“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.’ But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD” (Genesis 6:7-8, NIV).
Are you aware of the Australian songwriter of Hillsong (Marty Sampson), who wrote such songs as, “King of Majesty,” “Now That You’re Near,” “Saviour King,” “Reason I Live” and “Shout Unto God”? He was reported that he renounced his faith.
Some of his reasons: “hypocrisy of pastors, lack of miracles -- his sorrow over false miracles such as what he observed in a secular documentary on Benny Hinn. He also questioned why there are so many different interpretations of the Bible.” He also asked “How can God be love…” yet send billions of people to a place of eternal suffering?
Recently, however, he clarified that he didn’t renounce his faith. But it was on “incredibly shaky ground” and he wanted to really know the answers.
If he is with us right now, at least, he will receive the answer to one of his questions, “How can God be love yet send many to hell”?
Perhaps, we could tell him, “God is love, but He is not only love. He is Holy. No trace of unholiness could survive in His Holy Presence. In His Holiness, His standard of righteousness is so high, that our human righteousness is like filthy rags in His sight! Actually, the question should be, “How can God who is enamored of His Holiness prevent an unrighteous person to go where he deserves to suffer?”
God, however, is not only Holy in exercising His love and mercy. He is also Sovereign in His Holiness. And in His Sovereignty, He displays not only His absolute Sovereign Power, but also His Sovereign choice. And that will be our topic today… GOD’S SOVEREIGN CHOICE, as we deal with our text (Genesis 6:7-8).
So, how could God display His Sovereignty in making of His choices?
In the previous seven verses, we got a picture of God as One, who will not plead for the sinners forever and that He is being grieved with sin.
Now, in our text, He is pictured as God who is not only in control of all things, but decides what will happen to His creation. And He displayed that as the Sovereign God, who is not only All-Powerful, He could also execute anything especially toward His creation. He could determine anything and bring it to pass whatever He desires.
In our passage, we could point out at least two important things what the Sovereign God can do. What are those? How does He display His Sovereignty in the account?
First, GOD COULD EXTEND HIS WRATH (verse 7).
We read verse 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.’”
We could observe some significant things in the verse. As the Creator and Sovereign God, He could display His wrath and wipe out what He created. As God who is Good and Just, He would not allow any sin or evil to prosper. He would surely put them to an end. He would blot them out from His Holy Presence.
And to uphold His Holiness, in His Sovereignty, He could unleash His wrath even to the many, not just to some or to the few.
In His Holiness, He abhors sin and would not tolerate anyone who will pollute His Holiness to go unpunished.
The word “regret” in Hebrew is not limited to the meaning of being sorry for one’s own doing. It could also mean to have pity or compassion for others. It could also mean to ease oneself by taking vengeance. So, instead of allowing the suffering caused by sin to continue over His creation, especially on His own people, God in His Mercy and Wisdom determined that it’s best to eliminate the “instruments” of sin.
Indeed God is love. But He is not in love with sin. We read in Psalm 5:4-6, “For you are not a God who is pleased with wickedness; with you, evil people are not welcome. The arrogant cannot stand in your presence. You hate all who do wrong; you destroy those who tell lies. The bloodthirsty and deceitful you, LORD, detest.”
In the New Testament, we read in Romans 2:5, 8-9:
“But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed… But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.”
At the return of Jesus Christ, we read also this account in Revelation 6:15-16:
“Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. They called to the mountains and the rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!’”
Jesus Christ is not only a Loving Saviour. He could also be a wrathful Judge.
It is unfortunate that many people have limited the picture of God – downsizing Him to a God of love, who will just overlook their sin. They could not look upon Him as the Holy God whose abhorrence to sin is great. They could not conceive the God whose wrath is piling up on the unrepentant sinners.
So, saints, do we see now the importance – the great importance – of truly believing in Jesus?
In John 3:36, we read: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.”
No amount of good works could remove God’s wrath from us. But, if we have faith in His Son, His wrath does not remain on us anymore. For He does not consider us His enemies. He does not see us as wicked. We read in John 1:12:
“Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”
If you really believe in Jesus Christ, in God’s sight you are already His child – a child who is holy and obedient.
No favor, no appointment, no honor, no privilege in this world could match the favor to be given the right to become the children of the Holy God.
Do we really grasp the wonder of being adopted as God’s children? Not only we received something – the so-called eternal life, but something very serious was removed from us. What was removed was not just a deadly cancerous cell, but the wrath of God – and the prospect to be thrown in hell and suffer there for eternity.
And we do really see the need why Jesus should be preached to others? Many are unaware of God’s wrath that was on them and only Jesus could save them from it.
Next, how did God display further His Sovereign choice?
Second, GOD COULD EXTEND HIS FAVOR (verse 8).
We read verses 8, “But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.”
Last time, we realized that between Abel and Cain, Abel was the one who found favor in the eyes of God. He found favor, not because of his excellent offering, but because of his faith. His faith, which is clear to us today, is God given. Because of it, Abel was able to offer a better sacrifice than Cain. Because of his faith, he was truly righteous in the eyes of God.
Now in our passage, God’s favor was extended not on one among two individuals, but on one man among the whole of humanity! God extended His mercy only to the family of Noah.
Truly God is merciful and gracious. But, no one can obligate Him to be merciful to everyone. God is Sovereign and He alone can choose to whom He will extend His mercy and grace.
Remember when God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, only Lot and his daughters received the favor of God. When Lot hesitated to leave his place that would be destroyed, we read in Genesis 19:16, “When he hesitated, the men (or the angels) grasped his hand and the hands of his wife and of his two daughters and led them safely out of the city, for the LORD was merciful to them.”
God did not show His mercy to all or even one half of the inhabitants of the place. He chose to whom He would extend His favor.
As He told Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion” (Ex. 33:19).
Paul also quoted it in Romans 9:14-15, “What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’”
In verses 21-24, the Apostle continued: “Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use? What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath — prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory — even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?”
And in God’s Sovereignty, He could extend His favor of mercy not to the many. He has the right to make same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes.
So, saints, do we see the great privilege to experience the grace of God to become the objects of God’s mercy?
All of us deserve the wrath of God and to suffer in hell for eternity. And yet the Holy God and Sovereign God extended His favor to us. We read in Ephesians 2:3-5, “All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions — it is by grace you have been saved.”
God who is rich in mercy does not extend it to the same degree to everyone.
God may not grant you physical favor that others are enjoying now. But, He granted you the favor that not only you can enjoy now, but you can enjoy even in the days ahead and in the eternal ages to a greater degree.
Let this spiritual truth strengthen us. Let’s value God’s favor more than anything else. Let it motivate us to pursue a holy life.
CONCLUSION:
In closing, God is Sovereign. Not only His Power is absolute, but in His choice as well. Whatever His Will, He can bring it to pass. Whatever His purpose, no one can thwart. Not only He can direct where the wind blows, or the water of the rivers flows, but also what our heart will desire for.
In His Sovereignty, He can choose and is able to separate light from darkness, the land from the water. He can choose and is able to make what will be our gender. Though He does not delight that wicked will suffer and desire that they will be saved, He can choose to extend His wrath to most of them and extend His grace to others.
The blood of Christ is more than enough to cover the sin of every sinner. But God in His Sovereignty can choose even before the foundation of the world whom He will cleanse from their sins.
