The Great Hall of Faith mentions Abel, Enoch and then Noah. These Old Testament saints exhibited their Spirit-led, God-focused, faith-filled lives as a testimony for us, Christians living millennia later.
“Noah was a righteous man, blameless among his contemporaries; Noah walked with God”(Genesis 6:9–10). Noah was “righteous... a blameless man,” not a perfect man, as is evident when one reads the last dozen verses of Genesis, chapter nine. Imperfect, flawed and faulty, “Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord” (Genesis 6:8, NKJV). Noah needed God’s grace.
“Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with wickedness. God saw how corrupt the earth was, for every creature had corrupted its way on the earth” (Genesis 6:11–12). “The Lord saw that human wickedness was widespread on the earth and that every inclination of the human mind was nothing but evil all the time” (Genesis 6:5). “There is no one who does good, not even one” (Psalm 14:3 and Romans 3:10). None. Not one. That includes Noah. But God’s grace was lavished upon Noah.
“Then God said to Noah, ‘I have decided to put an end to every creature, for the earth is filled with wickedness because of them; therefore I am going to destroy them along with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it with pitch inside and outside. This is how you are to make it: The ark will be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high’ ” (Genesis 6:13–15).
“By faith Noah, after he was warned about what was not yet seen and motivated by godly fear, built an ark to deliver his family” (Hebrews 11:7). God informed Noah of the coming judgment and delivered the blueprints for the construction of the Ark. By faith, Noah built it.
The rain wasn’t falling. The floodgates hadn’t burst open. Even though Noah hadn’t seen a downpour or deluge, Noah trusted God. He believed. He had faith, so Noah went to work.
In the last verse of chapter five, “Noah was 500 years old” (Genesis 5:32). Soon after that, we learn that “Noah was six hundred years old when the flood came and water covered the earth” (Genesis 7:6). It is possible therefore, that Noah’s construction of the Titanic-sized wooden boat, was a century-long building project. Without modern-day power tools, lumber milling equipment, or hydraulic lifts, and with a work-crew of only four, it is quite possible that the building project took one-hundred years of tough toil and grueling, arduous labor.
But note the example. Faith drew Noah to the building site early every morning and kept him busy until the sun was setting. “Let us not get tired of doing good, for we will reap at the proper time if we don’t give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us work for the good of all” (Galatians 6:9–10).
Faith works.
All Scripture quotations, except as otherwise noted, are from
Holman Bible Publishers’ Christian Standard Bible.
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