MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Genesis 8:13-19
MAN’S GOING FORTH AFTER THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD
I. That he goes forth upon the Divine command. “And God spake unto Noah, saying, go forth of the ark, thou and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons’ wives with thee.”
1. That Noah was councilled to go forth from the ark on a day ever to be remembered. “And it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth.” Men should always keep the chronology of their moral life, the days of deliverance from unwelcome circumstances should be carefully remembered; this will aid the gratitude of the soul. Every great soul has its calendar of progress. There are some days men can never forget. The day on which Noah came out of the ark would be an immortal memory.
2. That Noah was commanded to go out from the ark when the earth was dry. God never commands a man to leave his refuge or his circumstances under conditions that would render it indiscreet to do so. He waits till all is ready, and at the most fitting moment tells the good man to go forth from his hiding place into the new sphere of activity. Men should not step out of the ark until the earth is dry enough to receive them, and then only at the call of God.
II. That he goes forth in reflective spirit. We can readily imagine that Noah would go forth from the ark in very reflective and somewhat pensive mood.
1. He would think of the multitudes who had been drowned in the great waters. As he stepped out of the ark and his eye only rested on his own little family as the occupants of the earth, his heart would be grieved to think of the multitudes who had been destroyed by the deluge. True he was glad to escape from the close confinement of the ark, but his own joy would be rendered pensive by the devastation everywhere apparent. And when the judgments of God upon the wicked are observed in the earth, it is fitting that men should be thoughtful.
2. He would think of his own immediate conduct of life, and of the future before him. When Noah came forth from the ark, he stood in a world destitute of inhabitants, and equally destitute of seed and harvest. He would have to engage in the work of cultivating the soil and in providing for the needs of the future. He is now entering upon an anxious and laborious life. How few men truly realize that the future of the world depends upon their industry. The once solitary husbandman is now forgotten in the crowd of those who culture the earth.
III. That he goes forth in company with those who have shared his safety.
1. He goes forth in company with the relatives of his own family. “Go forth of the ark, thou and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons’ wives with thee.” God permitted the family of Noah to be with him in the ark, to relieve his solitude, to aid his efforts, to show the protective influence of true piety; and now they are to join him in the possession of the regenerated earth, that they may enjoy its safety, and aid its cultivation.
2. He goes forth in company with the life-giving agencies of the universe. “Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and whatsoever creepeth upon the earth; after their kinds went forth out of the ark.” And thus this motley and miscellaneous crowd came out of the ark to fill creation with its usual life.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
NOAH’S FIRST CONSCIOUSNESS OF SAFETY AFTER THE DELUGE
Genesis 8:13. Now, it is somewhat natural, and it may not be either uninteresting or unprofitable, to speculate concerning Noah’s impression on his first out-look upon “the face of the ground that was dry.”
I. He would, probably, be impressed with the Greatness of the Calamity he had Escaped. The roaring waters had subsided, but they had wrought a terrible desolation, they had reduced the earth to a vast charnel house; every living voice is hushed, and all is silent as the grave. The Patriarch perhaps would feel two things in relation to this calamity.
1. That it was the result of sin.
2. That it was only a faint type of the final judgment.
II. He would probably be impressed with the Efficacy of the Remedial Expedient. How would he admire the ark that had so nobly battled with the billows and so safely weathered the storm?
1. This expedient was Divine. Christianity, the great expedient for saving souls from the deluge of moral evil, is God’s plan. “What the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh.” Philosophy exhausted itself in the trial.
2. This expedient alone was effective. When the dreadful storm came we may rest assured that every one of that terror-stricken generation would seize some scheme to rescue him from the doom. There is no other name, &c.
3. The expedient was only effective to those who committed themselves to it.
III. He would probably be impressed with the wisdom of his faith in God. He felt now:
1. That it was wiser to believe in the word of God, than to trust to the conclusions of his own reason. He might have reasoned from the mercy of God, and the general experience of mankind, that such an event as the deluge would never have happened; but he trusted in God’s word.
2. That it was wiser to believe in the Word of God, than to trust to the uniformity of nature.
3. That it was wiser to believe in God’s Word, than to trust to the current opinion of his contemporaries. Now, will not the feeling of the good man when he first enters heaven, correspond in some measure with the feelings of Noah on the occasion when he first looked from his ark, saw the face of the “dry ground,” and felt that he was safe? Will there not be a similar impression of the tremendous calamity that has been escaped? Will not the sainted spirit, as it feels itself safe in the celestial state, reflect with ordinary gratitude upon that deluge of sin and suffering from which it has been for ever delivered. (Homilist.)
As the flood commenced on the 17th of the second month of the 600th year of Noah’s life, and ended on the 27th of the second month of the 601st year, it lasted a year and ten days; but whether a solar year of 360 or 365 days, or a lunar year of 352, is doubtful [Keil and Delitzsch].
As times of special mercy are recorded by God; so they should be remembered by the Church.
At His appointed periods God measures out mercy unto his Church.
The patient waiting of the saints would God have recorded as well as his own mercy.
As mercies move God’s Church, so He moveth His saints to remove the vail, and to meet them.
Several periods of time God takes to perfect salvation to His Church.
Genesis 8:14-17. After their patient waiting God will certainly speak to His saints.
God speaks not doubtfully but certainly to His people in His returns.
God Himself must speak unto the satisfying of His saints in reference to their conduct.
Upon the change of Providence, God speaks change of duty to His saints.
It is at God’s pleasure to ordain or lay aside external means of man’s salvation.
God’s promise is completely good unto His Church for saving.
Propagation, and increase of creatures on earth, is God’s blessing for His Church.
Genesis 8:18-19. God’s command and saint’s obedience must be found to bring about their comfort.
It becometh saints to make their outgoings and incomings only upon the Word of God.
Providence appoints and maintains order in the moving of His creatures; but especially in His Church.
Admirable is the work of Providence upon brutes to keep them in order.
The motion of the brute is at the Word of God to go in and out for safety.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY THE
REV. WM. ADAMSON
Deluge! Genesis 8:13. This narrative has encountered countless and incisive criticism. The enemies of truth have gathered about it. They have marshalled all their forces. They have looked from a distance upon its palaces and towers. Sceptical scientists have said: “We will undermine these Chapter s with adverse criticism on the possibility of such a deluge. We will prove that its foundations are a mere shell—that within is but a bed of quicksand.” Thus have they toiled to shatter Noah’s ark for centuries; but it still remains intact; and though it is not true that the material fabric remains undecayed on the summit of inaccessible Ararat, yet it is gloriously true that the moral structure stands fixed and sure on the towering summit of Divine Truth:—
“Grounded on Ararat, whose lofty peaks,
Soon from the tide emerged.”
Freedom! Genesis 8:17. When the door of the ark was thrown open what a joyous bursting forth there was! The strong eagle spread his wings and soared upward from the place of his long captivity. The lordly tiger, who had crouched in tameness and quiet through those long months, bounded with a sudden roar into thickets among the hills. The beasts of the field and the birds of the air followed—each in its own way. They had entered by two and two—by seven and seven, in order and method; but doubtless they came out in a different manner—swift—eager—delighted.
“Till all the plume-dark air,
And rude resounding shore were one wild cry.”—Anonymous.
How will the bodies of the saints bound from the ark of the grave! How will their spirits spring with inconceivable gladness, when the door is opened, and they are bidden to “enter into the joy of their Lord!”
Spiritual Truth! Genesis 8:13. Gather off your beech-trees in the budding spring days a little brown shell in which lies tender green leafage, and if you will carefully strip it, you will find packed in a compass that might almost go through the eye of a needle the whole of that which afterwards in the sunshine is to spread and grow to the yellow green foliage which delights and freshens the eye. In this mysterious incident of the Deluge are folded up all the future purposes of Jehovah in the destiny of the world—all the fruitful lessons of grace and goodness to be taught to the future generations of the church, and all the figurative symbolism bearing upon the many-sidedness of the great salvation of the Son of God:—
“Ours by His eternal purpose ere the universe had place;
Ours by everlasting covenant, ours by free and royal grace.”
Liberty! Genesis 8:18. Up to this point, Noah was a prisoner of hope—secure, yet still a prisoner. When through grace the sinner has passed the judgment of the first creation, and has felt the tossings cease, and then has seen the hill-tops, and received the olive-leaf from the mouth of the gentle Dove, his freedom is near. Many a conscientious doubt as to rules or times or places is now resolved for us. Then Noah and his sons,
“With living tribes innumerous, beasts and birds,
Forth from the ark came flocking.”