Genesis chapter 6.
The way God works and the way he moves is often unpredictable.
I often say that God throws curveballs.
He works in unexpected ways.
But a common trait of God is to raise somebody up in just the nick of time
when there's a task at hand.
He challenged Abraham to pick it all up, everything he had,
and go and God would tell him where he had to go along the way.
That's pretty scary.
He rose up Moses to become the mouthpiece of the law, of God's law.
And Moses was, by his own description, slow of speech and tongue.
He even said that slowly.
Joseph was a man who ran the breadbasket of the world in the midst of a famine,
but he had been sold into slavery by his brothers, left for dead.
David was the youngest and the overlooked,
but God used him to expand Israel to its greatest heights, at least so far.
Did we bring up the foot-shaped mouth of Peter?
Did we bring up the Christian killer named Saul or the late bloomer named James
who became the pastor of the church in Jerusalem?
That's just a few of those because God throws curveballs.
How about if God picks a man that lives in the desert
to build a boat to save humanity from total destruction
while the earth was to face utter destruction?
That's what God did, and he chose Noah to be that man.
Now, how did he pick him?
Who is it that God uses?
What is God looking for in us to use us?
Now, as I've listed several people,
we could get several traits that God looks for
in examining the many that I've mentioned,
but I just found, I just want to look at a few traits
that we see in Noah this morning.
I think it's challenging enough.
It's plenty to ponder on.
It's found in Genesis chapter 6, beginning in verse 5,
and it says this,
The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth,
that every intention of the thoughts of his heart
was only evil continually,
and the Lord regretted that he had made man on earth,
and he grieved him to his heart.
So the Lord said,
I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land,
and man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens,
for I am sorry that I made them.
But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.
These are the generations of Noah.
Noah was a righteous man,
blameless in his generation.
Noah walked with God.
I don't know about you,
but I know that I,
I want to be used of God.
I want God to use me for his purposes,
as he sees fit,
and to do my best to remove any hindrances
that may be,
that I may be prone to put in his way.
I want to be used of God.
And from Noah's example,
I believe we find some things that God looks for.
Who does God use?
God uses one who is blessed.
It may seem kind of backwards to say it like that,
but it's the truth.
It's not.
It's not backwards.
It's the truth.
It's just the way God works,
and we don't have to understand his work.
We better accept it,
but we don't have to understand it.
God favored Noah.
He did.
He blessed Noah.
He didn't do that because Noah was righteous,
although Noah was righteous.
He was not perfect,
and scripture points that out,
but he was right.
And God looked upon him with favor,
and he shined.
It is the blessings of God
that allow us to be at our very best.
We're not able to do that within ourselves.
God enables us.
As a matter of fact,
when it says that he found favor with God,
that word in the Hebrew literally speaks of grace.
In other words,
it's in his grace and by his blessings
that we're allowed to be everything that we can be
for his honor and for his glory.
We don't receive his blessings because of what we do.
We are blessed by his grace
and given the ability to do that.
And when we use that God-given ability
to do blessed things,
we are further blessed.
It is a fulfillment of what life was meant to be.
It has to do with being used for your purpose.
I don't normally carry a pocket knife.
I've had a few in that big knife store
in Sevierville.
I'll go in there and find one and buy one
and put it in my pocket
and wash it in the washing machine the following week.
I don't normally carry a pocket knife.
I have a couple,
but I just don't need it that often.
But I do carry a set of keys.
I carry a set of keys
and I can cut a lot of things
with a jaggered end of a key.
I'm pretty good at it.
Don't come messing with me.
I'm pretty good at it.
So,
do my keys always do a good job cutting something?
No.
My keys are made to open locks,
but sometimes I can cut through packaging tape
to open a package when it comes.
You take those tags off your clothes,
you know,
I'll get my key out, son,
and saw that baby off.
But much beyond that,
my keys won't cut it.
Pun intended.
Why?
Because that's not the purpose of the keys.
The purpose of the key is to unlock,
to open a lock.
My best defense is my key,
so if you mess with me,
be careful, son,
because I'll pull it on you,
you know.
But that's not really the purpose of the key.
The key is to unlock.
Knives are made for cutting.
Our purpose in life
is to live for the Lord.
We're to carry out His will for our lives,
and when we don't do that,
we are living outside of our purpose.
We're not living up to our potential.
You'll be blessed by God
when you carry out His purpose for your life,
that His grace has enabled you
to do,
and you'll see the favor of God.
The favor that God has for you
as you walk in His way.
Living for Him
brings everything to light.
Scripture says that Noah
was favored and blessed,
and God used him.
But I see another trait as well.
God uses one who is righteous.
One who walks with the Lord
can be righteous.
It's not that we earn that righteousness.
It is that we're changed by God's power
and by His might,
and under God,
we can live in a way that pleases Him.
Now, for the Christian,
this righteousness is positional.
We have been made right by the Lord
when we come into relationship with Him.
And now,
we just have to live that way
in our practice.
And Noah did.
He put his faith in God
to work,
and God enabled him
to live a righteous life.
I want you to listen to what Hebrews 11,
verse 7 said about him.
He said,
By faith Noah,
being warned by God
concerning events as yet unseen,
in reverent fear,
constructed an ark
for the saving of his household.
By this,
he condemned the world
and became an heir
of the righteousness
that comes from faith.
Just as in the days of Noah,
so it'll be
in the days of the Son of Man.
What a contrast to the world
in which he was living.
His world was marked by wickedness.
His world was marked by perversion.
And the thoughts and the minds of society
were polluted.
They were led by the lust of the flesh.
They were led by the lust of the eyes.
They were led by the pride of life.
How do you survive in your walk with God
when you live in a world
that's filled with all of that stuff?
Well, we better learn
because we're right there.
We're right in the midst of it.
Jesus was talking about his return
and he said this in Luke chapter 17,
verse 26 and following.
He said,
Just as in the days of Noah,
so it will be in the days of the Son of Man.
They were eating and drinking
and marrying and being given in marriage
until the day when Noah entered the ark.
And the flood came and destroyed them all.
Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot,
there will be eating and drinking
and buying and selling,
planting and building.
But on the day when Lot went out from Sodom,
fire and sulfur rained from heaven
and destroyed them all.
So it will be on the day
when the Son of Man is revealed.
Now, I want you to understand something.
The point of that passage is the suddenness
and the need of readiness
concerning the return of the Lord.
I truly believe the only thing
that is holding the Lord back from coming
is the Father telling him to go get his bride.
And I believe we need to be ready.
I don't care what's happening in the world
and you're trying to figure it out on your timeline.
You better be ready
because I'm telling you,
the Lord could return at any time.
However, I want you to understand
that the wickedness we see around us today,
it is no greater than the wickedness around Noah.
He faced the same thing.
It's probably not any better today
than it was with Noah,
but it's probably not any worse.
So what do you do if you're a Christian
who's trying to live for Christ
if the world you live in is wicked enough to destroy?
What do you do
when the whole world seems to have turned upside down?
It becomes completely amoral
and the things that they should shame
are held as if it's correct.
And the things that are correct
as if they're shamed.
What do you do in the midst of that?
I'll tell you what you do.
You live for the Lord Jesus.
You live on for Christ.
You live a righteous life.
It is the darkness that the light is made more obvious.
The more wicked world,
the more the faithful Christian will stand out.
And friend, it's time we stand out.
It's time we make a difference in the world
in which we're planted.
God uses one who's righteous,
but also God uses one who is a witness.
No one didn't try to hide the fact
that the difference in him was God.
He let that be known.
He spoke out about living right before the Lord.
And you know how I know that?
Because 2 Peter 2, verse 5
calls him a herald of righteousness.
Now, a herald is a person who carries
or proclaims important news.
And Noah was speaking of the Lord.
He was preaching about the Lord.
So don't think that Noah was some recluse whittler
that never engaged with anybody,
but spent 100 years of himself,
to himself building the boat
that God told him to build.
No, Noah honored God with his life.
And when people ask him
why he lived the way he did,
if people ask him
why he built a boat miles away from water,
he told them.
Actually, he was telling them
before they ask
because he is a herald of righteousness
as Scripture describes him.
There is a fella at Sam's Club these days
that is trying his best.
He stands beside the dog food
and he's trying to sell me a home warranty
every time I go in there.
He asked me if I'm a homeowner.
I said, I am.
He does his sales pitch.
I tell him I'm not interested.
I come back two weeks later.
He says, are you a homeowner?
What is it about me
that makes him think I'm losing my home?
I mean, what is that, you know?
But I want you to understand something
about this fella.
He is a herald for the home warranty.
I mean, he is.
He does not wait for you to ask him,
why do you loiter by the dog food?
He don't ask.
He meets you where you are.
And he tells you
the qualities and the timing.
If you'll do it today,
Sam's will pay for your first month,
but you got to fill out the form now.
Go to it now.
He's a herald of the home warranty.
He's dedicated to it.
I don't approach him.
He approaches me.
Noah was living it,
is what I'm trying to tell you.
Noah was sharing it.
He was telling people about it.
He told people
who made the difference in his life.
And my friend,
we ought to too.
We ought to be heralds of the gospel.
Sharing with others
the difference that Christ has made in our life.
Seek them out.
Pray for them.
Speak to them.
When God opens the door for you to do that,
God uses a witness.
Somebody who's just willing.
He'll use you.
He also uses one who is blameless.
Blamelessness speaks of how people took him.
Some people live right.
They talk right.
But you just don't trust them.
You can't quite put your finger on it.
But something just don't smell right.
It just seems like something's up.
That was not the case for Noah.
Noah lived out his faith.
He spoke of it.
And when Noah was standing with two other men
having a conversation
and Noah walked off,
those other two guys would look at each other
and say,
I think a lot of that man.
That man's a lot.
He's a man of God.
And when discussion came up
about why Noah was building
a cruise ship-sized boat
in the middle of the desert,
they didn't understand him.
They probably thought he was a little off.
Maybe way off.
But I'm telling you,
if he was blameless,
they thought the world of him.
He believed God
and people believed in him
and God uses people
with a reputation
that people can trust.
He'll use the blameless.
God also uses one who walks with God.
He uses the person who walks with God.
And Scripture says clearly
at the end of this passage,
Noah walked with God daily.
That means he talked with God.
That means he walked with God.
That means he lived for God.
Now, I want you to notice
the progressive buildup
in this description of Noah.
First, he was a blessed man.
We could spend the afternoon here.
If I were to ask you,
has God blessed your life?
Share today some way
that God has blessed your life.
If you were quick
and wasn't hungry,
you could stand up and speak
and talk about the blessings
of the Lord.
He was blessed.
He was a righteous man.
Not near as many as there should be
are righteous today.
God honors
and God uses
the righteous.
He was a blameless man.
Many want that.
They aim for that kind of goal,
but they few reach that,
that blamelessness.
He was a godly man.
He walked with God.
That term there,
Noah walked with God,
is something that is used
very rarely in the Old Testament.
It is spoken of about Enoch.
It is spoken of about Abraham.
It is spoken of about Isaac
and some godly kings.
And that's it.
And when you combine
all those characteristics
of being blessed
and being righteous
and being blameless
and walking with God,
I want you to understand
the impact
that that has upon your life.
For one,
you are spiritually alert.
He knew the judgment
of God was coming
because he walked with God.
Nobody else seemed
to have a clue apparently.
But he knew it was coming
because he walked with God.
He was spiritually alert.
Not only that,
but he was spiritually accurate.
He was aiming
in the right direction.
He was surrounded
by the ungodlessness
of the day
and yet he was blameless
and above reproach.
It wasn't that he was
a little bit better
than everybody else.
No, he was blameless
and above reproach.
That means that people
didn't say anything bad about him
and if they did say something about him,
somebody was going to straighten you out
if you said something.
That whole phrase
that Noah was blameless
and above reproach
just hangs over me.
What a testimony.
What a place to aim.
to be blameless
and above reproach.
Not only that,
but he was also
spiritually consistent.
He steadily walked with God.
Not only was he made stronger
by that,
but he impacted
other people's lives.
He was a herald
of godliness.
I mean,
as Noah was exposed
to the holiness of God
in his walk,
he became more aware
of the wickedness
around him.
And it's cyclical
the way this works
because the more aware
of the wickedness
around him,
the more he realized
the coming
of the judgment of God.
And the more he realized
the judgment of God
was coming,
the more he considered
the evil of the world.
And the more aware
of that that he was,
the closer he walked
with God.
And the closer
that he walked with God,
the more he was aware
of the judgment of God.
Out of the overflow
of that spiritual life,
he lived blamelessly
blamelessly before the Lord.
He lived,
he walked obediently
before the Lord.
And he spoke openly
about the Lord.
And what,
what may seem ironic
about all that,
I don't believe it is,
is the name Noah
means rest.
Debatably,
the busiest man
on the earth.
He had a big boat to build.
Yet his name
means rest.
That's what
a blameless walk
and talk
with God
will do for you.
In the midst of the busyness
and the chaos,
God will give you rest.
Hebrews 11 verse 7
says that he worked
with a reverent fear.
That means that he had
a reverence
and an obedience
to God
that motivated him
to let nothing
come in the way.
Nothing.
Not,
not his misunderstanding,
a flood.
Many believed
it hadn't even rained yet.
And here he is
preparing for a flood.
How do you wrap
your head around that?
He didn't let his
weariness get in the way.
He built a big old boat.
He didn't let his
weariness come in the way.
He didn't let the ridicule
come in the way.
I mean,
he was blameless
and right,
but people would say,
you know,
he's blameless
and he's right,
but is he all right?
What's he doing?
Not the stress
of the job
ahead of him.
Did you realize
that once he
got that thing built,
what was in front
of him?
For one,
he was going to be
on a boat
with his family
for a year,
you know?
But besides that,
he was a cruise
ship manager
for thousands
of animals.
Nothing
came in the way
of him being
used by God.
And I'll tell you,
in a day of wickedness,
God uses
the person
that lives out
God's purposes
for his or her life.
The person
that's blessed
by God.
The person
who's willing
to be a blessing
for the Lord.
God wants people
who live
a consecrated life,
a solid witness
for the Lord,
a reputation
without blame,
that have a solid
daily walk
with God.
God's
love.
That's why
he'll use you today.
May there not
be any
hindrances
in our life
from being
everything
that God
would have us
to be,
from doing
everything
that God
would have us
to do,
than accomplishing
all
that God
has set forth
for us.
May nothing
come in the way
of that.
And so I ask
today,
what is it
in your life
today
that serves
as a hindrance
from you being
everything that God
would have you
to be?
I'm not
talking about
10 years
ago.
I'm not
talking about
20 years
ago.
I'm not
talking about
two weeks
ago.
Let's deal
with today.
What is it
today
that keeps
you from being
everything that God
would have you
to be?
for some
of you,
it may be
that although
you have a
knowledge of
the Lord,
an awareness
of Him,
the reality
is when you
look at your
life,
you've never
entered into
a relationship
with Christ.
You've never
surrendered your
life to follow
Him.
You've never
confessed your
sins before Him.
You've never
asked Him to
forgive you and
to come into
your life and
change you.
You've never
entered into
a relationship,
never been
saved.
And if that's
the case in
your life,
I've got news
for you.
Today's the
day of salvation.
He'll meet
you where you
are and change
you forever.
And maybe you
have done that,
but the reality
is there's areas
of your life that
are not pleasing
to God.
You've not been
obedient about God.
Maybe you've
done that privately
and never made
it public.
Jesus, by His
example and by
His commission,
tells us that
our faith ought
to be made
public.
We need to
let that be
known.
Or maybe you
have all that
down, but you
don't have
everything down.
And there's
some things you
need to put
down at the
altar and leave
them today so
that you can be
used of God,
not for great,
mighty, earth-shaking,
life, world-changing,
but just be ready
to do what God
wants to do in
your life.
Let nothing come
in the way of
what God wants
to do in you.
May we honor God
with everything that
we are.
With every head
bowed,
with every
eye closed.
God wants to
love.
I don't know how
God speaks to
you today, but I
know you'll never
be happy unless
you are obedient
to Him.
And so I would
encourage you to
just simply be
obedient to God.
If you've never
given your heart and
life to the Lord,
I'd love to guide
you in that
process.
If you've never
been baptized as
a believer, but
you've got a
personal relationship
with Him privately
and never made
that public, you
come.
We'd love to
guide you in
that.
Maybe God's
drawing you to
this church.
This is where
God would have
you to go.
I encourage you
to join us.
You invest in
us, we invest
in you, we grow
together.
We get it done
for the kingdom's
sake.
Or maybe you just
got something in
your life that's
gnawing on you
today and the
Holy Spirit is
eating your lunch.
Whether it's in
the pew where you
are or whether it's
at this altar, it
don't make any
difference.
Let's just get
rid of it.
Let's just take
care of it today.
Let's make a
commitment to not
let anything in our
life be a hindrance,
to be everything that
God would have us
to be.
We're not looking
for the grandiose,
we're just looking
for obedience.
Just do whatever
it takes to be
everything that God
would have us to be.
Lord Jesus, I love
you and I thank you
for the life of
Noah.
How inspiring and
how encouraging it
is to me to know
that you meet us
where we are, you
make us what we
need to be, and you
guide us to be
everything that you
have us to be, and
you use us for your
purposes.
God, today, speak to
our hearts and lives
and give us the
willingness and the
fortitude and the
obedience to do
exactly what you
would tell us to do.
Nothing more and
nothing less.
Lead us right now
during this time, I
pray.
In Jesus' name, amen.