A Clean Slate

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Last Sunday night, I started sharing with you a series of messages on really 12 of the biblical events that had, I think, the most impact, the most effect on the world that we live in today. And it’s not to say that this is the definitive list or these are definitely the most important. These are really my opinion about which of the ones still have the most effect on the world we live in today.

And I started talking to you last week, not just about the fall, not just about Adam and Eve, but really about, I say it’s an event. In the Bible, it’s about three chapters. In reality, it’s about 1,600 years of history where we see what Adam and Eve started with, where they just ignored God, and it broke out into open hostility toward God over the next several generations, to where it got to the point where evil just exploded and became uncontrollable, to the point where God was just sick of it and said, I’m going to give them 120 years to turn around.

And now to us, that sounds like a long time, but in God’s time span, that’s a blink of an eye. In the time span of how long people live nowadays versus how long they lived back then, it would be like God saying, I’m going to give them ten more years. I’m giving them long enough to turn around, but I’m giving them just a little while longer and then I’m done.

And what we hopefully learn from that is that there’s a pattern that started then and continues today that if you leave sin unchecked, if you leave sin alone to just do what it does, it chokes out everything and takes over and it will destroy everything. What Adam and Eve started with what we would look at and say is just one simple little act of disobedience. They ate some fruit.

The fruit wasn’t the big deal. It was the disobedience. But what they started with one simple act of disobedience and I don’t even think was open hatred toward God, just I’m going to do what I want to do. What they started blossomed.

And to use the word I used last week, it exploded. And so hopefully what we learned from that is that we need to be on guard in our own lives and not leave these things unchecked. I can’t tell you, don’t do one little sin.

I mean, I can tell you that. But God even knows that we’re going to sin. I mean, it’s still in our nature.

Now, over time, with the help of the Holy Spirit, He gives us the ability to do less and less of that, but we never become sinless. So the answer for us is not stop sinning. I mean, that would fix a lot of things, but we can’t do that.

The answer for us then is to deal with that sin when we notice it. Not ignore it, not excuse it away. Deal with it, cut it off, kill it, yank it out right there at the roots instead of wallowing in it.

Don’t let it go any further. Don’t let it grow and take over our lives. Don’t let it grow and take over our families.

Don’t let it grow and take over our church. And if we start coming to repentance as individuals, and we come to repentance as families, if we come to repentance and clean house as a church, at that point then we have credibility to deal with the sin of the nation. But it has to start with us in our own lives and work outward about dealing with our sin before God.

Tonight we’re going to look at what happened after this in chapter 6 of Genesis. We left off with God saying, I’m done with them. I’m going to give them just a few years.

And he said in verse 5 of Genesis chapter 6, we looked at it last week, God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil can lead. So God saw that there was nothing but wickedness in everybody’s heart. Everything everybody thought was just evil all the time.

And as I’ve told you before, as bad as our society is today, I don’t think we’ve gone to quite that depth of evil because there is still a remnant that tries to serve the Lord. Are we perfect? Absolutely not.

And we should be the first ones to admit that. But we try to serve the Lord. We concern ourselves with what the Lord says.

And so for that reason, things aren’t quite as bad today as they used to be if we look back far enough. And God looked at this wickedness and said, it’s time to start over. Sometimes we just need a clean slate.

Sometimes we just need to start over. I’ve talked about my garden before. My garden last year was not good.

I did it there in Moore at my parents’ house. And I started out, I put lots of work into it and had it looking nice. I had pictures of it on Facebook and Instagram.

It was just beautiful. I had put up stakes and strung wire for my beans to climb up. I mean, it just, people were impressed.

And rightfully so, it was impressive. But you know, we had lots of rain. Lots and lots of rain.

I think last year was the year that the remnants of a hurricane came through over Oklahoma and dumped tons and tons of rain on us. I may be getting my years fused. So it was either last year or the year before.

Whatever year we had all the rain was the year that this happened. Last year? Okay.

The weeds took over. I was out there every day. I was out there up to my ankles in the mud and pulling weeds every night, and I just couldn’t keep up with it.

And with all the weeds out there, my plants were growing, but they weren’t producing any vegetables. And I don’t really do flowers or ornamental plants. If I’m going to go to the trouble, I mean, some of you do, and I think they’re pretty.

If I’m going to go to the trouble of growing something and nurturing it, I want to eat as a result of that work. So they were growing and they were big, but they weren’t producing. And the watermelons, they started producing, but then when it got hot, they’d split open.

And it was just a big mess. I couldn’t keep up with the weeds. The plants weren’t doing what they were supposed to be doing.

And it was just frustrating. And I said, I’m done. I didn’t even keep trying.

And after about the middle of June, I said, I’m done. And I started plowing things under and pulling things up. I was sick of it.

I said, I’m just going to start over next year. Clean slate. They weren’t doing what they were supposed to do.

Any of them. And I started over. Clean slate.

I did save one plant. There was a rosemary plant that I had planted. And, you know, rosemary is its own thing.

I mean, if it’s got leaves, those are the part you use. So it pleased me. And I let it live.

And I told my mother I’m going to come back and get that rosemary plant. And I just never think about it when I’m there. I need to go back and get it because I saw it yesterday and it’s as big as mine.

So I need to go dig it up and see if I can transplant it here. But I let that one live to carry on to my garden the next year. I wanted a clean slate.

Folks, that is sort of how God felt. When he looked at the wickedness of the world, said not one of them is doing what they’re supposed to be doing. And you know what?

I’ve gone back and forth on that. People have said, but there was one righteous man named Noah. I’m not sure that he started out as a righteous man.

The New Testament calls him a preacher of righteousness, and that might have been after God got a hold of him. It says that God saw that there was only wickedness all the time in everybody’s hearts, and verse 6 says, And it repented the Lord. It changed his mind that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air, for it repented me that I have made them. God said, I’m sick of the wickedness down there, and I’m going to start over, I’m going to wipe everything out, I’m going to get a clean slate. It says in verse 8, but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.

Now, I don’t know this for sure. I don’t know whether Noah was a wicked man or not. What I know is that it says, every thought of everybody’s heart was only evil.

All the time. And then it turns and says, but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. And some people want to say, well, Noah was a righteous man.

There was one righteous man left. Guys, the point of grace is that we don’t deserve it. And so it’s entirely possible that God looked at man and said, well, they’re all evil, but I’m going to pick one.

And maybe it’s that he looked at Noah and thought, yeah, he’s wicked. Yeah, he deserves to be destroyed as well. but this one will obey me if I get hold of him.

Could have been that God just liked Noah the best. I don’t know. It could be that God looked at him and used some criteria that I can’t even guess about. But what I read in this passage that says, everybody was only evil all the time, but Noah found grace.

So God reached out and gave Noah something he deserved. I’m sorry, he did not deserve the opposite of what I tried to do. God reached out and gave Noah something he didn’t deserve and gave him grace.

God saw the extreme wickedness of man and said, I’m done. I’m going to destroy this. None of them are doing what they’re supposed to do.

I’m going to start over. I saw that with my garden. We see that sometimes cooking or baking.

None of these things are turning out right. I’m throwing them out and I’m starting over. If you’ve ever experienced that, I’m just throwing this out and starting over.

You have a glimpse of how God felt. I’m going to try to be very still. You have a glimpse of how God felt.

Now we don’t fully understand how God felt. How could God be so harsh? Because we deserved it.

And it repented God. It broke his heart that things turned out this way. This is not what God wanted.

But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. and it says we’re going to skip down to verse 11 this is a story that covers multiple chapters and we just frankly don’t have time to cover every verse of this tonight I want to hit the highlights with you we skip down to verse 11 it says the earth also was corrupt before god and the earth was filled with violence and god looked upon the earth and behold it was corrupt for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth there you know there’s another thing when people say well how could God be so harsh as destroy all of mankind because he was mad at them? Folks, they were hurting themselves and they were hurting each other and sometimes you’ve just got to stop.

You know, it might have been an act of mercy that God destroyed man when he did because they were hurting each other. The earth was filled with violence it said in verse 13, and God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me for the earth is filled with violence through them and behold I will destroy them with the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood.

Rooms shalt thou make in ark and shall pitch it within and without with pitch. So you’re going to take tar of some kind and you’re going to put it on the inside and on the outside of the ship and you’re going to make it watertight. And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of.

The length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, the breadth of it 50 cubits, and the height of it 30 cubits. A window shalt thou make, excuse me, make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above. And the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof with lower second and third stories shalt thou make it.

And behold I even I do bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life from under heaven and everything that is in the earth shall die. I sat down about a year ago and did the math on this and I should have brought the figures with me I can’t remember them off the top of my head. But sat down and did the math about okay this many cubits times this many cubits as a cubit.

There are a couple different thoughts on that. A couple of different units of measure in the ancient world called cubits. But any one of them you look at, they come anywhere from around 22 to 16 inches, usually around 18 inches.

You start doing that math and you realize this is a massive. . .

And I started trying to do the math and figure out the capacity of a ship like this. And the number was enormous. And I started wanting to compare it to, ÒOkay, well, what is the volume, what is the capacity of the Empire State Building?

What’s the capacity of Cowboy Stadium in Dallas? I wanted to do a comparison. It’s hard to find.

You Google capacity of buildings. It usually talks about occupancy, the number of people. It’s hard to even find those numbers.

But I started thinking, okay, then gallons. We’ll look at how many gallons of space were in this ship, and it was in the middle. This is a massive, massive boat that he’s told him to build.

And again, the New Testament says that Noah was a preacher of righteousness. I think God got a hold of his heart. And whatever wickedness was there, he dealt with before God and began to preach repentance, began to preach righteousness to the people who were around him.

All the while, he’s taking this 120 years of reprieve that God has given them to build this boat and try to get the message out to as many as he could about, you need to repent, God’s going to destroy everything. And we see at the end of that, God saved alive eight people who were willing to get on the boat. And he says here, everything shall die.

Now, my point of telling you that this ship had a massive capacity. There was plenty of room to fit every kind of animal. Not every species, but every kind. There was plenty of room for the people.

There was plenty of room for the supplies. And also, this was a massive undertaking of faith on Noah’s part. Because if I heard God say, I want you to build a massive ship in your backyard, I personally am probably going to think I’m going crazy.

Noah heard God and believed God. That what he said he was going to do, he was going to do. And so God promises him, you’ve got to build this boat.

Save your family, save some of the animals, because everything left on earth is going to die. But with thee will I establish my covenant. We’re in verse 18.

And thou shalt come into the ark, thou and thy sons and thy wife, and thy sons’ wives with thee, and of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, and keep them alive with thee. They shall be male and female, of fowls after their kind, of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind. Two of every sort shall come unto thee, and keep them alive.

And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee, and it shall be food for thee and for them. Thus did Noah according to all that God commanded him. So he goes through this massive undertaking of faith where God says, I’m going to destroy everything.

I’m going to start over. I’m going to punish this sin. I’m going to purge it from the earth.

And I’m going to save a few of you alive. And Noah’s going to take an act of obedience and an act of faith on your part to build this ship. But I’m going to save you.

I’m going to keep you alive. So God instructed Noah on how to build the ark, how to secure his family. And then we see that Noah went and did these things.

Noah followed God’s instructions. And we look ahead to chapter 7, starting in verse 11. In the 600th year of Noah’s life, in the second month.

By the way, don’t think you’re ever too old to serve God. Noah’s 600 years old when the flood began. Which means if God got a hold of him right when he decided, I’m going to destroy them all.

And if Noah started building then, the earliest Noah could have possibly started building, Noah would have been 480 years old at the youngest. So you’re never too old to obey God, never too old to follow him. In the 600th year of Noah’s life in the second month, the 17th day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the rain was upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights. And I feel like I’ve just said this all day.

I don’t know how this works. there’s a lot I don’t understand about the mechanics of how things work but it says there’s rain it says the fountains of the deep were opened up can’t remember can’t remember if I told you or not but when we had that last big rain here we saw water bubbling up in our front yard where I thought I thought our water water main had burst out there by the water meter now it was a hole coming from the backyard it was a gopher hole and the backyard is higher than the front yard and so we had water gushing up through our front yard that was draining out of the backyard. You get water underground and you put pressure on it, you put the pressure of gravity of whatever else.

I mean, you see geysers out in the west. There’s water underground. And when God sends it out, there can be a lot of water. You combine that with rain and it just, there was water everywhere.

Water like we couldn’t believe. It says the fountains of the deep were broken up and the windows of heaven were open. And suddenly these people who had doubted God and ignored God and been hostile toward God even when they were faced with the knowledge that hey God is going to flood everything God is going to destroy everything and your only hope is to obey Him and get on this boat they still ignored it and suddenly they found they found God’s judgment pouring in from every direction from up and from down.

And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights in the south same day entered Noah and Shem and Ham and Japheth the sons of Noah and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them into the ark, they and every beast after his kind and all the cattle after their kind and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind and every fowl of his kind and every bird of every sort. And they went in unto the Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life. So God said every kind.

This has been one of the stumbling blocks for people. Well, there’s no way all the animals could have fit in there. Two of every kind.

And really, seven of the clean animals so that they’d have food and sacrifices. Two of every kind. That would never fit.

Two of every animal. It doesn’t say two of every animal. It says two of every kind. And when you look at what that word kind means in Hebrew and the implications of it in biological taxonomy, it really means like a family. It’s not every species or genus.

It’s every family. So you’ve got things like cows. You don’t need two Jersey cows and two Guernsey cows and those are the only kinds that I know.

You don’t need two rat terriers and two beagles. You need two dogs. Every creeping thing, you don’t need two black snakes and two brown snakes and every creeping thing.

One thing that I would like to ask Noah is why didn’t you negotiate with God on the snakes and rats and things? You know, Abraham negotiated with God, why didn’t you at least try it? Maybe he did and it’s just not reported.

But every kind, every general grouping, and then we know that from these eight people, all the races, all the colors, all the diversity of humanity came about. And there’s black, and there’s brown, and there’s white, and there’s pasty white, and there’s all sorts of colors that came from this one family. So it’s really not that much of a stretch for me to believe that all these breeds of dogs and all these different kinds of cats, the house cats and the big mean ones, that they all came from.

For me, that’s not a stretch of the imagination to believe that over time it was possible. Genes were all in there. And so every creeping thing, every flying thing, they all came into the ark.

Where is the breath of life? And verse 16 says, and they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh as God had commanded him and the Lord shut him in. They all went in there and God shut them up in the ark.

You know, if God, if God decided I’m going to destroy everybody and I’m going to leave nobody alive and Noah got wind of it and said well I’m going to build a boat God could have sunk the boat so don’t think of this as Noah working for his salvation this was a faith thing and God saved them through telling him go prepare the ark and by shutting them up in the ark and by letting the ark survive God shut him in and the flood was forty days upon the earth and the waters increased and bare up the ark and it was lift above the earth and the waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth and the ark went upon the face of the waters and the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth. That word prevailed is interesting to me. When you prevail you win.

So it was a fight between dry land and water and the water won because there was so much of it. There was no dry land left. And all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered.

Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail and the mountains were covered. Now I don’t know exactly what he means. 15 cubits above what?

It can’t be 15 cubits above sea level. If they’re talking about 15 cubits over the highest mountain, now the whole earth was changed by this. But think about it today.

If there were mountains as high as Everest, we’re talking 15 cubits above that. That is a lot of water. Where did all that water come from?

Where did it all go? I have no idea. I just know the earth was different before the flood and different after the flood.

And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl and of cattle and of beast, and of every creepy thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man, all in whose nostrils was the breath of life, and all that was in the dry land died. And every living substance was destroyed, which was upon the face of the ground, both man and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of heaven. And they were destroyed from the earth, and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.

And the waters prevailed upon the earth 150 days. And we know that eventually the flood subsided. Eventually God, through a process of time, sent them out.

God made a covenant with them and said, you can go repopulate the earth. You can eat the animals now. Don’t kill each other.

He gave them some instructions and sent them on their way. They were supposed to disperse and they were supposed to multiply and fill the earth. Now they weren’t exactly obedient, as we’ll talk about next week.

But God sent a flood to destroy the earth. And you know what? If God had said, I’m going to destroy everybody, he completely justified in doing it.

Sort of like when I say, if God decided I’m going to send all of you to hell, he would have been completely justified in doing just what we deserved. And yet he, out of his grace, out of his own kindness, he chose to keep a remnant alive even at that time. Now, how does this affect our world today?

Because all of these have been about, okay, these are stories from the Bible, but how do they affect our world today, and what are we supposed to do about it? First of all, we need to realize God judged sin once. Not just once, but in this story, God judged sin of the whole world in a big way once.

And He’ll do it again. Now a lot of times, a lot of people seem to live life thinking that, well, I’ll just, you know, God hadn’t gotten me yet, so maybe He’s not going to judge. Oh no, God is not forgetful.

I mean, God can choose not to remember. But God hadn’t forgotten His promise that He’s going to bring judgment on sin. Some people think, well, God’s just letting things go.

2 Peter 3 tells us, The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness. In other words, God is not lazy or negligent about His promises when it comes to righteousness and sin and judgment, but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. God always seems to allow space to repent.

Now, I say always. Eventually, sometimes for some people, that space to repent is up. You know, he gave Israel chance after chance after chance to repent, sent the Assyrians in to conquer them.

He gave Judah chance after chance after chance to repent. And they’d repent for a while and then they’d go back to their old ways. Finally, God sent in the Babylonians and said, you’re done.

For each of us, God gives us chance. And I don’t just mean people in this room. For each of us as individuals, God gives us chance after chance after chance to repent.

And at some point, the breath of life goes. It’s gone. Life is over and the chance to repent goes with it.

So God leaves space to repent. We shouldn’t misinterpret that and say, oh, God’s just letting us off the hook. There’s no judgment.

Our sin is fine. No, we need to realize God is serious about sin. He judged it once before, but he gave them 120 years to repent.

We need to realize that God is serious about sin, but God is also serious about giving us a chance to repent and give. Let’s not think, oh, God must have not seen what I did yesterday because he hadn’t done anything to me. Maybe God’s given you just a little bit more time to deal with him before he deals with you.

And second of all, this is probably more fitting to share with a Sunday night crowd at church, that God always works through a remnant. God always seems to keep a remnant around and works in them and works through them even when everything else is destroyed, even when everything else has just gone to pot, as my grandfather would say. After everything else has fallen apart, God seems to preserve a remnant that he can work in.

In this case, he kept eight people alive and some animals in the ark so that he could rebuild. He didn’t need them to rebuild. He could have put new people from scratch.

He did it once, he could do it again. But he chose to work through this remnant that he would save. You look at Elijah.

And he talks to God and says, you know, everybody, everybody in the nation of Israel has bowed before idols. There’s nobody left. And God told Elijah, he says, you’re not alone.

I’m looking for the number. He says, I’ve reserved to myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. told Elijah when Elijah said, Israel is over. Israel has completely been corrupted and I’m the only one left.

And God says, wait, wait, wait. Yes, Israel is in big trouble. Yes, Israel has bowed before idols.

Yes, Israel has sold its soul before this demon cult. But there’s still a remnant. There are still 7,000 in the country.

Now we’d say, well, 7,000 to work with us. In a whole country, 7,000 righteous left who still worship God, that’s not a lot. And yet God says, I’ve kept 7,000 pure.

I’ve reserved them. They are still with me. And so Elijah was reminded, yeah, the nation may be going to hell in a handbasket, but God still had a remnant that he could and would work through.

We see this happen over and over throughout Scripture, that it looks like everything is just a total loss, and God says, I’ve got a few still here. Now why does that matter to us? Because I feel like we are, I know we’re not there yet, but I feel like we are rapidly approaching a time like Noah’s where it’s just evil all the time.

As I told you last week, the things that 20 years ago people would whisper about and talk about in secret. Now they brag about and they want to have parades about. And so it’s not necessarily that there’s more sin around us, It’s just that it’s open and vocal. And it can feel very much like, well, let’s just all huddle here around the candles until the end.

That’s exactly what we don’t want to do. I mean, I understand that impulse. I’m right there with you.

I understand the darkness is closing in on us. Let’s just huddle here and be holy together and wait for Jesus to come back. God has preserved a remnant.

Even in our society, even in our culture that is so deeply compromised and so deeply corrupted, God has preserved a remnant. And I’m not just talking about this church. But you go all over this country tonight and you will find maybe some large groups of people and maybe some small groups, maybe even some smaller groups like this.

When I was interim pastor in Lindsay, because of my schedule, well, I didn’t have a lot of opportunity to do a lot of work down there other than just being there on Sundays. And so there were times we were down there, and there might be six of us, and I’m not sure how we kept the lights on. You know what?

You could go in Lindsay, Oklahoma, and with all the darkness around there, six people still meeting and trying to hold high the banner of Jesus Christ. You’ll find all around the world today, you’ll find believers meeting underground in China. You’ll find believers meeting behind closed doors in Saudi Arabia, where it’s not legal either. You’ll find people sharing the gospel in prison camps, in forced labor camps in North Korea.

They’re in there for even owning pages of the Bible, and they know that they will be killed. It’s even worse than China. They know they will be killed for sharing the gospel even in that prison camp, and they’re still doing it.

You’ll find with even the darkness and the perversion of our society, there are people who are still on their knees, and hopefully we’re among them, who are still on our knees crying out to God for this nation and asking Him to hold back the judgment that we deserve and asking Him to give us a revival. You see, from a human standpoint, it’s easy to look at the world and say, well, we’re outnumbered. We’re used to that. We live in a democratic country where we go the route of the majority.

We take a vote and then we go which way the majority wants to go. And sometimes I think that’s a horrible way to do business. Other times I like it.

But we’re used to, okay, whatever way the majority goes, that’s the direction of the country. No, no, we need to look at things from God’s perspective. And God says, I’ll keep back a few.

Wait until you see what I can do with a few who are sold out to me. I was warned a few times by the search committee when I was looking at coming here. Please don’t be scared off.

We just have a small congregation. They love each other and they want to work and they want to grow. And my answer to that every time was that I would rather have ten people who want to do something for God and who are committed than have a thousand who just sort of jump in and out.

Folks, the reason I believe that is because I believe that’s how God operates too. give me the 7,000 w