Genesis 6
Genesis 6:1-4
1 When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them,
2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose.
3 Then the Lord said,
‘My Spirit will not contend with humans for ever, for they are mortal;
their days will be a hundred and twenty years.’
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days
– and also afterwards –
when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them.
They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
Well, didn't I have fun with this passage... *
After talking to a few people about this chapter, as well as searching Jewish websites (such as 'THIS ONE'), hoping to find out who the Nephilim and the "sons of God" were, I ended up just as ignorant as I started. I really wish the guy who recorded this part of the Bible had explained all that.
I did have this idea:
If God made more men and women like Adam and Eve, the first of our kind (and possibly the ancestors of those who went on to marry Adam and Eve's children, and so on), couldn't they be the 'sons of God'?
Could men like Adam, created as Adam was, be the sons of God? Men who were 'sons of God' because they had no earthly parents?
Men of perfection and purity, formed by God's own hands - not of flesh; whereas the rest of us were conceived after sin entered the world. It's possible, isn't it? It makes sense, doesn't it?
The Bible tells us in Genesis 5:1 that 'This is the written account of Adam's family line'. So perhaps the 'sons of God' were other men God created from dust? Other 'lines'. All different shapes, sizes and what we now call 'races'. (God loves variety. Nature will show you that. It makes sense that He made more than one 'colour' - if I can use that term.) With 'humans' being those born from a womb, and not created by God's hand as Adam and Eve were. After all, God is recorded as saying that His Spirit will not contend with man forever...
God saw that the men He created - His sons; made just like Adam...with wives created just like Eve??? - were more focused on lusting after other men's daughters than being Godly. They were enjoying the physical and forgetting their spiritual heritage, maybe? Their concern was for their own lusts, it seems.
I don't know. Perhaps we'll never know until we get to heaven and have God explain it all to us, but it's a thought...
This thinking plagued me for most of the day. So much so I forgot what I was doing here until God nudged me and reminded me that I was to look for His hand - and that with His heart attached. As I'm reading, I tend to get sidetracked and forget that I'm on a personal journey, knowing God is calling me closer to Him; calling me deeper into His presence and heart. I'm not here to unravel the mysteries of the Bible or man's history.
So... looking for God's hand in Genesis 6...
In my 'paper' Bible, the Zondervan Renew Bible, Genesis 6:6 says, "The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain." :( This drove home for me, yet again, not to look for God's hand without knowing His heart, and not to think He's forever talking in an angry voice.
He was grieving. God had pain in His heart. He grieved. Do you know what it is to grieve? Do you know what it is to grieve without anger, while still remaining true to, and perfect in, love? Have you ever had your heart broken? Do you know what it is to hold pain in your heart because of something your child has suffered or been exposed to or been abused or wounded by? If so, feel God's pain. Chances are He was grieved not solely for Himself but for those He created, and for the children of 'man'...? Don't you grieve when you're children are hurting? There is no greater pain for a parent than seeing their child suffer, is there?
He could've also been grieving over the rift that comes between Him and His children when His children choose selfish desire and the lusts of the flesh over a relationship with Him. Knowing God as I do, through Jesus, I very much doubt He was saying 'poor Me' or throwing a tantrum. Chances were His regret was linked to the compassion He had on the daughters of man, also.
In His regret and desire to 'wipe man from the earth', chances were He was not reacting out of anger, but out of compassion for those suffering at the hand of evil, and for the benefit of all. God's will is not for man to suffer. I know many of us think the worse thing in life is death, but as it's written in the New Testament, to be absent from the body is to present with the Lord. Who's to say when God takes the breath from 'man' He is not simply taking them home and leaving their earthly vessels and all the suffering behind...? Me, I long for that day. Take this body; bring on a new one! Take this heartache; give me joy! Take these limitations and insecurity and the control of man; give me freedom! Seriously, don't ever mourn for my death, however it comes about. That won't be a tragedy - that will be the greatest freedom and celebration I'll ever know.
In reading these verses, I can easily see how we can think God is this huge mean Guy in the sky who swats whatever ticks Him off...but ya gotta know His heart to understand and appreciate what His hand is doing. Once, I shook my head wondering why God would bring the flood, but knowing Him now, knowing He has a merciful heart, I see a totally different picture. I see Him mourning over the sins of His sons and what they have cost man and the daughters of man. I see the pain in His heart that occurs when His estranged children want nothing to do with Him. I see Him wanting to free 'man' of suffering, even if that 'freeing' doesn't look right to some of us. I see Him setting a rescue plan into action.
Then in comes Noah. (Noah and his wife, and his sons and their wives - with each woman being born to another 'line' flowing from the 'sons of God'...? Meaning, all of different colour hair, eyes, skin, etc, which blended to start off the world as we know it...?)
Noah finds favour with God, so he is 'rescued', so that could say God hated the others and only saved Noah and his family, but I'm more inclined to believe that God had a plan, and as deeply as 'man' had grieved Him - or as great as the pain in His heart was, because of 'man' - He still wanted that plan to go ahead. He still wanted the earth to be inhabited, and He still wanted to walk with His children...so He gave us another chance. If God didn't want His plan to go ahead, if He didn't want you and I to walk this earth today, He would've wiped out Noah and his family, also.
Did you hear that? If God didn't want you to walk the earth today, He would've wiped out Noah and his family, also.
As a sinner - one who has walked the path of sin even after choosing to walk with God - I have witnessed the hand and heart of God's grace and mercy over my life. I have known, in my heart, His presence and His grace as I have not only stumbled from His path but ran from it at times, too. I know what it is to cause God grief. I know what it is to feel the ache of His heart. And I know what it is to be called to, as Noah was, from the depths of 'evil', and set apart, by God, in order to be saved and carried back to the Light.
I know what it is to be rescued and given hope for the future - and to be given a future.
Couldn't this passage be a metaphor for what God is willing to do to rescue you? I believe so.
I can't go beyond this chapter without highlighting God's rescue plan, His grace and mercy, and His desire to release you from suffering, because that is how He has been with me. God met me in the depths of my sin. He did have a rescue plan for me. I would've drowned in the depths of my own sin and the misery that caused if He did not reach out and rescue me with His hand, with His heart and with His Son. How could I accept all of what He's given me and done for me, then turn to this verse and offer you nothing but His anger? How selfish of me that would be. Selfish and wrong. You are alive today because God created you, because He wants you to be, and everything He offers Noah and his family - safety, a future, hope, protection, freedom from sin and its consequences, etc - He offers you now. God doesn't look at you and will you to drown in your misery. He's offering you His rescue plan. It's up to you whether or not you get on board with it.
Stares at blank wall; developing a twitch in left eye *
After talking to a few people about this chapter, as well as searching Jewish websites (such as 'THIS ONE'), hoping to find out who the Nephilim and the "sons of God" were, I ended up just as ignorant as I started. I really wish the guy who recorded this part of the Bible had explained all that.
I did have this idea:
If God made more men and women like Adam and Eve, the first of our kind (and possibly the ancestors of those who went on to marry Adam and Eve's children, and so on), couldn't they be the 'sons of God'?
Could men like Adam, created as Adam was, be the sons of God? Men who were 'sons of God' because they had no earthly parents?
Men of perfection and purity, formed by God's own hands - not of flesh; whereas the rest of us were conceived after sin entered the world. It's possible, isn't it? It makes sense, doesn't it?
The Bible tells us in Genesis 5:1 that 'This is the written account of Adam's family line'. So perhaps the 'sons of God' were other men God created from dust? Other 'lines'. All different shapes, sizes and what we now call 'races'. (God loves variety. Nature will show you that. It makes sense that He made more than one 'colour' - if I can use that term.) With 'humans' being those born from a womb, and not created by God's hand as Adam and Eve were. After all, God is recorded as saying that His Spirit will not contend with man forever...
God saw that the men He created - His sons; made just like Adam...with wives created just like Eve??? - were more focused on lusting after other men's daughters than being Godly. They were enjoying the physical and forgetting their spiritual heritage, maybe? Their concern was for their own lusts, it seems.
I don't know. Perhaps we'll never know until we get to heaven and have God explain it all to us, but it's a thought...
This thinking plagued me for most of the day. So much so I forgot what I was doing here until God nudged me and reminded me that I was to look for His hand - and that with His heart attached. As I'm reading, I tend to get sidetracked and forget that I'm on a personal journey, knowing God is calling me closer to Him; calling me deeper into His presence and heart. I'm not here to unravel the mysteries of the Bible or man's history.
So... looking for God's hand in Genesis 6...
In my 'paper' Bible, the Zondervan Renew Bible, Genesis 6:6 says, "The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain." :( This drove home for me, yet again, not to look for God's hand without knowing His heart, and not to think He's forever talking in an angry voice.
He was grieving. God had pain in His heart. He grieved. Do you know what it is to grieve? Do you know what it is to grieve without anger, while still remaining true to, and perfect in, love? Have you ever had your heart broken? Do you know what it is to hold pain in your heart because of something your child has suffered or been exposed to or been abused or wounded by? If so, feel God's pain. Chances are He was grieved not solely for Himself but for those He created, and for the children of 'man'...? Don't you grieve when you're children are hurting? There is no greater pain for a parent than seeing their child suffer, is there?
He could've also been grieving over the rift that comes between Him and His children when His children choose selfish desire and the lusts of the flesh over a relationship with Him. Knowing God as I do, through Jesus, I very much doubt He was saying 'poor Me' or throwing a tantrum. Chances were His regret was linked to the compassion He had on the daughters of man, also.
In His regret and desire to 'wipe man from the earth', chances were He was not reacting out of anger, but out of compassion for those suffering at the hand of evil, and for the benefit of all. God's will is not for man to suffer. I know many of us think the worse thing in life is death, but as it's written in the New Testament, to be absent from the body is to present with the Lord. Who's to say when God takes the breath from 'man' He is not simply taking them home and leaving their earthly vessels and all the suffering behind...? Me, I long for that day. Take this body; bring on a new one! Take this heartache; give me joy! Take these limitations and insecurity and the control of man; give me freedom! Seriously, don't ever mourn for my death, however it comes about. That won't be a tragedy - that will be the greatest freedom and celebration I'll ever know.
In reading these verses, I can easily see how we can think God is this huge mean Guy in the sky who swats whatever ticks Him off...but ya gotta know His heart to understand and appreciate what His hand is doing. Once, I shook my head wondering why God would bring the flood, but knowing Him now, knowing He has a merciful heart, I see a totally different picture. I see Him mourning over the sins of His sons and what they have cost man and the daughters of man. I see the pain in His heart that occurs when His estranged children want nothing to do with Him. I see Him wanting to free 'man' of suffering, even if that 'freeing' doesn't look right to some of us. I see Him setting a rescue plan into action.
Then in comes Noah. (Noah and his wife, and his sons and their wives - with each woman being born to another 'line' flowing from the 'sons of God'...? Meaning, all of different colour hair, eyes, skin, etc, which blended to start off the world as we know it...?)
Noah finds favour with God, so he is 'rescued', so that could say God hated the others and only saved Noah and his family, but I'm more inclined to believe that God had a plan, and as deeply as 'man' had grieved Him - or as great as the pain in His heart was, because of 'man' - He still wanted that plan to go ahead. He still wanted the earth to be inhabited, and He still wanted to walk with His children...so He gave us another chance. If God didn't want His plan to go ahead, if He didn't want you and I to walk this earth today, He would've wiped out Noah and his family, also.
Did you hear that? If God didn't want you to walk the earth today, He would've wiped out Noah and his family, also.
As a sinner - one who has walked the path of sin even after choosing to walk with God - I have witnessed the hand and heart of God's grace and mercy over my life. I have known, in my heart, His presence and His grace as I have not only stumbled from His path but ran from it at times, too. I know what it is to cause God grief. I know what it is to feel the ache of His heart. And I know what it is to be called to, as Noah was, from the depths of 'evil', and set apart, by God, in order to be saved and carried back to the Light.
I know what it is to be rescued and given hope for the future - and to be given a future.
Couldn't this passage be a metaphor for what God is willing to do to rescue you? I believe so.
I can't go beyond this chapter without highlighting God's rescue plan, His grace and mercy, and His desire to release you from suffering, because that is how He has been with me. God met me in the depths of my sin. He did have a rescue plan for me. I would've drowned in the depths of my own sin and the misery that caused if He did not reach out and rescue me with His hand, with His heart and with His Son. How could I accept all of what He's given me and done for me, then turn to this verse and offer you nothing but His anger? How selfish of me that would be. Selfish and wrong. You are alive today because God created you, because He wants you to be, and everything He offers Noah and his family - safety, a future, hope, protection, freedom from sin and its consequences, etc - He offers you now. God doesn't look at you and will you to drown in your misery. He's offering you His rescue plan. It's up to you whether or not you get on board with it.