By Jill Roberts and Michael Canalé
Michael has a high standard that he has set for this blog. It is as follows:
“Very good means you can do better, yet it is is where many stop. Great is the pinnacle of whatever you are doing. It happens when you couldn’t have done better.”
This is what we have attempted to achieve from day one of these blogs. Today, as we write about the very mind of God, this mandate has never been more at the forefront of our own minds.
In this regard, we want to begin by stating that, while we will, to some degree, recount the story of Noah and the Flood, it is almost tangential to that about which we are really writing. Michael and I want to keep the standard he has set and to, in the process, travel WITH you, our readers, to something great – an odyssey into the mind of God, as it relates to this well known passage of Scripture.
Some might be thinking about now, “Wait a minute! Doesn’t the Bible clearly state that knowing God’s state of mind is impossible?”
The answer is “Yes,” but “No.” Our feet firmly planted in midair, let us explain.
The “yes” aspect of our answer comes from the writing of Paul in Romans 11:33-34:
“Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God; how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out.
For who has known the MIND OF THE LORD? Or who hath been his counsellor?”
(emphasis added)
KJV
HOWEVER,…Jesus, himself, said that, “The things which are impossible with men, are possible with God.” (Luke 18:27) KJV. How? Paul also gives us this answer in 1 Corinthians:
“…no one knows the THOUGHTS OF GOD except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit is from God, so that WE MAY UNDERSTAND what God has freely given us.”
(emphasis added)
1 Corinthians 2:11-12) NIV
The KJV says such understanding is,
“ spiritually discerned.”
(1 Corinthians 2:14)
So, can we know what God was thinking in the story of Noah and the Flood? Yes, if the Spirit reveals this to us. That He do so is our prayer.
When we ended last week’s blog, Michael and I had presented the dilemma facing the God of the Universe, that is, that mankind had gone from praying to God to having become all evil, all the time, especially with regard to violence. (Genesis 6:5,11) NIV. In the midst of this complete failure of civilization and God’s plan, was one exception: Noah and his family, who were obedient to God and found His favor. (Genesis 6:8) NIV.
As to this divine dilemma, God’s mind was decisive in arriving at a solution: He would bring about a flood of such proportions that water would cover the Earth. Was God’s state of mind to do this immediately? Certainly, this was easily within His power to orchestrate. Was God acting in a fit of pique and precipitously wiping out every living person and animal on the planet? Would the decision to flood occur one day and the flood on the next? Not al all!
Depending on the Biblical scholar you believe, from the time of God’s resolve to flood until the first drop of rain began to fall, either 75 or 120 years had passed. There is Scriptural authority for both lengths of time, but this blog is about the mind of God and will not address the merits of each.
God doesn’t do anything without a reason, we would all agree. He very deliberately chose to rescue Noah and family in an ark, something that would take a significant amount of time to build.
Secondly, God made another important choice He chose to save Noah and family, yes. The relevant question is, who was Noah? Our answer is found in 2 Peter 2:5: Noah, very significantly, was,
“ …a PREACHER of righteousness…”
(emphasis added)
NIV
What was a preacher? “In the Greek, ‘preacher’ is translated, ‘herald,’ or an official entrusted with making public proclamations of a transcendent nature.” (“Got Questions article, “What Does it Mean That Noah Was a Preacher of Righteousness? 2 Peter 2:5.”)
Did God leave behind a scholar, in his books all day, a farmer, busy in his fields, or a shy man and one slow of speech? No. It was not a coincidence that the spokesman God allowed to know about the upcoming disaster, was a PUBLIC SPEAKER whose VERY PROFESSION was to make important announcements of a SPIRITUAL nature! And Noah was righteous, a truly good man who was in the business of influencing others to also be good, as well as telling them what was going on in the realm of the spirit – God’s realm.
What was God’s state of mind? He was clearly moving slowly so that a professional preacher could warn of the flood and bring that world away from its violence. Noah had the decades of time and the established talent to do this well.
Michael said,
“This man built the boat in the middle of nowhere, where there was no water. Imagine what people thought. God got their attention. Then Noah spoke.”
This God of Second Chances did not have a mind of anger; He had a mind of hope. There was still a way to save His Creation from their horrific ways – time and a man named Noah. God knew that Noah was righteous and that he would give it his all to bring this endlessly evil world to their own arks. Noah knew the dimensions of an ark that could save. Would he not have shared these with anyone willing to turn from their ways.Tragically, there was apparently only laughter and derision during the years of the construction of a massive boat in a sea of dry land.
Michael and I are purposely omitting the story of the Flood itself. This is well known and is outside the theme of this week’s blog.
After the flood, Noah immediately built an altar to God. (Genesis 8:20) Upon it, he performed a sacrifice of an animal, a subject we will consider in depth in later blogs.
Highly significantly, the Noahic Covenant, an agreement between Noah and God, was established. In this, God gave instructions that are reminiscent of those given to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. This is extremely illuminative of God’s state of mind:
“Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth…Everything that lives and moves about will be good for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.”
(Genesis 9:1,3) NIV
What does this tell us about God’s thoughts and intentions? Clearly, He was trying to reestablish Eden. He tried it with a covenant between Him and Adam and Eve. It failed. Now, His mind was set on trying to start afresh with Noah. There was a similar condition in each covenant.
In Eden, there was one tree of which they could not eat. With Noah,
“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood in it.”
(Genesis 9;4) NIV
God gave man free will and with that a choice.
Then, with Noah, God began to give His laws.
He warned him that if one took the life of another, he would forfeit his own life. Genesis 9:6) NIV. It is critical to remember that God later refines this in such a way that what He said forms the underpinnings of our own just and fair system with regard to every level of homicide.
The question that we ask ourselves is: What was God’s state of mind then, in instructing Noah as to the penalty for murder? Surely, prominent in God’s mind was one name – Cain. God had tried mercy, after Cain, with malice aforethought, murdered his brother, Abel. God placed a mark on Cain to PROTECT AND SPARE HIS LIFE, lest anyone seek to administer the death penalty, taking matters into their own hands. When man, surely many of Cain’s descendants, turned to complete violence, how was God’s mercy to Cain returned? It was all escalating crimes of brutality and bloodshed. So, God increased the punishment. His state of mind? He is God and, knowing the future, He saw the cross and Jesus on it. Yes, of course. But, God viewed as crucial these centuries of effort to try everything else first.
If we could summarize the entire Old Testament, would it not chronicle God’s attempt at this. When Jesus, prostrate on the ground in Gethsemane, asked his Father whether it was possible for the cup to pass, God would have tried everything, and an enormous part of that record would be the entire Old Testament itself. Why was this critical when He already knew the outcome? It is a question for the ages.
Finally, we ask ourselves, Who is this God of the Old Testament? Was He self satisfied and content after the Flood? Was He happy to have decided to flood the Earth? Two words tell us the answer to these questions: NEVER AGAIN:
“The LORD…said in his heart: NEVER AGAIN will I curse the ground because of humans, even though every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood, and NEVER AGAIN will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.”
(emphasis added)
Genesis 8:21) NIV
“NEVER AGAIN will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; NEVER AGAIN will there be a flood to destroy the earth…NEVER AGAIN will the waters become a flood to destroy all life.”
(emphasis added)
Genesis 9:11,15) NIV
What was God’s state of mind? It is a thought-provoking question, to say the least. Michael so wisely says,
“Don’t make the mistake of thinking that God is human. He is so much more complex than that.”
We leave this question of God’s state of mind to each of you, Spirit led, to decide. He will surely speak to us all when we reach out to Him with all our hearts.
When we each discover that answer, one certainty exists. He is the God of deliverance whether He is trying to deliver us or His own Son. And, these two are inextricably entwined. As Michael said, how complex this is. How mighty this God.