No Compromise

DEVOTION

GENESIS

NO COMPROMISE

Gen 6:5-8

5 The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. 6 The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain. 7 So the LORD said, "I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth — men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air — for I am grieved that I have made them." 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.

NIV

We had just seen how the descendants of Seth, the supposed Godly minded clan intermarried with the descendants of Cain, the not so godly clan and now this condition of all mankind is the result. It also has been many generations since we saw the sons of God choosing wives from the clan of Cain, since we are now at the time of Noah. It is now evidence that all of the descendants of all of them have left God behind and turned inward toward the pursuit of their own desires. Let us not assume they were all really bad people, committing gross or base sins such as murder. They may not even been engage in complete immoral behavior, or their business practices may have not been totally committed to cheating or stealing from the poor. They may still had some social graces, but the point of the inclination of their thoughts being evil all the time is that they left God behind. If they were serving themselves then they were not serving God and if they were not serving God then whatever they were serving was evil. We cannot serve two masters.

Matt 6:24

24 "No one can serve two masters . Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

NIV

Although Jesus is specifically speaking about serving God or money, this would have applied to the case of these people always having their heart bend toward evil, which is not being bent toward God. We are in the same boat. We cannot serve our own interests and those of God, unless of course our interests are that of God’s. This had to be the case with Noah, as he found favor in the eyes of the Lord. When people turn from God to serve their own agenda’s it grieved him. It must have been a lot worse than it is today or we all would have been wiped off the face of the earth and he would have started over again. It seems the world is just as bent toward evil today as it was in the days of Noah. But we are in the age of grace. God promised he would not do that again, but still the lesson is learned. If we go about our lives without God, we are bent toward evil. Again that does not mean everyone is a bad person. Some who refuse to believe in God do great works for their fellow man. But nevertheless their agendas are man based rather than God based and therefor in the eyes of God they are bent toward evil all the time. We who desire to serve the Lord, who do not have the inclination of our hearts bent toward evil or serve ourselves, should we say, all the time, still do things that are not pleasing to God. Just because we are not always wanting to serve self, we do anyway at times. This is not about sin in that sense, it is about turning from God, refusing to acknowledge him as Lord. Again all this was a result of those who did live in accordance with his plan engaging themselves with those who did not live in his ways. This unequal yoking brought about a whole generation of people who did not live in his ways. The weak brought down the strong. The unbelievers diluted or infiltrated the thinking of those who believed. The result grieved God. We cannot allow the thinking of the unbeliever, no matter how intelligent their argument is, infiltrate our thinking which is based on the truth of God. It simply cannot be both, there is no grey area, it is either black or white, right or wrong, God or someone else. There can be no compromise with the world. Our desire has to be to find favor in the eyes of God. Now having said that, we who have accepted his Son as our Lord and Savior have indeed found favor in his eyes. As Noah was to build an ark, which we will see in the coming sections of this beginning, and he was saved because of the ark, we have found safety in the cross. If we are in the cross we will be saved. As Noah could either be in the ark or not in it, he could not be both, we cannot be in the cross and of the world, we are either one or the other. There can be no compromise.