Genesis

Brick by brick, the tower grew higher and higher. And so did their pride. They wanted to be famous, and safe. They wanted to be “the ones” to do this thing with their own hands. They were quite pleased with themselves. “The ones”.

“Look at this mega church I built”. “Look at this ministry I built”. “The bigger, the better because people will see me and how close I am to Jesus”.

Sound familiar?

Yeah….

You see, God wasn’t pleased with them. He could see what they were doing. They were trying to live life without Him. That doesn’t make us happy, or safe, or ANYTHING.

Living life like that only destroys us. God loves us too much to let that happen. So, He’ll interfere. He’ll stop things. Plans get halted. We get annoyed, but we need to just see that God is saving us from ourselves.

God knows.

God knows that however high we reach, however hard we try, we can never get back to Heaven by ourselves. We are not saved by our works (Ephesians 2:8-10)

We don’t need a staircase; we need a Rescuer. The way back to Heaven isn’t a staircase, it’s a Person.

We can never reach up to Heaven, so Heaven came down to us Jesus.

Jesus. Jesus. Jesus.

It’s all about Jesus.

Today’s thought: I cannot save myself, this situation, or this person. I need Jesus.

See: Genesis 11

A world gone wrong, earth was no longer the perfect paradise that God had intended when we get to the story of Noah. It’s frightening to see how quickly all of humanity forgot about God. I count 8 short generations from Adam!

The story of Noah’s life involves not one but two great and tragic floods. The world in his day was flooded with evil. The number of those who remembered the God of creation, perfection, and love had dwindled to ONE. Incredibly, in ALL the world, only Noah and his family still worshiped God.

I’ve had times of being alone in taking a stand for God. And, I’ve had times when I just “felt” alone too. But, to really be the ONLY family on the planet who worshiped God!? Whoa.

GOD’s response to the situation was a 120-year-long last chance, during which He had Noah build a graphic illustration of his life. Nothing like a huge boat on dry land to make a point! Because of his faithfulness and obedience, God saved him and his family from a vast flood that destroyed every other human being on earth.

For Noah, obedience meant a long-term commitment to a project. Many of us have trouble sticking to any project, whether or not it’s directed by GOD. It’s interesting that the length of Noah’s obedience was greater than the life span of people today. The only comparable long-term project for us is our very lives. But, perhaps this is the one great challenge Noah’s life gives us—–to live, in acceptance of GOD’s grace, an entire lifetime of obedience and gratitude.

Read the story of Noah, the flood, and the new beginning for humanity starting in Genesis Chapter 6