Wednesday, February 01, 2006

You Want Me To Build a WHAT!?!

Imagine, if you will, being in Noah's shoes. Noah from the Bible, not Baby Noah, although he is SOOO CUTE! Okay, so you are lying in bed one night, drifting off to sleep and you hear a voice. You look around. Nobody is there. You say to your wife, "Honey, did you say something?" She's like, "Huh?" Okay, nevermind, go back to sleep. So, then you hear the voice again. You realize it is God talking to you! Imagine that feeling! I have seen angels, I have seen demons, but I have yet to hear the voice of God speaking directly to me. I know it is a possibility, but I can only imagine what it will be like! Awesome! Anyway, so you are sitting there, talking to God and He tells you to build a really big boat. You have never seen a boat before. You don't know how to build one! What is everyone else going to think? HOW are you going to explain this to your wife! They are all going to think you are out of your mind. What if they try to lock you up for being crazy before you are able to finish it? God tells you He is going to destroy all mankind, except you and your family. Talk about walking on eggshells! Boy, you don't want to make God mad, but are you really sure you want me to build this boat thing? Oh my goodness. Talk about a leap of faith! Noah had more faith than anybody! Oh, yeah, and after you are done, go and get all of these animals and bring them together into the ark. Yeah, like they are just going to come along willingly...oh, they are?

I would have to say that Noah was delighting in God's will. Despite all the things that others must have said to him while he was working on this huge project. Everyone around him must have thought he was nuts. And it would have been so huge that everyone around for miles would have been able to see it. Not like you could hide it in a garage while you were building it! The only thing he had going for him was that he knew it wasn't going to rain until he was done. No down time!

And he had faith that could move mountains, or animals, as it were.

Oh, if we could have such faith in the midst of adversity! To be able to say, "Okay, God, whatever you want me to do, I will do it without question." Gen. 6:22 "Noah did everything just as God commanded him." Gen. 7:5 "And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him."

Noah was six hundred years old at the time the floodwaters came. Would you have that kind of faith at an old age? That is a hard thing to do! Pretty set in your ways, ready to retire, and God comes to you and gives you this huge assignment. Okay, God, where do I start? That is faith!

They were in the ark for a hundred and fifty days. five months. That is a long time to be in there with all those animals and your family. Talk about claustrophobic! I get antsy if we are in the house for a couple of days! Five MONTHS!? You have got to be kidding! More faith. Okay, God, is this really going to end? Okay, I hope you are right!

Let's all have the faith of Noah and maybe God will give us some extraordinary job to do also. Or maybe we are already doing extraordinary jobs and we just don't realize it. Hopefully, when other people see us, they will see the love of Christ in us and isn't that what it is all about?

1 comment:

Sinnersaint said...

Hopefully, when other people see us, they will see the love of Christ in us and isn't that what it is all about?

Amen to that.

And how about all the animals geting along for that long...