UNDER PRESSURE â—½ YOU
In Genesis 6 we read how God saw that wickedness in men was great on the earth, and it grieved his heart. God decided to destroy man and beast, and fowls of the air…but there was one man called Noah…who found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
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What a simple message in those few verses. We too live in a debased world, a fallen, putrid and stinking place. Even the beauty of the very earth has become tampered with and contaminated by evil. Man’s continually evil imagination has made it this way. But that’s not the focus of this story.
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God has made a way of escape through it!
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God found Noah and offered him favor, just as he will do with those of us that walk with Him today.
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The weight of the world is overwhelming; it can make us feel so isolated and helpless. But we are anything but hopeless! In the presence of sin and evil is God’s grace that abounds.
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Romans 5 says where sin increased, God’s grace has surpassed it and increased it all the more.
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Do we have to be perfect to receive this grace? Oh, no. Even Noah wasn’t perfect. But he walked with God in humility and pureness of heart.
Why do we need grace? Most primarily, we need it for forgiveness of sin. But we also need grace to live, to work, to raise our families, to stay true to God, for understanding, and so much more. God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power.
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The last words Peter wrote in II Peter 3 warn us to be on guard, to not lose our secure footing…but rather grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus.
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Back in the beginning, Genesis 6 painted a very bleak picture of how evil man had become in such a short time from creation…every thought was evil. Yet, in the middle of all that debauchery, there was one that was pure in heart and walked after God. Noah was chosen to then build the ark, sustain the flood and repopulate the earth.
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We too, those that love God and walk with him, have God’s grace to sustain life in this present world and even the world thereafter.
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A great prayer to pray as a family, by yourself, or with friends, when the world is overwhelming:
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Father, like Noah, we need your grace for all these things. We recognize that we don’t deserve it, but that you gave it.
As Noah sacrificed to you, Lord, we sacrifice the deep places of our hearts to your Holy Spirit’s search light.
Wash us pure and clean once again so that we stand before you justified.
Shower your grace upon us, Lord!
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And Lord, for this world, we see the things you are exposing before us.
And we pray your power and your justice be done.
Your kingdom come, on earth, as it is in Heaven.