Genesis 9:1-7 The Gospel Certainty: The Love of God

The Introduction

There is no doubt that God is personal and he responds personally to us as individuals. He cares for us, speaks to us, answers are prayers and provides for us.

God certainly acts very intimately and personally.

But throughout the Bible, what we see is a consistent God--the only God who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

And the story of Noah is beyond the judgment and wrath by God on sin and unbelievers. "Be like Noah, do your best, and don't be caught outside the ark and you will be saved." I think that misses the entire point of Noah story because it misses the gospel of Christ.

What we have clearly seen, since Genesis 6, is that God does everything in order to save you and me to him forever.

The Flood is a microscopic few of the final judgment and the wrath pour out in the last book of the Bible--the Revelation of Jesus Christ.

When we look at the Bible as a whole, we see God's goodness and everything he did was good. We saw his people who were good but then fell. God's judgment came as a prophecy to what we see in Revelation.

That through trials, tribulations, and persecutions, God came in the form of a man yet fully God--Jesus Christ-- who came, lived, died, resurrected, and ascended back to the right hand of God.

Make no mistake: Jesus Christ will return again to judge the living and the dead. In that judgment, his wrath is poured out again like he did so in the Flood. Unlike the Flood, it will never be done by water and outright destruction. Instead, Christ came to bring life. And we are finally restored to him, just like God intended in the beginning.

This gospel is the promise of God. The promise of God is perfectly established in his unbreakable covenant. Why would God make a covenant with a being that is so unrighteous and far from him?

Because He loves us so much--he promises to love us forever, no matter what we do.

Sounds familiar? Like a parent to a child? Like a husband to a wife? Like home to a lost soul? Now you see why God is so tender to the orphan, the widow, and the lost?

Let us examine the covenant--the unbreakable promise of God.

The Text

Genesis 9:1–7 (CSB)
¹ God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

² The fear and terror of you will be in every living creature on the earth, every bird of the sky, every creature that crawls on the ground, and all the fish of the sea. They are placed under your authority.

³ Every creature that lives and moves will be food for you; as I gave the green plants, I have given you everything.

⁴ However, you must not eat meat with its lifeblood in it.

⁵ And I will require a penalty for your lifeblood; I will require it from any animal and from any human; if someone murders a fellow human, I will require that person’s life.

⁶ Whoever sheds human blood, by humans his blood will be shed, for God made humans in his image.

⁷ But you, be fruitful and multiply; spread out over the earth and multiply on it.”

The Support

The covenant of God is beyond just a mere promise. God is a promise keeper--he lacks the ability to break any of his promises. We are filled with sin. We break promises all the time. To quote the movie Top Gun: "We are writing checks that our butts cannot cash."

But not God. He is explicit in what he says and how he says it. And what really should pop your top is that because God is not restricted by time nor space, the future where he said he will do something--guess what? He is already there. He is there in the future right now. But that is whole other sermon.

Here is the simple definition of the covenant: you and I have our parts to do in this promise. However, if you fail to do your part, I will still do my part.

When God makes a covenant, he is always going to hold up his end of the bargain. The commands he gives within the covenant--well, we are going to fail. And listen to be carefully: these are still commands but these then become blessings if you fulfill them or curses if you deny them.

God

¹ God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

The Love of God has blessed us to do his will

If you think this is God's commandment to have babies--almost. This is not a commandment but a blessing. Some cannot have babies. And if you pay attention to the world, we are getting more and more older singles and these older singles will sometimes make their way into our churches--God be so gracious.

Can your church switch context and minister to these single people who are absolutely cherished by God or will you just keep preaching to families and married folk?

This verse here sums it up: whatever God has called us to do, he will give grace to do his will.

In other words, take it all the way back to Genesis 6: "But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord."

Ephesians 2:8-9 (CSB) For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—9 not from works, so that no one can boast.

You and I will need favor and grace to do his will. No exceptions.

² The fear and terror of you will be in every living creature on the earth, every bird of the sky, every creature that crawls on the ground, and all the fish of the sea. They are placed under your authority. > ³ Every creature that lives and moves will be food for you; as I gave the green plants, I have given you everything. ⁴ However, you must not eat meat with its lifeblood in it.

The Love of God knows exactly what you need

Matthew 6:31-34 (CSB) So don’t worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you. Therefore don’t worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

You see that. Do you and I need food, water, and shelter? Yes. Do you and I need provision by God? Yes.

But what do we really need to do in order to live?

John 3:5-8 (CSB) Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Whatever is born of the flesh is flesh, and whatever is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I told you that you must be born again. The wind blows where it pleases, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

You and I must be born again in order to live with God forever and ever. Heaven is beyond perfection. Our minds cannot fathom.

But if you are not excited about being in the physical presence of God to enjoy and be with him for all of eternity, then why go to heaven.

Heaven is not heaven without the tangible, felt presence of the Triune God.

Go to God for God. Nothing else is going to satisfy you.

The Gospel

⁵ And I will require a penalty for your lifeblood; I will require it from any animal and from any human; if someone murders a fellow human, I will require that person’s life. ⁶ Whoever sheds human blood, by humans his blood will be shed, for God made humans in his image.

The Love of God is the penalty for our lives

1 John 4:10 (ESV) In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

1 John 4:10 (CSB) Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

The Love of God is the life for our lives

Hebrews 10:1-4 (CSB) Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the reality itself of those things, it can never perfect the worshipers by the same sacrifices they continually offer year after year. Otherwise, wouldn’t they have stopped being offered, since the worshipers, purified once and for all, would no longer have any consciousness of sins?But in the sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year after year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

Romans 6:10 (CSB) For the death he died, he died to sin once for all time; but the life he lives, he lives to God.

The Love of God sheds his blood for our lives

Hebrews 10:5-7 (CSB) Therefore, as he was coming into the world, he said: You did not desire sacrifice and offering, but you prepared a body for me. 6 You did not delight in whole burnt offerings and sin offerings. 7 Then I said, “See— it is written about me in the scroll— I have come to do your will, God.”

Hebrews 10:8-10 (CSB) After he says above, You did not desire or delight in sacrifices and offerings, whole burnt offerings and sin offerings (which are offered according to the law),he then says, See, I have come to do your will. He takes away the first to establish the second. By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time.

Jesus Christ is the penalty.

Jesus Christ is the life.

Jesus Christ is the blood.

Jesus Christ is that provision.

Jesus Christ is the righteousness we need.

Jesus Christ is the blessing.

Our Response

The Love of God: Love God then go

⁷ But you, be fruitful and multiply; spread out over the earth and multiply on it.”

The covenants of God, the promises of God, in the working of God to save his people is because God loves us so much.

John 3:14-17 (CSB) Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Love God. Obey God. And go and tell others of this amazingly good news.

Peace and grace be with us all.