Noah ... Part2
What is it that you’re looking to get out of your faith?
Really- what is it you’re looking for?
Do you come to church because it makes you feel good, like you’ve done something holy, something for God; do you go to Bible studies because it’s a good time with friends, and a break from the day-to-day routine; do you read your Bible and do devotions because you’re supposed to?
I hope the answer is “NO” to each one of these.
There are always at least two answers to most of my questions – the first kind is the “Church” answer – you know what I mean… these are the answers that we give because we know that’s what our answer should be … for example, if I were to ask what’s the most important thing in your life… the church answer would be “God”. But then there’s the second kind of answer- the truthful kind. Yes, we give these ‘church’ answers … God is the most important thing (You know I don’t mean ‘thing’ literally… He’s not a ‘thing’) we say while we’re sitting there in church surrounded by other church people … but often our lives tell the world something totally different.
Sometimes we all know what the church answer is to the question … please, don’t give me church answers!!
Let’s decide to be truthful in these studies.
NO, for most of us, God is not the most important ‘thing’ in our lives.
We would like for Him to be, we wish He was, we know He should be.
He is in our minds – but not as much in our lives.
How do I know that?
Look around- you see, often times our mouths say the ‘church’ answer while our actions truly speak the real answer.
We say that it’s God- but we don’t study His Word (haven’t got time), we don’t spend time in prayer with Him (not 3 minutes just before you go to sleep at night- waking up in the morning to realize we fell asleep while we were praying last night … yes, we all do that!), we come to church when it’s not much of an inconvenience( we have cottages to go to all summer, ball games we HAVE to attend, hockey games we can’t miss, and that bed is just so comfortable Sunday morning after we’ve worked hard all week), we give what we have left-over (God wouldn’t want us to go without all our toys, clothes, restaurant food, our daily Timmies, that extra car, the annual winter vacation…) , we buy that 3rd TV instead of supporting a child in a developing country (or next door)…. Yadda yadda yadda … we say one thing …. But we truly speak in and by our actions.
Please do not give me church answers.
One thing with God’s Word… you really can’t just wade into it. You must jump in… often times up to your neck, it gets deep quickly.
In chapter 5 of Genesis we saw Noah introduced. I hope you begin to look at genealogies a little differently- if God included them they have a specific purpose.
There’s another reason for Noah’s genealogy being given in chapter 5 … it’s what we will jump into here in chapter 6. Let’s read the first 9 verses. (if you need a good online Bible check out www.biblegateway.com … lots of translations, commentaries, etc)
Genesis 6
Wickedness in the World
1 When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with[a] humans forever, for they are mortal[b]; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
5 The LORD saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The LORD regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the LORD said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.
Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God.
We will need to jump around a bit, because there is SO much here to study.
Why did God destroy the earth with a flood?
Our church answer here is because they were wickedly evil. Yes, the earth was filled with evil and wickedness. But Really?
What do you think that those people were doing that is any more wicked than what people do today?
Have you watched the news lately, read a newspaper, surfed the internet? In Canada alone we abort over 100,000 babies each and every year ( compared to 330,000 live births- that’s one in four that we kill); we have horrible gruesome murders; mass murders; sex crimes/murders that I can’t even make myself read or listen to; pornography run wild; pedophilia; bestiality; lives that are of no value because they are too old, too crippled, too young, too poor; people starved to death by greedy governments; theft; drugs; you name it we have mastered it in 2010.
Do you really think that they were any more evil than we are? Did they know of a sin that we have not yet uncovered? Well, yes and no and sort of.
Let me ask you this… why did God choose only Noah from among all the people of the earth?
The church answer … He found favour in God’s eyes. Okay people- here’s another rant … we have to stop being asleep at the wheel. We need to wake up and smell the coffee. Learn to ask some questions. Get awake.
Why did Noah find favour in God’s eyes? Did you notice that genealogy in chapter 5 … well, maybe the answer lies in that list.
Yes, the world was extremely wicked (for a reason, we’ll get there in a moment) … the people were evil and cruel and committed murder and sin at every turn (just like the world today)… and there was one man who stood out as being different from all the rest… NOAH.
(Now here’s a side trip that will lead us to answer that question of why God chose Noah, but it’s a long trip to get there, so grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the journey.)
Did you notice verses 2 and 4:
The sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
Why do we just read right over these verses, never stopping to ask … “Ha?”
The sons of God married the daughters of men … wait a minute, what are we talking about here?
This is the part we don’t hear preached that often (if at all), and we certainly don’t tell it in the kids’ version.
Here’s where we jump in – neck deep- right into the Word of God. Got your floaties on? Need a life jacket?
We have to understand what is being said here, it’s the key to the whole flood story (and more…)
The ‘sons of God”… who are the ‘sons of God’? This term is used only 3 other times in all the Old Testament (OT).
These are the references:
Job 1:6Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.
Job 2:1Again there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them to present himself before the LORD.
Job 38:7When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
In the New Testament (NT) it is also used in 7 places:
Luke 3:38; John 1:12; Romans 8:14 & 19; Philippians 2:15; 1 John 3:1 & 2
Who are the ‘sons of God”?
There are three main interpretations:
1) the ‘sons of God’ in the Noah story were the godly line of Seth’s descendants- who followed God and served Him.
The ‘daughters of men’ were the ungodly lineage of Cain – who were ungodly and evil.
This line of thought says that against God’s will, the godly line of Seth inter-married with the ungodly, evil line of Cain and thus incurred God’s wrath.
There are several major problems with this line of reasoning; first- we are never told that all of Seth’s descendants were godly men… and vice versa, that all the descendants of Cain were evil and wicked.
Second- the term is never used elsewhere to mean the descendants of these two lines.
Third- prior to this passage these two lines had not been admonished not to intermarry.
Fourth- why just the men of Seth’s line and the women of Cain’s line … and not the otherway around Godly women marrying ungodly men?
Fifth –if the men of the line of Seth were godly men, why were they marrying these ungodly women?
And maybe most troubling, why would the union of these two family lines produce a separate and distinct race called the Nephilim?
2) The second interpretation is that the ‘sons of God’ in the Noah story were the nobility (kings, aristocrats, nobles, etc) and the ‘daughters of men’ were the peasantry (the common people)
This isn’t even strong enough to argue against… as in the first suggestion (Cain/Seth lines) there’s no reason why this union (royals with common) would produce a separate race of people known as the Nephilim.
3) And the third interpretation, which is the most difficult: the ‘sons of God’ were fallen angels and the ‘daughters of men’ were the daughters of men.
One of the chief laws of interpretation is that when and wherever possible, the Bible should define its own terminology. How the term has been used in the past, and how is it used in successive passages will usually give us good insight in to its intended meaning.
People will baulk at the fallen angel/demon interpretation because it’s too far out there… strange … ungodly… fearful … and it makes us think about some issues we are not used to pondering.
Let’s look at how the term ‘sons of God’ is used in the OT in Job.
Job 1:6Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.
Job 2:1Again there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them to present himself before the LORD.
Job 38:7When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
In all three verses the term is referring to angels. The angels came to present themselves before God in Heaven … obviously these were not Seth’s lineage, nor was it earthly kings … in these verses in Job it is talking about angels.
Now the term is also used in the New testament
Luke 3:38 Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.
John 1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: (sometimes translated as children of God)
Romans 8: 14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
And so on.
When the term ‘sons of God’ [in the Hebrew it is ben elohiym Strong’s numbers H1121 & H430 respectively] is used it conveys the meaning:
“to be brought about into existence by God’s creative act”
In the OT it is only ever used to speak of angels.
In the NT when the term is used it speaks of only Adam (once) and Christians (believers in Christ).
Now here is the thought – Adam was the only person who was a direct creation of God- thus he is called a ‘son of God’; Angels are created beings, directly created by God. There are as many of them today as there was when God made them. No more- no less. (Don’t even get me started on the foolishness of people turning into angels when they get to Heaven! Read your Bibles- nowhere is that even suggested, hinted at or even alluded to as being possible. Humans and angels are separate creations- your loved ones are not angels in heavens … and the really bad news is that you are not an angel now, nor will you ever be :o)
So Adam was a direct creation of God-a son of God; angels were a direct creation of God - sons of God; what about the term being used for Christians?
Well, the Bible has already answered that for us (it usually does!)
Check out 2 Cor 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
Gal 6:15 (NLT) 15 It doesn’t matter whether we have been circumcised or not. What counts is whether we have been transformed into a new creation.
What does God do when we accept Christ as Savior? He (God) makes us a new creation! We are therefore able to be called sons of God… we have been made into a new creation by His direct act.
So in a nut shell, the opening verses in Genesis 6 tells us some very important info … at this time in the worlds history, fallen angels (we would know them as demons) have come to earth and have mated/bred with human women. The offspring of this ungodly union is known as the race of the Nephilim.
Look carefully at what verse 4 tells us:
They were the heroes of old, men of renown
I promise, this will be my last rant for today … how do we look at the Bible … (No church answers!) Yes, I know it is the Word of God… Yes, I know it is inspired by God and is truth from the first word to the last period. … But, what do we really think about it?
What is it to you?
Is it a good book? I read a good book once called “What Would Jesus Do” in fact I’ve read it several times because it’s such a good STORY… lots of people read books.
This Book- the BIBLE – is not a story book! These are not just little stories for us to tell our kids at bedtime! These words, these chapters, these books- they are the living breathing Word of the MOST HIGH GOD. And if we’re lucky we give it 15 minutes a day.
This Book that we hold in our hands (or read on the I-Pad now days) is beyond our comprehension.
And we need to start looking at it a little differently. (We need to talk about World Views… in a later lesson- remind me about that) Here in God’s Word are all the answers, is all the truth.
An interesting comparision- westerners (us) tend to view the Bible as a story… Easterners (Jews) tend to view it as a text book. Think about how those views will affect the outcome.
Many students of university (they call it institutes of higher learning- phewy!) are schooled in Greek and Roman mythology. We used to watch the “Hercules” cartoon,-this will give my age away- with his side kick the half man/ half goat boy, I think his name was “pan”… anyway who were these Greek and Roman Myths about?
The myths are about the gods (who came to earth and mated with humans) and their offspring- or demi gods (demi gods are half god/ half human… any bells ringing yet?)
Some of these names might sound familiar: Hercules, Neptune, Saturn, Zeus, Apollo, Poseidon, Achilles, Hades, Eros, Jupiter, Demeter ….
The Word of God should always be our final authority. It needs to be.
The Bible tells us in verse 4 that the offspring of these demons (fallen gods) and the women were the Nephilim(also translated ‘giants’) - who were “the heroes of old, men of renown”. Could it be that the Bible has the true story of the Titans, the gods of both Greek and Roman mythology? Of course it does.
All over the world, cultures still hold onto a vague memory of God- they do worship, but it’s become twisted the further away they get from the truth … the Bible tells us who these gods/giants were, where they came from, how they got here (and even what happened to them… but that’s for later too). There’s usually always a shred a truth to myths… you just uncovered the truth behind the Myths of Roman and Greek gods.
PS: We will answer the question of why only Noah found favour with God… next time :o)
PPS: We aren’t done with the Nephilim yet, we just blew the dust off the pages … there’s much, much more to follow. Hope you’re finding God’s Word enthralling!
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