Genesis Chapter 6
This is not a passage that immediately lends itself to a simple understanding, especially not as read in the Good News Bible. it might appear on the surface to be quite simple but I am afraid it isn't. I hope however by the time we have finished our exposition this morning it will be clearer and more relevant to our modern day understanding.
The first thing that must be made absolutely clear in studying this passage is that it is describing particularly in the fist eight verses the state of the world after the fall. It is a world of immense evil. The cancer of evil has spread throughout the world and all people with the exception of Noah have departed from the things of God. If we think our world is in a bad way how much worse must the situation have been at this time.
So let us look first of all at the first four verses. There are three distinct areas that we need to address. There are three obvious areas we need to look at.
What is meant in the GNB by heavenly beings, What is this about 120 years and what on earth are giants?
It all sounds like myth and fairy tale at first reading. But it is not and any problems we have at first glance at this passage are due to the difficulty of translating the original text.
Let us deal then with this verse that reads, ""some of the heavenly beings saw these girls were beautiful and took the ones they liked." Now if you have your GNB open you will see that there is a footnote translation that gives an alternative to these words ,"heavenly beings." it suggests this might be "sons of God". This is in fact a more accurate translation but doesn't immediately clarify the situation.
In order to understand this a we must first of all understand that there were even in these early days, two distinct camps of people. There were the descendants of Cain - ungodly and wicked and there were the descendants of Adam and Seth, these were the godly folk who even in the fallen state of the world still tried to live in some kind of fellowship with God. And in Chapter 5 that we dealt with last Sunday afternoon we saw that some of them them notably Enoch managed very well to walk with God even in the fallen world.
So when in this passage we read of the Sons of God taking the girls they liked. What lies behind this is a dreadful crime and sin. These Sons of God are the descendants of Adam, those who were supposed to be walking in the ways of God. So what is this dreadful crime and sin? It is two fold. They are leaving the ways of God and people of God and lusting after others. They are abandoning the ways of God and giving into what can only be called bestial behaviour. Here is lust running rampant. There is no talk here of love. It is self indulgence. It is lust. The Sons of God yoked themselves unequally with unbelievers something forbidden in scripture. And they took their partners on the basis of looks.
You see as we well know when you mix good with bad the bad almost invariably corrupts the good rather than the other way around. We know this only to well in our neighbours. If we get a bad neighbour it spoils the whole street or avenue. If we take the things of God and try to mix them with ungodly things then what happens? We know what happens! The things of God are weakened. As soon as we take the road of compromise we are lost. As soon as we give that inch it is all lost.
And the world was corrupt. Let me quote to you from William Still and Essay he wrote on the Cross; " Other things reveal human sin very startlingly and very frighteningly. Remember God's death sentence on the generation that was going to drown in the Flood, saving only eight persons. This speaks of the enormity of the sin of man, that he drowned the lot, a whole generation. The enormity of sin may also be seen in the fact that when the children of Israel refused to go up into the land, God said, "Listen you adults who have refused to go up because you fear the giants that I say I'll deal with: because you refuse to go up, everyone of twenty years age and over shall die in the wilderness. I will drive you round and round in circles, round and round in the desert of Sinai for thirty mine years till everyone of you has expired except Joshua and Caleb - because when they went up with the other ten spies to spy out the land they came back and they said, "We can easily take it" God said, "Every grown up but these two shall die..."
Here then we see the awfulness of the judgements of God. But even here in this awful time and with this awful judgement do you see the graciousness of God? The graciousness of God is hidden in the Good News Bible. For when it talk of the 120 years. it is not to read as suddenly God is going to limit our lives to 120 years. Rather God is giving the people a period of grace of 120 years to sort themselves out. To return to him. To repent of their wickedness. Even as judgement is pronounced time is allowed - over a century in fact for people to come to their senses. Over a century in which God's Spirit will wrestle with them and try to bring them back to their senses. After all Noah knew the way - so did they! So God may judge but he also gracious! Always ready to welcome home the repentant sinner.
Now let's deal briefly with these giants that are mentioned here. These are the children of these foolish and unwise marriages between the Sons of God and Daughters of the Men as we have already described. These are not giants as of fairy tales. But men who oppressed and resorted to violence. Powerful and yet corrupt who did what they wanted. Perhaps we might have called them warlords or bandits. All this is obvious from the original text and words.
In verses 5 to 7 we see clearly the reaction of God to all of this. God is deeply aggrieved by what he sees. Although we must be careful in how we understand these verses. When we read of his regret and of his being sorry these are mere human emotions being used to try and help us get into the divine mind that we might all the better understand what is going on here. Nothing here may be taken to imply that God changes his mind. Rather it shows us the enormous displeasure that God felt at his wayward creation. He looked at the whole of creation and at the change in mans heart . He sees their only wickedness. There is no effort to repent or change his ways. Man has descended into bestiality.
So the Lord in his graciousness looked upon our world and gave them 120 years to repent. To put their house in order. As we read at verses in the NIV, " My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal...."
And that's the way it remains with us. We have an allotted time to repent of our waywardness. On every side the Word of God is revealed to the world. Repentance is called for and the way of salvation opened to us. The message of Gods graciousness is unchanging. The option given to this generation of wickedness was the same one offered to this generation. The words of Jesus in Revelation to the Church at Laodicea are relevant for all time: Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears me voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him and he with me. To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches."