(Genesis) Genesis 10 Intro

Now today, friends, we come back to the book of Genesis, and we are down to the 10th chapter. But probably I should say a word or two before we leave the 9th chapter, because the question always comes up, why is this recorded about Noah and the sin of Noah? Well, may I say that if man had written a book, he would have done one of two things. He would have covered it up and made Noah a hero, or else he would have made it a great deal more sordid than it is.

But the fact of the matter is that it's recorded for a purpose. It's recorded to let you and me know that God was encouraging the children of Israel in entering the land of Canaan for the very simple reason that there was a curse pronounced upon them, a judgment upon them. And all you have to do is read the rest of the Scripture, the Old Testament, on secular history to discover that.

Canaanites have pretty much disappeared. And then these things, we're told, are written for our learning. It's to let you and me know something of the weakness of the flesh, that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

And the Lord Jesus said, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. And Paul made it very clear that no flesh would be justified by keeping the law at all. And Paul in Galatians 2.16 says, for by the law shall no flesh be justified.

So that what we have here is the story of a man that fell. And it's a story of the weakness of the flesh. Now, we offered an excuse for Noah last time, but frankly, this is the bare facts, getting right down to the nitty-gritty, Noah got drunk.

And that raises for us today the real problem, and maybe that you as a Christian do not get drunk. But may I say, maybe you and I are living in the flesh to the extent we're just as displeasing to God as Noah was. We today have, I think, a wrong conception of life in this universe that we're in.

For instance, our nation has spent billions of dollars to put man on the moon. And it's just not a good place to live, it looks like. But nothing is spent on how to live on the earth.

And you know that's what God is concerned about, is to train you and me how to live on the earth. And so you have this tremendous statement, and there's no curse pronounced upon Ham. The curse is upon Canaan, his son, and I do not know how much Canaan was involved in this.

All we are given is just the record here, and we recognize that Canaan is mentioned for a very definite purpose. But it hasn't anything to do with a curse of color that's put upon any part of the human race. I think that has been one of the sad things that have been said about the black man that is not fair to him at all.

And it's not fair to God, because he never said that. After all, the first great civilizations were Hamitic civilizations, the Egyptian and the Babylonian. And we need, I think, to make it very clear, certainly Noah didn't lose his salvation.

I trust that you understand that. That it was an awful thing, and frankly, I see no excuse for it.