Working Preacher Narrative Commentary for Sunday, 7 September 2014 with Scripture Genesis 6:16-22; 9:8-15

Working Preacher Narrative Commentary for Sunday, 7 September 2014 with Scripture Genesis 6:16-22; 9:8-15
Commentary on Genesis 6:14-16 “Build yourself a ship from teakwood. Make rooms in it. Coat it with pitch inside and out. Make it 450 feet long, seventy-five feet wide, and forty-five feet high. Build a roof for it and put in a window eighteen inches from the top; put in a door on the side of the ship; and make three decks, lower, middle, and upper.
17 “I’m going to bring a flood on the Earth that will destroy everything alive under Heaven. Total destruction.
18-21 “But I’m going to establish a covenant with you: You’ll board the ship, and your sons, your wife and your sons’ wives will come on board with you. You are also to take two of each living creature, a male and a female, on board the ship, to preserve their lives with you: two of every species of bird, mammal, and reptile—two of everything so as to preserve their lives along with yours. Also get all the food you’ll need and store it up for you and them.”
22 Noah did everything God commanded him to do. 9:8-11 Then God spoke to Noah and his sons: “I’m setting up my covenant with you including your children who will come after you, along with everything alive around you—birds, farm animals, wild animals—that came out of the ship with you. I’m setting up my covenant with you that never again will everything living be destroyed by floodwaters; no, never again will a flood destroy the Earth.”
12-16 God continued, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and everything living around you and everyone living after you. I’m putting my rainbow in the clouds, a sign of the covenant between me and the Earth. From now on, when I form a cloud over the Earth and the rainbow appears in the cloud, I’ll remember my covenant between me and you and everything living, that never again will floodwaters destroy all life. When the rainbow appears in the cloud, I’ll see it and remember the eternal covenant between God and everything living, every last living creature on Earth.” by Jacqueline E. Lapsley
The earth was so corrupted by violence that God decided to wipe out everything God had made.
This is a terrifying story, even before the digital special effects of the recent “Noah” movie. In our rush to tame the story, to divert attention from the shocking fact that God wants to destroy everything, we focus on the animals (“two by two”) and make thematic nursery room wallpaper. In the context of the larger primeval story (Genesis 1-11), however, the terror of the flood is not that surprising, even if it still shocks.
The evidence that the creatures God has made -- and especially the human creatures -- are extremely violent, has been amassing almost since the beginning. The disobedience of the first couple, which put themselves at the center of the meaning instead of God, sets up the disobedience of Cain; first the relationship between humans and God is damaged (Genesis 3), then the relationship within human community is damaged (Genesis 4). Violence is made possible by the disordered relationship with God. Cain’s descendent Lamech intensifies the violence (Gen 4:23-24) by reveling in vengeful murder. What was so beautifully ordered in Genesis 1 is now utterly disordered by violence.
So perhaps it is not so surprising that God would wish to do away with a project that has gone so badly awry. Of course, there is a “yet” in the story: “Yet I will establish my covenant with you … ” God makes a covenant with the “righteous” Noah (son of the murderous Lamech! Neither our biological nor social context determines our identity), because there is always a “yet” with God in the primeval story. God makes clothes for Adam and Eve, protects Cain from human vengeance, and now looks to continue the relationship with humanity in spite of their overwhelming violence.
Noah is tasked with bringing animals onto the ark, for in the new post-flood world, their deliverance will be as important as humanity’s. Richard Bauckham has shown that the phrase “each according to its kind,” repeated five times in Genesis 6:19-20 alone, really means “each according to its species” (Living With Other Creatures, Baylor, 2011). Noah, representing humanity, is to keep these creatures alive (6:20) for the sake of the preservation of the species. Likewise, human beings are to continue their charge of the food supply for humans and animals (6:21), a task originally commanded in Genesis 1:29-30. Humanity is charged with creating and maintaining conditions under which all God’s creatures can thrive.
This new era of God’s saving action is marked by the announcement of the first of several covenants in the Old Testament. God makes a covenant with Noah and with every living creature on the earth never to destroy them or the earth again (9:11, 17), and the sign of this covenant is the rainbow in the sky. This covenant signifies that God is in a sacred relationship with all humanity and all creatures, that God desires their flourishing. Today widespread extinction of species and many natural disasters are the result of human exploitation. Humanity’s crucial role in ensuring the flourishing of all God’s creatures (announced here in Genesis) is today widely ignored or outright rejected.
In addition to announcing the divine covenant with all creation, God also blesses Noah and his sons, but something in the blessing has changed since the blessings of Genesis 1. Here Noah and his sons are commanded, and in a sense, promised, to be fruitful and to multiply, just as in Genesis 1. But instead of simply having dominion over the animals, a kind of benevolent guardianship, as in Genesis 1, a new element appears here in 9:2: “The fear and terror of you shall rest on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the air, etc. Into your hand they are delivered.” The harmony of the ordered world in Gen. 1 is here displaced by terror, and a profound alienation between human beings and the rest of creation.
The next verse (verse 3) notes a further consequence of the cleavage between humans and animals: where prior to the flood everyone was a vegetarian, now meat-eating becomes a reality. As with the curses in chapter 3, the fear and terror in this passage are not part of the divine will for creation. This is not prescriptive on God’s part, but descriptive. That is, this account of the human relation to creation accurately depicts reality as we live it. The Bible accounts for this situation by reference to the human propensity for sin and violence. Meat-eating is a concession to the animal (including the human animal) propensity for violence.
This is the only biblical covenant between God and all living creatures, yet its importance is often downplayed. While this covenant is often treated as unilateral, that is, the emphasis is all on God’s promise not to destroy, the covenant also makes demands of humanity: we are charged with fostering conditions under which all creatures can flourish, by ensuring they have habitats to live in, and by facilitating a sustainable food supply.
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John Wesley's Notes-Commentary:
Genesis 6:16-22; 9:8-15
Verse 17
[17] And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.
And behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth — I that am infinite in power, and therefore can do it; infinite in justice, and therefore will do it.
Verse 18
[18] But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.
But with thee will I establish my covenant — (1.) The covenant of Providence, that the course of nature shall be continued to the end of time, not withstanding the interruption which the flood would give to it: this promise was immediately made to Noah and his sons, Genesis 9:8, etc. they were as trustees for all this part of the creation, and a great honour was thereby put upon him and his. God would be to him a God, and that out of his seed God would take to himself a people.
Verse 9
[9] And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
We have here the general establishment of God's covenant with this new world, and the extent of that covenant.
Verse 11
[11] And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
There shall not any more be a flood — God had drowned the world once, and still it is as provoking as ever; yet he will never drown it any more, for he deals not with us according to our sins. This promise of God keeps the sea and clouds in their decreed place, and sets them gates and bars, Hitherto they shall come, Job 38:10,11. If the sea should flow but for a few days, as it doth twice every day for a few hours, what desolations would it make? So would the clouds, if such showers as we have sometimes seen, were continued long. But God by flowing seas, and sweeping rains, shews what he could do in wrath; and yet by preserving the earth from being deluged between both, shews what he can do in mercy, and will do in truth.
Verse 13
[13] I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.
I set my bow in the clouds — The rainbow, 'tis likely was seen in the clouds before, but was never a seal of the covenant 'till now. Now, concerning this seal of the covenant, observe, (1.) This seal is affixed with repeated assurances of the truth of that promise, which it was designed to be the ratification of; I do set my bow in the cloud, Genesis 9:13. It shall be seen in the cloud, Genesis 9:14. and it shall be a token of the covenant, Genesis 9:12,13. And I will remember my covenant, that the waters shall no more become a flood, Genesis 9:15. Nay, as if the eternal Mind needed a memorandum, I will look upon it that I may remember the everlasting covenant, Genesis 9:16. (2.) The rainbow appears when the clouds are most disposed to wet; when we have most reason to fear the rain prevailing, God shews this seal of the promise that it shall not prevail. (3.) The rainbow appears when one part of the sky is clear, which imitates mercy remembered in the midst of wrath, and the clouds are hemmed as it were with the rainbow, that it may not overspread the heavens, for the bow is coloured rain, or the edges of a cloud gilded. As God looks upon the bow that he may remember the covenant, so should we, that we also may be ever mindful of the covenant with faith and thankfulness.
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Sermon Story for Sunday, 7 September 2014 by Gary Lee Parker
Many generations after God created the Heavens and the Earth, He looked down and saw the evil the humans were doing to each other, His creation, and Himself. From the disobedience of the first created humans to God's rule to the murder of a brother by a brother to the continuous violence of humans against human, God had decided to wipe out the whole creation with a flood and start over agains. As he looked around, He saw a man who was more righteous than any other peraon on the earth. This man's name was Noah. God spoke to Noah saying to him that He is going to make His covenant with him and his wife and sons and their wives to preserve them to start anew. God stated that Noah was to build a ship that could hold all his family members plus two of every animal creation by species. Noah obeyed God and build the ship according to the specifications God has given to him. After the flood came and all creation was destroyed except for Noah and his family as well as the species on the ship, God again said to Noah that He was going to make His covenant with Noah and his family placing a rainbow in the clouds of the sky to show that He was not going to destroy the earth by flood anymore. This was a promise of God for all humanity. 
What people do you realate to or not relate to?
How do understand the destruction God did to His own creation?
How will live out God's promise in your life and family relationships?
May we listened to a song written and song by a contemporary artist, Bob Dylan. The Song is "2 X 2":
One by one, they followed the sun
One by one, until there were none
Two by two, to their lovers they flew
Two by two, into the foggy dew
Three by three, they danced on the sea
Four by four, they danced on the shore
Five by five, they tried to survive
Six by six, they were playing with tricks

How many paths did they try and fail?
How many of their brothers and sisters lingered in jail?
How much poison did they inhale?
How many black cats crossed their trail?

Seven by seven, they headed for heaven
Eight by eight, they got to the gate
Nine by nine, they drank the wine
Ten by ten, they drank it again

How many tomorrows have they given away?
How many compared to yesterday?
How many more without any reward?
How many more can they afford?

Two by two, they stepped into the ark
Two by two, they step in the dark
Three by three, they’re turning the key
Four by four, they turn it some more

One by one, they follow the sun
Two by two, to another rendezvous
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