Good morning, church family. Let me just give us a summary of where we've been thus far. The first one is in Genesis 1, we learned that creation occurred in six literal 24-hour days. And so one of the questions that came in to me this week was, Pastor, I understand that you said that it's six literal 24-hour days, but In 2 Peter, it says, with the Lord, a day is a thousand years, and a thousand years are as a day. And my response to that was, well, that's a great question. Why would that kind of language be written in Peter's letter? Well, we have to realize that when we come to the Word of God, we have to identify what is the genre of literature. In Genesis 1, the genre is actually narrative. It's narrative. It's historical narrative. And in 2 Peter, Peter had a penchant for using hyperbole to drive home a point. It's similar to what Jesus said to Peter when Peter said, Lord, how many times should I forgive my brother for sinning against me? Jesus said, 70 times 7. The idea there is he's not specifically saying 490 times and then on the 491st time you don't have to forgive him. No, Jesus was giving an outlandish number just to give Peter the idea that we should always be forgiving. In the same way, Peter in 2 Peter chapter 3, he is basically saying, with the Lord a day is as a thousand years and a thousand years are as a day, indicating that God is outside of time. Time does not contain God and His purposes. Furthermore, as we studied in Genesis chapter 1, we realized that this refrain continued to be repeated as the six days of creation were given. And the evening and the morning, the first day. And the evening and the morning, the second day. And it was very clear from the writer, in fact, nobody came up with the idea of gaps of time or millions of years until the 1800s. Prior to that everybody took the Genesis account literally six 24-hour periods of time. Well what seals the deal for me is that in Exodus chapter 20 when God gives Moses the Ten Commandments, in it he says you are to work six days and then you are to rest on the seventh day because it is a Sabbath. And this is to identify or reflect on God's creation of the world, that God created the world in six days, and he rested on the seventh. And so that's why I hold to the six literal 24-hour days in Genesis. Great question, and I want others to come as well. Number two, all humans are created in God's image. That means whenever you look around around you, no matter who that person is, they were created in the very image of God. That is, they have certain communicable attributes that only God our Father has. And therefore, they are valuable to God. They are of infinite worth. to our Father in heaven. And so therefore we should treat people with the dignity that God gave to them by His image. Number three, God instituted marriage between a male and a female. This was God's institution. It was prior to the law. It was prior to Israel. It was even prior to Abram. It was between Adam and Eve. And of course, over and over in the New Testament, Jesus refers to that institution of marriage in helping us understand God's design for humankind, civilization, and how the world is to grow and reflect His glory. Number four, Adam and Eve brought sin into the world. God gave them a prohibition, don't eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But if you do, you will surely die. And of course, Adam and Eve, Eve saw that the fruit was good. And she saw that it was pleasing to the eye, and she took and she ate. And then she gave some to her husband, who was with her. He was with her. And they plunged the world, not just humanity, but all of the earth into a state of a sinful, decaying, dying world. And so Satan, of course, tempted them and they fell. God then judged the world through a flood and we studied last week the flood and the ark and how many animals on the ark and how long were they on the ark and when they came down off the ark there were only eight people to begin anew. And so we begin in Genesis chapter 9 today, we get this idea of this newness, this restoration, this beginning again. And so we see that God saved that remnant, Noah, and his family. So if you do have questions as we go through our study today, it could be on any part of Genesis 1 through 12, please feel free to text them or email them to these. areas. So today we're going to get into the question, promise or pride? Obviously, if you think about what we're going to read today, it's talking about the rainbow. And the rainbow, of course, in our culture, our modern culture, has been adopted as a symbol for the LGBTQ community. And so therefore, I want us to get right back to what the Bible has to say. What does God's word have to say? And so if you're able to stand and for the reading of God's Word, please do so. And I'm just going to read the first seven verses for us and then we'll continue on. In chapter 9 it says this, verse 1, Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, Be fruitful, and increase in number, and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth. and on all of the birds in the sky, and on every living creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea. They are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything. But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal, and from each human being too I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being. Whoever sheds human blood by humans shall their blood be shed, for in the image of God has God made mankind. As for you, be fruitful and increase in number. Multiply on the earth and increase upon it. Father, this is your word, we thank you for it. Lord, help us as we study this passage this morning that we will understand the way you value human life, the way you are a keeper of your promises, and the way in which you are commanding us to be consecrated unto you. Father, thank you for your word. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. So this morning I want us to look at, as we walk through this entire chapter 9, we're going to look at the commands of God, we're going to look at the covenant of God, and then we're going to look at the curse of Noah upon one of his sons in his lineage. And so this morning, in verses 1 through 7, we see the two commands of God. The first one's not hard. It's actually repeated again in verse 7. Be fruitful, increase in number, and fill the earth. Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. What is missing here in chapter 9 something that you should pick up on. Turn back to Genesis chapter 1, if you will, and in chapter 1 verse 28, when God created Adam and Eve, it says this, God blessed them and said to them, be fruitful and increase in number, fill the earth. it goes on. It goes on to say, "...and subdue it, rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground." You notice here that in Genesis chapter 1, God gave humankind the ability to rule and reign over all of creation. However, with the fall of and the continuation of the sin condition throughout the human race to the point where God had destroyed everyone and the world with a flood, a deluge that covered the entire world. He begins anew with Noah, but the sin seed was still in mankind. It would still perpetuate throughout the generations until God restores all things again. And so I see here that there is a pause after God says to Noah, be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. In fact, humans no longer have dominion. And in fact, the human diet has now expanded beyond plants and vegetables and fruits to meat. However, no lifeblood is to remain in the meat. And it's interesting, he says here, verse 4, but you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. Over in Leviticus, we learn that the blood is a symbol of life. that the blood is what makes us alive. It is interesting that the blood throughout all of Scripture is applied in such a way that God ordains that blood be spilt for the sin of all mankind, ultimately at the cross at Calvary. That Jesus, the perfect sacrifice, he was the blood offering for our sin. It was Jesus who took on the penalty and the payment of our sin condition. It is Jesus who we gather in a place like this to worship on Sunday, after Sunday, after Sunday, actually saying that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the reason we have assembled in this place. It is the same reason that churches all over the world every single Sunday come together and we worship the risen Savior because He alone is worthy of our worship. You see, and God is telling Noah that this blood symbolizes life and it's pointing to the blood at Calvary. It's pointing to Jesus instituting the Lord's Supper. This is my body given for you. This is my blood in the new covenant given for you. We'll talk about the covenants in just a moment. But you see here, the animals dread humans after the flood. Before you, the implication of this reading, look at what it says there in verse two. The fear and dread of you will fall on the beasts of the earth. The implication behind this is that animals and humans got along swimmingly before the fall, before the flood. And it's interesting that now animals dread humans. Of course, we see the consequences of the fall, of the sin of humankind and how it thrust all of creation, not just humanity, into sin and decay and death. And so we see here that God wants them to be fruitful and multiply, but then secondly, he commanded them to honor God's image. Notice what he says there in verse 6. Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed. For in the image of God has God made mankind. You see, it says here that God will demand an accounting for human life that is taken innocently. So human life is sacred to God. And many people point to this and say, see, here's a point at which God kind of instructs us for capital punishment. And so we have to ask ourselves the question, what does that mean? Does that mean that, in fact, when someone sheds innocent blood, then they too shall die? This is the concept of capital punishment. It's referred to in Romans chapter 13. Paul actually goes into a long detailed analysis of how God has given the ability of the government to decide on those types of cases. And so God here is basically saying, I love all human beings because they're created in my image and when you take their life then you are taking my representation out of this world. You yourself are becoming God. When God gives us His image, He wants us to represent Him. You know, this is something that I've been pondering a lot lately in my life. How do I represent God well? How does my life become an offering? How is Randy Disharoon's life going to be viewed? You know, we're going to be doing a funeral service this afternoon for Earl Bayham. And I just want to ask a question. What will they say at your funeral? What will be said about your life? Will it be that you were a beautiful, consistent, powerful representation of God Almighty in your life? Will people see your life and say that is a reflection their Creator. That is a reflection of their Savior. Notice what Bo read earlier. God understood that with Noah the flood would come, but I'm convinced that Isaiah has that passage written in chapter 54 to remind us of how much God loves us, how much God wants His children to be just like Him, to represent Him well. That is why every Christian wants to hear the words when we pass from this life into the next, well done, my good and faithful servant. You see, that's the emphasis here in Genesis chapter 9, and it is the theme throughout all of Scripture, that God wants His children to represent Him well. Well then we go on to the next section. Let me read it for us. And this is the covenant section. Verse 8 picks up this way. Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you, the birds, the livestock, and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you, every living creature on earth. I establish my covenant with you. Never again will all life be destroyed by waters of a flood. Never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth. And God said, this is the sign of the covenant. I am making between me and you and every living creature with you a covenant for all generations to come. I have set my rainbow in the clouds and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all the living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth." And so God said to Noah, this is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth. I find it fascinating whenever you read the scripture you see the repetition of certain words or phrases. Do you realize that in this particular passage that I just read the word covenant occurs eight times? Eight times God spoke the word covenant. Well, what is a covenant? It is an established bond between two parties. That's what a covenant is. And it's interesting here, it is a covenant that God makes with the entire world, humans and all living creatures. God is establishing for us a covenant relationship, and its scope is geographically everywhere, and it's personally to everyone. And so we see here that God is establishing this covenant, and He is the one who initiates it, and therefore God, who is faithful, who can never lie, will keep His covenant promise. And so we see here that this is a beautiful picture. Every time I see a rainbow, it causes me to reflect on God's promise that He will not destroy the world with a flood. And here we sit in 2024, some 4,000 years after this flood event, and God has kept his promise. God's promises are faithful. He will do for us what we cannot do for ourselves, and that is God's relationship with humankind. The covenant includes every living creature, and it also is for all generations to come. Now the sign that he gives is the rainbow. The sign. Now it's interesting, we think about covenant language in the Old Testament and then in the New Testament. Jesus actually even says a wicked and perverse generation asks for a sign. Over and over and over and over again in his particular ministry people, Jewish people specifically, were asking him to give them a sign to prove that he was the Messiah. But you have to see, you have to understand the whole panorama of history that leads up to that point. This is why Jesus would tell them a wicked and perverse generation asked for a sign. They have seen the signs, they should know the signs, they have lived the signs, they have been benefactors of the signs of God. You see, Adam was the first to get a covenant with God. I will bless you, be fruitful and multiply. It's the Adamic covenant. The second covenant is here with Noah. I will put a rainbow in the sky and I will never destroy all flesh from the earth again. That's the second covenant. It's to all people. And then he calls Abram. In chapter 12, he calls Abram. And then in chapters 15 and 17, he gives them another covenant. He gives Abram a covenant. He says, and the sign of that covenant will be circumcision. But I will bless you and multiply the peoples that come from you and give you the land that I will show you. And God did it. And then, of course, we have the Mosaic Covenant. God saw the people in Egypt and they were oppressed by slavery of that evil, wicked nation, Egypt, and the Pharaoh. And God led them out through Moses. And Moses was their deliverer. And he brought them to the Mount Sinai. And God gave them the law. He gave them the commandments, the Ten Commandments and all of the law. And that was a covenant With God, that covenant of the law was repeated over and over and over again after Moses into Joshua and into all the kings that were there. And then there was a king who was raised up. His name was David. And God made a covenant with David. And he said, the throne will never depart from your lineage. Of course, David died. Solomon died. Every other king of Judah died. But it was all pointing to that one king who would come and he would institute the new covenant. And that, of course, was referred to in Jeremiah 31. God was telling the Israelite people, I will set a new covenant between you and me. You have violated the first covenant, but I will set a new covenant, and that new covenant will lead to Jesus Christ. So when Jesus is approached by the Jews asking him to give him a sign, he's saying over and over and over and over again, God has given you sign after sign after sign. And now the one sign I will tell you about. I will give you no sign except the sign of Jonah. Who was in the whale's belly three days and three nights. even as I, the Son of Man, will be in the earth three days and three nights. You see, Jesus was predicting his resurrection. He was establishing for them that he is the fulfilling work of God. He is the end of the covenant language. Jesus Christ is the one who sat there the night before he was betrayed and he shared the cup and the bread with his disciples. And he said, this bread is my body, which is given for you. Take and eat all of it. And then he says, this is my cup, which is the blood of my body, and it is the blood of the new covenant. Take and drink. All of it. I don't know about you, but I get so excited when I think about how God orchestrated all of these covenants to bring us to the Messiah, the one who would rescue us from our sin forever. While he rescued Noah and his family temporarily, they still died. They still suffered in their sin condition. God is helping Noah to see that his finished work on the cross, his victory over the grave, brings us into an everlasting relationship with the King of kings and Lord of lords. That we are now God's children. And so now we turn to the third section of this passage. Verse 18 says this, the sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Ham was the father of Canaan. Note that These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the whole earth. Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it across their shoulders, and then they walked in backward and covered their father's naked body. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked. Verse 24, when Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, he said, curse it, be Canaan. The lowest of slaves will be to his brothers. He also said, praise be to the Lord, the God of Shem. May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend Japheth's territory, and may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be the slave of Japheth. After the flood, Noah lived 350 years. Noah lived a total of 950 years, and then he died. Well, we come to a passage of scripture that most pastors just skip right over. It's an interesting and very puzzling passage. And if we were to spend a lot of time on it this morning, I could walk you through why this is not too difficult for us to understand. And hopefully, I'll give you the cliff notes here, because it's kind of R-rated, if you will. But first we see that Noah himself is not the Messiah. When God said in Genesis 3.15, I will put enmity between you and her seed and your seed. And he will strike your head and you will strike his heel. The idea there is that God is establishing that someone in the lineage of Adam and Eve is going to defeat the devil, is going to defeat Satan. Of course, when Eve had Cain and Abel, she believed that perhaps it would be Cain. Of course, he sinned. Then, of course, you think it's Shem, but then Shem's line, he sinned. And then you think it's maybe Noah, but now we see here this picture of Noah, and here's a man who has gotten drunk. Now, to drink wine was not a problem, It's not a problem. Scripture doesn't prohibit wine drinking, okay? I know we're in a Baptist church. This sounds like almost blasphemy, doesn't it? But the truth is, nowhere in the Bible does it forbid us from drinking wine. However, what it does say is you shall not get drunk because wine is a mock mocker. Wine is a mocker. It makes you act the fool, okay? And so Noah here planted a vineyard. We have no idea how much time had transpired, but Noah plants a vineyard. And of course, then he drinks some of the grapes, the wine from the grapes, and then he gets drunk. And that, of course, is the sin here. It's interesting how it is also a picture of the original sin in the Garden of Eden. Noah's drunkenness and thereafter nakedness reflects the sin and shame of Adam and Eve. Notice it was Adam and Eve who took the fruit. They took fruit and they ate it. And then what happened after they ate it? Because they know they had sinned against God, they felt what? Naked. They knew that they were naked. And it's interesting how this parallelism shows up in the text. That Noah himself planted a vineyard, ate some of the fruit or drank some of the fruit, and then he became naked. It's an introduction to the sin state. But Ham, is, of course, goes into the tent, sees his father naked, and then, of course, he goes outside and tells his two brothers. And scholars have postulated ad nauseum on exactly what Ham did. Some think that he was simply a voyeur, that he looked at his naked father. Others say that he went in and castrated his father. This is from the rabbinic literature. Others say that he went in and had sex with his father. Others say that he went and had sex with his mother because in Leviticus 18 and 20 it identifies that to uncover your father's nakedness can imply that you are having intimate relationships with the wife. mother. And so a lot of scholars believe that Ham dishonored his parents by going in and trying to usurp the patriarchal power of the family by having a child by his own mother, and then going out and bragging to his two brothers. So why is this important? because we will see that Canaan is the one that God through Noah curses, and Canaan is that fourth child many believe that it's the illegitimate child. of this union between Ham and Noah's wife, and that this child then would grow. And it says in Exodus chapter 20 that I will curse three and four generations out. And so we see this as an opportunity for us to recognize that even in the midst of this sin condition, God has a plan. Canaan could be the son from Ham's sin. And Canaan would be known for its abominable acts in Leviticus 18. In fact, it compares the abominable acts of the Egyptians with the abominable acts of Canaan, and the two are cursed by God in Leviticus 18. And you see how when Joshua comes into the land of Canaan, what does he do? God tells him, wipe them out. Why? Because of all, if you go and read Leviticus 18, you'll see the abominable acts of the Canaanites. And that is why God told Joshua, wipe out those pagan people. You see, God recognized that we live in a world of sin and people are going to take the personalities of themselves and from their father, and they're going to wander off. They don't have to, because Shem was the one who was blessed. He becomes the Semites. Jewish people of today. And then Ham of course is the youngest, and he of course is the father of Canaan, into which God called Abram to go. And then finally there's Japheth. Japheth was actually the oldest son, but he's listed third in most every listing. The reason is his story is less significant than Shem's and Ham's. but he of course will have an expanded territory according to Noah's promise. You see, and so now we see the map up here on the screen. The map shows us how these three family units went in different directions. Japheth up to the north into the European region. Ham down into Egypt and into Africa and also into the Promised Land which we now know as Jerusalem. And then Shem came all the way. He went west of the Fertile Crescent, east of the Fertile Crescent. And so we see how this all shapes up. What the Bible is teaching us is that Shem will become the son of promise and Shem will lead to a man named Abram. and God will call Abram out of Ur and bring him back to the land that God would show him. And so my three sons, you remember that show, My Three Sons, well that's what's happened here, okay? And then finally we see the promised seed of Jesus Christ. The promised seed comes from Adam, then Seth, then Noah, then Shem, and then of course the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and then Judah. Jesus is known as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. Jesus would come through that line. And so we see that the promised seed maintains. Well what do we make of all this? We make of all this two things. Number one, that God's plan will never fail. It does not depend on humankind. Praise God, hallelujah, what a savior. Number two, that God loves us and he has a long-suffering patience with us in order for him to bring about his purposes and his plan and in his time. This is why we must remember every day we get up, we are God's representatives in this world. The end of the day is that when we come to the Word of God, we study difficult passages like this, we come away with one conclusion. God is sovereign over the affairs of men. And because He is sovereign, He is trustworthy. and His purposes are good and pleasing. And our job is to align our lives to His plan, recognizing that we live in an ugly, sinful, diseased, decayed, dying world. You know, I can't overemphasize this enough. No one in this room has been immune from difficulty in your life, from challenges, from struggles, from disappointments. All of us, all of us have. But the beauty of it is, is that God's still on His throne. And because He's on His throne, no matter what comes in our lives, He's the one who gets the final say. Trust Him. Trust Him with your whole life. That's the message of the rainbow. That every time it goes up into the clouds, God says, My promise will stand. Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Your love for us, it's evident. Even though we fail and we have foibles in our lives, we struggle from time to time with sin conditions. We struggle with our attitudes, Lord. A lot of times we think negative things. A lot of times we are struggling with other people. We struggle with our own difficulties, whether it be health-wise or financial or Even psychological, Father. I pray, Lord, that you will help us to understand that you love us first and foremost. You love us more than any other person could possibly love us. Number two, Father, that you are in charge. Everything that happens, you have knowledge of. We don't surprise you, Father. There's nothing we do or think or say that is a surprise to you. But one thing we've picked up from the Word today is that even a man that you called righteous sinned and brought shame to his family. And Lord, we know that even in that sin, you loved Noah. You loved him with an agape love, an unconditional love. And you gave him a promise. Father, we all have the promise in Jesus Christ. We stand on this side of the cross, and Father, this morning I pray that if anybody in this room does not have a relationship with Jesus Christ, that they will settle that issue as soon as possible, that they'll reach out to me this week. Lord, if there's anybody in this room who just really is struggling with anything right now, I pray that they will come to you, they'll pour out their heart to you. Amen and amen.