WEBVTT 00:00:01.300 --> 00:00:03.065 We are in the middle of our series. 00:00:03.065 --> 00:00:04.350 We're calling it how Did we Get here? 00:00:04.350 --> 00:00:04.740 I want to. 00:00:04.740 --> 00:00:10.292 We've got this nice, awesome banner so we've got to pull it out so you can see it and be impressed. 00:00:11.220 --> 00:00:16.492 So, like the primary story I've said this before in the Hebrew Bible is the story of the Exodus. 00:00:16.492 --> 00:00:28.929 The people of the Hebrew people, the people of God, find themselves enslaved in Egypt for hundreds of years in the book of Exodus it's actually one of my favorite books and then they cry out to God like God, rescue us. 00:00:28.929 --> 00:00:32.744 And so God hears the cries of the people and he goes and rescues them. 00:00:32.744 --> 00:00:33.787 This is the story of the Bible. 00:00:33.787 --> 00:00:38.912 In fact, this becomes a paradigm or like a framing story for lots of other stories in the Bible. 00:00:38.912 --> 00:00:47.884 So frequently they would describe the Hebrew people God is the God who liberates, who sets us free from our enslavement, the things that enslave us. 00:00:47.884 --> 00:00:52.082 And so that's how this story is kind of framed, as God's liberator. 00:00:52.082 --> 00:00:55.371 But it raises the question how did they get in Egypt? 00:00:55.371 --> 00:00:59.628 How did they end up in Egypt as slaves, and why were they slaves for several hundreds of years? 00:00:59.628 --> 00:01:00.652 What happened? 00:01:00.652 --> 00:01:01.360 How'd they get there? 00:01:01.360 --> 00:01:14.271 And so to understand, they have to rewind one entire book back to Genesis 1 and read Genesis, and Genesis goes from the beginning all the way through to the last chapter and kind of ends with them ending up in slavery in Egypt. 00:01:14.271 --> 00:01:16.387 So here we are in our story. 00:01:16.387 --> 00:01:17.209 How did we get here? 00:01:17.980 --> 00:01:20.328 And last week we unpacked a bit of the Cain and Abel story. 00:01:20.328 --> 00:01:30.331 Remember, cain and Abel were the two brothers, the two sons of Adam and Eve, and they bring their offerings to God and God prefers Abel's offering over Cain's. 00:01:30.331 --> 00:01:31.153 We don't really know why. 00:01:31.153 --> 00:01:32.561 It's just one of the sad I don't know. 00:01:32.561 --> 00:01:35.829 Maybe it's sad, I guess it's sad Tragic use of the Bible. 00:01:35.829 --> 00:01:38.822 But Cain doesn't handle it well. 00:01:38.822 --> 00:01:42.987 He becomes upset and he doesn't manage his emotions well. 00:01:42.987 --> 00:01:47.415 And so he, his brother, and then God asks him hey, where's your brother, cain? 00:01:47.415 --> 00:01:49.177 And then Cain says am I my brother's keeper? 00:01:49.177 --> 00:01:52.025 And God's like yeah, you are your brother's keeper, where's your brother? 00:01:52.025 --> 00:02:01.924 And then his blood cries out to God from the ground and God hears the cries of his people and those who are being oppressed, and and uh, and he, you know, and he does something about it. 00:02:01.924 --> 00:02:08.854 So then then Cain, because of what happens, he's left to wander the earth, we're told in the text and he's afraid. 00:02:08.854 --> 00:02:10.986 He says, god, don't let me wander out there. 00:02:10.986 --> 00:02:12.806 There's people out there and they're going to kill me. 00:02:12.806 --> 00:02:18.031 And so God, with an act of grace, he marks him on his head with I did a cross. 00:02:18.031 --> 00:02:23.826 It probably wasn't a cross, but he marks him with something and he protects him while he's out there wandering but, and he protects him while he's out there wandering around. 00:02:23.847 --> 00:02:28.212 But it raises the question and I raised this in my email this week so, if you got that, who are these people? 00:02:28.212 --> 00:02:29.354 Who's out there? 00:02:29.354 --> 00:02:35.026 It seems like there's people that are out there that are not Adam and Eve, not even Adam and Eve's sons or daughters. 00:02:35.026 --> 00:02:36.030 We know about Cain and Abel. 00:02:36.030 --> 00:02:39.066 They actually have a third son named Seth, who replaces Abel. 00:02:39.066 --> 00:02:44.963 And then there's these other people that live out there outside the garden east of Eden. 00:02:44.963 --> 00:02:48.486 And who are they and how do we make sense of that? 00:02:48.486 --> 00:02:52.050 Well, just quickly, let this marinate or simmer for a minute if you haven't heard this before. 00:02:52.069 --> 00:03:18.629 But I would say this this Bible is probably not an explicit explanation of the scientific origins of humanity, so it's okay that there's other people out there that just don't get mentioned in the story, because this story, really, we would do better to read it as like a paradigmatic story of humanity and our estrangement from each other, our estrangement from God and even our the fissure of relationship between us and the creation. 00:03:18.629 --> 00:03:29.235 So these stories are deeply and profoundly true in that way, but they're probably not to be read like some kind of deep scientific or historic document on the origins of the human species. 00:03:29.235 --> 00:03:37.444 And so if you're in the room and you're a scientist or like you, like science and you're trying to reconcile how do I reconcile science and theology it can be done. 00:03:37.444 --> 00:03:40.468 We have to just read the text properly and how it's supposed to be read. 00:03:40.468 --> 00:03:48.586 And so Cain then goes out there and God protects him from this, from all these people, and he marks him with this mark of grace. 00:03:48.586 --> 00:03:52.657 And then things begin to get a bit out of hand. 00:03:53.019 --> 00:04:00.323 So today we do the Noah story, and the Noah story opens by and you heard Betty read it this way it said that God looks at all of the creation. 00:04:00.323 --> 00:04:02.346 This is just a couple chapters later in the story. 00:04:02.346 --> 00:04:07.193 So you have Adam and Eve, have Cain and Abel, and then you have a whole bunch of things. 00:04:07.193 --> 00:04:11.504 And then chapter six, god looks at the creation and sees it's all corrupt. 00:04:11.504 --> 00:04:13.068 Everybody's wicked. 00:04:13.068 --> 00:04:24.166 Their hearts are evil, everyone's bent towards doing the wrong things and injustice and corruption, and like you're, like what in the world happened between chapter four and chapter six, like Like everything you know? 00:04:24.166 --> 00:04:26.451 Just kind of like started on fire. 00:04:26.451 --> 00:04:27.031 It's wild. 00:04:27.031 --> 00:04:31.218 And so then God sends this flood and Noah on the ark. 00:04:31.218 --> 00:04:39.708 You probably know the story and here's the thing too the more familiar we are with a story like, the more we've heard it, the harder it is for us to really see what it's really about. 00:04:39.708 --> 00:04:45.769 So this morning I want to unpack this story briefly and offer a different way of thinking about Noah and the ark story. 00:04:45.769 --> 00:04:47.173 Is that fair, okay? 00:04:47.173 --> 00:04:48.543 So I got to let you know. 00:04:48.562 --> 00:04:50.310 I drew my own slides again today. 00:04:50.310 --> 00:04:52.805 Are you ready for this? 00:04:52.805 --> 00:04:54.884 Just remember, I'm not. 00:04:54.884 --> 00:04:59.005 I didn't go to artist school, artistry school, I went to the school for theology. 00:04:59.005 --> 00:04:59.869 So bear with me. 00:04:59.869 --> 00:05:01.146 But here's my title slide. 00:05:01.146 --> 00:05:02.584 I've titled my sermon. 00:05:02.884 --> 00:05:03.788 Why Would God Do that? 00:05:03.788 --> 00:05:08.384 Save the whales, thank you. 00:05:08.384 --> 00:05:10.007 That was my wife's idea. 00:05:10.007 --> 00:05:12.600 I go hey, we should put a flag on Noah's ark. 00:05:12.600 --> 00:05:13.702 And what could it say? 00:05:13.702 --> 00:05:14.303 That would be funny. 00:05:14.303 --> 00:05:16.329 She goes save the whales. 00:05:16.329 --> 00:05:18.754 Yes, thank you, katie. 00:05:20.521 --> 00:05:21.401 Why would God do that? 00:05:21.401 --> 00:05:23.447 Because here's the thing about this story. 00:05:23.447 --> 00:05:26.954 If we're honest, this story's messed up, it's crazy. 00:05:26.954 --> 00:05:38.389 Now, when I was younger, I always sort of inherited or caught this interpretation that goes like this, and you might have heard this interpretation hey kids, because we love telling this story to kids for some reason. 00:05:38.389 --> 00:05:43.165 Hey kids, you better obey God, if not you might get drowned. 00:05:43.165 --> 00:05:53.413 Oh, okay, since these kids are furiously trying to obey you know, and in fact we like paint these stories in this mural on kids' nursery room walls. 00:05:53.413 --> 00:05:54.642 I'm like, why do we do that? 00:05:54.642 --> 00:05:59.444 If you've done that, just forgive me, I'm not trying to pick on you, but like this story is horrific. 00:05:59.444 --> 00:06:02.310 A ton of people die and it's like this violent. 00:06:02.310 --> 00:06:10.730 You know a crazy story and I was at a church down in lakeville big church and they have this paint on their kids, like in their kids learning area. 00:06:10.730 --> 00:06:11.800 I'm like, oh no, they've done it. 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:20.464 But I've always been told this is like a measure of punishment up by god on humans because they're just being idiots or whatever. 00:06:20.985 --> 00:06:26.387 In fact, I was in seminary years ago at bethel and I was like I love, love the Old Testament. 00:06:26.387 --> 00:06:31.201 Like if I could go back, I would just want to like be a Hebrew scholar or something like that, but it's too late for me now. 00:06:31.201 --> 00:06:42.466 I got to keep doing this, but so he so, so I'm in this class, it's like Old Testament one, and we're going through this story and he goes okay, any, and like he just read it like it was no big deal. 00:06:42.466 --> 00:06:43.526 And he's like any questions? 00:06:43.526 --> 00:06:45.288 And I got, I got lots of questions. 00:06:45.288 --> 00:06:48.290 So I go I look around, nobody says a thing. 00:06:48.290 --> 00:06:48.971 It's like crickets. 00:06:48.971 --> 00:06:51.274 I'm like, yeah, I got a few questions. 00:06:51.274 --> 00:06:52.915 You guys are sadists. 00:06:52.915 --> 00:06:53.536 I don't know what's going on. 00:06:53.536 --> 00:07:09.076 So I raise my hand and I'm like, hey, this story seems about how we can read this story. 00:07:09.557 --> 00:07:13.288 And the prophet was like I said, oh, is there any other way to read it other than like punishment? 00:07:13.288 --> 00:07:20.012 He goes nope, get my things, then I'll just be on my way. 00:07:20.012 --> 00:07:26.071 I was like, seriously, like you're a professor of old testament. 00:07:26.071 --> 00:07:27.733 Nope, this is it and it's. 00:07:27.733 --> 00:07:29.084 This is god's punishment on humanity. 00:07:29.084 --> 00:07:32.661 It's no more evident now than it is in the cross a couple thousand years from now. 00:07:32.661 --> 00:07:39.663 So, oh, so he views the cross like just god's angry, you know, being poured out on jesus and in our stead. 00:07:39.663 --> 00:07:41.766 I'm like there's no other way to think about the cross. 00:07:41.766 --> 00:07:45.963 Nope, okay, fine, but I'm so frustrated so I go to the bathroom. 00:07:45.963 --> 00:07:51.425 Like an hour later, you know, I'm in there doing my thing and this guy walks in and one of my classmates is like dude, thanks for asking that question. 00:07:51.425 --> 00:07:53.125 I have those same questions. 00:07:53.125 --> 00:07:58.870 Where the heck were you 20 minutes ago when I was asking the professor you let me out there. 00:07:58.870 --> 00:08:08.141 I'm just out there drowning. 00:08:08.141 --> 00:08:10.627 So here's my question Is there another way to read this story? 00:08:10.627 --> 00:08:11.990 Don't say nope, because there is. 00:08:12.011 --> 00:08:16.124 I did a deep dive on this many years ago and I've done it many years since. 00:08:16.124 --> 00:08:20.583 There's lots of great, wonderful Jewish scholarship on this story and another way to read it. 00:08:20.583 --> 00:08:22.208 Here's how I want to propose. 00:08:22.208 --> 00:08:24.141 I'm going to begin with the end, so you know where I'm going. 00:08:25.324 --> 00:08:31.925 I think, rather than God just getting upset and just destroying everything and be like, well, no, okay, fine, here's a rainbow, I feel bad. 00:08:31.925 --> 00:08:48.414 Rather than that, I think it's actually a story of cleansing and rebirth and one of new creation. 00:08:48.414 --> 00:09:00.371 This story actually now gives me incredible hope that we can have new life, we can be made clean, we can be washed by the waters of God and brought to new life. 00:09:00.371 --> 00:09:01.940 That's what God is doing. 00:09:01.940 --> 00:09:03.647 So if you ask who is this God? 00:09:03.647 --> 00:09:15.808 This is the God who makes a way through the waters of chaos and provides a cleansing bath for all of us and for a little Uriah, and we can be made new and be made whole again. 00:09:15.808 --> 00:09:18.416 There can be a better tomorrow than there was today. 00:09:18.416 --> 00:09:21.004 So now I'm going to prove it to you. 00:09:21.725 --> 00:09:22.369 How did we get here? 00:09:22.369 --> 00:09:24.384 Everything is corrupt, god says. 00:09:24.384 --> 00:09:24.985 He looks at everything. 00:09:24.985 --> 00:09:25.748 It's all corrupt. 00:09:25.748 --> 00:09:27.211 Everyone's wicked, everyone's broken. 00:09:27.211 --> 00:09:30.527 They're all doing dumb things that's the original Hebrew dumb things. 00:09:30.527 --> 00:09:32.303 And God's like okay, what you know what? 00:09:32.303 --> 00:09:33.288 But he looks at everything. 00:09:33.288 --> 00:09:34.029 It's all corrupt. 00:09:34.029 --> 00:09:45.275 Well, again, in Genesis 1, 2, and 3, with the land, with the animals, there's plenty of food for everyone. 00:09:45.275 --> 00:09:47.597 I'll walk with you and I'll be with you. 00:09:47.597 --> 00:09:53.142 I'll be your God, you'll be my people this is later language, I'm using it and just trust in me. 00:09:54.024 --> 00:09:54.888 And things go wrong. 00:09:54.888 --> 00:10:02.903 They eat of the fruit, they hide, they're shamed and they're sowing fig leaves together, I assume, just frantically, trying to cover their shame and their guilt. 00:10:02.903 --> 00:10:04.845 And God comes to them and says where did you go? 00:10:04.845 --> 00:10:06.606 Where are you, where are you hiding? 00:10:06.606 --> 00:10:08.288 And he calls them out of hiding. 00:10:08.288 --> 00:10:09.850 He gives them real skin, you know. 00:10:09.850 --> 00:10:10.932 But there's this fissure. 00:10:10.932 --> 00:10:14.635 There's this, you know, this struggle of desire and domination between Adam and Eve. 00:10:14.635 --> 00:10:22.700 The land is going to have to be worked and it's going to be a struggle now and they're removed from the garden. 00:10:22.700 --> 00:10:34.293 There there's, there's this breaking between god and them, like this, relationally, there's all kinds of fissures and like sin seems like just a fracturing of relationships is what it kind of does. 00:10:34.293 --> 00:10:35.417 So they have their first boys, cain and abel. 00:10:35.417 --> 00:10:41.611 We have a farmer, we have a shepherd, and again cain becomes angry with god's displeasure of his own offering, so he kills his brother. 00:10:41.611 --> 00:10:44.145 He can't handle it, so he kills his brother and tries to hide it. 00:10:44.145 --> 00:10:48.979 And there's this breaking at the first murder and then just a couple of chapter. 00:10:48.999 --> 00:10:51.371 Actually, in the same chapter we read about a guy called lamech. 00:10:51.371 --> 00:10:52.235 Have you heard of lamech? 00:10:52.235 --> 00:10:52.860 He's in the bible. 00:10:52.860 --> 00:10:53.923 Here's the verse. 00:10:53.923 --> 00:10:59.580 So it says lamech is like bragging about killing a guy for hurting him or injuring him. 00:10:59.580 --> 00:11:07.455 So he says I've killed a man for a young man, for inj injuring me, and if Cain is avenged seven times, then I'll be avenged 77 times. 00:11:07.455 --> 00:11:16.972 Cain's got nothing on me, king Kong ain't got Okay, never mind Judgment day, Okay, anyway. 00:11:16.972 --> 00:11:22.807 So Lamech is out of his mind Whatever he's done, his murderous acts. 00:11:22.807 --> 00:11:28.504 This wanton, violent, murderous act is 77 times worse than what happened with Cain. 00:11:28.504 --> 00:11:32.465 It's like, well, things are starting to get out of control a little bit now and getting a little wild. 00:11:32.465 --> 00:11:39.149 Then you have this bizarre story about the sons of God like marrying and like relating, if you know what I'm saying, with women. 00:11:39.149 --> 00:11:39.750 Have you heard this story? 00:11:39.750 --> 00:11:41.663 So one chapter later, go ahead for me, Jesse. 00:11:41.884 --> 00:11:50.171 In actually the opening of 6, it says when the people began to multiply, so there's more people going around, there's lots of other folks that are having kids and the daughters were born to them. 00:11:50.171 --> 00:11:52.865 The sons of God, these divine beings. 00:11:52.865 --> 00:11:54.409 They're actually called Elohim also. 00:11:54.409 --> 00:11:59.270 They're called Elohim this is the name for, like you know, divine gods or angelic beings, something like that. 00:11:59.270 --> 00:12:06.173 These sons of God saw that these women were fair or delightful, the text says, and they took them. 00:12:06.173 --> 00:12:12.937 They took them as wives and they began to procreate with these women. 00:12:12.937 --> 00:12:14.884 Now, in the ancient world this was totally normal. 00:12:14.884 --> 00:12:19.846 You read all kinds of Greek and you know Roman mythology or other kinds of mythology and the divine beings. 00:12:19.846 --> 00:12:23.283 You know intermingling or having relations with humans, not a big deal. 00:12:23.283 --> 00:12:25.701 But in the Hebrew story this was forbidden. 00:12:25.701 --> 00:12:27.626 This was out of bounds for the Hebrew people. 00:12:27.626 --> 00:12:33.269 They were not supposed to have this kind of you know, sort of weird crisscross over between the divine and the humans. 00:12:33.269 --> 00:12:34.961 But this is what happens. 00:12:35.020 --> 00:12:40.501 By the way, notice what it says in the text the sons of God saw that they were delightful and they took them. 00:12:40.501 --> 00:12:41.302 Does that remind anybody of any other passages we just read a couple weeks ago? 00:12:41.302 --> 00:12:41.361 And they took them. 00:12:41.361 --> 00:12:45.139 Does that remind anybody of any other passages we just read a couple weeks ago? 00:12:45.139 --> 00:12:49.846 It says Eve saw the fruit was good or delightful and she took it. 00:12:49.846 --> 00:12:52.006 So we have a similar kind of thing here. 00:12:52.006 --> 00:12:54.287 And so they took it. 00:12:54.287 --> 00:12:59.748 And so now things are going to spiral out of control and they're going down the drain fast. 00:12:59.748 --> 00:13:05.149 And God sees the whole thing and it says it's corrupt, it's broken. 00:13:05.149 --> 00:13:11.812 By the way, in Genesis 1, god sees that the creation, what he's made, and he calls it very good. 00:13:11.812 --> 00:13:17.111 And now, just a couple of chapters later, this whole thing is like the house is on fire and people are. 00:13:17.111 --> 00:13:20.909 God sees it and he calls it corrupt. 00:13:20.909 --> 00:13:21.751 Now it's broken. 00:13:21.751 --> 00:13:23.865 So what is God to do? 00:13:23.865 --> 00:13:27.442 What's God god to do? 00:13:27.442 --> 00:13:27.863 What's god gonna do? 00:13:27.863 --> 00:13:28.904 This whole thing is spiraling out of control. 00:13:28.924 --> 00:13:32.160 In the text in genesis 6, verse 6, is that god is deeply troubled in his heart. 00:13:32.160 --> 00:13:33.383 He's sad. 00:13:33.383 --> 00:13:35.005 You know that god gets sad. 00:13:35.005 --> 00:13:39.360 God is deeply troubled in his heart, it tells us so. 00:13:39.360 --> 00:13:43.328 His response right away is not anger or it's like wanton violence. 00:13:43.328 --> 00:13:46.274 No, he's sad, he's deeply troubled. 00:13:46.274 --> 00:13:49.386 And if you're a parent, if you're a good parent, you know this. 00:13:49.386 --> 00:13:56.250 When your kids act like knuckleheads, sometimes it grieves your heart and God sees he's deeply troubled. 00:13:56.250 --> 00:14:02.065 What's he to do when the whole thing has already become destroyed? 00:14:02.065 --> 00:14:05.633 See, I would argue, it's not that God comes along and destroys it. 00:14:05.633 --> 00:14:08.788 Rather, it's that the whole thing has already been destroyed. 00:14:08.788 --> 00:14:13.385 It's actively being destroyed and God's like okay, what can we do to save this? 00:14:13.385 --> 00:14:15.692 How can I help push this thing forward? 00:14:15.692 --> 00:14:27.744 So it's like a potter Thanks to my friend Jack and Wendy who were sharing this analogy with me but a potter who's making a vase and he gets to the end and it's like it's got some holes in it and some air bubbles. 00:14:27.984 --> 00:14:31.272 Any potters in the house or any workers with clay, what do you call? 00:14:31.272 --> 00:14:32.062 What do you call those? 00:14:32.062 --> 00:14:33.586 A worker with clay? 00:14:33.586 --> 00:14:33.806 Whatever? 00:14:33.806 --> 00:14:36.111 Anyway, anybody make clay stuff. 00:14:36.111 --> 00:14:40.224 Potter, yeah, potter, okay, what do they do? 00:14:40.224 --> 00:14:40.484 What do you? 00:14:40.484 --> 00:14:42.147 You know it's got holes in it and there's air bubbles. 00:14:42.147 --> 00:14:45.370 You can't, you can't put it in the kiln, it'll, it'll, it'll ruin it. 00:14:46.192 --> 00:14:47.073 So you have to start over. 00:14:47.073 --> 00:14:50.467 You kind of, you kind of take it back down to its base form. 00:14:50.467 --> 00:14:51.631 This is what God does. 00:14:51.631 --> 00:15:03.893 See, god takes the creation and he sort of undoes it and makes it go backwards, almost in reverse, and he brings it back to its original shape, its formlessness, in order to start again. 00:15:03.893 --> 00:15:04.793 Here I'll show you. 00:15:04.994 --> 00:15:05.495 So the beginning. 00:15:05.495 --> 00:15:07.403 We have the primordial waters. 00:15:07.403 --> 00:15:08.384 Remember this in Genesis 1? 00:15:08.384 --> 00:15:09.388 Go ahead for me, jesse, I think I gotta. 00:15:09.388 --> 00:15:10.572 There's these. 00:15:10.572 --> 00:15:17.822 In the beginning, the God was in the beginning, god created the heavens and the earth, and there was, the earth was formless and void. 00:15:17.822 --> 00:15:19.264 Tohu vavo, remember that word? 00:15:19.264 --> 00:15:24.092 And the Spirit of God hovered over these primordial waters. 00:15:24.092 --> 00:15:25.654 This is called the Tehom. 00:15:25.654 --> 00:15:33.730 It's this abysmal, this abyss, this deep, dark waters of chaos, and it's sort of like this bizarre picture of this water. 00:15:34.539 --> 00:15:40.474 And in the Noah story, god brings the creation back to its original form of formlessness. 00:15:40.474 --> 00:15:43.589 He decreates or he uncreates the creation. 00:15:43.589 --> 00:15:45.706 By the way, this is a result of sin. 00:15:45.706 --> 00:15:49.490 You could say then that sin is an undoing of creation. 00:15:49.490 --> 00:15:56.947 When we engage in sin, or sin as like a larger cosmic force, sin is that which undoes the creation. 00:15:56.947 --> 00:15:57.369 Are you with me? 00:15:57.369 --> 00:15:59.352 It undoes our creative acts. 00:15:59.352 --> 00:16:00.803 It's the opposite of creativity. 00:16:00.803 --> 00:16:04.011 It degenerates things, it destroys things, takes them apart. 00:16:04.011 --> 00:16:07.322 So this is how Genesis 1 begins. 00:16:08.105 --> 00:16:09.249 And so Noah's there. 00:16:09.249 --> 00:16:12.961 Everyone's corrupt, actually, everyone's corrupted except for Noah and his family. 00:16:12.961 --> 00:16:15.469 The word Noah in the Hebrew is what you might think it is. 00:16:15.469 --> 00:16:18.741 It's the word noach, and noach means literally, means rest. 00:16:18.741 --> 00:16:20.823 So this man, his name's Noah. 00:16:20.884 --> 00:16:29.572 God comes along, sees Noah, he's like, hey, I'm going to return the world back to the way it was in the beginning, just to a primordial mess of water and chaos. 00:16:29.572 --> 00:16:33.176 I've got to start over kind of thing and cleanse all of the earth. 00:16:33.176 --> 00:16:39.119 And so he finds one guy in his family who's righteous, and it says that this guy, noah, he walks with God. 00:16:39.119 --> 00:16:43.561 Where have we heard that before Genesis 1 and 2. 00:16:43.561 --> 00:16:52.707 This guy might be something like a new Adam and God might be recreating or renewing or restarting this whole thing over. 00:16:52.707 --> 00:16:58.393 And so God allows the waters to come back and kind of have their way with the world. 00:16:58.393 --> 00:17:00.715 But he saves Noah, who walks with God. 00:17:00.715 --> 00:17:03.616 So he tells Noah hey, build an ark. 00:17:07.808 --> 00:17:08.191 I drew a picture. 00:17:08.191 --> 00:17:08.673 You want to see it? 00:17:08.673 --> 00:17:13.769 I think I have a picture there. 00:17:13.769 --> 00:17:14.613 It is, yeah, not bad, huh? 00:17:14.613 --> 00:17:19.701 Let's let that wash over you for a moment. 00:17:19.701 --> 00:17:20.001 That is a bear. 00:17:20.001 --> 00:17:20.423 It's a grizzly bear. 00:17:20.423 --> 00:17:21.345 Be careful, I know what you're thinking. 00:17:21.345 --> 00:17:24.029 That ark isn't big enough to house all those animals, but it is. 00:17:24.029 --> 00:17:28.684 It's like Mary Poppins' purse, so just trust the process. 00:17:28.744 --> 00:17:29.728 But it's called the Teva. 00:17:29.728 --> 00:17:31.211 Anyone know where else? 00:17:31.211 --> 00:17:37.609 There's only one other place that this word is used in the Hebrew Bible for Teva, which we call ark. 00:17:37.609 --> 00:17:40.165 It's in the Moses story. 00:17:40.165 --> 00:17:42.166 What's the Moses story about? 00:17:42.166 --> 00:17:51.133 Well, his mom, in order to save his life, puts him in a teva and sends him in the waters, and the teva saves his life. 00:17:51.133 --> 00:17:56.169 So this is maybe a story about being saved out of the waters of chaos, or something like this. 00:17:56.872 --> 00:18:00.162 By the way, it's made out of gopher wood, we're told, or cypress wood. 00:18:00.162 --> 00:18:01.605 I think gopher was a better interpretation. 00:18:01.605 --> 00:18:08.060 It's gopher wood, not badger wood wood. 00:18:08.060 --> 00:18:09.102 I think gopher wood is a better interpretation. 00:18:09.102 --> 00:18:18.847 It's gopher wood, not badger wood, not hawkeye wood, gopher wood, I'm just saying and so God has Noah and his family build this big boat, this ark, this thing made of wood. 00:18:18.847 --> 00:18:20.232 And where do you get wood? 00:18:20.232 --> 00:18:21.076 But from trees. 00:18:21.076 --> 00:18:24.025 So you got trees, you got water. 00:18:24.025 --> 00:18:25.628 The primordial water is coming back. 00:18:25.628 --> 00:18:28.102 You also have animals on board. 00:18:28.102 --> 00:18:33.721 They take two of some, seven of others on board and they live in harmony with the animals. 00:18:33.721 --> 00:18:37.228 So there's trees, there's harmony with animals. 00:18:37.228 --> 00:18:38.811 Noah's a guy who walks with god. 00:18:38.811 --> 00:18:41.163 There's enough food for everybody. 00:18:42.506 --> 00:18:42.886 Yeah, this is. 00:18:42.886 --> 00:18:44.530 This is eden're back in Eden. 00:18:44.530 --> 00:18:51.369 It's a floating Eden, and they're floating on top of the waters of chaos as the whole thing begins to go backwards. 00:18:51.369 --> 00:18:53.728 So here's the world as they saw. 00:18:53.728 --> 00:18:54.181 I want to show you. 00:18:54.181 --> 00:18:56.226 I drew this in a picture as well, so check this out. 00:18:56.226 --> 00:18:57.308 I think I have a picture of a Jesse. 00:18:57.308 --> 00:18:58.291 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:18:58.291 --> 00:19:00.788 So remember the story. 00:19:00.788 --> 00:19:02.760 Yeah, let that, let's just. 00:19:02.760 --> 00:19:03.060 But the story. 00:19:03.060 --> 00:19:04.722 Yeah, let that, let's just. 00:19:04.722 --> 00:19:05.703 Tree grass. 00:19:05.703 --> 00:19:07.705 Can you see the apples on the tree? 00:19:07.705 --> 00:19:08.727 I was very proud of the apples. 00:19:08.727 --> 00:19:12.631 Okay, just see water, not water. 00:19:13.192 --> 00:19:17.596 So when God makes the world, he separates the waters above and the waters below. 00:19:17.596 --> 00:19:22.665 They thought the people in the ancient world that there was water above this dome that kept them. 00:19:22.665 --> 00:19:24.869 That kept the water at bay, if you will. 00:19:24.869 --> 00:19:26.913 And so there's water up there. 00:19:26.913 --> 00:19:27.942 That's why the sky was blue. 00:19:27.942 --> 00:19:31.840 And so God makes the world by separating waters and he makes a way for dry land. 00:19:31.840 --> 00:19:35.589 And then there's water up here, water below, and it's being kept away by this dome. 00:19:36.112 --> 00:19:45.644 In the Genesis story, when the rains begin, it says the floodgates or the windows of heaven open up and the water needs to pour back in. 00:19:45.644 --> 00:19:51.933 Yeah, it's creation going backwards, it's returning back to its primordial state, and this is the waters from the ground begin to rise up. 00:19:51.933 --> 00:19:56.028 Have you ever been in a rainstorm where the waters from the ground begin to rise up? 00:19:56.028 --> 00:19:58.125 Yeah, yeah. 00:19:58.125 --> 00:20:05.462 So there's this water, so it's all coming back together and it begins to return back to this original state where there's just water everywhere. 00:20:05.462 --> 00:20:09.690 And there's this floating ark, this teva. 00:20:10.611 --> 00:20:11.412 What is god doing? 00:20:11.412 --> 00:20:23.209 He's returning it all back and he's getting rid of all the things that are, that are contrary to the will of god, or or the the flourishing of life, those things which are destroying life. 00:20:23.209 --> 00:20:26.766 He's getting rid of and he's washing this whole thing clean. 00:20:26.766 --> 00:20:31.086 It's like a great bath for the whole earth in order to restart again. 00:20:31.086 --> 00:20:34.234 And the text tells us that God remembers Noah. 00:20:34.234 --> 00:20:51.483 After it rains for many days, god remembers Noah, he remembers his promise to Noah and he sends the ruach of God, the spirit of God, the wind of God, the breath of God, to blow and separate again the waters. 00:20:51.483 --> 00:20:56.696 So God now again separates the waters and dry land appears. 00:20:56.696 --> 00:21:00.095 They send a bird out and the bird finds an olive branch and brings it back. 00:21:00.095 --> 00:21:01.210 There's vegetation again. 00:21:01.210 --> 00:21:10.594 They, finally the art, comes to rest on this mountain and they release the animals, and the animals, the creatures, are back in the land again. 00:21:11.625 --> 00:21:16.776 And then God tells the humans, noah and his family, hey, be fruitful and multiply. 00:21:16.776 --> 00:21:17.979 Where have we heard that before? 00:21:17.979 --> 00:21:20.988 Yeah, this is how babies happen, right? 00:21:20.988 --> 00:21:24.934 Genesis 1. 00:21:24.934 --> 00:21:28.160 Now it's like a recreation of the creation. 00:21:28.160 --> 00:21:33.256 So you have Genesis 1, creation, genesis 6, an undoing of the creation. 00:21:33.256 --> 00:21:35.847 It goes backwards, back to how things were in Genesis 1. 00:21:35.847 --> 00:21:42.179 And then God starts again with a new Adam and a new Eve, a new family, new animals, new vegetation, new dry land. 00:21:42.179 --> 00:21:44.147 The spirit is still at work, doing things. 00:21:44.147 --> 00:21:47.055 He says hey, be fruitful and multiply. 00:21:47.055 --> 00:21:48.458 We're starting over. 00:21:48.458 --> 00:22:05.720 And, by the way, the ark comes to rest on this mountain in the seventh day Sorry, it's the seventh month, it's the 17th day of the seventh month, there's lots of sevens in this story and the ark comes to rest on this seventh, on the seven. 00:22:05.720 --> 00:22:17.174 Well, this ark is doing what God did in the creation narrative it's resting right there and the guy driving the boat, his name, is Noah, which means rest Noah. 00:22:17.174 --> 00:22:22.601 So God cleanses the earth. 00:22:33.013 --> 00:22:41.353 Jesus made water a sign of cleansing and of rebirth and the kingdom, baptism, is this purifying bath and cleansing and washing of all the things that are incompatible with the will of God and the love of God and the creation of God. 00:22:41.353 --> 00:22:45.736 There are things in us that are incompatible with the presence of God. 00:22:45.736 --> 00:22:50.814 I love what Thomas Merton says I don't know much about heaven, but I do know that not much of me will be there. 00:22:50.814 --> 00:22:52.678 Yeah, I love that. 00:22:52.678 --> 00:22:54.709 There's some things to get out of us before we get there. 00:22:54.709 --> 00:22:56.373 But here's the story. 00:22:56.373 --> 00:22:58.196 There is hope. 00:23:03.305 --> 00:23:07.805 This story about water and cleansing and rebirth and Noah and his family and starting over. 00:23:07.805 --> 00:23:12.246 It's a new creation. 00:23:12.246 --> 00:23:12.586 And first Peter. 00:23:12.586 --> 00:23:20.709 So many years later, one of the apostles looks back on this story of Noah and he's like oh, yeah, yeah, that's a baptism, it's a washing away of all the sin and junk in our lives in order we can have new life. 00:23:20.709 --> 00:23:25.057 Peter calls this a baptism, the story of Noah's Ark. 00:23:25.057 --> 00:23:29.796 Yes, there is a better way to read that story than God's ticked off and he's going to kill everybody. 00:23:29.796 --> 00:23:36.218 No, god returns this thing back to its primordial state in order to start over and give new life. 00:23:36.218 --> 00:23:39.928 Back to its primordial state, in order to start over and give new life. 00:23:39.928 --> 00:23:40.789 Here's what I want you to leave with. 00:23:40.789 --> 00:23:41.810 You can have a better tomorrow. 00:23:41.810 --> 00:23:43.674 There is a way forward. 00:23:43.674 --> 00:23:48.714 And baptism, cleansing, rebirth, new life this is all part of it. 00:23:49.377 --> 00:23:53.189 Many years ago, me and Katie moved to Minnesota and from Colorado. 00:23:53.189 --> 00:23:58.546 I lived my whole life in Colorado and we started over and we wondered can we do this? 00:23:58.546 --> 00:23:59.188 Is it possible? 00:23:59.188 --> 00:24:01.915 Can we move across the country and kind of begin our lives again? 00:24:01.915 --> 00:24:03.776 It wasn't like anything terrible would happen. 00:24:03.776 --> 00:24:10.202 Those first 20-something years we were like we want to start over and we did it and I could not be more grateful. 00:24:10.202 --> 00:24:17.192 It was one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life and we moved here and now here we are with you people and we had two of our four kids here in Minnesota. 00:24:17.192 --> 00:24:18.034 We love it. 00:24:18.034 --> 00:24:22.178 We started over, started new, fresh and clean. 00:24:23.098 --> 00:24:32.073 I have a dear friend I've told the story before, but I love the story who, him and his wife, were married for many years and after many years of being married they were happily married, had two kids. 00:24:32.073 --> 00:24:44.971 It was discovered that one of them was being unfaithful in the marriage, like devastatingly unfaithful, and I remember me and Katie would talk with them and try to figure out what to say, how to counsel them, like there's no way they can survive this. 00:24:44.971 --> 00:24:47.973 Their marriage is might as well just blow it up and find somebody new. 00:24:47.973 --> 00:24:48.756 This is not going to work. 00:24:48.756 --> 00:24:59.238 But the husband's like no, no, I want to try and I'm like I'm a pastor, I should be saying yes, I don't know if this is possible, man, I don't know. 00:24:59.238 --> 00:25:00.528 I did say I go. 00:25:00.528 --> 00:25:02.875 I don't know if that's the right thing to do, but I will be with you. 00:25:02.875 --> 00:25:08.092 And if I know nothing other than this, I know this about God God makes beautiful things out of our messes. 00:25:08.092 --> 00:25:09.290 So I know it is possible. 00:25:09.290 --> 00:25:23.394 And a year later, through tons of prayer and work and counseling and graphic honesty, we got invited to their house to renew their vows with them and they did it. 00:25:23.394 --> 00:25:24.156 They made it work. 00:25:24.156 --> 00:25:26.811 And it's been many years since then, but they've done it. 00:25:26.811 --> 00:25:30.573 They started anew and they washed the past away. 00:25:30.573 --> 00:25:36.490 Obviously there's consequences, no doubt, but there was new life on their side. 00:25:36.664 --> 00:25:42.289 I have another friend who was an alcoholic for over a decade, Couldn't get out of his own way. 00:25:42.289 --> 00:25:46.390 His wife begged him to stop, threatened to leave him if he didn't stop. 00:25:46.390 --> 00:25:47.032 And he didn't stop. 00:25:47.032 --> 00:25:53.417 He was invited to meeting after meeting, after meeting with AA and others, and comment and he wouldn't go. 00:25:53.417 --> 00:25:56.169 And then finally his wife said I'm leaving, I'm out. 00:25:56.169 --> 00:25:58.452 He said, fine, I'll go to a meeting. 00:25:58.452 --> 00:26:14.869 And after over a decade of struggling with alcoholism, he goes to a meeting and he goes to another meeting and he goes to another meeting, another one, another one, and he's been sober now for over 10 years on this side of that thing, just one day at a time. 00:26:16.487 --> 00:26:20.330 This morning we're going to invite you forward as we pray and sing and do some other stuff. 00:26:20.330 --> 00:26:44.998 I want to anoint you with water to remind you of this story, this story of cleansing and rebirth and new life and a man who walked with God, who was faithful, and the regeneration of the whole thing and God's deep grief over the way things have become, but his promise, his covenant, this rainbow, this whole thing to make life keep going and to make life flourish. 00:26:44.998 --> 00:26:46.288 And so we're going to be coming. 00:26:46.288 --> 00:27:03.867 If you want to, you don't have to, but you can come forward and after the offering, globe goes by just for sake of traffic, and we're going to anoint you with water and we're going to just I'm going to declare over you it'll be me, sonia, ben, I think, kirsten will have four stations I'm going to declare over you what I think is the deepest truth of the whole of the cosmos. 00:27:03.948 --> 00:27:11.574 I do, I'm convinced of it and I'm convinced, if you really were to absorb this, let it sink deep into your soul, it could change the way you live. 00:27:11.574 --> 00:27:12.396 It really could change it. 00:27:12.396 --> 00:27:16.652 So, as you come forward, I think, come forward with your hands open. 00:27:16.652 --> 00:27:25.371 You don't have to literally, but like, just come forward with an open heart and allow these words I think are that are true to sink deep into you and allow them to take root. 00:27:28.335 --> 00:27:30.578 And be reminded, too, of your baptism. 00:27:30.578 --> 00:27:32.327 If you're in the room, you've been baptized. 00:27:32.327 --> 00:27:33.512 Great, that's awesome. 00:27:33.512 --> 00:27:34.135