In the second sermon, the focal passage was Genesis 6:5-8, where God announces his intention to blot out man and all creation, and save Noah and his family.
This destruction is due to the total evil and wickedness of man, since the fall of mankind recorded in Genesis 3. The three truths revealed in this passage deal with man’s depravity and lack of holiness. The first truth explains that man’s depravity is total and affects each part of him. This doctrinal understanding is completely necessary in understanding the gospel of Jesus Christ. If one believes there is some measure of goodness or that one is only sick from sin and not dead, this defies the doctrine of original sin. Paul states in Ephesians 2:1, “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins.” This doctrinal truth is foundational
to the Christian faith and cannot be overstated. As Dane Ortlund explains in Gentle and Lowly, “If sin were the color blue, we do not occasionally say or do something blue; all that we say, do, and think has some taint of blue.”5
In this text from Genesis, God makes the totality of this sin nature clear: “Every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (6:5). This same truth is echoed in Jerimiah 17:9: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick;
who can understand it?” This definite condition of man is due to our heritage in Adam and his sin. As Paul explains in Romans 5:12, “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” This is the nature of man—sin.
The second truth in this text explains the result of this sin and man’s depravity.
Sin demands judgment and separation from a holy God. God explains throughout Scripture that the penalty for sin is death and separation from God. This is observed in Genesis 3:23-24, when God exiled Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden because of their sin.
Romans 6:23 states, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” All of this is the result of God’s complete holy and righteous nature. His nature cannot coexist with sin and unholiness. Furthermore, in this depraved and sinful condition, man does not even desire to commune with God. As Paul quotes from Psalm 14, “As it is written, ‘None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God’” (Rom 3:10-11). Because of this complete rebellion, God must punish and separate himself from sinful man. This text in Genesis makes this abundantly clear.
Genesis 6:7 states, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.” While the phrase “for I am sorry that I have made them,” causes some to stumble, it is important to remember that, throughout Scripture, the various writers use
5 Dane Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2020), 47.
anthropopathic terms in an attempt to describe an infinite God to finite man. These anthropopathic terms are simply a literary technique whereby human feelings and emotions are given to something other than a human being, in this case, God. Louis Berkhof reminds of God’s immutable nature: “God is devoid of change in his Being, his perfections, his purposes and his promises.”6 This phrase should not be a distraction to the realization that God must punish sin and unholiness.
Amid the troubling truth of God’s necessity to punish sin and separate himself from sinful man, Genesis 6:8 reminds of the hope of the gospel: “But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.” This is the third truth focused on in the text. What a sense of hope this sentence brings. It serves as a great reminder that regardless of one’s sin and helplessness, God determines man’s righteousness and holiness. It is not dependent upon man’s ability or lack thereof. Throughout Scripture, the reader is reminded of God’s great will in saving his elect. In Genesis 18-19, the troubling story of Lot, Abraham’s nephew is recorded. Even in all the evidence of sin in Lot’s life, God’s great mercy is declaring him righteous (2 Pet 2:7). Whether it is God finding favor with Noah or declaring Lot righteous, this truth is observed throughout all the Bible. The apostle Paul reminds the church of this in Ephesians 2. After making clear man’s separation and being under God’s wrath in Ephesians 2:1-3, Paul gives these beautiful words, “But God” in Ephesians 2:4.
Also one is reminded in Ephesians 1:4-5 that God has chosen his elect before the
foundations of the earth and chosen them for adoption as sons. Just as Noah realized the great news of the gospel at the brink of death, the same is true for all mankind. All men have been summoned to death, due to their sin. Yet, in God’s infinite mercy and grace, he as planned the way that sinful man can be forgiven and obtain God’s holiness and
righteousness through Jesus Christ.
6 Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 46.