Amen. What if you turn in your Bibles to the book of Genesis chapter 8, we'll be looking at verses 1 through 12 this morning, Genesis chapter 8, 1 through 12. Last time I tried to show, from the text itself, from the rest of Scripture, and even from the effects and creation, that the flood of Noah was a global catastrophe that really happened. The great criticisms against it, the boats itself, not big enough, we showed, I didn't give you this stat, but the smaller version, the smaller cubit version, would have 522 box cars, railroad box cars of cubic space. That's how much the smaller version would be equal to 522, you know, the railroad box cars. It could easily hold all of the animals, all the kinds of animals, all the food, plenty of room for Noah and his family to live, and there would have been more room. And the water, we saw the three sources of water, the interstellar water, which until just a few years ago, the majority scientific opinion was that's where all of our oceans came from water from space. So when God opens the windows of heaven, and we theorize that perhaps it was some interstellar water, why is that crazy? When the leading scientific theory, until 2014, was that's how the oceans got here, water from space, and the great fountains of the deep that the Bible talks about, again, in 2014 when they discovered more than three times all of our oceans put together is right now, that much water, right now, under the ground, scientists know that now, God would just have to break some of those up and let that water in, and again, I believe that the creation is to right that the mountains weren't as high, and the oceans weren't as deep, and as God carved out, the oceans and raised up the mountains, that's where the water went to, and then the water went back into the great deep, as the water went back into those places where we can see it now. By the way, Psalm 104, not in the New King James, but in the ESV of New American Standard, it declares that God raised up the mountains and lowered the ocean trenches. You don't get it again in the New King James because of the translation issue, but it says in Psalm 104 verse 5, you who laid the foundations of the earth so that it should not be moved forever. You covered it with the deep as with the garment, the water stood above the mountains, something every scientist believes today because of the marine fossils on top of the highest mountains. The water at one time stood above the mountains, and at your rebuke they fled, at your voice of thunder they hastened away, they went up over the mountains, and the valleys went down to the place you found to them. The mountains went up, the scripture says, and the valleys went down. God actually did that, and he did it at the time of the flood, and so we looked at those things. I didn't give you so many other stats that I could give you, and so many things that I wanted to talk about. One of the proofs that the layers are laid down rapidly, by the way, are all of those mega-sequence rock layers in every one of them. You have these great giant folds and twists and bends of rock layers for hundreds of feet, sometimes going back on itself, exquisitely perfect, unbroken, rocks don't bend. Those layers were laid down rapidly, and while they were still moist, pressure came in and bent them, and that's why they're hardened today. It happened much more rapidly, even as some scientists are starting to see a paper published in 2014, a lot of things happened in 2014, in Earth and planetary science letters, the title of the paper was Andes Mountains formed by growth spurts. It states this, that the Alta Plana Plateau in the central Andes Mountains, the Andes Mountains, South America, huge mountain range, one of the biggest mountain ranges in the world. The Alta Plano Plateau in the central Andes Mountains, and most likely the entire mountain range, was formed through a series, listen to this, of rapid growth spurts, isn't that interesting? Quote, this study provides increasing evidence that the plateau formed through periodic rapid pulses, not through, not through a continuous gradual uplift of the surface, as was traditionally thought and, quote, isn't that something? Periodic rapid pulses, creationists have been saying this for decades, and the most periodic and the most rapid pulse was the flood of Noah, that set the continents adrift from the one great continent, which again, by the way, the secularists, finally, in the middle of the 20th century admit, you can look it up now, that there was at one time one great continent on the earth, creationists were saying that for millennia, it's called Pansia, they have an import, Pansia, they discovered it when they discovered continental drip, which they did not believe in, until the mid-20th century, and that it's the continents smashing into each other that formed the mountains, right, subduction and abduction and collision and all that, they admit that now, and they're starting to come around, but again, we could go on and on and look at more and more, but what I want to do instead is move to the end of the flood. The end of this great catastrophic event that formed this world the way it is today, and consider this great judgment, a judgment beyond all judgments, the only things bigger than this is when Jesus comes again, but to consider how it was that the people of God and the rollinate of Him, weathered this storm, how they lived, how they responded, how they trusted in God's mercy, even in the midst of enduring the great judgment upon the earth that deeply affected them. And I want us to see that and apply that in our own lives, because if Noah and his family can weather the greatest judgment ever, relying on God's mercy, then hour, yes, your much smaller judgments and chastisements and difficulties that are very real to you, that maybe life and death to you, you can weather those storms. You can live by the mercy of God, just as Noah and his family did. And that's what I want to focus on in this text, let's pray as we turn to God's Word. Father again, bless the reading and the hearing of this Word. Let us understand it and let us believe in you through it and let us live better because of it. And we pray this in Jesus' name, amen. We are now the Word of the Lord from Genesis, chapter 8, beginning in verse 1. This is God's holy Word. Then God remembered Noah and every living thing and all the animals that were with Him in the ark and God made a wind to pass over the earth and the waters subsided. The fountains of the deep and the windows of heaven were also stopped. And the rain from heaven was restrained, again three sources of water. And the waters receded continually from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters decreased. Then the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat and the waters decreased continually until the tenth month and the tenth month on the first day of the month. The tops of the mountains were seen. So came to pass at the end of forty days that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. Then he sent out a raven which kept going to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth. He also sent out from himself a dove to see if the waters had receded from the face of the ground. But the dove found no resting place for the soul of her foot and she returned into the ark to him. For the waters were on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and he took her and he drew her into the ark to himself. And he waited yet another seven days and again he sent the dove out from the ark then the dove came to him in the evening and behold a flat, a freshly plucked, all of leaf was in her mouth and Noah knew that the waters had receded from the earth. So he waited yet another seven days and sent out the dove which did not return again to him anymore. The word of the Lord. I want you to know as first of all this morning God's mercy in the midst of wrath, God's mercy in the midst of wrath we recall that the deluge, the flood of Noah is the single greatest judgment of God, the greatest display of his wrath that will be until the second coming of Christ. As of his wrath is declared and the lake of fire is seen and all of that. But remember the flood was sent in chapters 6 and 7 to destroy all mankind from the face of the earth. That's why God sent the flood because of the sin of man and some wonder why did the flood have to take out all the animals then and destroy all the world. Well part of it is because man is over the earth. God created the earth in a sense for man and all the creatures in a sense for man. To rule over them, to subdue them, to have dominion over them. So all these things are part of man's way of glorifying God and honoring God. So when man falls into sin, the judgment comes upon everything. All of it's going to be judged because it's all man's as it were. It's his property. So it's all just, if you remember when Adam first sinned God cursed the ground. It's already happened. Everything becomes mortal now, including the animals because of man's sin. So there was already great judgment on the earth because of man's sins, thorns and fizzles now coming forth. I believe this is when a lot of the noxious creatures that pray upon dead things because you need something to get rid of the dead things now and parasites and all of that would have come forth in this time of judgment. But now the judgment comes and it's going to destroy everything, right? And God could have used the, just think of it. God could have used anything to judge man, right? He could have used fire, could have used an angel. I mean, other, other judgments, God sends angels to call on fire from heaven, think of Sodom and Gomorrah. Right? He could have just sent a disease. He does that among the Assyrians at one point. Wipe out all the wicked with the disease, but God chose a flood of water. Water not only is violent and powerful and destroys, but water cleanses, right? Water purifies. God created us that way that with water we wash things. We wash our hands, we wash our food or whatever. Water washes away the sin of the world. That's what baptism symbolizes, right? A washing away of our sins. And that's why Peter says that Noah's flood is a type of baptism, not that it actually does it. He said, not the actual washing away, but that it, that it's a plea for God to, for a good conscience that we look to God to do it, right? God's grace in the new birth, but, but baptism pictures that. And so water is used to show not just, not just to kill the wicked which God sent it for, but to, to purify the world, to, to begin again, God made the earth from water out of water through water. So with water he unmakes it. It's fitting when you think of it that way. And it shows forth again, God cleansing the, the, the, the filth of man, the sinfulness of man. Look at this, you know, many of the words for sin is, is filthiness and dirtiness, defilement, all of that water is purifying and cleansing. And so God is, is going to begin a new with Noah. And it's fitting to you that if Noah and humankind is reduced to eight, well, it's fitting that the animals would be greatly reduced to how else could man have dominion over them. So there's like a new beginning here, right, a new creation, but what was seen was this great act of God's judgment using this great flood and what we see in scripture in this text is God's mercy in sparing Noah and sparing the animals and sparing his family. And Habakkuk teaches us that we can pray to God in the midst of great judgments to remember his mercy. Remember the story of Habakkuk, Habakkuk's living in the time of the Babylonian captivity, well, just before it. And Israel is sinning greatly and Habakkuk sees the sins in the cries of the God. How can you continue to allow such wicked people to oppress such better people? And God says, I'm going to send the Babylonians and that's going to destroy the wicked. And Habakkuk doesn't like that answer. How can you send the Babylonians to judge Israel? They're worse than us. And remember God's answer to Habakkuk, the just shall live by faith. Believe in me, trust in me, and I'm going to, at my time, punish the Babylonians too. And so Habakkuk prays in chapter 3, verse 2, O Lord, I've heard your speech and was afraid. O Lord, revive your work in the midst of the years. Here it is, in the midst of the years, make it known, in wrath, remember mercy. That's what I want you to focus on, in wrath, remember mercy. That's what Habakkuk prayed, and no doubt Noah and his family would have prayed that a lot on the ark. For 150 days, they were tossed to and fro on the way. You know God never tells them how long it's going to take. Did on the ark, the Gilgamesh epic, it's the only last seven days. And all the other legendary flood, it's always last. 150 days before the flood ceases to increase, before it starts to go down, before the ark finally comes on and drowns itself on the mountains of Araran. On the fourth month, on the 29th day, they didn't know that it was going to end the next day, that the next day they're going to feel themselves breached as they were beach onto the land, even though it's still underwater. By the way, the displacement of the ark, most scholars, leave would have been half of its height, because that's standard for boats. So it was 30 qubits, so it would be 15 qubits, and remember God said, the waters covered the mountains for up to 15 qubits. So it could have gone right over the top of Mount Everest, at 15 qubits. But 150 days, they never told how long. This is the greatest maritime storm ever, and it was fearful, and yet God protected them, and they had God's Word of mercy. They had gone onto the ark, God told them to build an ark, to keep them alive. They brought, well, God brought the animals to them, and so God's keeping the animals alive, God told them to get food. They bring food on the ark, so they have all these tokens of God's mercy that prepared them for the judgment. And I want you to think about that in your judgment times, in your times of difficulty and your times of chastening, and we all go through them, whether it's chastening because we are in sin, and sometimes that happens to us, whether it's chastening because we're not in sin. And God is proving us, like he proved Job, Job went through what he went through, not because of any sin, but because of how good he was. And maybe that's where you're at today. Maybe you've been a faithful Christian, and God has brought difficult cheese into your life. And you need to remember the tokens of God's mercy that prepared you for this, the tokens of God's mercy, the things that Noah could look to. Well, he told us to build the ark, that's so that we would live. He brought the animals, that's so that they would live. He told us to put food on the ark, and we're still eating it, and we're still alive. He told us to bring seven clean animals, which means we're going to get off in worship. And so we've got to remember God's promise to be merciful, even in the midst of judgment. If you're a believer, Christian God has promised you ultimate and everlasting salvation, whatever temporal judgment has come into that, remember God's promises. And his mercy will find you in the end. God's mercy in the midst of wrath. We need to be able to trust in that. Secondly, I want you to notice God's good providence. God's good providence. Providence has been described as the invisible hand by which God causes his purposes and plans to come to pass. And everything is part of God's plan. God is overall sovereignly ruling all. Yes, the wicked are allowed and ordained in God even to do the things they do. We don't know how all that works out, but we know God's in control. There's got a single thing that's ever happened that surprised God that somehow wasn't part of his plan. Even evil acts, and they are evil. We don't want to ever say they're not evil, and God hates them. And yet for whatever reason or purpose, he uses them, right? We could think of Judas, but trained Christ, a heinous act. God hated that act, and yet it was spoken up 500 years beforehand that it would happen just the way it did, and even the price, 30 pieces of silver, who was named in Scripture. That was part of God's plan, what Judas did. Did Judas say, oh, I'm going to do this because I want God's plan to come to pass. No. Judas did it to get 30 pieces of silver, and so he didn't know that God was overruling his acts and his evil to bring about salvation. And that's the thing we have to remember in God's prophet, and sometimes we don't see the good. We don't understand how it's happening for a good. Sometimes all we see is, how can this be good? And maybe that's because we're focusing on the thing, and maybe the thing isn't good, and there's a lot of things that aren't good. But you've got to remember, the Bible doesn't say all things are good. It says, because of God's power, all things work together for good. And I want you to think of God's providence to know of. What did Noah and his family know while they were on the ark? What did they see? What did they feel? Well, for 150 days, pretty much darkness, you know, the dark clouds in the skies, rain falling. Yes, I know the torrential rain stopped after 40 days and 40 nights, but there would have been periodic rainfalls throughout the whole time. So ways, they would have been going up and down and up and down. I believe there would have been tsunamis, hundreds of thousands of feet high sweeping near it. These geysers coming out of the ground, remember that one little earthquake that caused that great tsunami in Japan, like 13 years ago, reshaped the coastlines? What do you think this is doing? That's a drop in the bucket compared to Noah's flood, but certainly God would protect the ark and the ark was built to the perfect buoyancy impossible to capsize, so it could ride up these railways and down, but that's all you would have felt for 150 days. And again, on on month four, day 29, you don't know that it's ending tomorrow. You don't know that you're finally going to stop drifting and that's the thing you've got to recognize. I know sometimes we go through judgments and I talk to Christians about this and we're caught up in the, this is the way it's going to be for the rest of my life and that's not true. My grandmother used to say in a hundred years' buster, you'll never know the difference. Whatever it was, there was bothering me in the moment. I used to not like it, which she would say that, but I wanted to be gone now, not a hundred years, but it's true that there's nothing in this world that we get so caught up in and so, you know, stressed out about that in a hundred years it's going to matter. The only thing that's going to matter is did you know Jesus? How did you live for him in the midst of that thing that seems so important at the time, but really, it really wasn't, it really wasn't that big a deal. Even if it is life and death, life and death in this world, we're all going to face that. Everybody's done it before us. Many have been faithful in that and we can be faithful. But we need to recognize that God's providence, again, is it work, ultimately for our good. Then we don't see it again. God could have killed all the wicked and steady has Noah and his family built an ark for decades being persecuted and hated and ridiculed the whole time. That's God's providence towards them. All of the labor, all of the hardship, all of the persecution, built an ark. God could do it himself in a moment, art, right? I mean, think of all that. God could have killed all the wicked. He wouldn't need to build an ark. God could send a disease. He didn't need to send a flood. God decides what he does. God decides. We're supposed to respond to that. We can pray and ask him to change it or to modify it. Sometimes that's the case. You think of Hezekiah told by the prophet, you're going to die, get your house in order. He cries out to God. God gives him 15 more years. I don't think that God won't change. We don't know His ultimate plan set in stone that's not going to change. We only know what we see. Pray to Him. Ask Him for mercy. We don't know what is decreed of, well, isn't it's not of your business? Your business is to ask Him to help you now. We are at it. I don't want you to think of God's providence in waiting 150 days. Why that long? God could have had the flood destroy people in a month in a week. And then the water could subside pretty quickly. It's not so bad, little boat ride. 150 days. The flood rages. All mankind would have been dead long before. And the flood rages. Think of God's providence. Think of the awesomeness of God. We have to get the on our tiny little things. Well, everything's not perfect for me now. So where are you God? 150 days on the ark. When did the last man die in the flood? 30 days in? 50 days? Certainly 100 days in. Everybody was dead. 150 days. If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, God was instilling great wisdom into those eight people. Was he not teaching them that I'm God and you're not? This is going to start again when I'm ready. And then God's slowly withdraws the tools of His wrath versus Ford five finally at the end of 150 days. The ark again scrapes onto land. They don't see it yet. They don't see the tops of the mountains for another three months, two and a half months. It's not until the 10th month. The ark rested in the 7th month on the 17th day of the month on the mountains of Eirat, verse five, and the waters decreased continually until the 10th month. So they're sitting there for three months, not moving. And the water's slowly going down, three months. And then the tops of the mountains were seen by who? By knowing. Nobody else there to see them. So much for the local flood, right? Topps of the mountains in the distance they can finally see peaks here and there. Ten months, three months just sitting there. Where's God? Not a single word comes to them, not a word. They were told about the flood. They were told about the ark. They were told about the animals. God used all these natural means to bring this supernatural flood, supernatural in the sense that He sent it. But we don't only see the only supernatural act in the whole flood of Noah is when God shuts the door. That's the only clear one. The other things could all be natural things. Again, the windows of heaven. I'm speculating. I can't imagine that when I say what the windows of heaven were, even the mountains of the great deep. But that seems pretty clear. We know there's all that water down there. And God says God opened up the ponds and they came out. And then the rain, 40 days, 40 nights again, a global rain, something our atmosphere conditions would not allow for now. But maybe somehow in nature it was possible then. Maybe that was supernatural too. All I'm saying is that God used all these natural means, but He gave a supernatural, reveal word that the flood was really going to happen, right? God spoke to Noah clearly and truly not according to the Russell Crowe movie, if you've seen that. With Methusel, I don't know, getting high on mushrooms and it wasn't saying, it's a good laugh though. He went a good laugh. God spoke to Noah, revealed it as clearly as I am, Noah heard from God. Now Noah's on the ark, 150 days and he's not hearing anything, right? And the water slowly, three months slowly going away, why so long? You know why? There's one very practical reason because God is using natural means, if Noah would have gone off the ark as soon as there was some land around them, they would have died, they would have died quickly. And do you ever been somewhere where there's been a massive flood? And there's places where you walk over and it's like it'll give way. And then mudslides come and avalanches and all sorts of stuff that happens and all kinds of flots and jets and all sorts of dead things and disease and stuff just bad. And so God keeps them on the ark as He's preparing the earth. You know, there needs to be time for plants to grow again so that they can get off and begin to plant. There needs to be soil. God is keeping them there for their good, they don't know that though, do they? And they don't know when to get off, but His delay was for their good. He's preparing the ground, He's making sure it's safe, it's once everything is dry, there's a lot of dry ground around, that's when God orders them to get off the ark, but I want you to notice they're on the ark for more than a year, probably by my record counting it's a year and ten days, a year and ten days on the ark, they never get off once. And then God commands them to get off and they don't get off until He commands them because they're trusting in God's mercy. Here's what I want you to get from this point, God's delay is for our good, right? God's delay is for our good, God's delay, He doesn't give you what you want when you want it, He delays, He's doing something bigger than just that thing that you want, He's making you like Christ. I think of it all the time when I think of like my testimony and how I came to the Lord and God converted me at the age of 20. And I think I was a senior in college at the age of 20 because I went to kindergarten young. And not until my senior year, you know, and my whole year college career up till that point was do as little as possible, have as much fun as possible, and try to avoid trouble as much as possible. But other than that, get away with everything you can, goof off, you know, animal house was kind of my guiding the movie, part of your college is one big party. And I think of the, you know, the opportunities I slaughtered. God wouldn't it have been more sense to save me in like senior high and I could have dedicated myself to you and use that time at Penn State to study rather than to goof off? I would have majored in baby philosophy or Bible or something and learned so much more instead I majored in television because one time my mom said to me, and this is literally why I did it. She did make a good television camera me. Okay, it sounds good. Me. Whatever. I'm going to college. Party time. Woohoo. But it was a television station cornerstone that I meet my wife, right? That I make contacts that I'm not doing television programs there, you know, hosting them and bringing a reform perspective that wouldn't exist on that channel if I wasn't there. You know, so you see things that God uses and I have an experience now that I can relate to people that the guys just to go to college and seminary and, you know, get their call and I'm not saying that's wrong, but they don't have certain things that I do have now. And an appreciation and how much extra work I did to make up for the fact that I goofed off so much. So, you know, God remembers mercy and God's providence is for your good. I want you to notice it in verse 1 again. God remembered Noah and every living thing and it literally says in the Hebrew and every living thing and every beast is singular, singular, singular. Don't think that God has forgotten you. Don't think that his mercy isn't going to find you. Don't think that his providence somehow has excluded you, that the old things work for good doesn't apply to you. Don't believe that. You have to wait on the Lord. You have to trust in him. God remembered Noah and every animal on that ark. Jesus said in Luke 12, 6 are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins and not one of them is forgotten before your God. That's the way Luke has them say it. Not one of them is forgotten. God doesn't forget a single sparrow and you think he's going to forget you. We have to wait on the Lord and trust that he's working for our good. So I want you to notice thirdly our remembrance of God, our remembrance of God. The title of this sermon actually is based on the title of the sermon that I preached at the Women's Retreat a couple of weeks ago. Some of you ladies probably saw that right away. And I chose the title, the remembrance of God, then and now for two reasons. You can take that two ways, right? The remembrance of God objectively that is our remembrance of the object God. The remembrance of God, our remembering of God. We have to remember God. We have to remember God. Now I'm not talking about some kind of mental recollection or intellectual awareness. So yes, I remember that there's a God, okay, I'll go back to my business. Remembering God is when we act according to his word, when we do things because we're believing in him. When he is in our mind and conscience with what we're doing, whether it's building a house, we're driving a car, we're playing golf or singing to him in church. We are aware that we are his and we are living for him because we remember him. We remember our purpose and creation. The remembrance of God is what we're called to do over and over again in Scripture. All of the ceremonial law, if you study it, was so that Israel would remember the Lord. Those tassels that they would remember me. Speak of my word when you get up, when you lie down, when you jump, when you fall, when you do whatever. Basically, my word, my word, that you would remember me. In fact, Israel was called in the ceremonial law in the Pasaduk to remember God's commandments, to remember God's fear, to remember God's worship, to remember God's love, to remember the Lord, their God. Remember him because we have a tendency to forget and to just live our lives by what's in front of us, not much different than the animals. What are my desires right now? That's what I'm going to do. No, no, remember who you are, remember God, he made you for something better than that. One of the ten commandments, remember the Sabbath day, to what? To keep it, remember to do, remember to act, we don't remember to think, remember so that you would, keep this day, that you would live your life for him, six days, live for him. And the seventh day, live for him, remember, remember what God has promised you and act accordingly. That's what we need to do. I think, know what, remembering God's promises to him, remembering the mercy of God and telling him to make the ark, to bringing the animals, having the food, seeing now that they're on land. What does Noah do? He's six and seven. It came to pass at the end of forty days, after the ark's been sitting there. No, open the window of the ark, which he had made. So he's trying to ask what? He's trying to discern God's actions and what God's doing. He knows he has God's ultimate plan of mercy and salvation, just as we do. And yet he's in the midst of not knowing what to do, necessarily next. What should I do now in order to live for God, and so he takes the means and the opportunities and the abilities that God gives him, oh, I have these birds. I can send them out and see if God's judgment has passed, because I don't know. I don't know. Is this a temporary respite? Is it time to get off the ark? Is it time to do something else? He uses the opportunities and the means that God has, and he sends a raven, and he sends a doubt. Notice it. You don't always get it, but verse seven and eight, he sends them both at the same time. And there's two very different birds. A raven, oh, you probably see this on the road, right? You know, you see these big black ravens, crows, different birds of prey, coming down and landing on, you know, the squirrel that's been hit by a car picking it up, and I mean, these things will land on anything, eat anything. And that's when he sees the raven doesn't come back because the mountain tops have been showing for a while. So he can land anywhere. There are probably bloated corpses and rotting creatures everywhere. So it can eat. The raven doesn't need to come back. There's enough sustenance out there to support a raven, but not a dove. A dove is a very dainty creature. You will never see a dove picking a dead rabbit's carcass apart on the road. They don't do that. A dove is more dainty. Dove cares about things more. So the dove didn't find a place for a foot, well, they were not for her to actually live. There wasn't enough for the dove to have a life, and so she comes back to the ark. Because there was no place for her to set her foot. And I want you to notice here that in using the opportunities and the abilities that Noah has, and so Noah knows, okay, the flood is is down enough for a raven, but not enough for a dove. So we need to wait a little bit longer, but in the midst of this and the midst of coming through this great judgment, you know, Noah, and sometimes we just, we only think about ourselves and what we don't have and what we need, Noah still remembers to be kind and to be generous, even to an animal. In the midst of not knowing, I just can't help, but when I read verse 9, I mean, think of this. I'll read verse 9. The dove found no resting place for the soul of her foot. She returned to the ark to him, for the waters were on the face of the whore. Now listen to this. Why does scripture tell us this? So he put out his hand, and he took her, and he drew her into the ark to himself. How do we know it takes the time to care for a single bird and show kindness to it? Noah remembers the Lord. He remembers the Lord. He still is a generous godly person. He does kindness to this creature that just served him, and he brings it back into the ark. It seems to me that that's what we're supposed to do, not get all caught up in ourselves, in our pain, in our judgment, in our suffering, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, me. If there are still ways I can help with the kind of others, I should be doing that. If you're not a quadriplegic right now, unconscious in a hospital, you can still do some things. Don't ever get to the point where you're not trying to serve or trying to give in some way. We were able to go to, most of our family's home right now, and that's just a great blessing to Robin and I. Calvin isn't here. We went and we drove to visit him over in Virginia, Ashford, Virginia, like four and a half hours away. We spent the day with him. And so, of course, I'm going to listen to all of my music with the kids in the car on the way over. But one of the songs that we got to listen to was Sammy Hagar, Give to Live. It's how we say it, like Sammy's most Christian song, right? If you want love, you've got to give a little. If you want peace, turn your cheek a little. If you want faith, you've got to believe a little. And it just talks about how we're supposed to live out the things that we, and I know he's not a believer. But there was truth in that song that we have to think about other people for really going to be a loving person. How can I complain that God isn't loving me and I have opportunities in front of me and I don't think about it. You know, I get caught up in my pain and it doesn't happen and I know sometimes mentally there can be things that happen. I know in my mom was dying just this last September, August, and she had cancer in her liver real bad. And I didn't know this. But when you get liver cancer, it affects your brain. So you don't know what you're doing for a long time. So my mom was back and weird. We didn't know why. And you know, she got to the point where I'm driving her to the hospital visits and you know everything was, she was just so stressed out about herself and like telling me, oh, push so much. She's curved. Oh, you're going to miss the turn. I'm like, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to, you know, I'm not going to drop you and pick her up the putter in the wheelchair. You know, oh, you're going to have mom when you call down and finally, you know, we're going back home after this and you know, we're stopping it. Subway, I'm going to get them lunched her and my brother and and like, she said something to me about, you know, why are you upset where I said, mommy, you know, I'm just so disappointed. Where is your faith? You're so worried and caught up in yourself right now. Where is your faith? Okay, you know, you may be dying. Everybody dies. We're supposed to be Christians and I just kind of pulled out my heart and then I got in and I went into the subway and I brought the hockies back out and when my mom, when I got to the card and again, I don't know how much of this was the liver mess and with her mind but she said to me, sorry, I want to thank you. You know, you're right. I haven't been acting like a Christian and that whole trip to, you know, from Salzburg to Indiana, the Southburg, everything's 20 months. The whole trip, we talked about the Lord, we talked about the Word of God. She actually asked about her grandchildren and suddenly there were other things there because I was able to remind her and maybe God gave her a moment of clarity mentally. But beloved, don't allow yourself to get to the place where you don't remember the Lord. I don't be tempted to just, you know, put your faith in man and other things. You know, Moses, or sorry, Noah is showing kind of, and he's living by the Word of God. There's another way you can see it. Verse 10, he waits seven days, says on another dove. Verse 12 waits another seven days. Why is he doing things according to the seven days? Because God showed man and Genesis that you live according to a seven day pattern and Noah is doing that. He hasn't forgotten to do that. He's still conducting himself, according to the Word of God. He's on an ark. He doesn't know of the pleasant, he doesn't know what's going on. He's kind to animals. He's remembering the Lord and he's living his life and that's sometimes that's all you can do. But that's what we need to do. To live our lives according to what God has revealed, not put our trust in men because when we do, it'll be shattered. Psalm 20 verse 7, some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord, our God, remember the Lord, Christian. Don't forget him in your pain and your suffering and your persecution. Remember him. Fourthly and lastly, I want you to notice God's remembrance of us. God's remembrance of us. I said to you that phrase, the remembrance of God can be taken two ways, objectively our remembrance of God, but subjectively it's the remembrance that God has. The remembrance of God is the remembrance, the remembering that God has of us and the chief verse in this chapter, it seems to me until you get to the end, but in our section for sure is verse 1, then God remembered Noah. He remembered Noah and every living thing and every living creature. God remembers the things that he's made and he causes a window, a spirit, the same roof that was hovering over the face of the waters when he created man from nothing. He remembers Noah and he sends a wind over the waters and the waters begin to go down. God acts on behalf of his people when he remembers and God's remembrance is not merely mental either. When God remembers us, he remembers his promise to us that though we are sinners and ought to be cast off, he has committed himself to us. When God remembered Abram, he rescued a lot from Sodom and Gomorrah. The scripture says that and God remembered Abram. Abram only pled for ten people to save the city. When there was just one lot, God still didn't destroy him. He said as angels in, he remembered Abram's prayer and he rescued a lot. When God remembered Israel, when he heard their groaning, it says when they were slaves in Egypt, it says God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. When God remembered Rachel, he opened her womb and she conceived and gave birth to Yosaf, which means add, increase, give me another son. Now remember Rachel, when Jesus was known on the cross, bearing the wrath of God. No one's ever had to do that by the way. We've never felt a drop of God's wrath. We feel as chastening as testing His, maybe even leaving to ourselves for a while, but we've never felt His wrath. But while Jesus is bearing His wrath, a man on the cross who deserved the wrath of God, first to Jesus after being convicted by the Spirit to stop ridicule Him as He was with the other thief, and finally He says to the other thief, don't you fear God, we deserve to be here. This man has done nothing wrong. Lord, what does He say? Remember me, when you come into your kingdom. He asked Jesus to remember Him, and Jesus said today, you'll be with me in paradise. That's how God remembers. And of course, when I preach that the women's retreat, I preach from first Samuel on Hannah, who's married to Alcana, who was a godly man, but unfortunately this godly man's sinned and took another wife, Pininna, and so Hannah could never fully be one flesh with her husband because he's got another woman there, corruption of marriage, that the godly should never have done, and Hannah's trapped. She can't get out of that situation, her husband's a believer, there's nothing, there's no recourse for her to cause her husband to get rid of the second wife, and by the way, he has at least four children with the second wife, and the second wife persecutes her, and so she just prays to God at one point, God, if you would remember your maid's servant and give me a son, I'll give him to you. And the Bible says in the process of time, Alcana went into his wife, God uses natural means to God remembered Hannah, and she conceived and she brought a son, and of course she gave him back to the Lord. God remembers his people, beloved, he has bound himself to us. When God wants to tell us how much he has remembered us, how much he loves us, he shows us various scriptures, and in fact, I think what God does primarily, and he swears an oath to us, we enter into covenant with him, but he also gives particular verses, and he compares his love to the greatest love that human beings show, and I think scripture shows repeatedly, remember I said to you men and women, have different strengths and weaknesses, we glorify God equally, we're made equally in his image, but it seems to me that in several places scripture says that women typically have the strongest kind of human love. I just think scripture is pretty clear on that, that when the Bible wants to talk about the strongest love, it talks about the love that women show. Let me give you a couple of places. In 2 Samuel 1, verse 26, David is lamenting the death of his best friend Jonathan, and he says, I'm distressed for you, my brother Jonathan, don't Jonathan, you've been very pleasant to me, your love to me was wonderful, surpassing even the love of women. Now, why did he say that? Why didn't he just say surpassing the love of people, of most people? Because women love stronger than men typically, there's an emotional commitment, an element to love, and it's a commitment and a loyalty that women have that stronger than men, in general, in general, but David's saying that Jonathan's love was so great that it surpassed even the love of women. That's what a friend he was today, but he was that committed to David, that loyal to David, he loved him like a woman loves, not sexually, that's wicked, even thinkable. He loved him as a brother, but he loved David strongly, like women love strongly, and that God himself says this, when God wants to show us, but I know what you're thinking, you're thinking, well, you know, it was this big important person, and David's this big important person, and I'm this nobody, and where's my promise? Isaiah 49 verse 15, when God wants to tell us how much He loves us, when He wants to assure you that He will remember you, what does He say? Isaiah 49 verse 15, can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Again, when God wants to show us how much He loves us, He goes to the strongest kind of love, the love that women have, the love that women have for their child. All right, can there be anything stronger than that? A woman with her nursing child, that's what God is saying here. Again, Isaiah 49, 15, can a woman forget her nursing child and say, it's a rhetorical question, no, never, a never would a woman just forget the baby that she is born for nine months, given birth to in great pain, and now she's just going to let it die. Can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? It's unthinkable, and yet, we're so sinful, the next part of the verse says, surely they may forget, and it does happen. When I worked for Fox 53, I can remember two instances where this happened literally. A woman gave birth to a baby, didn't want it, put it in a dumpster, right after it was born. Another time, a woman threw her newborn baby out of a moving car, gave birth in a car. We reported these items. It does happen when people harden their hearts enough. Yes, even the love of a mother will fail, the strongest love. And that's why God says it this way. Can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you, says the Lord, to all of the people of God. You want an assurance that God won't forget you? He gives it to you in Isaiah 49. And he doesn't just stop there. Can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you, verse 16. See, I've inscribed you on the poems of my hands. It's because of the cross, because Jesus took the nail holes that he'll never forget you. How could you think that God would forget you, when forever Christ has the nail holes in his wrist, that he took for you, so that you'll never have to take the wrath of God. No one got to see the water subside and he saw that dove come with a freshly plucked olive leaf. He knows God's wrath has passed. We know it more because of Jesus. He took the nail holes for you. He's inscribed you on his hands. He'll never leave you. He'll never forsake you. He'll never forget you. The God who remembered Noah and the animals remembers you. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for your word. We thank you for your promise. We thank you for the assurance. We know this great judgment of Noah as a type of judgment, but there's another one coming and we need assurance that we won't undergo your wrath, that we won't be forgotten by you because we know we deserve it. We know we're sinners and you'll be right to cast us off. How do we know that you'll remember us? That you'll remember mercy in the midst of wrath. We know it were Jesus because you died on the cross. You took all of our sin and you took all of God's wrath and you yourself said it is finished. Help us to believe that Father when we are tempted not to. Forgive us forever down that you will remember us. Forgive us forever down that you will remember us.