Gen 8:13-22

Now it came about in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the water was dried up from the earth. Then Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and behold, the surface of the ground was dried up (Gen 8:13).

In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first of the month, Noah “removed” the covering of the ark. The word removed has a different meaning from opened. Once the covering is removed, no one can close it back up. At this time, Noah witnessed that the death and destruction had passed away and new life had come about.
God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the cattle that were with him in the ark; and God caused a wind to pass over the earth, and the water subsided (Genesis 8:1). The word remember indicates one’s care and constant thoughts about something because it dwells in that person. It is the greatest blessing when God keeps us in His mind, looks at us, and thinks about us.



The day when the covering of the ark was removed was the first day of Noah, the day of a new history

Since Jesus said that the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah (Matthews 24:37; Luke 17:26), we must be knowledgeable about “the days of Noah.” Those days were fallen era that could not be renewed because they were so corrupt and foul. There is no result without a cause. The reason why the world became so corrupt was because God’s sons married to daughters of unbelievers. They did so in their pursuits for the fame, power, and physical appearances. Seeing this, God declared that His spirit would never be with the mankind anymore. As soon as God said this, human beings became a mere chunk of meat, or flesh. They became worthless (Genesis 6:1-4). God said believers should not intermarry with unbelievers (Deuteronomy 7:3).
In the days of Noah, the corruption and wickedness of men were great on earth. It means that sins of men filled the world to the point where they were overflowing. Also, the earth was so corrupt that it was broken and destroyed. The earth was filled with violence. People were stubborn, violent, brutal, and wicked. Sins are truly terrifying. As men drove themselves to such a state, God became sorry and regretted that He had made man on the earth. Finally, He said he would blot out every living thing from the face of the land. In original Hebrew language, “blot out” has a meaning of “to completely destroy something to the point where it will be forgotten by people.”

Eventually, flood came and blotted out every living thing from the earth. However, Noah found favor in the eyes of God. Saints become masters of the new world when they find favor in the eyes of God (Genesis 6:8). God revealed to Noah how the flood would take place on earth and recorded in the Bible its process in great detail based on Noah’s age. We must pay close attention to this.

God gave Noah a notice about the flood when Noah was six hundred years old, on tenth of the second month. And the flood started after seven days, on the seventeenth day of the second month (Genesis 7:4). Since then, heavy rain came down for forty days and nights. All living things on earth drowned to death. The water prevailed upon the earth for one hundred and fifty days. Noah stayed in the ark for a year and ten days, from the six hundredth year, seventeenth day of the second month, until six hundred and first year, twenty seventh day of the second month. When God recorded the account in such great details with dates and years, there must be a meaning.

The first day of the first month, when liberation from Egypt of idolatry and unbelief came

Although Noah hadn’t yet come out of the ark, the water was finally dried up from the earth in the six hundred and first year of Noah’s life, in the first month, on the first of the first month. The day that Noah removed the covering of the ark was the “first day” for him. It was the day when the long and stifling flood finally ended and hope and joy filled in.

The first day of the month has a significant meaning throughout the Bible (Ezra 7:9, 10:17, 2 Chronicles 29:17, Ezekiel 45:18). In original Hebrew language, “the first day of the month” was derived from the word “head,” “beginning,” or “the first.” In the Bible, the origin of “the first day of the first month” lies in the time of Exodus. The people of Israel had to live under slavery in Egypt for 430 years because they did not keep God’s commandments and sinned by serving false gods and idols. They lived a life as slaves without names.
It was a life without being recognized as human beings, and a way of death. However, when God at last finished their long and bitter slavery and liberated them, He designated that month (the month of Abib) as the first month of the year (Exodus 12:2). The Israelites escaped from Egypt on the first day of the month and were reborn as God’s people. It was the day when they marched on with vigor towards a new heaven and a new earth.

Egypt symbolizes idolatry and unbelief to God. God is rebuking us for worshiping impersonal idols that cannot speak or listen, when God has made us as the masters of the all creations in the universe with His great love and mercy.

The recovery of God’s image in men who worshipped Egyptian idols and starting a new life begins on the first day of the first month. God called Egypt “crushed reed” on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it (Isaiah 30, 31, 36:6). When the Israelites ran out of food in the wilderness after they escaped from Egypt, they longed for Egypt and cried out that they would return to it (Numbers 11:13). It was an act of challenging God. Egypt is where Jesus Christ was crucified. “And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified” (Revelations 11:8). How absurd is it to long for Egypt where Jesus was crucified?

The first day of the first month, when scattered saints come together to the Word

The first day of the first month is when God gathers scattered saints together to the world of the Word. When Moses set up the tabernacle for worship, it was also on the first day in the first month of the second year since Exodus (Exodus 40:2, 17). King Hezekiah started to cleanse the temple, which had been destroyed and profaned by his father Ahaz the wicked king on the first day of the first month in 715 BC. He burned  and destroyed unclean things. Extending the consecration byeight days two times, he recovered the temple to the extent of being spotless and gave worship of thanksgiving (2 Chronicles 29:17).

When Hezekiah knelt down to repent his father’s sin with tears, God became indescribably joyous.
He granted all that he had asked for. Saints must do God’s work first. Worshiping God in the temple is the greatest blessing of all. We must think about God’s house, temple, before our own houses or workplaces. We must think of God before our own parents, children, or spouses. That is God’s command (Philippians 2:22). If we do not fulfill our duties of worshiping God in the temple, nothing will fare well.

It was early morning on the first day of the first month, when the Word of God came to Ezekiel (Ezekiel 26:1). It was on the first day of the first month, when the sanctuary was cleansed by taking some of the blood from a young bull and putting on the door posts of the house, on the four corners of the ledge of the altar and on the posts of the gate of the inner court (Ezekiel 45:18-19).
It was on the first day of the first month, when Ezra set out for the second return from the Babylonian captivity. It was also on the first day of the first month, when they finished the investigation on all the men who had married foreign wives to exclude them from the assembly.

The first day of the first month, when a new heaven and a new earth were opened

God had Noah to open the ark on first day of the first month. It was a day that a new heaven and a new earth were opened. Dear saints, until present, your businesses haven’t been well and you were filled with gloom, apprehension, worry, anxiety and concern. But I bless you in the name of the Lord that starting today you will remove the covering and receive God’s promises. It is possible when you believe it. Today is the first day of the first month of faith for us.

Let us take today as the first day of the first month and begin a new life

Is there anything that works out by our worrying over it? I hope you do not doubt. Little doubts lead to bigger doubts, and bigger doubts to unbelief.
They make us move away from the Word of God. Doubts are byproducts of unbelief. They make it difficult for us to believe and make us waver and hesitate. They make us doubt our family, neighbors, and even the Word of God. At this moment today, please cast away your doubts. Get rid of absurdity of doubts and be filled with God’s grace like Noah.

Please learn from the royal official, who believed what Jesus spoke to him and started off. Could he have left if he had doubts? When he “believed and started off,” his son was cured from a serious illness (John 4:50). Jesus’ Word is the very gift, an amazing one, for us who greet the first day of the first month. All we need to do is simply believe and go.

Let us take today as the first day of the first month and remove all the things that have caused pain, misery, sicknesses, ailments and heartaches. Let us all cast away anything that causes stench and breathe in new air. With a new resolve and determination, let us triumph in all aspects of our lives and win the fight against the sin and evil. Let us not give in to temptations and doubts but believe the Word of God consistently and move on. I believe that when we do so, the unprecedented blessings that even our forefathers had not received will be upon your families and throughout your generations, as described in Galatians 3:7-9.

Father God!
Make us not doubt others, families, and even ourselves. Let us all hold onto the Word in Mark 9:23, which says all things are possible to him who believes and believe the Word.
As the son of a royal official came back to life from the deathbed when the official believed the Word of Jesus and started off, let us experience the work of the Word that revives all our spirits.
Pyungkang Cheil Church is on the first day of the first month in a spiritual sense. Help us not to forget the first day of the first month and remove the covering of death and suffering, so that we can newly receive the Word of God and understand and believe it.
Bless us all to be faithful at Pyungkang Cheil Church and give glory to God till the end. Let us bear beautiful fruits of faith, by beginning and ending everything with faith. Safeguard every household by the work of the firewalls of the Holy Spirit.
Bless us not to commit the sins of ceasing to pray for the Word. Let us have the first day of the first month as we pray to God and receive answers from Him at all costs. We pray all these words in the name of holy Jesus with thanksgiving. Amen.

November 4, 2012, Lord’s Day 2nd Service Sermon