A Righteous Man
Genesis 6: 9-22 (NLT)
Intro is taken almost verbatim from Jeff Strite’s sermon, I Noah Man, sermon central.
Intro: As I was preparing for this sermon, I ran across this list.
"All I Really Need To Know I Learned From Noah's Ark"
. Noah didn't wait for his ship to come in, he built one.
. Plan ahead. It wasn't raining when Noah built the ark.
. Stay fit. When you're 500 years old, someone might ask you to do something REALLY big.
. Speed isn't always an advantage. The cheetahs were on board the ark, but so were the snails.
.Remember that the ark was built by amateurs and the Titanic was built by professionals.
. No matter how bleak it looks, if God is with you, there's always a rainbow on the other side/
. And above all else... don't miss the boat.
.There are many things to be learned from this story of Noah and the Ark, but most folks won't learn them because they don't believe what the Bible said about it.
.The Bible is very clear about the facts of the story:
.Mankind had become unbelievably evil... so much so that God was grieved and filled with pain and decided to send a flood to destroy all of mankind. BUT God found one man named Noah, and his family, who were worth saving.
.God instructed Noah to build a huge box of a boat called an ark and brought the animals to be saved to Noah. The floods came, the ark rose, and the whole earth was covered with water. Noah and his family stayed on board the ark for the better part of a year, and once they came off the boat God promised He'd never flood the earth again.
.I don’t really understand why so many refuse to believe the story of Noah and the ark.
. Over 270 cultures around the world still have ancient stories about a great flood, and most of them tell the same story:
. Man became corrupt
. The Flood was worldwide
. Eight people were survived the flood
. Representatives of all land animals were saved
. A dove was released to find dry land
. The survivors came down from a mountain to repopulate the whole world
. And the hero's name is often a variant of Noah:
Nu-u; Nu-Wah; Noh, Nos; and Nuh
.Historians have a rule of thumb they follow when encountering stories that are repeated across many cultures which seem to agree on so much. If there are this many facts that agree... the story's probably true.
.Now, the question for us this morning is this:
.What does God want US to learn from this true story?
There are many things we could learn from this story, we could concentrate on God’s judgment for disobedience, His love for his creation in saving the animals along with mankind, we could look at the wicked world that Noah lived in and compare and contrast with our society today.
. What I want us to look at this morning is why God chose Noah.
. What does a righteous man look like? We looked at some of these aspects when we looked at Enoch a few weeks back.
. Our scripture this morning tells us how one becomes righteous and how they should act after they become righteous.
. I believe that many are confused and how one becomes righteous and how they should conduct themselves as righteous people.
. Let’s look at the story of Noah.
. 9This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God.
10Noah was the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
11Now God saw that the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence.
12God observed all this corruption in the world, for everyone on earth was corrupt.
13So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Yes, I will wipe them all out along with the earth!
14“Build a large boat from cypress wood and waterproof it with tar, inside and out. Then construct decks and stalls throughout its interior.
15Make the boat 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high.
16Leave an 18-inch opening below the roof all the way around the boat. Put the door on the side, and build three decks inside the boat—lower, middle, and upper.
17“Look! I am about to cover the earth with a flood that will destroy every living thing that breathes. Everything on earth will die.
18But I will confirm my covenant with you. So enter the boat—you and your wife and your sons and their wives.
19Bring a pair of every kind of animal—a male and a female—into the boat with you to keep them alive during the flood.
20Pairs of every kind of bird, and every kind of animal, and every kind of small animal that scurries along the ground, will come to you to be kept alive.
21And be sure to take on board enough food for your family and for all the animals.”
22So Noah did everything exactly as God had commanded him.
. How did Noah become a righteous man?
. He Believed God.
. He put his faith and trust in God
. He had a relationship with God.
. Look at verse 13 with me.
. 3So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Yes, I will wipe them all out along with the earth!
. Noah and God had a conversation, God spoke directly to Noah and Noah believed what God was saying.
. Through the Old Testament, we see God conversing directly with people and their closeness and belief in him and what He tells them is what saves them. This is what makes them righteous, not their activities, their belief and acceptance of who God is.
. Genesis chapter 15, Abraham and God are having a conversation. God has promised Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, that He will bless him. Abraham tells God that the blessings are not any good if he has no heir to carry on the family and God takes him outside during the night and tells him to look up at the stars and count them if he can. He tells him that he will have that many descendants. Then we come to verse 6 of chapter 15 in Genesis.
. The foundational verse on faith in the Old Testament.
. 6And Abram believed the LORD, and the LORD counted him as righteous because of his faith.
. Abraham was considered righteous, not because of what he did, but because of his faith in God.
. Noah was considered righteous by God, not because of what he did but because of his faith.
. In order for any of us to be considered righteous in the eyes of God, we must first have faith.
. Noah did this through direct contact and conversations with God, we do that through our faith in God through Jesus Christ.
.The apostle Paul made this quite clear in his letter to the church in Rome.
. In Romans 4:1-5 Paul wrote this.
. 1Abraham was, humanly speaking, the founder of our Jewish nation. What did he discover about being made right with God?
2If his good deeds had made him acceptable to God, he would have had something to boast about. But that was not God’s way.
3For the Scriptures tell us, “Abraham believed God, and God counted him as righteous because of his faith.”
4When people work, their wages are not a gift, but something they have earned.
5But people are counted as righteous, not because of their work, but because of their faith in God who forgives sinners.
. Since the beginning, man has been declared righteous in God’s eyes by placing their faith and trust in him.
. We say we believe this and then we turn around and tell people that they have to do something in order to be saved. The Bible says no. that is not true.
.John Piper, a noted pastor and biblical teacher wrote this about the concept of being made righteous by our faith.
. “:Biblical teaching on justification by faith is obscured so that most lay people do not see it, let alone savor it as precious and base their lives on it.”
. While Mr. Piper and I have some different views about Calvinistic verses Armenian viewpoints, he is absolutely right about this.
We must base our life on being justified or made righteous by our faith and nothing else.
. Noah based his life on his trust and faith in God. That is why God saw Noah as a righteous man. That is why he is described as blameless. Not because of what he did, but because of who he was in his relationship with God.
. If you are here this morning and have placed your faith and trust in God through Jesus Christ, Guess what, you are righteous in God’s eyes.
. Our confusion starts when we think we can place our faith in God and just quit.
.Here is where we can learn so much from Noah.
. You see, once a person trusts God and places their faith in God, then, there is a way they should respond to God.
Noah shows us how a righteous person responds to God after they have placed their faith and belief in him.
. Noah Listened To God
. God had told Noah to build a boat; He gave him the dimensions and told him how to load the boat. He told him that He was going to send rain and flood the Earth.
. Now Noah could have looked at God and the first question would have been.
. What is rain? There is no recorded experience of rain in the Bible until this time. Most creationists believe that there had been no rain on the Earth up until then.
. The next question could have been.
. You want me to build a boat here on dry land? That’s just crazy Lord.
. The next question could have been.
.Do you really want me to put all these animals on this boat? How will I be able to keep them from killing each other?
. I’m sure Noah had many questions but look at verse 22 again.
. 22So Noah did everything exactly as God had commanded him.
. When Christian Herter was governor of Massachusetts, he was running hard for a second term in office. One day, after a busy morning chasing votes (and no lunch) he arrived at a church barbecue. It was late afternoon and Herter was famished. As Herter moved down the serving line, he held out his plate to the woman serving chicken. She put a piece on his plate and turned to the next person in line. "Excuse me," Governor Herter said, "do you mind if I have another piece of chicken?" "Sorry," the woman told him. "I’m supposed to give one piece of chicken to each person." "But I’m starved," the governor said. "Sorry," the woman said again. "Only one to a customer." Governor Herter was a modest and unassuming man, but he decided that this time he would throw a little weight around. "Do you know who I am?" he said. "I am the governor of this state." "Do you know who I am?" the woman said. "I’m the lady in charge of the chicken. Move along, mister."
.How many of us here today know that when the person who is really in charge tells us to do something, we’ better do it! So it is in the case of Noah.
. Noah listened to God and followed his instructions.
. Folks, we who are seen as righteous in the eyes of God, not because of what we do but because of our faith, need to listen to God.
. Just as He told Noah what he needed to do, He will tell us also if we will just take the time to listen to him.
. We see his instructions in the inspired, inerrant Bible.
. A righteous man will listen to God.
. A righteous man will also walk in close fellowship with God.
.Look at verse 9 again.
. 9This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God.
. I have a brother that is 23 months older than me. We grew up together and have always been pretty close. We have built a relationship with each other over the years that I do not have with my other five brothers. Don’t get me wrong, I love all my brothers but this brother and I have a special bond. We talk with each other every day and have a very good relationship with each other. I would say that we are in close fellowship with each other.
. Why do you think I am in a closer relationship with him than I am with my other brothers? I love each and every one of them.
. I am in a closer relationship with him because I spend much more time with him. We talk more with each other than we do with our other brothers.
. Being in fellowship with God is a relationship folks. Just like the one I have with my brother.
. We must spend time with him and talk with him.
. We do that through prayer and scripture. We do that by listening and talking to him.
. A man is not made righteous by being in fellowship with God, He strives to be in fellowship with God because he has placed his faith in God and God credits his faith as righteousness.
. If we have no desire to listen to God or be in fellowship with God as a righteous man should, perhaps our righteousness comes from self.
. If that is where we get our righteousness from folks, it is worthless.
. A righteous man receives his righteousness from God through faith.
. If this faith is true and genuine, he will listen to God and stay in close fellowship with God.
. Noah was a righteous man.
. Can you say the same this morning?
. Invitation
*** To my Christian brothers and sisters, thank you for taking the time to read this sermon. I ask that you take another second and score this for me. I am always open to feedback so that I can continue to grow in the proclamation of God’s word.
May God bless you as you continue to strive to walk worthy of His calling.
Sources: The Holy Bible, NLT
The Ultimate Float Trip, Nathan Hall, ( sermon central)
I Noah Man, Jeff Strite, (sermon central)
