Covenants 6

The Covenants of God
Part 6—The Noahic Covenant

Reading: Gen 8:20-9:17

* Todayt, we look at the Noahic Covenant—promised before the flood, consummated after the flood.

* Finally, is this a Covenant?

“…A covenant is an unchangeable, divinely-imposed, legal agreement between God and man that stipulates the conditions of their relationship…”[1]

*Criteria

(1) A Covenant is something conceived and established by God Himself, with a man, a family, a nation, or creation—This is a covenant established by God Himself, with Noah’s family and with all the creatures who survived the flood.

(2) The scope of a covenant is defined by God—this covenant has a universal scope.

(3) A Covenant may be conditional (a works covenant) or unconditional (a Grace covenant). This is unconditional—God will do what God will do, regardless.

(4) A Covenant is monergistic, one-sided, dictatorial—God is the ruler and judge of every covenant He makes with man. That is certainly the case here.

(5) The times for a covenant are established by God—this covenant is called “everlasting.”

(6) Covenants always involve blood and cutting. Noah makes a sacrifice.

(7) Covenants have rules and regulations of administration and enforcement. God gives very definite rules about human conduct.

(8) Covenants are so named by God—this is the first named covenant.

1. The Noahic Covenant

a. The Covenant Promised (quym beryth)—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.

b. The Noahic Covenant Consummated

(1) The Participants

(a) God
(b) Noah and his sons and their families and descendants—Gen 9:8-9
(c) All living creatures! 8:10
(d) The sign of the covenant—8:12

(2) The duration of the Covenant—8:15-17. The Sacrifice of the Covenant—Gen 8:20-21

c. The provisions of the Noahic Covenant

(1) The Command to multiply and replenish is repeated here—Gen 9:1
(2) Man is given different food—9:2-4

(a) Man was not authorized to eat meat before this.
(b) It may be that in the violent, pre-flood world, meat was eaten, but it was not legal.
(c) Now, God institutes the eating of meat.

(3) Murder is Forbidden, and Capital Punishment for murder is mandated—9:5-6

(a) Capital punishment is legalized.
(b) God had set a mark on Cain to protect him, but now capital punishment is mandated for murderers.

(c) The opponents of capital punishment accuse the government of murder—that is not the Biblical definition of murder. The Biblical definition of murder is when an individual consciously, purposely, and deliberately kills another human being.

(d) Capital punishment is not murder—it is God’s ordained way of dealing with murderers.

(4) Multiplication is contrasted with murder—7 And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.

(a) God loves people; God loves life; God loves babies.
(b) The murder of the unborn stinks in God’s nostrils, and is a rebellion against every covenant, every instruction, every Law, that God ever ordained.
(c) How curious that the pagans who oppose God, the liberals, are usually for abortion, but against capital punishment (and they want to save the whales and the sand fleas too).

(d) The life of a murderer is too sacred to take; the life of a whale must be protected; the life of a sand flea is precious beyond measure, and the government should protect all of them, but the life of an unborn baby is nobody’s business but the mother’s? That is so idiotic that I fail to understand how intelligent people can buy that horse manure!

(5) The key promise: God will not again destroy the Earth with a flood—Gen 9:8-18
(6) The warning implicit in the promise: He will destroy it in another way!

2. Similarities and Differences With What Has Gone Before

a. Similarities

(1) The command to dominion—this has never changed.
(2) The command to multiplication—this has never changed.
(3) The command to overspread the Earth—this has never changed.
(a) Note, man’s desire to gather in cities and leave the countryside barren and deserted seems to be a natural rebellion against this command.
(b) Cain founded a city, Nimrod founded a city and an empire.

b. Differences with what had gone before.

(1) Meat may be eaten, and Capital punishment is legalized.
(2) This is a covenant—this is the first covenant.

c. Observations

(1) Worship not regulated—God gave no laws, regulations, or ordinances for worship. This was a primitive, rudimentary Covenant with no development of a priesthood, etc.
(2) Few written laws except for murder.
(3) The way of salvation is not specified.
(4) But, as with Adam and his first descendants, the people left alive after the flood start with a basic knowledge of God, and as before, civilization declines rapidly, along with knowledge of God—* Rom 1:18-25

3. Criteria for a Covenant

a. Was the Noahic Covenant conceived and established by God Himself?

(1) Yes, it wasn’t anyone else’s idea.
(2) Noah did not propose it!
(3) Noah would not even have known about the need had God not told him.

b. What was the scope of the Noahic Covenant?

(1) All humanity
(2) All other living creatures

c. Was it conditional or unconditional?
(1) It was unconditional
(2) Was it monergistic, that is, was the Covenant with Noah totally God-dominated?
(3) Yes

d. What were the times established by God?

(1) “Everlasting”
(2) God’s definition of “everlasting” for this covenant: Gen 8:22 "While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease."

e. Did the Noahic involve blood and cutting?
(1) Yes—Noah made a sacrifice

f. Did the Covenant have rules and regulations of administration and enforcement?

(1) Yes
(2) They were mainly the same as the ones in God’s instructions to Adam, with some things added.

4. Did Man Obey God’s Instructions?

a. In a word—NO—Gen 11:1-4

b. Man was told to overspread the Earth, and man gathered in one place a built a city— Gen 11:8-9

(1) God confused the languages
(2) The overspreading of the earth began again.

5. Applications—“As it was in the Days of Noah…”

a. Is the Noahic Covenant Still in Effect?

(1) First, note the time frame—it is an everlasting covenant. That makes it not time limited by any other factors except by the existence of the earth. Gen 8:22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

(2) None of the provisions of the Noahic covenant are fulfilled, superseded, abrogated, or changed by subsequent covenants. (Note, this will be the case when the present earth no longer exists.)

(3) Therefore all of the provisions of the Noahic Covenant are still in place. If you are a living creature of any kind you are under this covenant right now.

b. The specific provisions of the Covenant today.

(1) The Command to multiply and replenish is still in effect. Carried through from the first instructions given to Adam and here included in the first Covenant, we are to multiply and fill the earth.

(a) Note that one of the great pagan movements which we must fight is the movement to kill children through abortion.
(b) Too many kids, too many kids! Where are our priorities?

(2) The family, established by God, is still the basic building block of society— Gen 9:8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, 9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;

(a) The pagans attack here as well:
(b) Fornication
(c) “Alternative lifestyles,” homosexuality, lesbianism, etc.
(d) The destruction of the family through the seduction of materialism, etc.
(e) Free and easy divorce, adultery, etc.

(3) Man is still the dominant creature—we are the stewards of the earth. The pagan animal rights movement challenges this continually.

(4) Man may still eat meat.

(a) Again, note that this is one of the areas that the pagans revel in attacking.
(b) Animal rights, vegetarianism, etc.

(5) Murder is Forbidden, and Capital Punishment for murder is mandated—

(a) The same Law of God that says that individuals are not to murder, is the Law that requires the government to enforce that law with the ultimate punishment.
(b) The Liberal left, with their opposition to capital punishment, again flies in the face of God.

(6) Multiplication is contrasted with murder— Gen 9:6-7

(7) God will not again destroy the Earth with a flood—Gen 9:8-18

(8) Note, in our day, mankind seeks to overthrow The judgment of God with respect to man’s violation of this covenant, which was the division of the nations.

(a) Leading American politicians of both political parties are speaking openly of doing away with nations, of having one world government.
(b) Students of Bible prophecy know that this will happen—it will happen when the “man of sin,” or Antichrist is revealed and sets up his one world government.

c. The warning implicit in the promise—God did not say He would not destroy the Earth, only that He would not destroy it with a flood.

d. The warning is actually made quite direct in the New Testament—

(1) Mat 24:37-38
(2) Luke 17:26-27
(3) 2 Pet 3:10-11
[1] Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, MI, 1994, page 515.