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"When God Looks at the World…"
There a few things that I enjoy more than a good view. I
have seen the view from 14,100 feet at the top of Pike’s Peak
over my home of Colorado Springs. I have been blessed to see
the view of Paris at night from the top of the Eiffel Tower,
the view of Rome from the top of St. Peter’s Cathedral, the
view of the Hong Kong Harbor from the top of Victoria Peak,
the view of Athens from the Acropolis, and my personal favorite,
the incredible view from the Villa San Michelle at the top of
the Isle of Capri looking back across the water toward Sorrento,
Italy. But one of the most amazing views that I have ever
seen is one that I am not likely to ever see directly, at
least not in this life. It is the view that flashes across
my computer screen of God’s beautiful earth as seen at night
from the Space Shuttle. These images seem to me to truly be
a God’s eye view of the world and I am amazed that at even
from space it is possible to make out such details as the
Trans-Siberian Railway, the Nile River, and even the I-4 corridor.
Yet in Genesis this morning we are told what the God’s-eye
view of the world really is, and sadly, it is anything but
beautiful. Moses tells us that God looked down on His
beautiful earth, upon the human creatures He loved, the
crown of his Creation, and what He saw was not beauty but
rather evil and wickedness. It should chill us to the bone
that God saw that every inclination of the thoughts of man’s
heart was only evil all the time. This sight grieved God
and filled his heart with pain. And so He did something
about it. He sent a flood to cover the earth and cleanse
it of wickedness and evil. Yet, he also carried out an
incredible act of deliverance by calling Noah to build
an ark and preserve a remnant of the Earth’s creatures.
The account of the Flood is one of the best, and yet least
known accounts in the Bible. It is our habit to decorate
the Nursery with pictures of animals marching two by two
and to teach children to sing songs about “Gopher-Barky”
but do we ever really think about what this account means
to us. Many, many questions have been asked about the
Flood and all of its details throughout the centuries
since this event. During our Digging Deeper time today,
Mr. Lehenbauer will discuss a few of them with you. But
for our short time here in worship this morning, I want
to direct our attention away from such details and back
to just what this account tells us about our God.
Imagine God looking down on all that he had created and
seeing that his creation was doing everything that He asked
them not to do. In this room, we are no strangers to
such feelings. Each one of us knows what it feels like
to be betrayed, to have those we love hurt us by doing
what we asked them not to do. It fills us with pain,
and that is exactly what how it was for God. In fact,
we are told that he was sorry that he made the creation
in the first place. Now, it is important for us to
remember that we are not allowed to put God in a box
or to attempt to make him behave as we would have him do.
The bottom line is that God is holy and we are not. It
is beyond our mental reach to truly grasp all that that
means for us. But one thing that it does mean, whether
we like it or not, is that God was within his “rights”
you might say, to cleanse what he made. I know that this
is a truth that we must wrestle with, yet it shines an
incredible light on Noah and his ark. For God who could
have wiped out everything, in fact, does not. He saves
those are the ark, in other words, he preserves and saves life.
The most important question that this should bring to our
hearts and minds today is the question: “what if God were
to look down on our earth today?” What if he were to look
past such details as the Trans-Siberian Railway and the I-4
corridor and instead to look at the details deep in the
hearts of the people who live along that corridor? What
would he see? Would he see us keeping his commandments,
loving and sacrificing for others, going out of way to tell
others about him? Would he see us doing such things every
moment of every day without fail? I am afraid the answer
is: “no.” Sadly, at the end of the flood account, the book
of Genesis confirms that the inclinations of man’s heart
were still evil, and nothing has changed. As Pastor Arp
reminded us, no one had to teach us how to covet the toys
of another or to use whatever means we desire to get them.
So God, motivated by love, cleanses his creation once again.
But this time he does not send a flood, he sends a baby.
God the Father sent his son to this earth to take on
and pay for the problem of our sin. God, who could have
taken his wrath out on us, instead takes that wrath out on
his innocent son on the cross of Calvary. On the cross,
Jesus carried all of our sin, all of the sin of the entire
world and he carried it all the way into his agonizing
death. This truth of the holy God giving his holy son
for we, his unholy people, is the central truth of the
Christian faith, and it is the source of all of our hope.
It is the source of our hope because we know that three
days later God the Father raised his son from the dead.
Through faith in Jesus Christ, God now preserves a remnant
in you and me. He preserves a remnant by the work of Jesus
Christ who as earned for us the forgiveness of all of our
sins, the forgiveness of the evil inclinations of our hearts
and minds. And it is no coincidence that he does that
through a flood. We here in central Florida are no
strangers to flood waters. In fact, when we had survived
hurricanes Charlie and Francis and were bracing ourselves
for Jeanne, my step-mother asked me if maybe it was time
for me to tell the good people of St. Luke’s to begin to
build an ark. Of course I had to tell her that it would
do us no good, because we had already nailed all the wood
to the windows!
Yet it is through the flood waters that God brings to us
all that Jesus Christ has earned for us on the cross and
through the empty tomb. In our baptism he washes away the
sin in our lives and claims us to be his own. And in the
work of the Holy Spirit we are now able to please God and
he is able to look down upon his earth and see all that
he is accomplishing through us.
What he desires most of all is that we would never forget
that we are now his mouthpiece to reminding the world of
his word and promise. Jesus once called a group of fishermen
to be fishers of men, and that is our task today. Today is
our 8th Annual Mission Festival. We are celebrating that
festival today with a special program. Please plan to be
here at 11:00am as the 1st Graders of SLLS remind us of the
central truth that the world is full of languages and cultures
and peoples, but that Jesus Christ is the same everywhere and
for all time. This program is a celebration of God’s work
among us and around the world, but it is also a reminder
that so many in our world do yet know him.
God’s desire is simple he is preserving a remnant through
the work of Jesus Christ and his desire is that that remnant
would include no less than all people from all places. While
it may not be possible for you to pack up and go to the ends
of the earth, there are some things that you can certainly
be a part of. Consider supporting or even being a member
of our mission team as we travel to Latvia again this summer.
Consider supporting our mission teams as they travel to
Honduras twice this year. But most of all, keep the peoples
of the world and all mission efforts in your fervent and
regular prayers. To assist you with that effort, please
pick up the LC-MS prayer calendar as you leave church today
and give it “refrigerator door importance” in your home
and lives. It is especially appropriate that this prayer
list calls the members of St. Luke’s to pray for our brothers
and sisters in Slovakia this month.
There are few things I enjoy more than a good view. And
there is one that I cannot wait to see. When God looked down
on the earth what he saw was evil and wickedness, but now,
when he looks down at you and me, he sees the most incredible
sight in the history of the universe. He sees his son. And
one day will see him face to face as well!
In Jesus' Name! Amen.
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