Herald Of Faith, Inc.   www.heraldoffaith.com
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Faith And The Family

Hebrews gives us three men of faith in its description of the time before the flood. Abel, who was murdered. Enoch, who never died, but was transported directly to be with God. And Noah, who lived while everybody else died. One is martyred. The second is raptured, and the third is saved through a great tribulation. It's no wonder we have a hard time with prophecies concerning the position of the church with regard to the coming of the Lord!

Before the Flood was a time filled with violence and revenge. Cain had a mark, so nobody could kill him, in spite of his committing murder himself. The seventh generation, a man named Lamech, just like Noah's father, boasted to his two wives, Adah and Zillah, "I have slain a man for wounding me. If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold." It was an age of blood feuds. Not enough to get an eye for an eye; Lamech wanted 77 eyes for an eye. The law of Moses provided a limit to revenge, only one eye for one eye.

Jesus provided mercy instead. Peter asked how many times to forgive. Seven? If revenge comes 77 times, like Lamech, seven isn't enough. Seventy times seven. We do not carry the spirit of Cain. 

It was a time of great backsliding. There were two groups of people, the sons of God, which I interpret to be the Seth lineage, and the sons of men, which I think was the Cain lineage. The descendants of Seth were tempted because the daughters of Cain were beautiful. Furthermore, they had culture. Cain had built a city, being driven off the farm after he killed Abel. Jubal, the father of those who played the lyre and pipe was there. Also Jabal, the tent dweller who had livestock, and Tubal-cain, who worked with bronze and iron. So the sons of God took wives of the sons of men, whomever they chose. They chose what they wanted, and it seemed to go well. They had beautiful and strong children, mighty men of old, men of renown. It seemed like the realpolitik of the world ruled out trust in God. You made your own decisions and chose your own way.

God saw that wickedness was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of man's heart was only evil continually. With the massive apostasy, there was not enough salt in the earth to prevent the judgment of God. It was like Sodom and Gomorrah: there were not ten righteous men. The only way out was destruction.

This is the world Enoch, and later Noah, were born into. Adam was 622 years old when Enoch was born; Adam lived to see Enoch's grandson, Noah's father, Lamech, but died about a hundred years before Noah was born. It was an age of very old people, most of those we read of living to be 900 or more. That means that Enoch knew of the story of creation, the garden of Eden, the fall, Cain and Abel. He knew them first hand from Adam. There was a tremendous generational span--eight generations living at one time. As if, for example, Charles the XII and Gustav Adolf from Sweden, or Christopher Columbus or William Shakespeare were here to explain their lives and actions in detail.

A curious thing in the Seth line. They give the age of the father at the birth of the firstborn son. There is no such information in the Cain line. It shows a sense of continuity, of passing the covenant with God on to the children. Enoch's life doesn't stand alone. When he was 65, God gave him a son, and a great sense of responsibility came to him. At that point he began to walk with God. Jude tells us that Enoch prophesied, saying, "Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him." Enoch was not an especially genteel preacher. His editorializing ran counter to the culture of his day. He, and later Noah, preached righteousness.

But consider his world. Lamech, who boasted of getting revenge 77 times, was also the seventh generation from Adam. Lamech was Enoch's contemporary. The world was evil!

In any case, Enoch began to walk with God when Methusalah was born. He walked with God for 300 years, and then stepped directly into eternity without dying. At that point, there was only one who had died naturally in the lineage, Adam. Seth, who replaced Abel, was alive, 896 years old. I suppose everybody got together and wondered what happened to Enoch Has he ben attacked by a wild man or a wild animal? Did they put out a missing person bulletin? Send a search party like they did for Elijah? He was so young, only 365! Now Methuselah is fatherless at 300. What is this world coming to? God reveals that his translation is a fruit of walking with God, and their hearts are comforted. They take special care of young Methuselah. At this point, only two in the lineage had left the world non-violently: Adam, who died, and Enoch, who didn't. In Adam we die, but by faith, we live. Some, I'm sure, were glad to see Enoch go. They didn't like his hard preaching. He was always butting his nose into their business and his favorite word was ungodly. As a public speaker, he wasn't witty and entertaining. He was kind of like my Dad’s friend, AB Ost, if any of you are around Methuselah's age, and remember that old maverick Covenant radical. One time AB literally threw a Jehovah's Witness out of his house for pretending to be an authority on Greek when he hadn't studied. John, his son, is soft, not hard like AB.

What kind of faith do you want? Abel faith, that suffers martyrdom, or Enoch faith that doesn't die? Jack Holm had two kids at ORU. One went to a church that suspected you of materialism if you earned more than 50 thousand dollars a year. The other one thought you had great faith if you earned more than a hundred thousand. But faith is faith: it has a variety of expressions. You can't put faith into a behavioral box, and insist on conformity. That leads to Pharisaism. Faith is built on God's revelation, not on man's judgment.

Enoch began his walk with God when he became a father. He probably wasn't the first and won't be the last. When you bring the future President of the United States home from the hospital and rock her in your arms, you sense the seriousness of your role. I'm a father. What I do as a parent will in large part determine what this child will be like. I seek God's direction and discipline myself to be consistent in bringing the child up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I want to set an example of faith.

Unfortunately, not all parents think that way. There are dishonorable and abusive parents who violate the trust given them. Some of you have had to overcome that disappointment. You have spent your life longing for a father--someone you could trust, respect, and rely on in every circumstance. You never found him on earth, and it makes you afraid to trust anyone. But you have learned instead to pray, "Our Father, which art in heaven." Your father was a disappointment and a disillusionment. But you have begun a change in the generations of your family by relying on the heavenly Father, in whom there is no disappointment, disillusionment, or shadow of turning. The earthly father wasn't worthy of much honor, yet we try to overcome our bitterness. We honor the heavenly Father, and He never disappoints us.

We fathers fear, of course. Am I giving enough time for my children? Enough money? Am I providing good spiritual nurture? Do I have blind spots that even my wife can't see? A thousand doubts.

Enoch, a good father, moved against his doubts. Enoch walked with God. Can two walk together except they be agreed? There was fellowship between them.

Enoch walked with God. Not ahead or behind, but in step with His plan for his life.

Enoch walked with God. His walk was progressive and consistent over 300 years. Not a serious of holy spurts followed by times of backsliding.

Enoch walked with God. The decision and action was personal. He didn't hire a priest to handle religion. He didn't leave it to his wife.

Your faith influences your children. Not only your decision to follow Christ, but the steps of faith along the way. My Dad pastored in Chicago for 25 years, and then resigned in 1958 to travel and teach national ministers overseas. Suddenly he had no salary. Bill Bass, a Jewish friend, said, "How about it Joseph, why don't you go in business with me?" 
"How much can I earn?" 
"The first year you will get at least what you earned in your best year as a preacher. After that, you set your own limits. I want to give the whole business to you."
Dad went home and thought, if I die with 200 thousand dollars in the bank or 200 thousand souls in heaven, which is better?

But he had no salary and three kids in college. Dare I move out in faith? Mom said yes. They agreed: God first. By God's grace, all us kids finished college without indebtedness. Dad dared to believe in God.

It didn't start with him. It started with my grandfather, Hilmer. His father, my great grandfather, would get drunk and go to the docks there on Marstrand, the island in Sweden we come from, and preach so the old ladies would cry. One time he got mad and killed a guy, and was put in jail. Another time, around 1875, my grandfather and his sister had put up a small Christmas tree, decorated it with a few ribbons. They heard their father's drunken steps, and ran to hide. He saw the tree, cursed, and threw it out the window. The kids ran to the neighbors for protection. My grandfather determined then that he would never touch alcohol. He gave his life to God, and served as the caretaker in the mission covenant church-Missionshuset-on the island, living in a simple room behind the pulpit. That room-honest, it was really a Covenant church-is where my Dad was born.

Faith is a contract between generations! Enoch walked with God. His great grandson Noah also walked with God. The patriarchs come later: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. Then Joseph. The covenant is handed from father to son. But it starts somewhere. Grampa makes a decision, and his faith is passed to the third and fourth generations. I love the Frenchman's phrase, "If you want to change a person, start with his grandmother!" You and I are the grandmother! My grandchild's faith starts here with my decision today.

Did they make mistakes? Of course. Some of them painful. At times their faith failed. But the big decisions were right. Their children rise up and call them blessed.

Noah built, the text says, an ark to the saving of his family. We too are building an ark to save our families. We work at it consistently by walking with God. Noah's 3 sons spent their entire life dominated by a single project, the building of the ark. Noah found grace, and extended it to include his family.

What did the neighbor's children say to Shem and Ham and Japheth? Your Dad sure is, uh, different. Always cutting down trees and bringing them over to that field to build his barge. He claims water is going to fall from the sky, and the thing will float just like a ship. He's pretty heavy on religion too, always preaching at us. Wasn't your ancestor Enoch like that? I think this talk about judgment is just whistling in the wind. The ark is just an escapist fantasy. 

The boys went home thoughtful, but they got to work, cutting trees, harnessing the oxen to move the logs, shaping the logs, building hoists and winches to lift the beams into place, making nails and pegs. Day after day they worked at this odd structure. When Mrs. Noah wanted a new kitchen in the house, all Noah could think of was a galley for the ark. When she wanted a beamed ceiling in the family room, Noah thought only of the beams for the ark. The whole family focused on the ark from morning until night, every day except the Sabbath, when Noah preached the judgment of God.

Couldn't you compromise the plan a little? 300 cubits is awfully long. A cubit is the distance from your elbow to your fingertip, about a foot and a half. "No, God has given me the plan. I can't decide myself how to build a vessel of salvation. I must build according to the pattern."

But isn't this ark an obsession? Indeed. A Magnificent one. Aren't you concerned about financial security, health family, higher education? Of course, but God has warned me, and given instructions to build an ark. The other things are secondary.

Well, if the world is going to be judged, you should spend your time meditating on God, interceding for us sinners, praying that God will change His mind, becoming more spiritual so your soul will be saved when the world drowns. "Get real! When the water comes, I want a good boat, not a soul reconciled to drowning!"

Noah and his family are united around a single purpose. Our only ticket to safety in this time of change is the ark. Only the ark can carry us from this time into the next dispensation.

Think of modern ark-travelers, the boat people from Haiti and Vietnam. The leave in rickety, un-seaworthy craft, with meager hope for charity from someone out on the high seas. They risk all in a desperate attempt to get away from the misery and corruption of their lives. But Noah didn't travel aboard an uncertain vessel. God gave him a revelation. He prepared for many years. He honored his fathers' prophecies, for Enoch had already begun to speak of judgment. Noah moved, not from despair, but from revelation.

Noah built an ark to the saving of his family. Enoch walked with God when Methuselah was born. The two are tied together by a faith that relates to their families. They are also connected by the long, long life of Methuselah. He died in the year the ark sailed, the only man who could truly say, "After me, the flood."

What are you building for your family? An ark of salvation or an escape from everything in the country? An understanding of God's Word or simply street smarts in business? An example of faith or a way to shield yourself from every possible discomfort?

We are called to move in faith in God. To attend to His word, to hear his revelation, and to act in faith. Anything less is not worthy of God, besides being against our own best interest. It is He who has determined the measure of success, and it is not Mammon. It is knowing God.

God can give you the cabin in the country--look at the boat he gave Noah! But when God gives it to you, you hold it lightly. It doesn't dominate. When you seek it instead of God, that same stuff holds you like a vice, telling you that you can never be happy unless you spend all your time there.

Do you ever get afraid of what your kids will think? When I left the insurance company, they hit the roof. For several days, they moped around the house. What do you tell your friends? My Dad is a missionary. Isn't that sweet! What's more, just when we made that decision, an investment that we thought would take care of all the college expenses turned into a total loss. Fear tried to take hold. Compromise. Go back. It's an ego trip, not God. Money! Think of how much your are losing.

There's only one response: “ Get thee behind me Satan! You are after the things men like, not what God wants. We choose to walk in faith, and we know that the children will understand that step as they grow to know God as well.”

How do you prepare the ark for the family? You enroll them in Sunday School, summer camp, youth trips, and such. You help in Bible Clubs, church classes, programs. Some of you maintain a family devotional life at home, reading a portion of scripture every day. All are good ways to encourage your children in the faith.

Your actions are the main influence. When the challenge of faith comes, what do you do? Do you even know that it is a watershed that will show the way for future generations? It always involves risk, fear, and change. But your response causes you to grow into greater stature as both human and Christian. 

We as a church are building an ark for our young people. We have prayed for a youth pastor, and some have made financial commitments to it. We need good role models of faith. We want to save their souls from the deceit and false gods of the world. We must build an ark for their salvation. Several from our church have determined to go into ministry; that shows a basic desire for serious discipleship in the church as a whole. We want that spirit to continue.

When you begin a faith response, you don't know where you will end up. You can only take one step, and sometimes you can't turn back. It is so decisive, like diving off a high-dive. You have to trust your spirit, that it is indeed God you have heard from. And then, after meditating on it, to move on the revelation without hesitating. "Wouldn’t you rather be safe than sorry?" Of course. That's why you choose to move forward in faith. If you choose only security, what will happen to the kids? 

We can't waffle or wimp. The saving of the family is too important. I want them to like my religion, not see it as an excuse to never have any fun. I want them to dare to trust in God, not see Him as a spoilsport in the sky who has developed a conspiracy against anything creative and new!

Your commitment to God involved rejecting the way the world thinks and accepting the creative and energizing word of God. That word comes to you today in daring boldness, asking you to do the impossible. It is a step of faith.

Are you building an ark? That's the only thing worth building in the long run. It alone deals with the crucial issue of life, the destiny of your soul. The center of your being must be strong enough to resist the vain temptations of the world; your eye must be clear enough to see the invisible Kingdom of God. 

Without faith it is impossible to please God. There are a thousand things I can be without, but I must have faith. When the Son of Man comes, Jesus said, Will He find faith? Faith is what God seeks. "He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him."

How do you develop your faith sense? Diligently seek God. He who created the world also created you, a spirit being, to have dominion in it. You have the power to confront physical reality with spiritual reality because both were created by the same Word. By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God. That was the message of the Faith and the Big Bang sermon two weeks ago.

Faith sacrifices. Like Abel, it looks to the lamb. It relies on Christ's work at Calvary, and follows His example of self-giving. Faith doesn't look to the beauty of Cain's fruit basket, but to the life-giving power of the blood of the Lamb of God. That was the message of Faith and Sacrifice sermon last weel.

Faith looks to the future: it is the substance of things hoped for. It prepares an ark to the saving of the family. It acts to counter the world's system, and to establish the coming Kingdom now.

With that brief summary, we end this brief series on faith. Always with the cry of the disciples: Lord, increase our faith!

Father in Heaven:
You call yourself a nursing Father in one place, letting us know that you not only lead us, but you also nurture us. We also determine that we shall nurture our children, our grandchildren, in the walk of faith. Let today be a watershed moment in our lives when we determine to live and example of faith in God before them. Amen.



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