{"id":15457,"date":"2021-04-30T22:00:36","date_gmt":"2021-05-01T05:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/genesis_8_13-22-copy\/"},"modified":"2021-04-25T18:41:26","modified_gmt":"2021-04-26T01:41:26","slug":"genesis_9_1-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/genesis_9_1-15\/","title":{"rendered":"A Covenant Making God"},"content":{"rendered":"

Genesis 9:1-17 Click here for Bible Verses<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Genesis 9:1-17.\u00a0\u00a0Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

Genesis 9:1-4 (NIV)<\/em><\/strong>
\n1\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.
\n2\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands.
\n3\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
\n4\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 1-4:\u00a0\u00a0In verse 1 God gives Noah and his sons a near identical commission to the one God gave Adam in Genesis 1:28: \u201cBe fruitful, increase in number, fill the earth\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0God also gave humans authority over the entire animal kingdom (\u201cthey are given in your hands\u201d \u2013 v2b).\u00a0\u00a0Meat is now explicitly okay to eat in addition to vegetables (v3), although God demands that special respect be paid to the lifeblood of the animal.<\/p>\n

Genesis 9:5-6 (NIV)<\/em><\/strong>
\n5\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man.
\n6\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0“Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 5-6:\u00a0\u00a0The reason God demands an accounting from people who shed the blood of others is because every person is made in the image of God and is precious to God.\u00a0\u00a0To God there is something precious about blood.\u00a0\u00a0If our blood is precious to God, how much more precious to God is the blood of His Son Jesus Christ, which is able to cleanse us from our sins and grant us forgiveness (see 1 Peter 1:18-19).<\/p>\n

Genesis 9:7-17 (NIV)<\/em><\/strong>
\n7\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”
\n8\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him:
\n9\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0“I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you
\n10\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0and with every living creature that was with you–the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you–every living creature on earth.
\n11\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”
\n12\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come:
\n13\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.
\n14\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds,
\n15\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life.
\n16\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
\n17\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 7-17:\u00a0\u00a0Here God establishes a covenant with Noah, his descendants (v9) and every living creature (v10).\u00a0\u00a0What is a covenant?\u00a0\u00a0The Holman Illustrated Bible contains an excellent discussion of covenants, including specific covenants you can find in the Bible.\u00a0\u00a0Generally speaking, a covenant is a promise, usually confirmed with an oath, where one person solemnly agrees to do something for another person.\u00a0\u00a0In the Bible, God makes several covenants with specific individuals.\u00a0\u00a0In some cases God\u2019s covenant is on the condition that the other person does something in return, and sometimes God\u2019s covenant is not based on any condition at all.\u00a0\u00a0Covenants you can find in the Bible include:<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0God\u2019s covenant with Adam (see Hosea 6:6-7) whereby God would give Adam eternal life if Adam did not eat from the forbidden trees.<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0God\u2019s covenant with Abraham where He promises to make Abraham into a great nation (Genesis 12:1-3).<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0God\u2019s covenant with Moses and the Israelites at Mount Sinai, where God promised to treat Israel as His special possession on the condition that the Israelites obey His Word (see Deuteronomy 7:12-16).<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0God\u2019s covenant with David, where God promises that David\u2019s kingdom will last forever (2 Samuel 7:16).<\/p>\n

–\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The new covenant that Jeremiah would prophesy about (Jeremiah 31:27-34) and that Jesus would institute where God promised to make forgiveness, salvation and restoration to God\u2019s presence available to people through Jesus\u2019 death on the cross (Luke 22:20; Hebrews 8:6-9:15).<\/p>\n

Here in verse 9 is the first time the word \u201ccovenant\u201d (in Hebrew\u00a0berit<\/em>) actually appears in the Bible.\u00a0\u00a0As we see in verses 8 to 17, God makes a covenant with Noah not to destroy the earth with a flood ever again.\u00a0\u00a0The covenant is not based on any condition; it does not require Noah or anyone else to make any promise to God in return.\u00a0\u00a0The sign of the covenant to confirm that God would keep this promise is a rainbow.<\/p>\n

What can we learn from this?\u00a0\u00a0God is a covenant making God.\u00a0\u00a0God does not owe us any promises, and yet in love God makes these covenants with His people to give them hope, security, assurance and protection.<\/p>\n

Heavenly Father, thank You that You call people to be fruitful, to increase in number on the earth and to rule over creation.\u00a0\u00a0Thank You for being a covenant making God, a God who makes covenants with His people because You love us and want to bless us.\u00a0\u00a0In Jesus\u2019 name, AMEN!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Genesis 9:1-17.\u00a0\u00a0Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

Genesis 9:1-4 (NIV)
\n1\u00a0\u00a0Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.
\n2\u00a0\u00a0The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands.
\n3\u00a0\u00a0Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
\n4\u00a0\u00a0“But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.<\/p>\n

On verses 1-4:\u00a0\u00a0In verse 1 God gives Noah and his sons a near identical commission to the one God gave Adam in Genesis 1:28: \u201cBe fruitful, increase in number, fill the earth\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0God also gave humans authority over the entire animal kingdom (\u201cthey are given in your hands\u201d \u2013 v2b).\u00a0\u00a0Meat is now explicitly okay to eat in addition to vegetables (v3), although God demands that special respect be paid to the lifeblood of the animal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15459,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gametime-sharing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15457"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15458,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15457\/revisions\/15458"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}