I wonder if the story of Noah impacts other people as much as it does me? I’ve already blogged about it three times:
In 2009 I wrote a blog titled Shut In & Remembered about how it was God who shut the door behind Noah and his family after they entered the ark, and then it was the Lord who remembered them and sent a wind to cause the flood waters to recede. What pictures of protection and compassion.
I wrote a second blog that year titled Worship First about how Noah’s first action – his FIRST action – when he got off the ark was to build an ark and worship God. After being cooped up in an ark with all those animals, he didn’t enjoy the freedom of running in the fresh air and he didn’t stand with the sun streaming down on him. He bowed and worshiped. Wow!
In 2012 in a blog titled A New Lesson from an Old Story I rejoiced at God going above and beyond when he repopulated the earth with plants before he even released Noah from the ark. I had always pictured Noah stopping off the ark into a world that had been devastated by the flood. Not our God! He prepared the land before releasing Noah and his family into it.
In today’s Resting at the River’s Edge readings, a different aspect of the account of Noah impressed me. The story of Noah begins with a simple verse:
But Noah pleased the LORD.
Genesis 6:8 (NCV)
It is followed several times by verses like this one
Noah did everything that God commanded him.
Genesis 6:22 and 7:5 (NCV), with similar verses in Genesis 7:9 and 7:16
Noah pleased God. And God asked him to do what would seem to be a wildly crazy thing – build an ark because it would rain for forty days and forty nights. Noah had never seen rain because the earth had been watered by springs from the ground prior to the flood. But Noah did everything that God commanded him. The desire of Noah’s heart was to please God. It was such a strong desire that he did an outlandish thing when God requested it. There isn’t a hint of complaint from Noah anywhere in the story. (And you know there was plenty to complain about – how foolish he looked to those around him as he built the ark (not to mention the cost of it), how closed in, dark and smelly the ark must have gotten, how long it must have seemed that he had to care for all those animals. It couldn’t have been a pleasant time of serving the Lord.)
Lord, I want to please You! Give me a heart that says “Yes!” to you without complaining!
The story ends with a lesson –
Then God blessed Noah…
Genesis 9:1 (NCV)
God blesses those who please Him and those who are obedient.
I would not have wanted the assignment God gave Noah. Sometimes I don’t want the assignments He gives me. I have found, though, that no matter how hard they seem at the time, they carry God’s blessings.
Next week we’ll begin a new series – Living from God’s Heart! It’s a series about developing a heart that pleases God and living out of that heart. Noah had a heart for God and lived from his heart. Be watching for our introduction to the series in the next few days.
Entries (RSS)