Dr. Manny Arango (0:00)

Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the journey. To all my fellow pastors, I've got a question for you. Does your city know that your church exists? Listen, I get it. You're preaching, you're leading, you're discipling, you're doing ministry. We are in the same boat. And let's be honest, social media and marketing, not your strong suit. Not mine either. And that's probably the last thing on your mind. And that's why we chose to partner with Church Candy Marketing for our church Plant the garden. We out here, y'all. They help churches get more actual guests walking through the doors on Sunday without your eye having to stress over ads or algorithms or trying to crack the social media code. Right now, Church Candy is helping nearly 400 churches reach their communities with simple invite ads. And it works. It's super effective. I can tell you from firsthand experience. So if you're tired of being your city's best kept secret, how about you do this? Go to churchcandy.com Manny and book a free consultation. Book a discovery call. Their team will break it all down and show you how to start seeing new faces at your church this Sunday. I'm in the trenches with you trying to grow the church. And how about we just start a whole campaign? No more empty churches. So let's partner with Church Candy and get our churches full. The glory of Jesus. Let's go. We get to talk about Noah today. We. We. Woo. We gonna dive in. Okay, I'm excited. Okay, I'm excited. So here we go. Day 84. If you've done the reading for the day, I'm proud of you. If you're on a streak, I'm proud of you. I think that what we're gonna talk about today is going to really add a lot of depth to what you read. If you have not done the reading, pause the video, pause the audio. Go handle that. Go do the reading. So let's dive into some hashtag context clues. All right? We'll see what we got time for. There's a couple of things that we need to really, really, really talk about. Here's the first thing. Okay. The instructions that God gives Noah for building this boat are trash. Like this. These. These are not good. Instructions. Let's. Let's actually read this in Genesis chapter six, which I know is yesterday's reading, but it's context for today. Make yourself an arc of cypress wood. Make rooms in it and coat it with pitch, inside and out. This is how you are to build it. Okay? So here's the instructions. This is how you ought to build it. The ark is to be 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high. Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit high all around. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower middle and upper decks. That's the instructions for an ark that's supposed to survive a flood. What kind of directions are these? These instructions are worse than IKEA instructions. Okay. For building their terrible furniture. No rudder, no keel, no bow, no mast, no stone. Interesting boat. All right, next thing that we need to realize, there's three distinct sections for this boat in upper deck, middle deck, lower deck. God commands Noah to build the ark according to a three in one ratio. Ring a bell, kind of like an outer court, inner court, holy of holies, maybe. Also, these cubits sound a bit familiar. Here's. Here's what the arc cubits supposed to be. 300 cubits the length of the ark, 50 cubits its width, 30 cubits its height. Well, let me tell you, in First Kings 6, verse 2, the Bible tells us that the temple that God that Solomon builds for God is supposed to be 60 cubits its length, 20 cubits its width, 30 cubits its height. So a second parallel between this ark and the tabernacle or the temple. Next, get this. We have no information concerning a rudder or keel or any of that, any of the things that you actually need for a boat. But we get instructions for a door that a boat this big is supposed to only have a one door. Now, let's think about what other building or structure in the Bible has a massive importance on its door. Oh, yeah, the tabernacle. And the tabernacle is a type and shadow of the person of Jesus. And Jesus teaches us in John, chapter 10, verse 9, that I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved. He will go in and come out and find pasture. There are multi. Are there multiple doors to board the ark? No. Are there multiple doors for the temple? No. Are there multiple ways to God? No. Jesus is the only door to salvation. Fifth, the word for ark is really, really, really interesting. Okay? In Egyptian culture, the word for ark is teva. In Egyptian culture, a teva was a chest or a holy shrine or a coffin which housed images and idols of the Egyptian gods. And these were used in Egyptian temples for the purpose of worship. Actually, these chests that were called arks were found in all Egyptian temples. According to a scholar named Abraham Yehuda, there were certain festivals where these arks, tevas, which contained images and idols of the gods, were carried on the Nile, were carried on the water from one temple town to another. Guys, I think that when the original audience of Genesis, the original audience of freed slaves interacted with this story, they were very aware of the Egyptian culture that they were just freed from. They were steeped in that Egyptian culture. Why would God have Noah build a boat but name it after an Egyptian dwelling place for their gods and idols? Maybe because God wants to fill his teva with creatures made in his image. Maybe because this is more than a boat. Maybe Noah is constructing a temple that this will be carried on the raging waters of the flood the same way the Egyptian teval was carried along the Nile. Maybe. Here we go. Noah, in Genesis, chapter 6, verse 21, is instructed that he has to take food into the ark. Now, that seems like common sense. Why does God need to tell him to take food? Well, when we get to Exodus, chapter 16, verse 33, guess what Moses said to Aaron. Take a jar and put an omer of manna in it and place it before the Lord so they can be kept throughout the generations. What other building gets food? That's right. Tabernacle. Has to bring food into the tabernacle. When the ark rests on Mount Ararat and Noah actually comes out, guess what he performs one of the largest burnt offerings ever recorded in Scripture. Who performs whole burnt offerings again? Oh, yeah, Priests perform those. What is Noah functioning as a priest? Why? Because maybe he's managing a temple. Maybe. I think I just gave you, I think around seven correlations. I mean, I think that that is, like, enough. But here we go for good measure. Genesis chapter 6, verse 22 says this. Noah did this, he did all that God commanded him. Let's compare that with Exodus, chapter 40, verse 16. Moses did everything just as the Lord had commanded him. In response to what? That's right. The building of the tabernacle. Just in case anybody needs another one, the ark comes to rest on the top of the mountain. Where's Abraham commanded to sacrifice Isaac? A mountain. What does that exact location become? Oh, yeah, the Temple Mount, where Solomon builds a dwelling place for God known as the temple. The tabernacle. Maybe, just maybe, this is more than a boat. Maybe the ark is a dwelling place for God. Maybe what the world needed was an ordered temple so that we could dwell with God again, so that we can attract the presence of God again, so that he could calm the chaos, conquer the chaos, subdue the chaos, and do the thing that he did at the very, very beginning of the story, which is pull creation out of chaos and into order. I would contend that for an eastern audience, they would have seen this as a boat, but they would have seen this as way more than a boat. They would have seen this as a floating, portable house, temple, tabernacle for the presence of God. Now, nerdy nugget, that's our context clue, okay? That without context, it's very hard to see that Noah's Ark is not just an ark, not just a boat, but that it's way more than that. Okay, nerdy nugget, there's all these parallels between Noah and Adam, okay? In the same way that God builds a garden and puts Adam and Eve in it, Noah builds a vineyard, okay? So we got a vineyard. We got a garden. And the Adam and Eve, you know, they are commanded, don't eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So it's fruit on a tree. What is wine is fermented grapes. So not only do Adam and Eve eat of some forbidden fruit, but so does Noah, okay? Once Adam and Eve eat of the fruit, they see their nakedness. They realize they're naked. Guess what happens with Noah. He drinks of the wine. He gets naked in his tent. He wakes up to realize that something has happened. And I'm here to tell you that the something that's happened is not just that his son saw him naked. If you actually want to see this, you can see. Exactly. Uncover the nakedness. Here's. Here's what happens. Noah's got three sons. First son comes into his tent, realizes his dad's naked. So now we got to figure out what happens between Noah and his son, because the. The next two boys cover their father's nakedness. Well, let's go to Leviticus 18. Leviticus, chapter 18, verse 7. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father, which is the nakedness of your mother. She is your mother. You shall not uncover her nakedness. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. So the nakedness of your father is actually your mother. So in Leviticus, when it says, don't uncover the nakedness of your father, saying, don't have sex with your mom, that. That's what that means. Next verse. You should not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife. It is your father's nakedness. So that's your stepmom, right? You shall not. Verse 9. This is Leviticus, chapter 18. You should not uncover the nakedness of your sister, your father's daughter, or your mother's daughter, whether brought up in family or another home. So there's the options between. What happens between Noah and Ham, okay? Option number one. Scholars and theologians really do just center around these three options, okay? Because let me tell you what didn't happen. He didn't just walk in and see his dad naked and go gossip about it. That. That. That's. That didn't even fit the. The biblical hermeneutics for. For how this language gets used. So let's. Let's go through the three options. This is our nerdy nugget for the day. You guys are going to love this. Option number one. Ham anally penetrates his dad. That's option number one, okay? Ham comes into the tent, sees that his dad is naked, and violates him, okay? Sexually. Option number two, Ham castrates his father, okay? That's option number two. Option number three, which is what I. Which is what I would argue probably happened, comes to his tent, realizes that Noah is not naked, and out for the count. And so Ham has sex with his mom, okay? Because uncovering the nakedness of your father is to have sex with your mom, okay? Is to do something sexually explicit with your mother. That's what Leviticus chapter 18 tells us. Here's the biggest clue that that is what actually happens. Because when Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done, he said, cursed be Canaan. Wait, why not curse be Ham? Ham is the one that did this. Go back up to verse 22. Because verse 22 is giving us information out of order. Okay, well, let's go to verse 20. Noah, a man of the soil, that Adam is described that way too, by the way, proceeded to plant a vineyard. Great. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan. Wait a second. The Bible doesn't even tell us that Ham had a son named Canaan. Why does. What. Why does. Why does the Bible want to let us know that Canaan is Ham's son? So bad. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers, outside. Outside. But Sheth and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders. When they walked in backward and covered their father's naked body, their faces Turned the other way so they would not see their father naked. Verse 24. When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, he said, cursed be Canaan. Why in the world does Ham's son get cursed? Well, I think it's because Noah wants to make it really clear that his wife is not pregnant with his child, but pregnant with his son's child. So cursed be Canaan. Now, the last piece of this little nerdy nugget cocktail of clues is this. Chapter nine, verse seven. As for you, be fruitful and increase in number. Multiply on the earth and increase on it. Okay, that's chapter nine, verse seven. Go to chapter nine, verse one. Then God blessed Noah and his son, saying to them, be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. So Noah's old as crap, but he's given this promise that he's going to what? Be fruitful and multiply? He's given that promise twice. And so there's a lot of midrash around this passage. And Jewish rabbis say that Ham doesn't want his dad to have another kid. Why? Because of the previous story. Cain doesn't even want to split things 50, 50 with his brother Abel. Ham does not want to split things into thirds with his two brothers. The last thing Ham wants is an additional brother. And now his chunk of the pie goes from 33% down to 25%. So what does Ham do? He gets another kid in the mix. That's his kid. So now he goes from getting 33% of the inheritance to upping his share of the pie to 50% of the inheritance. Because now Noah's next kid named Canaan is really Ham's kid. So Ham introduces competing seed into this equation so that he could get more of the pie. And ladies and gentlemen, he is now the beast in this new iteration. Bible Nerds. I have an announcement. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos, releases May of 2025, and pre orders are officially open. When I began to learn Genesis in its proper context, I learned that the creation account is not pretty. Primarily about God creating something out of nothing, but rather God bringing divine order to the chaos of the cosmos. That one nugget was a game changer for me because I've been preaching to all the kids in my youth group that peace was a solution for their anxiety. But really, God's solution to chaos is never peace, but rather order. Peace isn't something that you stumble into, it's something that you intentionally step into. And that starts with aligning your Life with God's order. I think that this book is a game changer. It's nerdy, it's practical, it provides a very contextual understanding of the book of Genesis. And if you grab a copy, you'll learn why there's a huge dragon on the COVID Head to the link in the show notes to pre order or head to crushingchaos.com to see the really dope trailer that we made for this book. I think it's time for you to crush the chaos in your life. And that starts with grabbing a copy of this book. Now back to the podcast. Now let's end with a timeless truth. God says to Noah, hey, I'm going to put a bow in the clouds. And that's going to be a sign of the covenant between you and I. Now what you need to know is that in Hebrew there is no word for rainbow. In a lot of our translations we translate that as rainbow, but really it just means bow. And when you think of a bow, what do you think of? Ah, I know exactly what I think of. And I know what every single person in an ancient Near Eastern context would have thought of. They would have thought of an archer's bow. They would have thought of a bow that would shoot arrows. And so you've got to ask yourself the question, God puts a bow in the clouds, in what direction is the bow pointing? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the bow. Bow is not pointing down towards humanity, but the bow is pointing up towards him. And this is the sign of the covenant that the next time wickedness fills the earth and the next time I have to flood the earth to clean it and to cleanse it, the arrow will not pierce you, it will pierce me. Which is why when Jesus is on the cross and it is time for a new flood to cleanse the earth, he's pierced from below. And a sudden rush of water and blood come from the side of Jesus. Because the archer's bow is not pointed towards humanity from heaven to earth, it's actually pointed from us to him, because we will be the ones to hurt him so that we can get cleansed. We have the gospel right here in the Old Testament. Now here's the other thing. In the ancient Near Eastern world, there was a suzerain and a vassal. Suzerain is the powerful party, the vassal is the non powerful party. There's a lopsided treaty in the ancient world. And in the ancient world, the vassal typically had to keep the sign of the covenant. Sometimes it was a signet, sometimes it was a receipt. It was a sign of the covenant. Anytime the Susan and the vassal saw each other, the vassal could be called upon to produce that sign of the covenant. And if they couldn't produce it, then the covenant was broken. God says this, I'm gonna make a treaty with you, Noah, and I'm the suzerain and you're the vassal. But get this, you're not responsible for producing the sign which is the bow in the clouds. I'm responsible for producing the sign which is the bow in the clouds, which is the most counter cultural thing Noah had ever experienced in his life. Because the point of these stories is not to show you the similarities between Israel and the surrounding cultures, but to actually show you the differences between Israel in the surrounding cultures. Because the differences, preach the differences, communicate a timeless truth. That timeless truth is this, that God wants desperately to be in covenant with you. So he sent his son Jesus to cleanse the world of its sins, to cleanse the world of its unrighteousness. And it is not him, the God of the universe, who puts the pressure on you to produce the sign of the covenant. It is him who's always willing to produce the sign of the covenant and do the work and go the extra mile so that he can redeem us. We should be grateful for a gracious, loving and merciful God. If there's anything that these stories highlight, it's that God is not angry in the Old Testament and then gracious in the New Testament. No, he's the same God yesterday, today, and forevermore. He's gracious in the Old Testament. He's gracious in the New Testament. And the reason that Jesus is gracious in the New Testament is because he's reflecting the grace of the Father that we get to see in the Old Testament. All right, guys, I love Genesis, but I'll see you right here tomorrow. Tomorrow we're in Genesis chapters 11 through 14. We're going to get introduced to a man by the name of. Yep, we meet Abraham tomorrow. I can't wait for it. I'll see you right here. I'm so proud of you, Abraham. You're on a street. Don't break it. And I'll see you right here. I love you guys. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show at thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebibledepartment. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.