moms.
We also recognize that with all the joy and the excitement that Mother's Day brings, that for so many different people, that there's a weight that also carries on Mother's Day.
Growing up, I was reminded of this.
My mom lost her mother when my.
Mom was 15 years old.
And so all growing through as my mom celebrated being a mom herself, it was always the reminder of the experience that she walked through from such a young age.
After I got married, aaron and I decided that we felt the lord was needed to start a family, which we walked down a path that so many ladies walk through, so many families walk through, of miscarriage and infertility.
But on top of that, of being a pastor and walking alongside people in life, we know that there's a lot of you, as we talked about even a few weeks ago, who have had to bury your children and walk through.
And so the thought of Mother's Day, while there is great joy, the thought of Mother's Day also carries a weight.
So if you're here with great joy.
Of what it means to be a mom and being celebrated or celebrating your mother, we want to celebrate alongside with you.
But if you're here this morning and.
There'S a weight that you feel, we want you to know that we feel that weight for you.
We feel that weight with you and that we are praying for you.
So as we dive into this in Genesis, let's go ahead and go to the Lord in prayer.
God.
I come to you this morning.
We're thanking you for who you are.
Lord, I thank you for those kids this morning.
I thank you that they did not get up on this stage and perform, but they got up on this stage and they worshipped you.
And, Lord, they led us in worship.
And so, Lord, I thank you for who they are, for what You've purpose and designed their life for.
Lord, I lift up every person in here, but especially, Lord, our ladies.
Lord, I lift up all the moms, from the youngest of young to the most seasoned and experienced mom in the room.
I thank you for their presence and their impact on their family.
I thank you for the reminder of who they are in Christ and as they sought to share that and continue to pass on faith.
But, Lord, I also pray for all the ladies in the room who today, the day is heavy.
The day is a reminder of loss.
The day is a reminder of something they long for, but they haven't been blessed with.
And Lord, I pray that in there that they would be reminded that not only, Lord, do we grieve with them and lift them up, but, Lord, you have not forgotten them.
You have not forsaken them, Lord, and you are with them as well.
Lord, I pray as we go through this account today and over the next several weeks, Lord, in the midst of what the flood can be remembered for and was, Lord, I pray what we would see is the glory of God and Your plan for salvation.
May we celebrate and may we worship you.
And it's in Jesus name we pray.
Amen.
I want to ask you a question.
Whether now currently in your life or at a young age, have you ever seen someone, maybe someone famous, maybe someone not famous, and thought to yourself, I would like to be like them?
They possess a talent or characteristics that you see and that you desire.
And so what you then try to do in ways is you try to.
Maybe emulate them a little bit, right?
You try to mold and shape the things that you do by looking at the things that they do and molding and shaping your patterns, your behaviors, to emulate them.
I was thinking about this week, like, growing up for me, what did that look like?
And I was a sports guy.
I still am a sports guy.
I love to play sports.
I love to watch sports.
Now, at 43 years old, I'd rather watch a sport than play a sport.
But you all are with me, right?
I love sports.
And I remember growing up playing basketball, playing football, playing baseball.
But my favorite sport to play was the sport of basketball, which, ironically, that was probably my least gifted sport.
I wasn't a great athlete by any means, but basketball I struggled in.
But I loved to go outside, whether it's playing one on one, which, by the way, Mother's Day, let me tell this story playing one on one against my mom, all right?
And you're like bo, let me tell you, all right?
I remember the day in 7th grade when I finally beat my mom in one on one, right?
Really quick, before we dive into this, here's what happened.
I'll never forget this.
This was the moment that I realized I could beat my mom in basketball, but that my mom owned me.
She went up for a layup.
And.
I came in from behind her, and I brought that right hand over, and as she went to lay that ball.
Into the hoop, I swatted it and threw it about 20ft in the opposite direction.
And then in only a way that.
A foolish 7th grader boy would ever do, I kind of bowed up at my mom, and the look on her face was, if you ever do that again, I will kill you.
Right?
We tell you.
I never blocked another shot from that moment forward.
But me and my mom, we didn't play one on one.
I had beaten her.
But it took me until 9th grade to beat my mom in a game of horse, right?
She'd just sit outside and just knock them down and knock them down and knock them down.
And she'd remind me, you may be taller.
You may be faster, you maybe can jump higher.
But my shot is better.
And it was and probably still is, right?
But I wanted to emulate my heroes in basketball.
1989.
Michael Jordan.
The Chicago Bulls were playing the Cleveland Cavaliers.
And if you know NBA, you probably know what I'm about to reference.
Michael Jordan made what basketball historians refer to as the shot over Craig ELO.
So the NBA playoffs, michael Jordan cut across the lane, got the ball, stopped, went up and over, scored.
Bulls win, leaves his hand dangling, fist pumps.
I get out in the backyard, not with anybody else, but just me, pretending that I'm Michael Jordan.
Catch the ball, go across to the.
Foul line, shoot, most of the time miss.
But if I made it I've emulated my hero.
In 1994, a guy and a family moved into our neighborhood who turned out to be one of my best friends, a guy by the name of Joe Timmerman.
And he moved from to North Augusta, South Carolina from Durham, North Carolina, which is the home of the Duke Blue Devils.
And his favorite player was Grant Hill.
My favorite player was Christian Lakener.
And we would get in his driveway and practice to the best of our ability.
Him throwing the basketball, to me, me catching it, posting up on an invisible Kentucky basketball player turning and making the shot.
And the goal wasn't simply to make the shot.
The goal was how did they position themselves?
How did they hold the ball?
What did they do when the ball went in?
And as we would emulate, as we would practice, as we would do these things, we would look and say, I don't want to just make it like Jordan made the shot.
I don't want to just make it like Leitner made it in 1992.
I want to do everything exactly the way that they did this.
I wanted to say, Somebody see me.
Do that and go, whoo.
That boy looks just like Michael Jordan, right?
All five foot ten, 120 pounds of him.
Right.
Not now.
Right.
And I find sometimes we do that in faith.
We read through Scripture, and I think there's some room for this.
I think this is okay.
I'm I'm not I'm not condemning this.
That that we look at men and women in Scripture.
We look at men and women of faith, and there's a longing and there the desire within us that says, I'd like to have faith like that.
We see that we see that in the Old Testament.
We see that in the New Testament, and we read through and we land in this.
I would like to have faith like they do.
But sometimes when we have that, we walk away defeated.
Because here's what I knew.
Playing basketball in my backyard or basketball.
In Joe Timmerman's driveway.
I would never be Michael Jordan.
I would never be Christian Leitner.
As many times as I practiced those.
Shots, I would never have the stage that they had.
I would never have the talent that they had.
I'd never be them.
And that's okay.
But I find that sometimes as we read through Scripture, we find ourselves in looking at this and saying, man, I'd like to have faith like them, but I never will.
And we approach the faith of our life in defeat instead of approaching the faith of our life in victory.
And so as we look through Noah today, as we journey through this, when we get Me land, we're going to examine his faith of what this looked like and the understanding that as we walk with the Lord, right, that this can be part of our story, too.
So let's start.
We're going to read Genesis six, nine through twelve to start off, since these are the generations of Noah.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation.
Noah walked with God, and Noah had three sons shim, Ham and Jacob.
Now, the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence.
And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt for all the flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.
And God said to Noah, I've determined to make an end of all flesh.
For the earth is filled with violence through them.
Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
And so this is what we see a little bit from last week.
All right?
So here's what reminded.
We get this description of Noah that Noah is blameless, that Noah is righteous.
Let me describe this.
This does not mean that Noah is perfect, all right?
This does not mean that Noah is a perfect specimen of human in this moment.
That's not what we see, but blameless and righteous.
What we can draw from this is that it's a positive, it's a Godly description of Noah's integrity.
That's what it means to be blameless.
And it's a positive description of Noah's conduct.
So he had godly integrity, godly conduct.
So this is what we see, who he is, and this is what he does.
This is the full embodiment, the piece of this that's so important for us is all of this is because Noah walked with God.
All of this is possible, not because Noah determines within himself that he's going to be this great man of great conduct, this great man of great character.
It's all because Noah understands in the closeness of the relationship with God that he pursues in his walk with the Lord.
It's the language that's used at the very beginning in the relationship where Adam and God walked together in the garden.
It's the same picture of the language that we get when God walked after Adam.
But Adam did what adam fled from God.
It's the walking together.
And so Noah's blamelessness and Noah's righteousness comes from walking with God, an intimate, personal, growing, real relationship that Noah has with his Creator.
And it's what God longs for you and I to have with him.
Not that we're pharisees determined in our own way, not that we are figuring out for ourselves what we need to do and how to do it.
We are not a better version simply of ourself, but in our relationship with the Lord and walking with Him under the power of the Holy Spirit, we are transformed and sanctified and who he would like for us and who he.
Has called us to be.
And the imagery of Noah stands in complete opposition with the earth and the.
Men and women who fill the earth.
And so the opposite is said in God's word of the earth, that the earth is corrupt, that the earth is filled with violence, that flesh, humanity is corrupted.
That's what we looked at last week.
So God says in this that he's going to make an end to the flesh and he's going to destroy them with the earth.
So it's going to be the call, right, for Noah to build an ark.
Let's look at verse 14.
Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.
Make rooms in the ark and cover it inside and out with pitch.
This is how you are to make it.
The length of the ark, 300 cubits, its breadth, 50 cubits, and its height, 30 cubits.
Make a roof for the ark and finish it to a cubic above and set the door of the ark in its side.
Make it with lower second and third decks.
For behold, I will bring a flood of water upon the earth to destroy all the 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, your son's wives with you, and of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you.
They shall be male and female of the birds according to their kinds and the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing on the ground according to its kind.
Two of every sort shall come into you to keep them alive.
Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten and store it up.
It shall serve as food for you and for them.
And Noah did this.
He did all that God commanded him.
So God gives Noah some things in this.
And so the first thing that God does is God gives Noah instructions for building the ark.
And so it's going to be the structure that's got rooms.
It's got three floors.
It's been described to me the more of what we look at the ark to understand it, like the imagery and the picture that we think of when we see a battleship is more accurate with this.
It will end up being I know we don't function in qubits, so here's.
The best we can kind of understand.
The dimensions of the ark.
The ark would be 510ft long.
This is one and a half football fields.
It would be roughly 50ft high.
So if you think of most of us, probably this is a silly comparison, but the close I could have a four story house, right?
So this is there.
And the ark had the storage equivalent.
This is the part for me that blows my mind.
It has the storage equivalent of 450 semi truck trailers is what could be stored in the ark.
So God gives Noah instructions for what he is to do with the ark, but then God also gives Noah a covenant.
Now, next week, we're going to talk way more about this, about the covenants that we're going to get throughout God's encounter with Noah and the ark and the flood.
But this week, let's just kind of think through that.
This is this promise on God's end that God's going to uphold what God said he's going to do.
And he makes this promise, he makes this commitment to Noah, and he says, here's the first one.
You're going to come into the ark with your family and you will live, right?
God begins it by saying, you're going to build an ark and I'm going to destroy the Earth and all that's in it, but you and your family, you will live.
And then he gives Him as if that's not overwhelming enough, he gives Him instructions for animals and for food.
Every animal, two of each kind.
And we're going to see some more here in a minute about that.
And then every sort of food that is eaten, every single thing, god said.
Here'S what you're going to collect.
And so the ark is built.
And Noah did all that God commanded him.
I love that Noah did all that God commanded him.
And we'll see this flow throughout.
God says, do this.
So Noah does this.
And just if you're curious, noah was.
Around 500 years old when construction began, right?
You think you're tired.
Here we go.
Chapter seven, verse one.
Then the Lord said to Noah, go into the ark, you and your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation.
Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate, and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate, and seven pairs of birds of the heavens, also male and female, to keep their offspring alive on the Earth, on the face of all the Earth.
For in seven days I will send rain on the Earth, 40 days and 40 nights, and every living thing that I have made, I will blot out from the face of the ground.
And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.
Again, here is what we see.
God gives more instructions, and Noah obeys, and Noah does what God commanded him.
So God says to Noah, go inside and seven days rain is coming while you are inside.
Here's how long it will rain, 40 days and 40 nights.
And while you're preparing for this, prepare for sacrifice.
Prepare for sacrifice.
He says, you're going to bring these pairs of clean animals on here.
And this is going to be important for the very end when we apply this for our life.
God says, I want you to prepare yourself.
I want you to think through, because throughout all of this, you're going to worship me.
You're going to worship me.
Let's look now at verse six.
So Noah was 600 years old when the flood of waters came upon the Earth.
500 when this started, 600 when the flood comes.
And Noah and his sons and his wife and his son's wives with him, went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood of clean animals and of animals that are not clean and of birds and of everything that creeps on the ground.
Two and two, male and female, went into the ark with Noah.
Get again, as God had commanded Noah.
And after seven days, the waters of the flood came upon the earth.
In the 600th year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the 17th day of the month, on that day, all the fountains of the deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were open, and rain fell upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights.
On the very same day, noah and his sons, shim, Ham, and Japheth, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his son, with them entered the ark.
And they and every beast according to its kind, and all the livestock according to its kind, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth according to its kind, and every bird according to its kind, every weaned creature, they went.
Into the ark with Noah.
Two and two of all the flesh in which there was breath of life.
And those that entered, male and female, of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him, and the Lord shut him in.
Here's.
The repetition that we see is God saying, this is what's going to happen.
This is what happens.
And the similarity that we draw from is that Noah obeyed.
God spoke.
Noah listened.
Noah obeyed.
This is the pattern that we see.
We talked a little bit about the patterns that we see in Genesis and the genealogy that we saw.
And this is the pattern of Noah's life.
God spoke.
Noah has clarity on what God desires for him.
Noah listens.
Noah obeys.
God is faithful.
Verse 17.
The flood continued 40 days on the.
Earth, and the waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the Earth.
The waters prevailed and increased greatly on the Earth.
And the ark floated on the face of the waters, and the waters prevailed.
So mightily on the Earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered.
The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them 15 cubits deep.
And all flesh died that moved on the earth.
Birds, livestock, beast, all swarming creatures that.
Swarm on the Earth.
And all mankind, everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life, died.
He blotted out every living thing that.
Was on the face of the ground.
Man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, they were blotted out from the earth.
Only Noah was left, and those who were with him in the ark and the waters prevailed on the Earth.
150 days.
So the flood comes.
Mountains covered by roughly 23ft, the highest mountain in the world, completely covered and the flood lasts 150 days.
I think, as I was young and I read this, I would think, like, 40 days and 40 nights.
And then God pulled the plug and, like, water going out of a bathtub, right?
And the ark circled, and it was done.
But no, right?
And it happens in a moment.
All died, just as God had said.
God, a God of his word, who's faithful and true to Noah and faithful and true to his judgment and his wrath, all died.
Chapter eight, verse one.
But God remembered Noah but God remembered Noah and all the beast and all the livestock that were with him in the ark.
And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided.
The fountains of the deep and the windows in the heavens were closed.
The rain from the heavens were restrained, and the waters receded from the earth continually.
At the end of 150 days, the waters had abated.
And in the 7th month, on the 17th day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Arab.
And the waters continued to abate until the 10th month.
And in the 10th month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.
I love this passage.
God remembered.
And as God brought the rain and as God brought the flood, god brought the wind and the waters, and they subsided, and they receded, and God dried the earth and say, about five more months, as this process goes on.
Verse six.
At the end of the 40 days at the end of the 40 days think back.
Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made and sent forth a raven.
It went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth.
Then he sent forth a dove from him to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground.
But the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth.
So he put up his hand and took her and brought her into the ark with him.
He waited another seven days.
And again he set forth the dove out of the ark.
And the dove came back to him in the evening.
And behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf.
So Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth.
Then he waited another seven days and sent forth the dove, and she did not return to him anymore.
There's two words that sum this up.
There's two words that we learn from Noah.
In this noah waited.
Noah waited.
The patience that God calls his people to as God works, noah waited.
Verse 13.
In the 601st year in the first month the first day of the month, the waters were dried from all the earth, and Noah removed the covenant from the ark and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry.
In the second month, on the 27th day of the month, the Earth had dried out.
And then God said to Noah, go out from the ark.
You and your wife and your sons and your son's wives with you.
Bring out with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh, birds and animals and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, that they may swarm on the earth and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.
So Noah went out, and his sons and his wives, and his son's wives with him.
Every beast, every creeping thing, and every bird, everything that moves on the earth went out by families from the ark.
And so here, you see, God gives Noah instruction.
Again, God had told Noah when to go into the ark.
God had Noah wait, and God gave.
Him instructions, as when he could leave in every aspect.
God, what do you desire from me?
Verse 20.
Then Noah built an ark to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird.
And the offered and and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, I will never again curse the ground because of man.
For the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth.
Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.
While the Earth remains seed, time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease.
So Noah has built an ark.
But now Noah builds an altar.
Noah builds an altar for the Lord.
Verse verse one, chapter nine.
And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the Earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and of all the fish of the sea, into your hands they are delivered.
Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you.
And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.
But you shall not eat flesh with its life that is, its blood.
And for your life blood, I will require a reckoning.
From every beast I will require it.
And from every man, from his fellow man, I will require a reckoning for the life of man.
Whoever sheds the blood of man by man shall his blood be shed.
For God made him in his own image, god bringing it back to creation.
And you be fruitful and multiply and increase greatly on the earth, and multiply in it.
And then God said to Noah, and to his sons with him, behold, I will establish my covenant with you and your offspring and with every living creature that is.
With you, the birds, the livestock, every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark.
It is for every beast of the earth.
I will establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.
And God said, this is the sign of the covenant that I will make between you and every living creature that is with you for all generations.
I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the Earth.
When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh.
And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh.
And when the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature, and of all flesh that is on the earth.
God said to Noah, this is the sign of the covenant that I've established between me and all the flesh that is on the earth.
And so what we see here is God gives his promise.
And when this season, which is particularly this season for us around here, when the rain comes and the humidity settles afterwards and the clouds are there and we see a rainbow, it's not just simply the beauty of the creation, it's the promise of God that we cling to as God's people and we're reminded of his salvation.
So I wanted to walk through all.
Of this over the next several weeks.
We can reference back to the flood, but I do want us to tie into this and look of what we see, what we learn from Noah, of.
What it means to have faith like that, faith like him.
What does this look like for you and I as we cling to this?
Well, the first thing that we see in the life of Noah throughout, over and over and over again, if we say, man, I want to have faith like Noah, is that Noah had obedient faith.
Noah had obedient faith.
So many times when we talk about faith, it's what I believe.
And we can believe things, we can know things, but God calls us to an act of faith.
It's who we are, it's what we do.
It's what we are becoming more and more and more.
And so it wasn't just good for Noah to sit back and go, you're going to do that, you're going to do that, you're going to do that, you're going to do that.
As God said to Noah, noah obeyed.
And it's what we find.
And he built an ark, a massive ark.
He received all the animals right?
I just feel like at some point in time they were standing there going.
Oh, there's more coming, right?
There's more like, we have two dogs.
And it's overwhelming, right?
And more and more and more, he prepared for a flood.
Let's understand, right?
It's never flooded, it's never rained, and he prepared for it.
When God said it, Noah went onto the ark.
He went on to.
On the ark.
Noah waited.
He waited on God, and he waited on God to call Him to leave.
And I don't know if you noticed this in this whole encounter of what we see.
Noah never speaks.
No one ever speaks.
Scripture is filled with God recording the conversations into his word of men and women, of faith as they converse with him.
God comes, god speaks something that is so foreign to Noah that you and I could not possibly understand the requirement of what God is asking.
And Noah does not speak.
I find that oftentimes we ask the question, what does God want me to do?
What does God want me to do?
I think it's a great question.
What does God want me to do?
What does God desire for my life?
What does God have for me?
But here's the question that I want to ask you this morning, if you're willing to ask the question, what does God want me to do?
If God asked you to do something, would you do it?
Would you do it?
Would you be like so many others and go, whoa, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.
Let's talk this out.
Let's work through this.
Or if God called you to do something, would you do it?
Church, may our obedience be positional, not circumstantial.
May our obedience be based in our position in Him and not our circumstances of life.
I'm pretty sure at 500 years old, noah's plan wasn't let me build this.
I'm pretty sure, as he had lived 500 years on this earth, that his plan in life was not to see the destruction of everyone that he knew.
I'm pretty sure that this is not what Noah had in mind of convenience in his life.
These were not the circumstances.
I'm sure that Noah thought that he was going to live these out.
But positionally who he was in God was that Noah walked with him.
And I find that in my life, and I'd be willing to bet in your life too.
Our obedience to the Lord is oftentimes limited to circumstances.
God, I know that you want me to go there.
God, I know that Your Word calls for me to do this.
Lord, I know this is what you want to create in me, but God, not now.
I don't have the time.
These are the things that I need to do.
God, did you know, I'm busy.
And God says yes, because you don't walk with me.
You don't walk with me.
Man we don't want faith like Noah.
Noah had obedient faith.
The second thing is, Noah had trusting faith.
Trusting faith.
I had a guy the other day tell me, hey, man, if you ever.
Want to borrow my boat, I'd let you take my boat out on the water.
That was a very kind statement.
I received that in great kindness and was very blessed by that offer.
But then I had to say, man.
Let me tell you this.
I know nothing about boats, and if.
I take your boat out, I could drown.
My family could, too, but I guarantee.
You we're going to tear something up.
That's what I know.
So if you want to go out on the boat, man, we'll go with you.
And like a little kid, maybe I could sit in your lap and drive, like you know what I'm doing.
That was a weird imagery, right?
But, no, I'm not taking your boat, because I don't know anything about boats.
I didn't grow up with boats.
I grew up with John boats and paddles.
Right?
That's what we had.
But here's what I do know on this, there's no sail on the ark.
Sales important.
They don't have motors.
Sales important.
So you can go where you need to go, where the wind will take you.
There's no rudder on the Ark, so that you can determine where you want to go and you can steer it and position it for where you need to go.
There were boats during this time because there were seas, but on the Ark, there was no sail.
And on the Ark, there was no rudder.
So here's what this means.
Here's how Noah had trusting faith, because Noah went wherever God took him.
Wherever he went is where God had said go.
But then the second thing, when they.
Get onto the boat, noah didn't yell back.
Hey, last person closed the door you ever left somewhere with your family and your kids are the last ones to leave, and you get home, and the front door is wide open.
That's happened at our house, right?
So, hey, whoever's coming out last, close the door.
Bible tells us that the Lord shut him in.
The Lord shut him in.
Noah responds to what he knows.
God says, do this, do this, do.
This, do this, do this.
Noah does it.
And then he trusts in what he doesn't know, because God gave Noah some, but not all the details.
Let me give you this illustration.
Let your trust in the Lord be surrendered and not reasoned.
Here's what it means to trust God with reason.
God, I trust you with all that I know and I accept.
I reason with you that this makes sense for my life.
I reason with you that this is the plan for my life.
And, God, I am obedient to the point.
I have faith to the point to where my reason aligns with your plan that you have for me, and that's not the faith that we see from Noah.
Noah's faith was based in surrendered.
My prayer for you and my prayer for me this week was this that we would live our life with no sail and that we would live our life with no rudder, and we simply went where God took us.
We went there in our marriage.
We went there with our kids.
We went there in our career.
We went there in our finances.
We went there in our sanctification.
We went there in our heart.
We went there in our mind.
We went there in every aspect of our life.
God, where you take me, I will go.
God, give me power of Your Holy Spirit, the axe that I need to chop down that sail that I've built, and to rip out that rudder that I've put onto my life as I determine what's best for me.
And then, lastly, Noah had responsive faith.
Noah had responsive faith.
We see two different times that Noah was prepared for worship.
He brought the seven pairs of clean animals on two and the birds in the altar.
Upon leaving the ark.
Here's why I think this is important.
Noah worshipped on the boat and off the boat.
Noah worshipped in the storm.
And after the storm, noah's worship was responsive to God.
May our worship be responsive to God and not to ourselves.
Too many times I let myself determine my worship or become the object of my worship.
And in that, that is not the worship that God longs for and desires for me.
How I all too often determine my worship are done by the conditions of my life and determined by my adoration of who I am and in my preference of who I want to be.
But God is who my worship needs to be geared toward.
See, my circumstances don't determine my worship.
I'm not waiting till the storm calms.
I'm not waiting till I'm out of the boat.
I'm not waiting till I'm simply at the mountaintop.
And I worship him through the storm.
But when the waters cease, when the waters are dried, when the ark is settled of my life and I come out of that season, it's not a chess poked out of look at what I've overcome and look at what I've done.
It's a look at what God has done in his faithfulness to me.
The aim of this message remember when that song came out, I Want to Be Like Mike?
I think it was Gatorade came out with that in the want to be like Mike picture of us being like Michael Jordan, every little boy, a lot of little girls in the backyard taking that shot.
I want to be like Mike.
The aim of this message is not to be like Noah, but to be like Christ and to learn from Noah.
And here's what we see this week.
This is what it means to walk with the Lord.
Noah was obedient, noah trusted.
Noah responded.
And what we're going to look at next week is this and in that God alone saves.
That's the story of the flood.
Would you pray with me?
God, we come to you this morning looking and seeing Your faithfulness throughout Scripture, Lord, who you are, what you've done, but also, Lord, we're reminded of what.
You'Re doing, that you are still a God who saves.
You're, still a God who calls you're.
Still a God who empowers obedience, who empowers trust.
You're still a God who receives the worship.
And God, may we look at our.
Lives and say, lord, I want to walk with you.
I want to walk with you, lord, adam ran, but Noah walked.
Adam ran away from you, but Noah walked with you.
And Lord, may we walk with you and understanding that's where our life, our hope, our purpose, our meaning, our salvation comes from, that if there's anything good, that if there's anything righteous, that if there's anything that's blameless, that if there's anything that's holy, Lord, it does not come from us and from our ability, but comes from walking with you.
And salvation was not found by Noah in coming up with a plan.
Salvation was found not in the craftiness of his hand or the intellect of his mind, but the salvation of Noah was found in God.
And he went into Your means of salvation.
And, Lord, you closed him up and set him in there promise in him the life that comes for Noah to be found in the promises of God.
Lord, that truth rings true for us.
We will not leave here and go into a structure made by the hands of man.
But Lord, you call us into a life with Christ, whose sacrifice whose sacrifice was made possible because of the hands of man.
And we identify with Him in his life, his death, his burial, and his resurrection.
Lord, I pray for anyone in here who does not know you, who does not walk with you, and could today be the day that they surrender their life to you and trust Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior since Jesus, and pray.
Thanks again for listening, and be sure to check back next week for another episode.
In the meantime, you can visit us@willeridgechurch.org or by searching for Willow Ridgechurch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.