I wrote earlier this week to encourage you all to read the Bible for what is- the Word of God. Read the Bible “Christocentrically”. Read and worship Jesus, the Living Word.
As we progress through the One-Year-Bible we will learn more about reading the Bible as history and reading for application also.
In today’s New Testament reading Jesus announces in His Sermon on the Mount that He came to fulfill both the Law (the Torah) and the Prophets (Matthew 5:17-18). He also tells us in these verses that the Law itself was a prophecy to be accomplished and that it would be accomplished in Himself. Jesus was born under the Law to fulfill the law by His righteous living and His substitutionary dying (Galatians 4:4). He redeems those under the law, those who have been sentenced to death by it, through His death as our substitute on the cross.
Later, on the Mount of Transfiguration we see Jesus discussing the Christo-centric revelation of the Law and the Prophets with Moses and Elijah. The Gospel of Luke tells us that they were discussing the way of escape, the departure, the death (in the original Greek text, the “exodus) that He would accomplish in Jerusalem (Luke 19:31). Jesus provides a way for us to escape God’s wrath when He was crucified, buried and raised from the dead in Jerusalem (see Luke 9:31).
In today’s Old Testament reading we continue to read the account of Noah. The ark of Noah is another picture of “the departure”, the exodus, the execution of the plan of salvation that Jesus would accomplish in Jerusalem.
“And the Lord remembered Noah” (Genesis 8:1)
How reassuring this is! What is the grace of God all about? It is the revelation of God doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. It is God being mindful of us. He knows our frame, our capacities and limitations. He remembers we are but dust. (Psalm 103:14) God gave us the capacity to fix things, but one thing we cannot fix is the problem of the human heart. The problem of our hearts. So God gives us what we do not deserve or cannot attain for ourselves. He gives us the revelation of His Word and the capacity to believe Him. We have the capacity to solve problems and fix things. But the problem of the human heart is beyond our ability to fix (Jer. 17:9; 13:23). What is the source of the fights and quarrels in human history? (James 4:1) Jesus said, “For out of the heart proceeds evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.” (Matthew 15:19; Genesis 6:5)
From God’s point of view it is not just a new heart that we need. A human heart transplant will not bring the cure. We need a new kind of heart; a loving, law-abiding heart. A heart that is right with God. And this is what the gospel of God’s grace promises us as an inheritance:
“ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.”
It is the promise of the Spirit that will be given to a new creation, a new man in Christ.
Noah’s name means ‘rest’. Although his life was quite active fulfilling his obedience to God (building an ark and preaching the Word) ultimately he would have to rest in the authority of God’s Word pertaining to the impending judgment against sin and His plan of salvation to escape that judgment. Like Noah, we need a vessel apart from ourselves to save ourselves. We must trust God’s revelation and be obedient to it. There was no rudder or mast to the ark. It was not for Noah to steer or accelerate this ship. He would have to ‘rest’ in God’s provision. As the waters of judgment came down upon the old creation he would have to trust that God would bring him into the new creation.
We also learn about covenant in this section. A covenant is the defining of a relationship. Promises and expectations are spelled out. In the covenant that God makes with Noah, God spells out His promises to Noah and his descendants (that’s us, by the way). God makes promises that He pledges to keep forever. God signaled that the rainbow would be a sign of that covenant. God says that He will remember the covenant when He sees it. When we see it, we remember that God remembers. We remember His grace. The Lord remembered Noah, so He will remember us. We can rest in His Word. We can trust in His plan of salvation and respond with the obedience of faith to enter into it (Genesis 6:18; 7:1; Hebrews 11:6-7).
Psalm 5:11 “Let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them sing joyful praises forever”
