Bible Study: Genesis

Lesson 7: Genesis 6- 9: The Flood, Part Two

Theology of the Flood Narrative

Theology of the Flood Narrative

1. the Noahic covenant (Robertson, 110-125)

a. The covenant with Noah emphasizes the close interrelationship of the creative and redemptive covenants. Throughout Scripture, God's redemptive acts do not occur in a vacuum but are intimately connected with the creation. When the Israelites are redeemed from Egypt, it is creation that is employed by God in their redemption. The prophetic language of judgment and restoration is replete with the theology and imagery of creation. When Jesus comes to earth, his ministry is marked by a mastery of creation and his death is marked by the disruption of creation. Paul reminds the Romans that creation to awaits the liberation from the curse. John portrays the consummation as a time when not only humanity is restored, but creation is as well.

b. The covenant with Noah demonstrates the particularity of God's redemptive grace. Both at the outset of the flood story and in its epilogue, we see indications of God's election. Noah alone is singled out for the carrying out of God's redemption, finding grace in God's eyes does not allow for merit on Noah's part and his later righteousness should be understood to flow out of his covenant standing with God. The choice of the line of Shem to be the bearers of God's presence also indicates God's selective operation within humanity.

c. The covenant with Noah demonstrates God's intention to deal with families in his covenant relationships. This is seen both in God's choice of Noah and his family as well as the blessing and curses that follow Ham's sin.

d. The covenant with Noah may be characterizes as a covenant of preservation. Here the realm of common grace comes to prominence. Common grace is the theological terminology for God's restraint of human sinfulness and his blessing of sinful humanity. The Noahic covenant has often been termed a covenant of common grace for its focus is not on a community of redemption, but on creation as a whole. The Noahic covenant features the promise on God's part to show constant mercy on humanity and withhold cataclysmic judgment and provisions aimed at the curbing of violence and protection of humanity. Thus, the Noahic covenant establishes a stability into which God's future redemptive plan can unfold. The flood itself represents a suspension of common grace whereby God's judgment is allowed to fall on humanity unabated (other such suspensions may include the conquest, the cross and the final judgment). 2. The eschatology of the flood

a. The flood becomes in the NT a type of the final judgment of God. See Matthew 24:37-38, 1 Peter 3:20 ff.; 2 Peter 3:3-7. The age prior to the flood is consider an age unto itself with its own creation, fall, flourishing of culture and final judgment. As such, it is a microcosm of the whole of history. Within this scenario then the ark and its inhabitants represent redeemed humanity, hence the sanctuary language applied to the ark.

"What transpired in the Flood was a sign of the consummation of the kingdom and the finale of redemptive history. Yet it was only a sign. Though the deluge judgment terminated the world that then was, it did not inaugurate the world to come. It rather introduced the world that now is, another phase in the interim world-order of genealogical history. Hence, the ark-kingdom not only played its role as an eschatological sign, but served the historical purpose of bridging the watery chasm between the former and present worlds. The redeemed remnant in the ark symbolized glorified humanity brought through the final cataclysm as the heirs of the eternal kingdom, but they were also the living continuation of the human race in general, carried through the Deluge into postdiluvian history. While the Flood as a sign of the redemptive judgment prophesied the end of common grace, the Flood as an inner-historical episode marked a transition through which the world-order of creation in the common grace mode was re-creatively perpetuated beyond the world that then was into the world that now is" (Kline, 244).

b. The flood points to the twofold nature of God's dealing with mankind. The flood narrative is, of course, about judgment; but, it is also about mercy, indeed grace. And so is God's dealing always with man, justice must be satisfied, but grace to is shown. The flood is "a typological drama that prefigured major aspects of the Consummation: redemptive judgment, cosmic recreation, and the perfecting of the kingdom" (Kline, 212).

c. This dual nature of the flood is also imported into baptism which is linked to the flood in 1 Peter 3:21. As with circumcision, baptism carries both the imagery of blessing and curse. Water in the Bible is both a source of blessing and a curse. To enter into covenant with God through baptism is to be subject both to the blessings of the covenant and its curse. To be brought into the visible church, but never become part of the invisible church is to bring greater condemnation upon one's self.

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