A Portrait of Biblical Manhood in the Life of Noah

Well if you have a copy of God's Word, if you would go ahead and turn to Genesis chapter 6. That's where we'll be in the scriptures this morning. Genesis chapter 6. We're going to look at verses 8, 9, and 10. We might, if we have time, we might also jump over to another portion of these early chapters in Genesis, but we'll just see what all the Lord allows us to get to. But first off, let me just say it's good to be back with you. Let me also say it's good to have a voice this time. The last time I was with you I don't think I had a voice the entire time. And then I also blamed you.

Those of you that came to True Church Conference after that, I didn't have a voice when you were there either. So this is the first time the Lord has given me a voice that's not cracking and raspy to actually be able to preach to you guys. And so I have enjoyed having a voice to be able to preach God's Word. Let me also say, because my senior pastor told me to make sure that I did this, let me say good morning from Grace Life Church of the Shoals. Brother Jeff told me to make sure that I told you that. He also said to tell you to make sure that I told you that He loves you, that Grace Life Church loves you, that Anchored in Truth loves you.

Many of you have been able to come to the True Church Conference in February. If you have not, this is your official invitation. We would love to have you there. We'd love for you to come and hang out with us for a few days in Muscle Shoals, get in on some of the preaching and the fellowship. It's your family just like it's my family. It really is the partnership that we have in the Gospel and for missions and for church planting and all that goes with that. And so please come. I believe the registration just started actually. And so hopefully you guys will have a good group to be with us.

I really have enjoyed spending time with the men and the young men of Grace Life Church this weekend. I want to start off just by catching the ladies up. And if you've been unable to be at some of those men's meetings that we have had, even if you are a man or young man here, I want to catch you up with what we have looked at thus far in God's Word and then introduce you to where we are going both this morning and tonight. We began Friday night over in the Fellowship Hall and we looked at lessons from the 12 men closest to Jesus. We did that from March, Chapter 3.

And we spent about half of our time looking at a brief historical sketch of each of the 12 disciples that the Lord summoned to Himself. And then we spent the back half of that sermon looking at some application from those men, from their lives, how God was working in their lives, how God was working through them, how He had pieced them together. And so that's where we began on Friday night of this Acts Like Men weekend. And then yesterday we had a wonderful time out at Lake Lincoln. Enjoyed some good burgers, some good fellowship. And we looked at 1 Chronicles, Chapter 11.

At a man, a lion, a pit, and a snowy day we looked at the man who we know as Beniah from 1 Chronicles, Chapter 11. And we made some points about how his dad, how his father had influenced him through the example of being a valiant man before him his entire life. We thought a little bit about the courage that is necessary if we were to be faithful men of God today. We talked about how faithful men of God, Biblical manhood includes serving in the position that God has given you. And then we ended by looking at the greatest Biblical man that has ever been known, and that is the Lord Jesus Himself.

And so we have sought to be challenged from God's Word. In our walks I have been challenged as I have studied and preached. I hope that your men have been as well. We have sought to be challenged to journey further towards Biblical manhood during this weekend. And we've looked at men from Scripture who serve as both positive examples and then also at times as negative examples. But ultimately we have sought to look to Christ, the only truly Biblical man. And so we're going to continue that this morning by looking at a very familiar Bible character. His name is Noah here in Genesis, Chapter 6, Verses 8 through 10.

And then when your pastor Chris asked me to stay on and preach Sunday night, I said, "Well, since I will have preached three messages to the men, I don't want the ladies to feel left out." So how about we end with a message to the ladies? And so we're going to do that tonight from Proverbs, Chapter 31. So ladies, I hope that all of you will be back and we'll let you get in on this Act Like Men Weekend by ending with a message to all of you. But Genesis, Chapter 6, Verses 8 through 10, we learn from a familiar Biblical character named Noah a little bit about Biblical manhood.

And once again our hope is not to just look at Noah, but ultimately to cast our eyes toward Jesus when we finish up with our time today. Now, I have six traits of Biblical manhood that I want us to see from Noah's life. I'm going to go ahead and tell you this. I seriously doubt that we're going to get to all six of these traits. And since I don't believe time will allow for us to get to all six of them, I'm just going to go ahead and list them for you. And so if we get to three or if we get to four, you'll know at least what those next two are going to be and you can study the text on your own and draw some conclusions.

So here are your six at the beginning of our sermon. Let me cover these and then we'll just see how many the Lord allows us to get to. Number one, Noah was a recipient of God's favor. Characteristic of Biblical manhood, number one from Noah. Noah was a recipient of God's favor. Number two, Noah was a righteous man of integrity. Noah was a righteous man of integrity. Number three, Noah walked with God. Number four, Noah was a father. Number five, Noah was obedient to God's word. And number six, Noah was a sinner in need of a sacrifice. Noah was a sinner in need of a sacrifice. Let's read our text this morning, Genesis 6 beginning in verse 8.

"But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord." These are the records of the generation of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time. Noah walked with God. Noah became the father of three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Let's pray. Father, we do thank you for your word. I thank you for the worship and song that we have already gotten to partake of this morning. I pray that not only that, but the testimony time this morning, I know that has already taken place as well. I pray that these have worked to prepare us to receive the Word of God.

Father, I am reminded of what one said, that the highest form of worship that we have here in this life and in your local church is the preaching and the receiving of the preaching of your word. Father, I thank you that as we have spent time in your word already this weekend, Lord, these brothers have been faithful recipients of the Word of God. Lord, we've had questions and further comments about it. Lord, I thank you for that evidence of grace in their lives, and I pray that it would be evident once again today.

And yes, Father, as we think about biblical manhood once again this morning, really many of these traits are things that are applicable just to every Christian. And so I pray that there will be application for both men and ladies here today so that we may live lives that glorify you and that point people to Christ. And we pray these things in his name. Amen. Biblical portrait of manhood from Noah. Number one, the characteristic we see first is that Noah was a recipient of God's favor. Or you might want to word at this point this way, Noah was a recipient of God's grace.

God's unmerited favor is just one way that we talk about God's grace in our lives. Church, the ultimate characteristic of biblical manhood is not toughness, though I think that's important, and we've seen a little bit of that from Beniah and some of the twelve that we looked at on Friday night. It's not grit, that's a good characteristic. It's needed today. We don't need any effeminate young boys or effeminate men. We need tough, gritty men that are going to serve the Lord. The ultimate characteristic of biblical manhood is not strength, that's important. It's not courage, we looked at that yesterday, that is important as well.

It's not something like gentleness. By the way, God's word says that a biblical man is a gentle man. It's one of the marks of godliness that we see among elders listed in the pastoral epistles. The ultimate characteristic of biblical manhood is not love. It's not any of a number of these characteristics that are good, that are virtuous, that are biblical, that are taught to us in God's word. But the ultimate defining characteristic of biblical manhood, of godly manhood, must begin with an examination of whether or not one has found favor in the eyes of God.

After all, we can't have biblical manhood or godly manhood apart from one having experienced the grace of God in being a recipient of the unmerited favor of God in his life and in his heart. Noah had experienced this. The portrait of biblical manhood begins with a simple recognition by the man of a couple of different truths that are true of all of us, both men and women alike. The first truth we see in Genesis 6, 5 through 6, when it says, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thought of his heart was only evil continually.

The Lord was sorry that he made man on the earth, and he was grieved in his heart." You see, if a man is going to be a biblical man, and we can also see if a woman is going to be a biblical woman or a godly man or a godly woman, it must begin with him or with her recognizing their own sinful, depraved nature before a holy God. There is no path towards biblical manhood or biblical womanhood that runs down another course other than you recognizing your sinfulness before a thrice holy God. You must come to a recognition that you really are who the Scripture describes you as. And here in Genesis 6, we see that that description is not a good one.

Let me just read those verses again. "What did the Lord see when he looked down at his creation, at least among men and women? He saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth. He saw that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. As a matter of fact, there was so much wickedness, and there was so much depravity in the heart of man that it says the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and that he was grieved in his heart at the sight of this wickedness." So if you are going to be a biblical man, you must come to a conclusion about yourself.

If you are going to be a biblical or godly woman, you must first come to a conclusion that you know what? Before God, I am a wretched sinner. I am depraved. I am wicked in my heart. And on the heels of that, you must also come to this conclusion, conclusion number two, and it is a recognition of your need for God's gratuitous mercy and grace to grant you favor in his eyes. It's not a work that you can do. It's not an amount of effort that you can produce. It is simply an act of God's gratuitous mercy and grace that he could change you from being someone who is filled with wickedness to being someone that he now looks upon with his favor.

Have you come to realize, sir, that you are a great sinner? Ma'am, have you come to realize that you are a great sinner before a holy God? Have you come to terms with the truth that the thoughts of your heart are only evil continually? Now maybe you would say, "Well, you know, Brother Matt, I mean, I agree that I'm a sinner, but now I don't know about that whole thing about the thoughts of my heart only being evil continually." Well, yes, you may, in God's common grace, have some thoughts that are not as evil as the next person, but if those thoughts are not focused and centered on God's glory, and centered around you and your selfish pursuits, then those are evil thoughts.

Have you come to the point where you have cast yourself on the grace of God as the only means you have to find favor in the eyes of a holy God? And when I say casting yourself on the grace of God, I don't mean just casting yourself on the theological precept of the grace of God. I mean casting yourself on the grace of God as it is seen in Titus 2, 11 and 12. There it says, "The grace of God has appeared bringing salvation to all men." So what does this tell us about the grace of God? The grace of God is found in a person. It is found in the person and work of Jesus.

You know, sometimes you hear people talk about the plan of salvation, but our pastor likes to say it this way, "We should talk more about the man of salvation." That's Jesus himself. Because God's grace, yes, is the unmerited favor of God, but it is seen and demonstrated most through the person of his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And by the way, when we experience the grace of God through the saving work of the Lord Jesus Christ, here's what it does in our lives.

Titus 2, 12, "It instructs us to deny ungodliness and to deny worldly desires and rather to live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age." When you are captivated by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, it changes you. That's why there's no path to biblical manhood or womanhood apart from experiencing the grace of God in the person of Jesus Christ. Only the man of salvation can give you a new heart, a heart that desires to live differently than what you had been living out in your sin. And so we must always start with the gospel when we think on topics such as manhood or womanhood.

We can't settle for simply a pragmatic approach to be a better man or a better woman. We must begin by recognizing that we are in need of the transforming grace of God to change our lives and give us a right standing before God, and that is exactly what we see in Noah. Noah was a man who had found favor in the eyes of the Lord. Point number two. Noah was a righteous man of integrity. Noah was a righteous man of integrity. Back to verse 9 in our text. These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time.

What we learn about biblical manhood from verse 9 is that the man who honors God is one who strives for a holy life or a righteous life, one who lives a life of integrity that is described as being blameless or above reproach among others. However, before we talk about what it means to walk in this manner, and we'll get there in just a moment, let's consider the context, the historical context, in which Noah lived in this manner. You see, verse 9 starts there by saying, "These are the records of the generations of Noah." Why is that placed there in the text? Well, here's why I believe it's placed there in the text.

This phrase, placed here prior to the description of Noah being a righteous man of integrity, is meant to point us to the context in which Noah lived. What was going on around Noah in the world in which he demonstrated this biblical manhood that resulted in a righteous and blameless life? Well, we just read it in verses 5 through 7, but let's read it again. Here's what Noah had to encounter. Here's what he had to live among in his day. Verse 5, back up in Genesis 6, "The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great." You know what was surrounding Noah in his day when he was living a righteous, holy, blameless life? Wicked men.

Not only that, it says that the wickedness of man was great on the earth. Every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Evil, you know, brothers and sisters, sometimes we are trapped in a time warp, and we can look at the day we live in, and by the way, there's a lot of wickedness in our day. There's a lot of evil in our day. And we'll begin to say, "You know what? There's never been wickedness like we see around us now. Just look at it. Look at what's in the news. Look at what's on social media. People are just glorying in the Senate. By the way, that's true." But you know what?

Our day, I don't believe, was as bad as Noah's day. It's bad, but not like Noah's. It was so bad at this point that the Lord said, "He was sorry that he had made man on the earth." It says, "He was grieved in his heart." Why? Because he could see the wickedness of man. "So grieved that the Lord said in verse 7, 'I will blot out man, whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things to birds of the sky, for I am sorry that I have made them.'" One scholar said it this way concerning the day in which Noah was living, that nothing was more corrupt than this age that Noah lived in.

He goes on to say that, "If at the present time the morals of men are so vitiated and the whole of life is so confused, still more vile and dreadful was the confusion in the time of Noah, when he had not even one associate in the worship of God and in the pursuit of holiness." No matter how bad it may be in the here and now, you know what you've got? A family of people at Grace Life Church that you can come in and have a bit of a sanctuary with each other every Sunday and every Wednesday. You can look out at the world and say, "My goodness, Lord, it's going crazy out there.

There's just evil and there's wickedness abounding." But you can always come here and you've got brothers and sisters in the Lord that He can encourage you. You know what Noah had? You know how many people he had? Zero. None. Wickedness abounded in every corner of this early society. It definitely was an evil day. And yet, in the midst of this wicked day, Noah was said to be a righteous man, blameless in his time. Let me ask you, church, what is your excuse for not living a righteous, blameless life in our day with all that we have at our disposal for encouragement, for teaching, for accountability, and for discipleship? What's your excuse?

Noah had a lot of them. Noah could have looked around and said, "Well, Lord, there's nobody here to encourage me." He could have looked around and said, "Well, Lord, I don't have a small group to go to on Sunday." Noah could have looked around and said, "Lord, I don't have a preacher. I don't have someone who's preaching the Word of God to me." Noah could have said, "Lord, I don't have any of these resources. I don't have books on biblical manhood and books on biblical womanhood." And by the way, he would have been right. Yet, in spite of that, he lived righteously, pursuing a life of holiness, a life of being blameless in this day.

So what's your excuse while you're not pursuing that sort of path in life? You know, church, a big part of biblical manhood, a big part of biblical womanhood, ladies, is walking against the grain of the wicked culture that surrounds us. That's just part of it. It means standing your ground when evil is assaulting you and your family on every front. It's hard at times. It's difficult. It means not being the guy or the lady who's most popular. It means you might be lonely at times. You don't think Noah was lonely at times? I bet he was.

The type of fortitude and strength of character needs to be taught in our homes, needs to be taught in our churches, needs to be exemplified by parents, needs to be taught in our small groups. Men, you need to lead out in this, in the local church and in your families. You need to attend and belong to a healthy church, one that's seeking to be a church that lives righteously in this age, that belongs to a church that pursues holiness, that values it. Again, one scholar said, "If Noah could bear up against the corruptions of the whole world and against such constant and vehement assaults of iniquity, no excuse is left for us.

We should with equal fortitude of mind prosecute a right course through innumerable obstacles of vice." More can be said, but let's get to more of our outline. Point number three, not only was Noah a recipient of God's favor, not only did Noah walk in a blameless way, he was a righteous man of integrity, but number three, we see that Noah walked with God. How was Noah able to live a righteous and blameless life in the world in which he lived, with the evil that surrounded him, with the wickedness that was so prevalent in his day? Well, here in this phrase, I believe we have the answer.

He was able to live a righteous blameless life of integrity because Noah walked with God. In Genesis 5, verse 22, we see this same description used of Enoch there when it says that Enoch also walked with God. I believe I'm correct on this. Noah and Enoch are the only two individuals in the Bible that are given this description. Now, we know that other people walked with God. Of course, we know that many believers are obviously highlighted in God's Word, but Noah and Enoch are the only two individuals that are described by saying that they walked with God.

Now, brothers and sisters, I'll go ahead and tell you, I am not exactly sure all that is meant here in regards to this phrase. Possibly walking with God is similar to walking in the fear of the Lord. We see that in the Proverbs, right? The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord. Maybe that's at play here in what it means to walk with God, a reverence of the Lord. Possibly this reference includes Noah's being God-centered in that his focus was on God rather than on the thoughts and opinions of man. In Genesis 4, 26, we read there in that chapter that at that point in biblical history, men began to call upon the name of the Lord.

Maybe that has some bearing here in this description of being one who walks with God. Possibly Noah was a man who spent much time in prayer calling upon the name of the Lord. Maybe it's a bit of all of those that we see contained here in this phrase. But whatever the phrase includes, the point is that Noah maintained a vibrant and personal walk with the Lord during his days on this earth, a vibrant and personal walk with the Lord. In our present time, brothers and sisters, there again is never an excuse for a disciple of the Lord Jesus to not walk with the Lord.

In our present time with the completed canon of Scripture that we have at our disposal, with the family of God's people in the local church, for all of you of Grace Life Church of Brookhaven, we have a pretty good idea of how we can maintain a vibrant and personal walk with the Lord, do we not? In 1 Timothy 4, verse 7, speaking of the spiritual disciplines I believe here, Paul told Timothy this, to discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness. Growth in godliness travels along the rails of personal discipline. There's no way around that.

If you are not personally disciplining yourself to spend time in God's word, to spend time in prayer with the Lord, then your growth in godliness is going to be stunted. It just is. If you don't personally discipline yourself to eat nutritious food, your physical health is going to be stunted, is it not? There's just no way around it. And you know what? For most of us, we're not always real disciplined about that, are we? And so for most of us, we walk around saying, "You know, that would probably do good to lose 6 or 8 pounds." Why? Because we weren't real disciplined, and so our physical health has been stunted.

The same is true of our spiritual lives as well. When we don't spend time in God's word, and we're not disciplined to pray and seek the Lord through prayer, then our spiritual life, our spiritual vitality is stunted. It doesn't go in the direction that we desire for it to. But you know what? Growth in godliness, walking with the Lord, is not just a personal venture. There is also a corporate aspect to our growth in the Lord. Have you ever considered that? Most of the time when we think about growing in the Lord, we do. We think of those personal spiritual disciplines.

Reading the Bible, reading good Christian books, praying, all those things that we can just do, us and the Lord. But you know what? Scripture says there's a corporate aspect to your growth in godliness. Consider this when Paul writes to the church at Ephesus in Ephesians 4, 11 through 16. It says, "And he gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints." Now remember, this is being written to a local church. He's not writing this to an individual. He's writing it to a church.

So as the Lord gives those people those gifts in the local church, He does it for the equipping of the saints, for the work of service. Now what does that result in? To the building up of the body of Christ. What is the building up of the body of Christ? That's your growth in godliness. That's speaking about your own walk with the Lord. But here, there is a corporate aspect to that. You can't just be you and Jesus, and you're going to grow in the way the Lord wants. That's not how He's designed it. Yes, you need you and Jesus, but you need the people of God, the local church, to have a vibrant personal walk with the Lord.

So it results in the building up of the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. Now you know when we will all attain to being a mature man or woman and to the fullness of the measure of sanctification which belongs in Christ? You know when we'll attain to that? We're not in this life. When we go to be with Him, we'll attain to that. But in the church, we're constantly seeking it, are we not? We're pursuing it. We're pursuing it by having an Act Like Men weekend.

We're pursuing it every time we come in here and preach the Word of God. We're pursuing it every time we meet in our small groups classes. We are seeking to grow up as the body of Christ, to maintain and progress in a vibrant personal walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. He goes on, "As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness and deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth and love in the church.

We are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body..." Now Paul uses a physical metaphor here about the physical body, but he's using it to demonstrate a spiritual truth. "...from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by every joint supplies..." Think about your physical body, it fits together, all those joints, all those sinews, all those bones, all those muscles, it fits. And when all of it's working properly, you have health, you have physical health, you have physical growth.

And as all those things do what they're supposed to do, according to the proper working of each individual part, it causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself and love. Now we get that physically. You know, throughout my time I'll do, I like to be active, I like to be outdoors, I like to exercise, and there are times when that pursuit of being an outdoorsman and exercising has led to some injuries in my life. Several years ago when my boys were younger, we were playing just backyard pickup basketball, I went up for a rebound, came down, tore my ACL. I mean, my knee just buckled straight out from under me.

When I was in high school playing football, broke some bones in my lower back. Never knew how much your back controlled until you don't have it, you know, and then all of a sudden it's like, "I can't do nothing with a bad back." I had two hernia surgeries that probably were a result of working out and doing things, but, you know, every time I've had one of those injuries and one of the parts of my body doesn't work, you know, it just stunts everything in my body. You know, when your knee just buckles out from under you, you don't walk with confidence anymore. When your back hurts, everything hurts. That's what I discovered.

What you discover is, you know, I need this whole body so that I can progress in godliness. And you know what? All of you need to grow in godliness is the spiritual body of Christ known as the local church. And you don't need just a little bit of them. You don't need just a once a month of them. You need them constantly. You need each other if you were to grow in maturity. The New Testament knows nothing, the Old Testament knows nothing of a sort of lone ranger Christianity. I know it all. Y'all don't know any of it. I don't need y'all. I've got my own thing. That's just not the church. It's not what the Lord taught.

So there is a corporate aspect here to maintaining a vibrant and personal walk with God. Men, you will be equipped to walk in a manner worthy of the gospel as a righteous man of integrity and strengthen for that task as you walk closely with God day in and day out. And that includes both your personal spiritual disciplines and that includes your discipline of being inside the corporate body of Christ known as the local church. There's no other method. What a wonderful description of biblical manhood. Simple and yet deeply profound. Noah walked with God.

Of all the things the Men of Grace Life Church of Brookhaven can be known for I pray that this description will be the most common one. Whatever else the community may say about you men at this church I pray that when they are honest they will have to say, "But you know what? Those men do walk with God." I'd be satisfied with that, wouldn't you Pastor Chris? Let me follow that description. We've got time for a couple more at least. Number four, this was pretty simple. Noah was a father. Again there in Genesis 6, Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. These are the records of the generation of Noah.

"A righteous man blameless in his time." Noah walked with God. Noah became the father of three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. We've got a lot of fathers here. I've seen a lot of young guys walking around. They were all enjoying triple stacked burgers out at the lake yesterday. Some of them were getting a few more sprites than they needed to. But that's what Act Like Men Weekend is for. You get a little bit more sugar than you should. You go out there and you romp and stomp and get dirty and nasty. That's what guys do. You've got to enjoy that at least one weekend out of the year every once in a while. Noah here is a father.

Now, we're not told a lot of details about what parenting might have looked like. We know he had three boys, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. It's important in our narrative because these three boys, along with their wives, would be the ones ultimately responsible for replenishing the earth with mankind as the flood would come and then they would have to repopulate the earth. But for our purposes, in looking at this biblical portrait of Noah, let's take notice that a big part of Noah's vocation in an ancient culture, in an ancient world, would simply for him to be the dad to Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Now, again, not much is given to us here in our text on his fatherhood. We can only imagine, considering the historical context we have already made note of, that parenting children in a day such as Noah's probably was difficult. Sometimes we have this glorified vision of the past. Oh, if we could just go back to the 40s or to the 50s or to the 60s, man, things were so much more pure. No, they weren't. They weren't more pure back then. The challenges might have been different. They might have been labeled differently. They might have looked different. Sin is sin.

I mean, right here in Genesis 6, there was no more evil day than right here in the early days of creation. So this was probably a difficult day to be a righteous man, to be a righteous father when you were surrounded by families that did not hold to these same values. Again, consider this. There was no local church family to aid Noah in his parenting. Aren't you thankful that you have a local church that can help you as a dad, as a mom, as a man, as a woman? I'm thankful for that. But Noah didn't have that. There were no books containing sound biblical principles to help Noah in this task.

How did he ever make it without the latest guru on how to raise your children? There were no other godly men who he could confide in on parenting matters. At this point in redemptive history, the completed canon of Scripture was not available to guide Noah. And on top of all this, he was living in a day filled with wickedness, surrounding them on every side, not exactly the ideal conditions for parenting. But then again, today's environment is not much better. Sin and corruption are celebrated in new ways today. Evil is called good at times, and good is called evil in our day.

And yet God has given many of us the task of being parents to young people in this age. And men, he has tasked you with being fathers so that you might lead out in shepherding those in your home. Thankfully, we do have many more resources to which we can turn to in our day. Let me just list them. I have a lot of Scripture here, but we're not going to turn to that just for sake of time. Number one, we have the Scriptures. Praise the Lord. You have a deposit of divine wisdom, men, that can aid you in being a faithful father. Now, notice I'm not saying being a perfect father. There are none of those.

Just a faithful father, maybe like Jehoa that we saw yesterday that lived a valiant life before Benaiah, that performed many mighty deeds before Benaiah. Benaiah learned from his example. You have the Scriptures. You have texts like Deuteronomy 4 and 9 and Deuteronomy 6 and 7 and Ephesians 6 and 4 and Colossians 3 and 21. Fathers, you have a very particular role in parenting as you lead out in your home. And you must take that seriously and you must base it on the Scriptures. And by the way, please base it on the Scriptures and not the latest book, the latest fad, the latest gimmick, the latest guru on how to do family stuff.

Base it on the Scriptures. What does God's Word say? And then be faithful to that. Say more about this tonight, maybe with the ladies because I think they face it more than men. But we have too many voices that are telling everybody how exactly their family has to look today. And you know what? Many of them, they're not drawing it from God's Word. There are principles here that we must all be faithful to, but there are also liberties within each family that we can enjoy. That's alright. You know what? The Fowler family probably doesn't look like the Shepherd family. The Shepherd family probably doesn't look like the Fowler family.

That doesn't mean either of us are not being faithful. It means we're just seeking to be faithful to the Scriptures in the midst of the family dynamics that all of us have. You know, at Grace Life Church for the Shoals, that leads some people to home school. That's wonderful. That's okay. We did some of that when our kids were younger. Some people end up in a Christian school. Some people end up in a public school. You can be faithful in every venue. There is no Scripture that says thou shalt do it this one cookie-cutter way. There are principles that we live out, right? And the Scriptures give us those, not some family guru.

But only do we have the Scriptures. We have the Church. We're seeing a repetitive theme here. It's probably a theme your pastor hits on. It happens in the local church. It doesn't happen without it. Our church family helps us in a number of different ways in our parenting. Men learn from the example of older men here at Grace Life Church of Brookhaven on how you can be a faithful dad. Seek counsel. Seek advice. Don't pretend that you know it all. You know what I have learned more than anything else is I have gotten older and my kids have gotten older. I have learned how much I don't know.

A common refrain for me in trying to be a faithful father is praying this, "Lord help." That's about it sometimes. That's kind of where I've landed on a lot of it. "Lord, please give me wisdom." And sometimes he gives us that through our brothers in the local church that have gone before us. Involve your children in the life of the church body. Help them cultivate relationships with others that are seeking to honor the Lord. Put the life of your family into the path of divine wisdom by making your close associates those who aspire to honor the Lord and live according to his wisdom and are doing it in the local church.

Again, there are no excuses, brothers and sisters, as to why you can't pursue and go hard after seeking to be a faithful parent, a faithful dad, a faithful mom if you are a member at Grace Life Church of Brookhaven. You don't have that excuse. You have resources. You have the Word of God. You have a faithful local church family. Lean into those things. Now let me give you a caution because we see it here in Noah's life. Turn with me real quickly to Genesis 9. Parenting is not a math problem. You know how math problems work, right? Let's just think of a simple one. Two plus two equals four every time. At least I think it still does, right?

Two plus two equals four. You know, you have a formula. You take two, you add two, it always spits out four on the other side. You know what? That's not how parenting works. Parenting is not "Teach them a Bible verse, take them to church." That always equals salvation. I wish it did. But that's not what we see even in Noah's life, who was a man who had experienced the divine grace of God, was a righteous man of integrity who was walking with God. In Genesis 9 verses 18 through 27. Now this is post-flood. So the flood is done. And then we hit this account. And it's part of Noah's journey and fatherhood.

"Now the sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem and Ham and Japheth. And Ham was the father of Canaan. These were the three sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated." Verse 20. "Then Noah began farming and planting a vineyard." Now this is a mark on Noah we'll get to in a minute. "He drank of the wine and became drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent." Now that's Noah's sin. We'll talk about that in a moment. "Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father and told his two brothers outside.

But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it upon both their shoulders and walked backward and covered the nakedness of their father. And their faces were turned away so that they did not see their father's nakedness. When Noah awoke from his wine, he knew what his youngest son had done to him. So he said, 'Cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants. He shall be to his brothers.'" In this incident we see that apparently two of Noah's sons respond to their dad's sin in a pious and respectful manner.

"While Ham, the third son, responds wickedly, mocks his father, and brings reproach upon himself and upon Noah his dad." One scholar simply said it this way, "Thus Ham therefore must have been of a wicked, perverse, and crooked disposition. One described Ham in this way that he had a depraved and malignant disposition." Now here's my caution. Same dad, same man, experienced God's favor, walked in a righteous, blameless path of integrity, walked with God, fathered the same three boys that we see in Genesis chapter 6 that are now in Genesis chapter 9. Two of them it would seem went on to serve the Lord and to be men of integrity like their dad.

One went on to live out his depraved, wretched nature even in the very presence of his dad. Does that mean Noah failed? I don't think so. I mean, was he a perfect father? Absolutely not. I mean, if anyone here wants to claim that you've been a perfect dad, let's have a conversation about that afterwards. We'll probably all come to the conclusion that no, we've messed some things up. We just have to trust the Lord in these things.

Be careful, brothers and sisters, if you see a family and they have two children living for the Lord and one that's not, or they have no children living for the Lord, that doesn't necessarily mean they're bad parents. It doesn't mean they've been unfaithful. You know what? This leaves us as parents praying for more grace, does it not? It leaves us dependent upon God. You know what you can do in your own power to save your son or daughter's soul? Nothing. Zero.

Now you can be a faithful parent, you can involve them in the life of the church, you can give them the gospel, you can do all the things you're responsible for, but you know what you can do to save them? Zero. You're dependent upon the Lord. Noah was dependent upon the Lord. This leaves us pleading with God to work in the lives of our children. So Noah was a father. Last one, we'll skip one and we'll go on to this one because we just read it. Noah was a sinner in need of a sacrifice. We're going to end where we began, right? We talked about him being a recipient of God's favor.

Now we're going to end by seeing that Noah was a sinner in need of a sacrifice. Again, we see a sin there in Genesis 9, 20-21. Not that this was Noah's only sin, but this is the one that is highlighted for us in the Scriptures. "Then Noah began farming, this is post flood, and planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk and uncovered himself inside his tents." Lest we be tempted to think that Noah is the hero of his own story, here we read that he was a man who, like the rest of us, struggled with sin and temptation.

In these verses we see that he becomes drunk and he makes a spectacle of shame of himself by laying naked in his tent where others could come by and see him. And thus we see again, men as we have seen with pretty much all of the men we have looked at this week in our weekend, that even the best of men are still just men. Just men. We learn here that our battle against sin, brothers, is never over in this life. I mean, this is Noah in old age, an elder man, an old man. And it's Noah in old age after we have read that description in Genesis 6. He had led a blameless life amongst a godless culture. He had been a man of integrity.

He had walked with God. Think of all those flowery dispositions, descriptions that we have been looking at from Noah's life. And now all the way towards the end of his life, when you would think, "Well, you know what? Maybe that battle with sin is done." Maybe he's matured to the point that he no longer has to fight. He's lived such a life for all these years that now he can just kind of sit back and relax and he doesn't have to battle sin like maybe he did in his younger days. We learn that is not the case. In his old age, he fails and he fails publicly. Men, let me encourage you to keep up your fight against indwelling sin.

It doesn't matter if you're 17 or you're 77. Sin is crouching at the door and its desire is to rule over you. Never get to the point where you think, "You know what? I think I've got it. I think I've made it. I can relax a little bit in my fight against sin. I can take it easy in my walk with the Lord." The moment you begin to put down your defenses is the moment you end up where Noah did in Genesis chapter 9. Maybe it's not drunkenness. Maybe it's not something shameful and public. I hope it's not like it was in his life.

But again, a righteous man of integrity who walked with God, if he can end up here in Genesis chapter 9, then you and I can as well. Even older men are not immune from the fight against sin. Let's end like the Apostle Paul when he wrote to Timothy in 2 Timothy 4, "I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race." The other thing we ultimately learn from this event is that the best of men are still in need of the greatest man. Namely, the God-man who alone is the Savior of sinners like Noah and like all of us. You know, church, it's never our performance that guarantees for us a close walk with God.

And it's never our performance that guarantees for us a right standing before God. Christ, through his perfect life, substitutionary death and death-defeating resurrection, he earned that standing on our behalf. It's not, "Oh, I have been such an upstanding man. I now have a right standing with God." No. I appreciate a lot of the things that our current president is doing. Some of the stances he has had, some of the policies he has passed. But have you seen what he said about some of these peace deals he's brokering? He said, "Well, you know, I'd like to go to heaven one day and I think this is my way to get there." No, it's not.

It doesn't matter how many peace deals you broke, it doesn't matter what type of man you think you are. The only one who can earn your right standing before God is Jesus, the one who did it on your behalf through his death and resurrection. And you know, the notion of a sacrifice needed to please God was already dimly on the scene in Noah's day. Flip with me one more time, just exercising our thumbs here this morning to Genesis 8, verse 20. Post flood, they exit the ark and we see a very early dim picture that I believe ultimately points us to Jesus here in Genesis 8.

Noah built an altar to the Lord and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the Lord smelled the soothing aroma and the Lord said to himself, "I will never again curse the ground on account of man, for the intent of man's heart was evil from his youth and I will never again destroy every living thing as I have done." Noah saw dimly what you and I get to see in full fruition now and that was that there is a need for a bloody sacrifice to appease the wrath of God. And that's what he's doing in Genesis 8.

He exits the ark and he offers a bloody sacrifice of clean animals to God and that bloody sacrifice appeases the wrath of God for this time. That soothing aroma was an atoning sacrifice offered up to the Lord and he says, "I will never again flood the earth." Well, that is a dim picture of the soothing aroma that Jesus himself would offer to his heavenly Father upon the cross. And this time it was not about a flood, it was about an eternal wrath of God that would eternally be abated and erased for everyone that would look to Jesus for salvation. You see, we are no different than Noah.

We are but sinners in need of a sacrificed Savior and that sacrificed Savior is Jesus himself. I would like to think that at the end of Noah's life, knowing what God had brought him through, what God had used him to do, the sin that he had experienced, whatever failures he had experienced, that he had a thought similar to what John Newton thought in his dying day as well. And it's a thought that I hope every biblical man or woman has at the end of our lives. John Newton, as he was lying on his deathbed, in one of his final conversations with one of his friends, said this, "My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things.

That I am a great sinner and that Christ is a great Savior." May we have the same thought as biblical men, as biblical women. May we go into glory saying, "You know what? It wasn't anything I did. It was what Christ did on my behalf." Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the gospel. We thank you for your Son, the Lord Jesus.