“For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God who said ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” II Corinthians 4:5-6

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Noah & Lamech


I’m preaching from Hebrews 11 this weekend about the story of Noah and I noticed something I hadn’t thought about before. According to the Genesis account, Lamech (Noah’s Dad) was 182 years old when Noah was born and he died at age 777. Moses mentions that Noah is 500 years old when Shem was born and that he was 600 years old when he entered the ark. If I did my math correct, Lamech died only 5 years before Noah entered the ark. If we understand chapter 6 at face value it took Noah 120 years to build the ark, (Answers in Genesis, says that it was more like 75 years) but in either case, Lamech if he lived around Noah,  would have been there as Noah was constructing the ark. Why does this matter? Glad you asked. You see back in chapter 5 of Genesis, Moses breaks the cycle of the “so and so lived so long and begat so and so and died” with a quote from Lamech:
“Out of the ground that the LORD has cursed, this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the painful toil of our hands” Genes 5:29
How crazy is that! Lamech prophesizes that Noah would bring relief. I don't think he thought the relief would come via the flood.  
 I’m still wrestling with this one.  

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