Our New Testament lesson comes from Revelation 12, verses 13 to 17. These are the words of the Lord. Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. But the woman was given two wings of a great eagle that she might fly into the wilderness to her place where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time in the presence of the serpent. So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a flood after the woman that he might cause her to be carried away by the flood, but the earth helped the woman and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. And the dragon was enraged with the woman and he went to make war with the rest of her offspring who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. This is the revelation of Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God. Turn now to our Old Testament lesson. We find another example of a flood, this time not from a dragon's mouth, but from the clouds of heaven. We will read verses that we read last time, but look at them from a different angle. So Genesis 6, verses 9 to 22. Pay careful heed to the reading of God's Word. This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God. And Noah begot three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed, it was corrupt. For all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me. For the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood, make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. And this is how you shall make it. The length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, its width 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits. You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. And behold, I myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life. Everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall go into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female. of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. You shall take for yourself of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to yourself, and it shall be food for you and for them. Thus Noah did according to all that God commanded him, so he did. May the Lord bless the reading and proclamation of his holy word to our hearts. Amen. You may be seated. Last time, we discussed Noah's construction of the ark in terms of God's covenant with him, that agreement in which God bound Noah to himself with promises, conditions, and sanctions. But as we looked at that story, you might have wondered, why did God tell Noah specifically to build an ark? Why did he specify the materials, gopher wood, The dimensions, 300 by 50 by 30 cubits. The occupants, two of every kind of animal, and then later we learn seven of every clean animal, of every bird. Also, why did he specify the architecture? Three decks, a window, and a door. What is the significance of the ark? This is important because as Christians who live in the modern age, in many ways, we have been indoctrinated by the Enlightenment to think that there's simply brute facts and raw stuff out in the world. And we've lost sight of the significance of things. And when it comes to the Bible, the Bible is an ancient inspired book where everything matters. So what is the significance of the ark? Is there any symbolism or any typology? Symbols are just pictures in space and types are pictures developed across time. Well, if so, what does the ark represent? What does it mean? And how does that affect your life? Well, I'm not gonna give you the answers to those questions. This is gonna be more of an inductive approach in which we ask three questions. Who is Noah in this story? What does he represent? Two, what is the ark? And three, what would it look like for you to build an ark today? Afterwards, you're all going to go to Lowe's and Home Depot and get your hammers and your nails and your saws. Or not. We'll see. What would it look like for you to build an ark today? And my hope is that I will show you that the significance of the ark, the significance of Noah, this is not an artificial construct or imposition on the text. I want to draw out the intended meaning of the divine author. First question, who is Noah in this story? What does Noah represent? Well, the first thing you might notice about Noah is he's surrounded by what? animals And if I direct any questions the covenant children, it's all gonna be I think toward the Kim family. They're the only kids not sick He's surrounded by animals. Well who else in the Bible was surrounded by animals anyone know? Who else had animals all around him? Adam in the Garden of Eden More than that, the animals came to Noah in binary pairs, male and female, two by two, and that should remind you of Adam's naming of the animals in Genesis 2 and his inability to find a helper suitable for him. He saw the lion and the lioness, the tiger and the tigress, but he didn't find anybody for him. So there's a connection between Adam and Noah. Also, what was Adam's vocation in the garden? It was twofold, he was a gardener and he was a priest. You remember that the words used to describe Adam's calling, which are serve and keep, are the same words used elsewhere for the priest's job description. Adam served and he kept the garden sanctuary, just as later the priest would serve and keep the tabernacle and temple. Well, here again, we find a connection with Noah. Noah, after serving as a builder, a preacher, and a sailor, began to be a farmer, we are told, or we could say a gardener, and he planted a vineyard, a kind of garden. Let's shoot again, take us all the way back to Genesis one through three. Like Adam, Noah functioned as a priest, not only by preserving the seven clean animals, but then on the other side of the flood, offering them as ascension offerings on the altar of sacrifice to the Lord. So there's a connection between Adam and Noah. and Noah, and it's not arbitrary. In fact, I want to show you that it's reflected in the structure of Genesis. Now, bear with me. We've seen that Genesis is structured by a series of genealogies. It's the backbone of the book, lists of names. signaled by the Hebrew word toledoth, which can be translated variously as account, records, history, generations, or genealogy. It indicates that what you're about to read is the account of somebody's descendants. In verses 9 to 10, which we just read, we get our third toledoth in the book of Genesis. We had the history of the heavens and the earth, and then the book of the genealogy of Adam. We'll now look at verse nine. This is the genealogy, the Toledoth. of Noah, and it goes on to list his three sons. What this means is this is a new section in the book. There are 10 sections in Genesis marked by that word, toledoth, and here's the third of those 10 sections. It's a hinge point in the story. I'm tempted to say it's a watershed in the story, and this is where the connection between Adam and Noah is really fascinating because Genesis 6 through 11, that section mirrors Genesis 1 to 5. Let me explain. Genesis 1 to 5, what do you get? You get creation, then you have the fall of Adam, then you have the sin of Cain, and then you have the sin of the sons of God that leads to the flood. Okay? That's the structure. Well, in Genesis 6 through 11, what do we get? We have a new creation of sorts after the flood as they step out of the ark on dry ground. Then we have a kind of fall of Noah as he is drunk in his tent, and then we have the sin of Ham, and then the sin at Babel, which leads to God's judgment. In other words, if you remember when I was in high school, we still did this. We had the transparencies that you would put up on the board. Who remembers transparencies? See, everyone's self-sorting themselves demographically. You don't know anything about transparencies. You're too young. But if you took transparencies and put them together, they would match up. And so if you think of Genesis 1 to 5 and Genesis 6 to 11 as a set of transparencies, and you laid them on top of one another, they would echo each other. They would mirror each other. It's a kind of panel structure. The Bible has these. Sometimes the Bible has sequences of seven. Sometimes it has what are called chiasms, where you have like something here, here, here, here, something in the center, and then it repeats itself. Well, this is a panel structure. It's like the Book of Jonah, which is set up as kind of like a diptych. Well, here, this is giving us a clue to the significance of Noah. It's giving us a clue. And that is, it's the same story with a twist. Noah is a new Adam at the headwaters of a new creation. That's what Noah represents. That's who Noah is in this story. You get pairs of animals, gardener, farmer, garden, vineyard, priestly work, a retelling of Genesis 1 to 5. Noah is meant to be a new Adam figure. And as a new Adam, Noah is also a type of someone else. He's a picture of someone else. Who's that? He's a picture of the last Adam. He's a picture of Jesus Christ, Noah's Ark building and preaching work. prefigured Jesus' preaching and church building work. Noah's long obedience in the same direction prefigured Jesus' obedience unto death, even the death of the cross. Noah's saving of his house prefigured Jesus' saving of the world. So when you read the Old Testament, realize that it's all pointing us to Jesus. That's what Jesus told the disciples on the road to Emmaus. Read the scriptures, Moses, the law, the prophets, the Psalms, for they testify of me. Well, here, Noah, as a new Adam, is a picture pointing to the last Adam. That's what Noah represents. Well, second question. What about the ark? What is the ark in this story? What does it represent? Again, we're talking symbolism and typology, pictures of spiritual realities. Well, on the surface, if Noah is a new Adam, then the ark is not just a ship or even a floating zoo. It is a new Garden of Eden. It is an environment of new creation. But there's even more going on here. Let's look at the description of the arc. We have 300 by 50 by 30 cubits. That's 510 feet long. That's 85 feet wide. And that's 50 feet high. It's big. It's half the size of a Titanic. That's 150 feet longer than a football field. But I think we need to be careful not just to focus on the size. Why are dimensions being given? When you go to the description of Solomon's construction of his palace, you'll notice something. There are no dimensions given. There's no blueprints. It's a man-made work for a kingly task. But when you get to the tabernacle, and when you get to the temple, there are dimensions given, and there are blueprints from heaven. So we're on to something here. This ark, is a kind of sacred space. God gives dimensions when he wants you to build a sacred space like the tabernacle or the temple. Now you'll notice in this passage, it doesn't say much about the shape of the ark. And you can think about what it might have been. The ark encounter has sought to recreate it as best they can, not only dimensionally, but also in a way that would make it seaworthy. That can be a fruitful, apologetic exercise. But in terms of symbolism, in terms of typology, in terms of spiritual significance, God's not really talking about a boat per se. It floats, but it's not described as a boat. That's not the big idea. The only other place the word ark is mentioned in the Old Testament is the container that held the baby Moses in the Nile River. The ark of the covenant is a different word, which is confusing in our English translations. But there's only two stories, Noah in the flood and then Moses in the Nile. If you want to know what its significance is, we have to go back to the Bible. Look at verse 16. It says, You shall make a window for the ark and you shall finish it to a cubit from above and set the door of the ark inside. You shall make it with lower, second and third decks. Now, if you read that. Three stories, a door, a window. What's that sound like? Any ideas? Sounds like a house. Someone said house. It sounds more like a house than a boat. And that's significant. It's already mentioned, actually, in verse... In verse 14, it says, make rooms in the ark. There are rooms here in my father's house. Are many rooms. And then you have three decks, or three stories. You've got a window, you've got a door, possibly a gate. This language is gonna be picked up by the same author of this story, Moses, and used to describe the tabernacle and the temple, the house of God on earth. This is a clue to what the ark is, what it represented. Like God's house, Noah's ark is a floating 3D model of the world. Say that again. Like God's house, the tabernacle, or the temple, Noah's Ark is a floating 3D model of the world. It's a miniature model of the cosmos. Let me show you how that's the case. First of all, it's got three decks or stories. These possibly correspond to the three sets of creatures. Maybe you have the birds in the upper story and the animals and the creeping things, that's possible. But they're also parallel to the three stories of the cosmos. We read the Ten Commandments earlier. What does it say? Things in heaven, things in earth, and the water under the earth. heaven, earth, and sea. That is the consistent way the Bible describes the universe as a three-story house of heaven, earth, and sea. Well, here we have a floating 3D model of that with three decks or stories. We also see the Bible describe heaven this way. There are three stories in heaven. You have the third or highest heaven where God dwells. The second, a heaven or outer space which house the planets. Then the first, heaven or atmosphere around the earth where the birds fly. This is how the earth was set up, with three zones. You have garden, you have land, and you have world. This is how the tabernacle and temple were set up, with three zones, outer court, Holy place, most holy place. This is just the way the Bible describes the universe, the heavens, the tabernacle, the temple, and it's how he describes the ark with three stories. 3D model of the world. It's also got a window. The raven and the dove are gonna leave through the window and come back, or at least the dove will come back with an olive branch to Noah. But here's how, in the very context, windows are described. Chapter seven, verse 11, let's read that together. In the 600th year of Noah's life, in the second month, the 17th day of the month, on that day, all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. Interesting. That's how he describes the rain. The windows of heaven are opened. Skip ahead to chapter eight, verse two. The fountains of the deep and the windows of heaven were also stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained. Well, in the midst of this flood, there is a floating 3D model of the world. Just as there are windows in heaven, there's a window on this ark. Just as there are three stories to the universe, there are three stories to this ark. It's also got a door or a gate. Well, how does that connect to the world? Well, Job 38, 8 through 11 says this. This is God speaking to Job. Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst forth and issued from the womb. When I made the clouds its garment in the thick darkness, its swaddling band, when I fixed my limit for it and set bars and doors. When I said, this far you may come, but no farther, and here your proud waves must stop. Bible says, figuratively speaking, that there are doors that God has put in place to not allow the ocean to go farther than he wants it to. Well, even so, there's a door in the side of this vessel. Now you might wonder, what about the gopher wood? Why is that significant? Now I said last time that nobody knows what gopher wood is. Some of you told me that the NIV had it all figured out because they translate it as cypress wood. But the NIV translators We're guessing. They don't really know. Nobody knows. And so it's really hard to deal with the significance of the gopher wood. So besides keeping the door of mystery open, what is this mysterious gopher wood? It's probably another link to the tabernacle and the temple. What's true of the ark? What's true of the tabernacle? What's true of the temple? They're all made of wood. The tabernacle of Acacia, the temple of olives, cedar, and cypress, and the ark of gopher wood. Again, just another connection, that like God's house, whether tabernacle or temple, Noah's ark was intended by God to be a floating 3D model of the world, a miniature pattern of the cosmos. It not only looks back to the garden, the old creation, but it looks forward to the garden city, the new creation. Again, remember that panel structure where Genesis 1 to 5, it's a story of creation. Genesis 6 to 11 is a story really of a kind of new creation. Now, of course, the ultimate new creation is yet to come, but the world after the flood was still relatively new and thus pointed to a new creation. 2 Peter 3 contrasts the world that then existed before the flood, the old creation. with the heavens and the earth which are now after the flood, a kind of new creation, which means that Noah's ark and Noah's flood is really a watershed event. These are overlapping tectonic plates in our chapter between the world that then was and the world that now is. And when Noah steps off the ark, it's like he's stepping into a whole new world. Later, Peter will speak of a new heavens and new earth inaugurated. in Christ's first coming and consummated in his second coming. So there's still a new heavens and a new earth to come, but we get a little token of this in the story of Noah. That's a lot of material. So just to summarize it all, with its dimensions, its materials, the three-decker architecture, the ark is a miniature picture of this coming reality, a floating 3D model of the world. Now, with Noah, I pointed out that he not only is a new Adam, but he really prefigures the last Adam, Jesus Christ. Well, even so, this ark prefigures the church. Now it's true that it also is a picture of Jesus because Jesus covers us. Jesus embraces us. We are safe in the embrace of Jesus Christ. He is a kind of ark of salvation to us if we're united to him by faith. But the ark is also a type or picture of the church of Christ. The nave of the church in historic churches is described as an ark. When you get baptized, you pass through the waters aboard the ark, so to speak. You are delivered from the elementary principles of the world. In communion, you taste of the powers of the age to come. Like the ark, the church, is a model of the new creation. It's a signpost of things to come. The church, like the ark, should be a safe place. This should be a place where you can come and feel safe. Yes, there are sinners here, but this is a place where God's people meet. This is a place where we enjoy fellowship with one another. This is an ark of safety in a very dangerous world. This is a place where you can find a new beginning. This is a place where you can find a fresh start. This is a place where you can find new friends and even a new spiritual family. Like the ark, even so the church. We've seen Noah. a new Adam who prefigures last Adam in the ark, a floating 3D model of the world, a new Garden of Eden which prefigures the church. But you might say, this is all very interesting, but how does it affect my life on Monday morning at 6 a.m. or 7 a.m.? ? or heaven forbid, 9 a.m., whenever you wake up, I don't know when. How does it affect your life? Well, congregation, my argument is that this kind of symbolism and typology is not just interesting. It actually lays the groundwork for practical application, and that leads us to our third and final question. What would it look like for you to build an ark today? And again, my application is not to be, go to Home Depot or Lowe's. That's not, we're talking spiritual application here. If that was the case, I'd probably tell you to go to Jeremy Huntington, who's an elder in New Bern who actually does build boats for a living. And he could tell you how to build a boat. That's not the application. That's not the kind of ark I'm talking about. We're speaking by way of analogy. What would it look like for you to build a spiritual ark today? That's a good question. But I actually want to deal with something first. Before you can build a spiritual ark, you need to come to Christ. Before you can build a spiritual ark, you need to come to Christ. You need to be saved. You need to be born again. You need to have your sins forgiven. You need to have the blood of Jesus applied to your person. You need to be saved. You need to find grace in the eyes of the Lord. Otherwise, if you try to build an ark, but you're not a converted man, woman, or child, well what are you doing? You're building a house on the sand. You're building an ark with no floor. And when the rains come, your boat's gonna sink. And when the floods rise, your house is going to fall, and great will be the fall of it. And so before you think about any kind of spiritual building project, you need to come to Jesus. Embrace Him as your Lord and Savior. Trust Him. Receive and rest upon Him alone for salvation as He's offered to you in the gospel. Come to Christ and be saved. Let Him cover you. With His blood and His righteousness, the best ark there is. Once you've come to Christ and then, and only then, then you're ready to build. Then you're ready to build. So I want to close with three applications, three building projects. First, Build the arc of personal piety. Build the arc of personal piety. Congregation of the Lord Jesus, are you investing your best in a world that is perishing? or in a lasting world to come? Are you laying up treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt and where thieves do not break in nor steal? Are you, as you live the Christian life, are you following the blueprints? Are you going back to the Bible and not following the zeitgeists, not following the spirit of the age? but saying, I'm gonna go back to the Bible. And if I'm out of step with the spirit of the age, so be it. I don't care about political correctness. I care about fidelity to the word of God. Are you following the blueprints in your marriage? Are you following the blueprints in your parenting? Are you following the blueprints in the way you do your work? Is your arc, so to speak, proportionate in its dimensions? Is your life Proportionate or is it out of joints? Is it out of proportion? Are you spending time every day in prayer and in Bible reading? but are you also fulfilling the other responsibilities that you have? Is it proportionate? Is your ark seaworthy or is it leaking? It's interesting that the Bible specifies that Noah is to put pitch on the ark inside and outside. Well, just as an analogy, is the ark of your spiritual life insulated against enemies from within and enemies from without. Are you ready for the storms of life? Are you well supplied? Are you stocked up on the promises of the word? Are you filling your life with the means of grace, the word, prayer, sacraments, and fellowship with other believers? Are you well supplied? for when the rains come. Are you remembering your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come, when the years draw nigh, when you shall say, I have no pleasure in them? Are you ready? Are you remembering your Creator now? Are your wife and children on board? It's a good question. It's not just about you, though we start with you, but are those closest to you for whom you have responsibilities, are they on board? Are they baptized? Are they catechized? Are you doing family worship? Are your wife and children involved? Someone asked me if the rest of Noah's family was involved in this ark building project, and I could say, I would assume it was all hands on deck. Everyone's getting involved in some way or another. And just to be a good reminder to you, especially men in the church, get your children involved in your work and in your ministry. Take them to the job site, the outreach, the shut-in. Model obedience to them. And in all these things, build an arc of personal piety. Second, build the arc of parallel culture. Noah's arc provides a model for cultural engagement. Let me explain. Instead of investing in existing structures, what did Noah do? He developed a parallel model of the world. Besides the animals, he also preserved, apparently, knowledge, art, technology, literature, history, and cultural memory along parallel tracks. When the old world perished, and they were the only people left, he was ready to bring out the seeds to plant a new world. He was ready to bring out the bricks to build a new world. It reminds me of the Irish monasteries during the Middle Ages, where they painstakingly copied. these illuminated manuscripts, and really helped to preserve the treasures of Western civilization. Or the Masoretic scribes who copied the Torah and the Nevim and the Ketuvim. They kept the Old Testament preserved. through meticulous, precise copying. Even so, Noah helped to preserve a remnant of the old world in which to bring a new one. Now this isn't the only model of cultural engagement. As Aaron Wren observes, sometimes it's prudent to go on the offensive and seek to reform or even capture existing institutions. We're seeing some of that right now in the political sphere. But at other times, it's strategic to abandon old structures and platforms. in order to build new ones, to withdraw from the culture war so that you have time and space to build a culture worth fighting for. Sometimes you fight culture wars and you wonder, do we have a culture worth fighting for? We need to cultivate a culture. that is worthy and is excellent. This is what Rod Dreher calls building a parallel polis or parallel city, a parallel set of structures. Perhaps it's education. The education structures that are there are failing you, and so you could reform them or capture them, and that's possible, or work within them, but sometimes it's prudent to leave those structures. and develop new ones, the arts, social media, or even medical practices. Like building an ark before the flood, on this model what you would do is build a parallel society while waiting for the current one to collapse. When it does, You're ready. You can bring out the seeds to plant a new one. You can bring out the bricks to build Christendom 2.0. This is especially strategic when you don't currently have much political power or social influence. Of course, if the opportunity arises, seize it. In the meantime, it's not wrong to seek it. Often, cultural change is downstream from political power. But overall, for most of us, most of the time, when you lack political power, and social influence, it may be a season characterized by witness-bearing and arc-building, witness and presence, developing a parallel culture, preach and build, show and tell, in Noah's case, a gospel message accompanied by a 510-foot-long, 85-foot-wide, 50-foot-high visual aid. When everything's falling apart in your society, prepare for rain, build an ark, climb aboard, hang on for the ride, and be assured, we're in this together, and we're in this for the long haul. Time is on our side, and Jesus is coming again. Build the ark of parallel culture. One final application. I've seen personal piety, parallel culture, one final building project, and then we will close That is, build the arc of biblical worldview. Build the arc of biblical worldview. This brings us full circle to where we began. We talked about how Noah isn't just a historical figure. He is that, but he's more. He's a picture of Adam and of the last Adam. The arc isn't just a historical artifact. It is that. It really existed. It was really built in time and space, but it's more than that. It's a picture of new creation. It's a picture of the Garden of Eden. It's a picture of the cosmos. The pictures of Noah in the ark aren't just nice window dressing. Biblical symbolism and typology have the power to baptize our imaginations. They attune our souls to the order of reality. They enable us to think God's thoughts after him. And so my last exhortation to you, congregation, is by faith, learn, as you build a biblical worldview, to connect the sign with the thing signified. Connect Noah with New Adam and last Adam. Connect the ark with new creation, invisible church. Connect the bread with Jesus' body. Connect the wine with Jesus' blood. Build the ark of biblical worldview. And as we come to the table, we will be privileged to taste of the power of the age to come. To taste the wine of a future wedding feast. To taste and see that God is good both now and forevermore.