Noah and Genealogy

Noah and His Genealogy
Quotes:
"History is indeed the witness of the times, the light of truth."
Cicero
"The past is never dead. It's not even past."

William Faulkner
"Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it."
George Santayana

The Power of Genealogy

Introduction
We are studying the Story, God’s Story. The story is told through a history of families; those families are grouped into genealogies.
• What are genealogies?
• Why are so many in the Bible? Do I have to read them?
Cain in Gen 4,
Seth in Gen. 5,
Numbers mostly genealogy, a listing of the clans of Israel,
Matthew and Luke: Jesus’

• How do genealogies help us?
Can a family line be changed?
Illus.: Living Rock mums: any hope to change the single mum lifestyle?
Can we help? What can we do when our friends make the same mistakes over and again?

• Why is this offensive or boring?

Why is this offensive or boring?
I. We find genealogies boring and offensive, because
1. Offensive because we are children of the Enlightenment, unbound by the past.
"Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it."
George Santayana

2. Boring, because it is someone else’s genealogy, not our own! We are not conscious of the personal connection.

Rom. 11:17 ¶ But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the rich root of the olive tree,
Rom. 11:18 do not be arrogant toward the branches; but if you are arrogant, remember that it is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you.

What are genealogies?
II. Genealogies are the record of a family.

Gen. 5:1 This is the record of the family line of Adam. ¶ When God created humankind, he made them in the likeness of God.
Gen. 5:2 He created them male and female; when they were created, he blessed them and named them “humankind.”

Notice the transition here:
Gen. 5:3 ¶ When Adam had lived 130 years he fathered a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and he named him Seth.
Adam was created in the image of God.
Adam fathered children in his own likeness.

Gen. 5:4 The length of time Adam lived after he became the father of Seth was 800 years; during this time he had other sons and daughters.
Gen. 5:5 The entire lifetime of Adam was 930 years, and then he died.

Such large numbers!!
Refer to blog for discussion of life-spans: Hard Sayings of the Bible…
1. Human beings were created to be immortal.
2. As sin took effect, humans could no longer have children in old age.
3. The form that Genesis 5 and 11 use, with few exceptions, is a stereotypic formula giving the age of the patriarch at the birth of his son, the number of years that he lived after the birth of that son, and then the total number of years that he lived until he died. It is the question of the function of these numbers that attracts our attention here.

Gen. 5:6 ¶ When Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh.
Gen. 5:7 Seth lived 807 years after he became the father of Enosh, and he had other sons and daughters.
Gen. 5:8 The entire lifetime of Seth was 912 years, and then he died.
Gen. 5:9 ¶ When Enosh had lived 90 years, he became the father of Kenan.
Gen. 5:10 Enosh lived 815 years after he became the father of Kenan, and he had other sons and daughters.
Gen. 5:11 The entire lifetime of Enosh was 905 years, and then he died.
Gen. 5:12 ¶ When Kenan had lived 70 years, he became the father of Mahalalel.
Gen. 5:13 Kenan lived 840 years after he became the father of Mahalalel, and he had other sons and daughters.
Gen. 5:14 The entire lifetime of Kenan was 910 years, and then he died.
Gen. 5:15 ¶ When Mahalalel had lived 65 years, he became the father of Jared.

Gen. 5:28 ¶ When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.

Gen. 5:29 He named him Noah, saying, “This one will bring us comfort from our labor and from the painful toil of our hands because of the ground that the Lord has cursed.”
Gen. 5:30 Lamech lived 595 years after he became the father of Noah, and he had other sons and daughters.
Gen. 5:31 The entire lifetime of Lamech was 777 years, and then he died.
Gen. 5:32 ¶ After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
How would you describe your legacy to this time?
Six word biographies. Not Quite What I Was Planning
Scott Birch claims "Most successful accomplishments based on spite."
Quit booze, coffee, cigarettes, women, died.
Shower. Shave. Shine. Work. Sleep. Repeat.
I’m my mother, and I’m fine. K. Bertrand
9 year old Hannah Davies considers herself
"Cursed with cancer. Blessed by friends";

Why are there so many genealogies in the Bible?
III. Genealogies in the Bible are important because the remarkable stories recorded are historical.
a. Genesis is a genealogy:
i. Of the human species.
ii. Of the key people in the species: tables of family lines make the outline.
iii. Of the human condition.

How do genealogies help us?
IV. Genealogies are summaries of God’s purposes expressed through human lives.

Applications:
1. Understand how your genealogy impacts you.
Ex. 20:4 ¶ “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.
Ex. 20:5 “You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,
Ex. 20:6 but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

EBC:
Children who repeat the sins of their fathers evidence it in personally hating God; hence they too are punished like their fathers.
Moses made it plain in Deuteronomy 24:16: “Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sin.”
The effects of disobedience last for some time, but the effects of loving God are far more extensive: “to a thousand [generations]“ (v.6).

Turner The concluding refrain of each generation is ‘and he died’. Only two deaths have been recorded prior to ch. 5, and both of these were murders (4:8, 23). Here we learn that death is the common human fate, whether through murder or otherwise. The fulfillment of God’s prediction ‘you shall die’ (2,17) may have been delayed, but come it does. Yet not all die!

2. Genealogy matters to those whom we love.
Jonathan Edwards contrasted with a contemporary.
George Marsden, Jonathan Edwards, A Life
[500-01] One famous study…celebrated Edwards’ contribution to the moral character of America through his descendants. The work, published in 1900, contr4asted the character and intelligence of 1,200 descendants of one of his most dissolute contemporaries to those of 1,400 of Edwards’ heirs. The descendants of Max Jukes, a New York Dutchman whose name the researchers changed to protect the guilty, left a legacy that included more than three hundred “professional paupers,” fifty women of ill repute, seven murderers, sixty habitual thieves, and one hundred and thirty other convicted criminals. The Edwards family, by contrast, produced scores of clergymen, thirteen presidents of institutions of higher learning, sixty-five professors, and many other persons of notable achievements.

3. Genealogy is the visible manifestation of our faith.
a. Rom. 4:16 ¶ For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace, so that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all,
b. Rom. 4:17 (as it is written, “A FATHER OF MANY NATIONS HAVE I MADE YOU”) in the presence of Him whom he believed, even God, who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist.

4. Genealogy cannot be changed from behind, but it can be transformed forward.

a. Cain in Gen. 4; Seth in Gen. 5: POINT: THERE IS ALWAYS A GODLY SEED!!

b. When we are born again, we are born into a new family, with a new lineage. All things are made new. By faith, we can change the trajectory of our family line. Many will rise up and call us blessed because the arc of the story turned in our lifetime.
2Cor. 5:17 So then, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; what is old has passed away–look, what is new has come!

c. 5:1—made in the image of God,
born in the image of Adam;
being remade in the image of Christ.