Genesis 6:1-8
Main Idea: Apart from God, man is hopelessly evil, but we have hope in God who is gracious
1. Apart from God, even the greatest men are still just flesh (v1-4)
• In the first four verses, Moses is showing the Israelites that even the people of old, the real people that pagan legends were based on and the people that Israel would have heard about in their oral history – they were just people who were reliant on God for their every breath and life and they were under the sovereign hand of God as well.
Job 1:6 Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them.
• God is setting the stage to reassure His people, that the ancient Nephalim were really nothing more than flesh still, whom God is sovereign over.
• They were not gods – and they are not related to the Almighty God in any way – they are only the lowest order of God’s creation of angels – the mere offspring of the fallen angels and human women.
• The Israelites didn’t need to worry about fallen angels or any unholy offspring – and for us who have been given the New Testament and have the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, we have no need to worry about evil either – God is sovereignly in control over all evil.
• Man is still tempted by a desire to transcend his natural boundaries and become like God in ways that God never intended.
• People want power, they want greatness, they try to be god-like and many religions cater to this ungodly idea of transcendence or becoming an enlightened being.
• But no matter how great you may try to be apart from God – no matter what course a person might pursue or follow after –no matter if a person seeks power in the occult or the demonic – or through position or control or money – the truth is the same for all men today as it was then.
• The greatest people of old and the greatest people today still die – they are but flesh.
“My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years."
• The Lord limits His Spirit from abiding in man forever because this was a wicked practice and God judged it so that it did not continue
• The total depravity of man results in God shortening human life permanently as well
• Man is just a mere mortal – who is sustained by God’s breath and at God’s good pleasure alone – if God withdraws His sustaining spirit – then man dies
• The earliest generations of man lived for almost 1,000 years – the equivalent of a day of the Almighty. But as man continued on and became further and further from God, his lifespan was shortened until the point where man’s lifespan stabilized – so that even the most healthy person, who didn’t suffer any major illness, would live to somewhere around 120 years of age.
• Now, it was not immediately shortened but after the flood, we will see that eventually, mankind did not live as long as he once did in the beginning.
• So that Joseph lived to 110 and by Moses’ time, he lived to 120 and then Aaron lived to 123 – in fulfillment of God’s shortening.
• “When Dr. Leonard Hayflick performed his experiments using human cells grown in a culture, he managed to pull back the curtain on an ancient process that essentially prevents immortality. The process of cellular death exists within our genetic code. The nucleus of a diploid cell (a cell with two sets of chromosomes) is comprised of DNA information contributed by each of an organism's parents. Since the key to the Hayflick limit is found in the cell's nucleus, we are basically programmed to die…. When all of the cells created in the human body before birth (and all of the cells these cells produce) are multiplied by the average time it takes for cells to reach the end of their lives, you get roughly 120 years. This is the ultimate Hayflick limit -- the maximum number of years that a human can possibly live. What's strange is that the Biblical book of Genesis (6:3) explicitly states that humankind's days "shall be one hundred years and twenty" – quoted from Discovery Health
2. Apart from God, man is continually wicked & evil (v5)
“The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”
• In the first two chapters of Genesis, we read language consistently that tells of God’s evaluation of His own work – it says over and over again that the Lord saw that it was good.
• When the Lord saw the work of man –contrary to the good work that God mean for man to do – man had rebelled against God in every way, so that all of the work of man was wicked.
• As a result of man’s desire or intent to be like God – because of Adam’s intent to be like God in the knowledge of good and evil – now, by Noah’s time, God’s assessment was that man’s “every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”.
• There could not be a louder and clearer indictment of the human heart – every intention, every plan, every design of the thoughts of his heart – the very core of who man is – it was only evil – not just sometimes – it was only evil continually!
• Romans 3:10-12 as it is written: "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one."
• Wherever God was good and fulfilled His promises for man to multiply and fill the earth, man filled the earth with wickedness
• We are here brought to the pinnacle of the man’s wickedness – man apart from God was only evil.
• No matter what man did to try to improve himself – whether through advancements in technology or society or other ways– man is beyond self-help.
• Mankind was not only guilty by inheritance – man was total depraved in his thoughts and intents at the core of who he was.
3. All mankind deserves God’s just judgment (v6-7)
“And the LORD was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. “
“The torah was not intended specifically for intellectuals but for the entire people, which is not concerned with philosophic or theological speculations. It uses ordinary language, plainly and without sophistication, and pays no heed to inferences that later readers, who are accustomed to ways of thinking wholly alien to the Bible, may draw from its words.” –Umberto Cassuto
1 Samuel 15:29 And also the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for he is not a man, that he should have regret."
• With God – everything He made was good – God was not sorry about what he made – He was full or sorrow over what man had done. He was not sorry because it took Him by surprise – He was full of grief because man had willfully pursued sin instead of knowing God.
• God in His very nature is opposed to sin and so God was grieved at His core of who He was by man and man continually evil thoughts and deeds
• So, here, without speaking to the ideas of causality or intentionality – the text just means simply that man’s deeds and thoughts bring grief to the heart of the Lord.
• This is a mixture of divine rage and bitter anguish against the sinfulness of man – a rage that would only be fully satisfied when He punished His own Son, Jesus Christ - the perfect man – to die for the sins of all those who will call upon His name.
“So the LORD said, "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."
• This is the Lord speaking in direct contrast with his speaking in Creation – instead of creating order and beauty and life, the Lord speaks here and declares that He will wipe out all life because of the sin of mankind.
• Man’s wickedness was so universal that the blotting out would be universal as well. This would be a complete clean-wipe of man and his effects on the earth and every being that was familiar with man or associated with man – so that the memory of fallen man would be gone.
• Still today, the wickedness of All mankind deserves God’s just judgment still
2 Peter 3:7-14 But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly….The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!... Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace.
4. By God’s grace mankind has hope (v8)
“But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD”
• The word Favor here has the meaning of grace or acceptance as well.
• At the end of this passage, God gives humanity hope of a new beginning that He will not completely destroy all mankind – He chose to bestow His grace on Noah.
• The world would be saved through the one on whom God had grace.
• Although mankind had completely rebelled and only pursued evil, through God’s grace on Noah, He would fulfill His promises to mankind
• God spares us by His grace today. Apart from God’s grace, all hope would be lost.
“this side of the flood, we don’t have to fear a universal deluge. Nevertheless we must fear a more lethal flood – that of being forever drowned beneath the cold waves of our own sin. Our only hope is in God’s great grace.” -R. Kent Hughes
• Jesus thought this passage was important for us to learn from today – because He referenced it in Matthew 24:37 when He spoke of the last days, He said,
Matthew 24:37-44 “As were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
• We don’t know when God’s final judgment will be revealed but God will again judge the whole earth.
• Salvation in the end will be only by God’s grace and all those who hope in God’s grace in the person and work of Jesus Christ will be saved.
• We must be ready and live today as if this life matters – and we need to remain awake so that we are not lured and enticed by sin.
• God worked in Noah by His grace just like He works in us by His grace to give us the ability both to will and to do according to His good pleasure.
Titus 3:4-7 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
• Like Noah was brought out and rescued through the waters of the flood – we are carried through the flood of our sins to salvation as we cling to Jesus Christ and receive the grace of God.
Potential Questions for Application:
1. How does remembering that even the greatest men are just flesh apply to the way you view people in your life at times?
2. Are there any areas where we are seeking greatness apart from God & seeking first His kingdom?
3. How does seeing that mans intents and thoughts were only evil continually help us view our own intents soberly?
4. How does knowing that God takes sin seriously affect the way we view our own sins?
5. Are we appropriately sorry over our own sins? Is it grief informed by God’s forgiveness and redeeming grace, which gives hope for change?
6. How does this passage help us marvel at God’s great grace to mankind more?
7. Where do we see God’s grace at work in our own lives despite our sinfulness?
8. How can this scripture help us grow in humble gratitude and put self-righteousness to death in our lives?
9. How can this passage help us view the lost people around us? How should it motivate us to share the gospel?
10. How does this passage enhance our worship of God?
