Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. This is study #14 of Genesis, chapter 6 and we are going to read Genesis 6:9-13:

These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 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. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

I will stop reading there. We are picking up where we left off in verse 9. We have been looking at some of the things God said concerning Noah. Noah found grace in God’s sight and he was a “just” man and “perfect.” We saw that each of these statements leads us to God’s salvation program and to what God has done on behalf of His elect people. There is no question that Noah was a child of God. If there is anyone in the Bible that we can be sure was a child of God, it was Noah because God has made these statements that perfectly describe someone who has become saved. The Lord said he was a just man and he was perfect. God did not see Noah’s sin because all his sins were paid for by Christ.

By the way, I had not planned to talk about this, but it needs to be mentioned. Noah was without blemish or without sin, in God’s sight, so the question should be asked: “Where did his sins go?” Jesus paid for them, but according to church theologians and other individuals that do not take into consideration all the Bible has to say, they say that Christ paid for sin in 33AD. They say that is the point at which Jesus bore the sins for everyone He came to save. They say that is the point when God poured out His wrath for those sins and Christ died for all our sins. They say that is the point of “baptism by fire” and the washing away of sin. If Christ did not pay for sins until 33AD, over 11,000 years from the creation of the world, how then was Noah made perfect? How can he be a man without blemish in this period of time almost 6,000 years from creation of the world? Where did Noah’s sin go?

Some of these theologians were even faithful men, but they lived during the church age at a time when the Bible was sealed, so they did not have understanding of a great many things that God had hidden and kept sealed until the time of the end. We have to take that into consideration and we recognize that some of these men could very well have been saved individuals. Of course, today when people fight against and reject the things that the Lord has recently opened up in the Scriptures, it is really a different matter than the understanding of a Reformer 400 years ago before God opened up this information. There is a big difference between someone back then and someone today that has been presented with the Biblical teaching that Christ was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world and then He later entered into the world to make manifest what He had already done in His atoning work. But many theologians and church leaders today just resist and “put their hands over their ears” and they refuse to hearken to what the Bible says, and that is a different matter.

A Reformer of old or a present day critic would say that Christ paid for sin in 33AD, but they are both faced with the dilemma regarding Abel’s sin or Noah’s sin and the fact that God has made it clear they were righteous and perfect. These people would say that Abel and Noah were saved by looking ahead to the Messiah and God granted them salvation through what Jesus would later do. That is fine “theological speak,” but it does not answer the question. Either sin is paid for or it is not paid for and you cannot have an in between state. Sin is only paid for when Christ has made payment – that is pretty plain and simple. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God and sin is the problem between man and God. God had a program to save certain people. He chose to love Jacob and not Esau, and so forth. We know all that, but there still has to be the mechanics of it and the application of it. There had to be an actual washing away and removal of sin. The payment had to be made. The major problem with this erroneous teaching that Christ paid for sins in 33AD is that they are saying that sins had been taken away from saints of old without the penalty for sin having been paid. They say, “They are paid for in principal. Since God is faithful, it is as if He had already paid for their sin.” These statements do not mean anything because God does not work that way. God cannot cleanse a sinner of his sins and wash them all away without first having received payment and satisfaction for those sins. It is not a just or legal thing in any way for God to forgive sins without having the payment already made for those sins. It would be as if God said, “Here, Noah, I will forgive your sins and wash them away because at a future time I will pay for them, but in the meantime I will just treat you as if all your sins are gone and give you all the blessings of salvation. And when you die you will be able to enter into heaven and be with me, even though your sins have not actually been paid for yet.” That idea is very unjust and it goes contrary to the Law of God and His system of justice.

When men develop things out of their own minds it leads to these kinds of doctrines and it presents all kinds of problems. We must start with what the Bible says. It was not me and it was not Mr. Camping that said that Christ was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. The Bible says it twice. It is not saying it was “in principal,” but it is a matter-of-fact statement. The lamb that was the Passover lamb had to be perfect and without blemish. Jesus was perfect and without sin. He was the perfect Lamb of God who died bearing the sins of His people from the foundation of the world. He made payment in full and then He rose from the dead, completely justified and all the sin question for His people was settled and it was only the matter of applying the salvation through the hearing of the Word. When the sacrificial lamb was slain, the blood was in the basin and the priest would dip the hyssop and apply it. That was all that was left to do. There was the sending forth of the Gospel so the elect would hear and have the atonement applied to them and become born again.

So, we begin with the fact that Abel’s sin had already been paid for and then through the hearing of the Word Abel became saved. Noah’s sin had already been paid for and then God applied the work that He had already performed, as Hebrews 4 tells us: “Though the works were finished from the foundation of the world.” Then through the hearing of the Word, Noah became saved. There is no contradiction. There is no problem area, such as the idea that someone is saved, but it is all based on something that will be done thousands of years from the date God saved them. Also, you cannot have a Gospel for the Old Testament saints that is “bloodless” for Abel, Noah, Abram, Jacob and Joseph, and so forth. God says that in order for there to be an inheritance there must be the death of the Testator. Christ must die first and then you could grant the inheritance to Abel and Noah and Abram, and so forth.

These are the kinds of problems that the doctrine of Christ paying for sins in 33AD creates. It throws everything off course and it is not what the Bible teaches. Again, people fight against doctrine that God has graciously opened to our understanding at this time and it is a wonderful doctrine in so many ways. It also helps us to understand our own present circumstances, as God has left His people on the earth to go through the Day of Judgment. We have the example of the Lord Jesus who died for sin at the foundation of the world, but then in the process of time He suffered again to manifest what He had done. This comforts us because we know we died in Him at the point of the foundation of the world and, yet, in this day we are appearing or being made manifest before the judgment seat of Christ in experiencing Judgment Day. There is a close similarity since we are the body of Christ and in filling up His suffering we are taught, but we first have to have an understanding of that doctrine in order to understand our present situation. Those that do not understand that doctrine will not understand what God is doing with His people as He causes them all to “appear” or “be made manifest” before the judgment seat of Christ.

Okay, let us go back to our verse in Genesis 6:9:

… Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

The word “generations” is found twice in verse 9, but they are two different words. The first word is Strong’s #8435, where it says, “These are the generations of Noah,” and the second word is Strong’s #1755, where it says, “perfect in his generations.” They can both be used to indicate generations of people, so I am not too sure what God is doing here, except that it says in Genesis 37:2:

These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, was feeding the flock with his brethren;

This word “generations” is Strong’s #8435. After making this statement, God is not presenting us with a genealogy, but He is telling us of Joseph and his dreams and all that relate to the famine, which relates to the Great Tribulation period. So when it says that “these are the generations of Noah,” the Lord goes into the condition of the earth and how it was corrupt and full of violence and His plan to destroy the world. In the next chapter, we will be brought to the flood account. It is a similar idea in that the “generations of Jacob” involves the spiritual condition of God’s elect at the time of the Great Tribulation. I think when God says, “These are the generations of Noah,” it involves the spiritual situation of God’s elect in the Day of Judgment. Through the historical parable of the flood, it relays what God’s people can expect at the time of the end concerning the world being full of corruption and violence at the time of the judgment of God. It is a spiritual teaching for the elect of God, just as the “generations of Jacob” had to do with the elect in the historical parable of the famine that points to the Great Tribulation.

Again, it says in Genesis 6:9:

… Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

This is very similar to what we previously read of Enoch in Genesis 5:22:

And Enoch walked with God …

We discussed this, but we will mention it again because God is bringing it up again when He indicates that another child of God “walked with God.” What does it mean to “walk with God”? According to the Bible, it means to obey God’s commandments. It says in 2John 1:4:

I rejoiced greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth, as we have received a commandment from the Father.

It also says in 2John 1:6:

And this is love, that we walk after his commandments. This is the commandment, That, as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it.

Or, it says in 3John 1:3-4:

For I rejoiced greatly, when the brethren came and testified of the truth that is in thee, even as thou walkest in the truth. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.

They are walking in truth and Jesus is Truth. The Bible tells us, “Thy word is truth.” To walk in truth is synonymous with walking in the commandments of God. It is “walking in the Bible.” That is what it means. It means to follow the narrow way laid out in the Bible and to follow the way that leads to the kingdom of heaven. You must walk in God’s commandments or in God’s Word and no one is able to do that unless God has equipped you with a new heart and new spirit and an ongoing desire to do the will of God. He gives His people the ability to perform His commandments perfectly from the heart, more and more, as they continue to walk in the way.

That is how Noah walked, according to what God had commanded him. God told him to build the ark and Noah went about to construct the ark. Was there ever a day or two when Noah did not feel like getting out of bed or when he felt like doing something else? I am sure he did and, yet, the nature of a child of God is that they may go astray for a day and maybe for a brief time Noah wanted to be like everyone else in the village and relax and take a day off. He may have been tired of building the ark, day after day. There may even have come a point when all the mockery was getting to him and he was so discouraged that he said, “I am just going to be like everyone else and work my farm and talk to people and have some fun.”

Maybe he did that for a day or even a week, but the nature of the child of God is that the next day or the next week he would come to his senses and he would say, “What am I doing?” He would look at the time he had wasted not working on the ark. It was a huge task and he had to get it done and now he had wasted 24 hours or maybe 168 hours and he looks back and realizes he was not better off going the way of the world for a day. It did not feel good. It did not satisfy him. It did not please him. As a matter of fact, he feels horrible that he did something displeasing to God and out of the “way.” It was outside the commandment given to him to build the ark, so Noah would have turned back. That is the nature of the child of God, even when he momentarily steps out of the “narrow way” and what God has commanded. He is disturbed. It does not feel right because he is now a different person. He has done something he thought he wanted to do and something he may have done in the past, but when he turns to things of the world, it is not the same. He is a new creature. The child of God does not have that desire for the “broad way” that leads to destruction and we cannot just go along with all the others in the world, like we did before, without being troubled in mind and feeling terrible about it.

So we learn that the best thing for us…and it is the best thing for us…is what we have come to enjoy and to take pleasure in, and that is doing the will of God. Yes, the world is against us and they may say cruel things and mock us and laugh at us, but, you know what? “This is what I must do. This is the way that God wants me to walk and it is better to please God than man. I know that and I am happier pleasing God than I am pleasing man.”