Tonight, I invite you to turn with me to Genesis chapter 6, as we read together the first eight verses, drawing your attention specifically to verse 5, in connection with Lord's Day 3. So I invite you also to turn in the back of the Psalter hymnal to page 10 and the appended pages of the Psalter Hymnal, Lord's Day 3, questions and answers 6, 7, and 8. Maybe, like me, you find it interesting. The catechism, you know, is a summary of the teaching of Scripture as we know. Of the main themes, we might say, of Scripture. And some of the catechism commentators refer to the catechism as our instructor. It instructs us. What I find interesting is it's the believer's confession, isn't it? It's not the unbeliever's confession, but the believer's confession. And as we have said before, it's always interesting how the three things that we must know include how great my sin and misery are, that that is part of the believer's comfort and therefore the first section of the catechism, which we are in, deals with that sin and misery. It may seem kind of depressing on the surface. Why can't we go right to the good news? But indeed, we need to understand it instructs us about ourself. And what I always find interesting, too, in this first section on man's misery, especially Lord's Day 3 and 4, is that it also begins somewhat with man's arrogance in sin. Okay, as if to say, alright, you want to tell me that I'm a miserable sinner. Well, whose fault is it? Why is it? Whose fault? Because certainly it can't be my fault. And if you follow the questions and answers down through Lord's Day 3 and Lord's Day 4 into Lord's Day 5, which is the first one on the second section on deliverance, It's interesting how the instructor softens from this arrogance of, well, certainly it can't be my fault, to, is there hope? And of course, that's the beauty that we see throughout the catechism, which instructs us, a faithful instructor of the summary of the Word of God. Tonight, Lord's Day 3. And if you would recite the answers together. Question six. Did God create man so wicked and perverse? No. God created man good and in His own image, that is, in true righteousness and holiness, so that he might truly know God His Creator, love Him with all His heart, and live with Him in eternal happiness for His praise and glory. Then where does man's corrupt nature come from? From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in paradise. This fall has so poisoned our nature that we are born sinners, corrupt from conception on. But are we so corrupt that we are totally unable to do any good and inclined toward all evil? Yes, unless we are born again by the Spirit of God. Genesis chapter 6, beginning at verse 1, as we hear now God's holy, inspired, infallible Word. When men began to increase in number on the earth, and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. Then the Lord said, My spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal. His days will be a hundred and twenty years. The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown. 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. The Lord was grieved that He had made man on the earth, and His heart was filled with pain. 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. But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. And of course, right after that we read, Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, And he walked with God. There ends the reading of God's holy word. May He bless it to us tonight. Well, beloved in Christ the Lord, as we do consider together the believer's necessary knowledge, that knowledge that we have said which is necessary of how great our sin and misery are, we need to keep in mind that this is not talking about one's experience or experiences of this life. Yes, of course, Sin and misery affect us in this life, and there are circumstances and situations that make life miserable at times, often as a direct result of our sin. Yet no two people really have the very same perspective on or have the same experiences in life. If you ask a number of people, well, how's life? You're going to get a variety of answers. Some will say it's great. Others will say it's tough. Still others will say, well, it's peaceful. Some might say it's kind of stressful. Someone else might say, well, it's filled with a lot of hardships. And still others might say, well, I enjoy a lot of success. You will not receive any two of the same answers most likely. But what we must know with regard to the greatness of our sin and misery is not about the degree of successes or hardships in this life or not even really about daily life itself. Jesus in Matthew 24 says, As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. And they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. Many of them may have enjoyed great success, at least as far as the world was concerned. Many of them might have said, hey, life is great. The point is that one's experience of this life is not necessarily, if ever, a gauge or a measure of the greatness of that one's sin and misery. But what we must know is about what all people have in common. What we must know is about the state of man's heart before God in and of himself. And it is all the same by nature for each and every person, for you, for me, for all of mankind, apart from the saving grace of God, the state of man's heart is all the same before God. And it points to the truth of man's utter hopelessness. Unless. Now, no one enjoys being told how rotten they are. Yet, the believer's true and real comfort of the amazing grace of God and of such a great salvation in Jesus Christ, as we have said before, will only flow from understanding our complete and utter hopelessness and our desperate need and reason for it. And then, of course, our deliverance from it. Knowing that, unlike all who perished in the flood. Knowing man's utter hopelessness, first of all, because of sin's consequences. Now, Lord's Day 2, answer 5, set the stage when it said, I have a natural tendency to hate God and my neighbor. That is my direction. That is my leaning. That is where I naturally go in sin. And then question 8 expands on this when it says, But are we so corrupt that we are totally unable to do any good and inclined toward all evil? And the answer begins, very matter-of-factly, yes. And this is the diagnosis that the Lord made, that the Lord found in the text in chapter 6, verse 5. The Lord saw how great man's wickedness on earth had become and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. And as we said a moment ago, that being the diagnosis, the natural question for sinful man is why? And the second question then is, well, whose fault is it? What is the root source of man's sin and sinful nature? In the Catechism, question 6, summarizing the teaching of Scripture, says it's not God's fault. Did God create man so wicked and perverse again? Very matter-of-factly, no. Blame. Blame is the first inclination of sinful man. Well, maybe first after denial. And blame starts at the top. But the very thought that God is to blame is evidence how wicked and perverse man is. However, the root source is not in man's created state. Now, it's interesting, we have a contrast here between chapter 6, verse 5, the Lord saw how great man's wickedness on earth had become, and chapter 1, verse 31, where we read, God saw all that He had made, and it was very good. As far as the Scriptures are concerned, just a few short chapters, huh? And God saw all that He had made, and it was very good, And then, the Lord saw how great man's wickedness on earth had become. And the idea of the Lord seeing, the Lord saw, is that it was not just a quick glance. Something that suddenly grabbed his attention. And therefore, it was not a hasty decision that moved God to destroy the world with a flood. Even after he announces it, he gave man 120 years. It was about 120 years before the flood actually came. On God's part, it was a studied examination. He well observed. He knew exactly what was going on. The root source is not in man's created state because man was created good, as Genesis 1 says. The Catechism says God created man good and in his own image, that is, in true righteousness and holiness. Now, boys and girls, we often speak using superlatives. Something is good, something else is better, yet something else is best. Good, better, best. Or on report cards, teachers evaluate the student's listening skills or understanding of the material or classroom participation or study habits. I noticed on the report cards that just came out for our boys, it's not quite using this evaluation, but when I was a kid, it seems to me, it was this way. It was either excellent or very good or good or fair or poor. And therefore, if you were evaluated as good or even very good, that left room for improvement. But man, as God created him, could not be created any better. It was the best. It was good. Whole, made in God's image, perfect in holiness and righteousness, able to answer to the purpose for which God made him. Something that is good, does what it's supposed to do. A good scissors cuts well. Man was made able to answer to the purpose for which God made him. And the Catechism says, so that he might truly know God his Creator, Love Him with all His heart and live with Him in eternal happiness for His praise and glory. Beloved, God is the purpose of our life. Our purpose is not, first of all, to prosper. The purpose of our life is not, first of all, to make a good living or to make a name for ourselves. God often blesses us with these things, but God is the purpose of our life. If the purpose of your life is not for God, if it is not for His glory, if His glory is not your desire or goal, then there is something terribly out of place in your life. Even as Scripture says, whether we eat or drink, whatever we do, even those things that we do without thinking, even the smallest activities or actions or thoughts, all are to be done to the glory of God. The root source of sin that results in man's utter hopelessness is not found in man's created state, but it is found in man's fall. Question 7. Then where does man's corrupt nature come from? From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in paradise. It's not God's fault. It is man's fault. And notice the Catechism does not say because of the sin of Adam and Eve, but it specifies the nature of it. The fall and disobedience. Boys and girls, we know what that was. It was eating the forbidden fruit of that forbidden tree. And Adam and Eve's disobedience was not in any way accidental. It was not at all unintentional, but it was active, willful obedience by which man fell away from God and it resulted in the poisonous fruit of sin as the catechism rightly says. This fall has so poisoned our nature that we are born sinners corrupt from conception on. For all have sinned, Paul says, and fallen short of the glory of God. There's non-righteous. It's terrible. And this poisonous fruit of sin is throughout mankind. Sin was not restricted to the first couple. We see that already with their firstborn Cain, don't we? Adam was the federal head of the human race, and therefore it affected all of his posterity, all of mankind. It did not stop at the gates of the garden. It affected all people throughout the earth. The text says again, the Lord saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become. Wickedness had spread throughout the whole earth wherever man had gone. We see how extensive this wickedness had become by the time God sent the flood. There was no integrity to be found except for Noah by God's grace. One commentator says, The flood of water did not overwhelm earth until mankind had first been immersed. Mankind had first been immersed in the pollution of wickedness. Noah was the only one not described with a sinful ruin throughout man's heart. He found favor in the sight of God. Moses describes the greatness of man's wickedness when he says that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil, all the time. It affected man's nature down to the very core of his being so that David could rightly say in Psalm 51, Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Many do not like those words. How can that be? From the moment, the very first moment of life in the womb, one is sinful. One is sinful in the sight of God. One is destined for the eternal fire of hell. The Catechism is correct when in it we confess, as question 8 asks, but are we so corrupt that we are totally unable to do any good and inclined toward all evil? Yes. That's the truth of all of mankind in sin. God saw that. God examined the intensity of man's sin, man's heart and life completely saturated, totally depraved so that mankind cannot even point to one moment of life when evil and depravity were not present. Every inclination, it's also translated every intention, every imagination, whatever word you want to use, every inclination or intention or imagination to help us understand that what's interesting, The same word is used again in chapter 2, verse 7, where it says, the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. Every inclination, every intention, every form of the thoughts of his heart. The idea is molding something as a potter does. It implies design and purpose. That's man's design. That's what he designs. That's what man purposes. Only evil all the time. Molding, creating, crafting, conceiving by the heart and the mind. God formed man good after his own image, but man in sin forms only evil. And we cannot escape the intensity here. Every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil. That means no drop of good mixed in all the time. Every, only, and all. mean every, only, and all. Every inclination, only evil, all the time. With no sorrow for, no guilty feelings about, only a totally seared conscience toward evil, like a scar with nerves that are dead and there's no feeling in it. Man in sin is scarred, as it were, to the truth of sin. no feelings toward it as far as sorrow or guilt for it every human thought from its inception exhaustively evil which results in corruption and violence we read in verses 12 and 13 God saw how corrupt the earth had become for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways so God said to Noah I am going to put an end to all people for the earth is filled with violence because of them I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth corrupt and violence yet again remember they might have said hey life is great we are enjoying it every inclination of the thoughts of his heart and of course we know that total depravity does not mean absolute depravity does not mean that man is absolutely as evil as he can be all the time and that's because of the restraining hand of God any restraint in exercising acting out on that wickedness is only by God's restraining hand. Only by His common benevolence or common favor or common grace. This is man's diagnosis. Utterly hopeless. It's a hard truth. And that hard truth is recognized in the world as we look at society as a whole. We see sinful and wicked inclinations put into practice all around us under the disguise of equal rights and toleration and acceptance and inclusion in order for man to get his way with regard to his evil desires. We see those inclinations acted out as we read the newspapers or watch the news and we read about the horrendous crimes that are committed. We even notice it with regard to the kinds of movies that are made or the television shows that are on TV. That's the kind of trash that people want. That's the kind of junk that people are attracted to. that's what they want. Shameful against God. And we also see wickedness promoted in subtle ways. I happened to see an article. I didn't read it, but I saw an article this past week. It had a picture of a young man and a young woman. And the title said, Want to save money? Don't get married. Again, I didn't read the article, but I suspect I know what it's talking about. Just live together. It's a whole lot cheaper. Something totally against what is pleasing to God. It's a hard truth. But also recognize in our own lives as we recognize selfish thoughts and plans and schemes in our own lives that result in sinful actions over and over and over again, day by day by day. And we begin to realize, don't we, that left to ourselves, even as believers, left to ourselves, we cannot escape ourselves if God were to remove His restraining hand from us. The only thing that we are good for is to cast ourselves into utter hopelessness apart from the grace of God. Unless. But are we so corrupt that we are totally unable to do any good and inclined toward all evil? Yes. Unless. We are born again by the Spirit of God. Indeed, that's a ray of hope here in this section on misery, isn't it? It's a ray of hope, yet ironically, we need to understand that we are still in this first part of the catechism and the goal of this first part of the catechism is to cause us to sense the greatness of our sin and misery. And therefore, these words, unless we are born again by the Holy Spirit, these words are not meant first to point us to hope. Indeed, they do point us to hope, but not first of all. But those words are first of all to cause us to say, as it were, I knew it was bad, but I didn't know it was that bad. I didn't know that it would take that. I didn't know that it was that hopeless unless, in the second place, He is born again. Unless there is a start from scratch because it's hopeless for man. It's as impossible as Nicodemus thought it was to be physically born again. We know that's impossible. Man is hopeless. In and of himself. Because man is dead in sin, as Paul says in Ephesians 2. Not just dented and scratched like an automobile that still runs perfectly mechanically fine. It's just dented a little bit or scratched. Not just a little bit deformed or a slight bit sick and just a little bit of tweaking, a little bit of medication will take care of things. But dead. Completely incapable of doing any good in the sight of God. Just like a dead corpse I guess that's a contradiction in terms or redundant, isn't it? Just like a corpse can't do anything except spread the odor of death. In the same way, all that we can do is evil. Inclined toward all evil. Man and sin is corrupt to the very core. He must be built up from the ground floor. There must be a start all over. And that's what God did with the flood, didn't He? He basically started all over with one man. In His grace, He did not turn His back on all of it. In His grace, He started all over with one man from whom He would bring forth the Messiah, our Redeemer, the one in whom we are born again, Jesus Christ. Noah was not perfect. The Bible makes that clear. but Noah was the object of God's grace of regeneration. He found favor in the sight of the Lord. He was born again, which takes a miracle. You see, that's how bad it is for man. It takes nothing less than a miracle. And that's what regeneration is. It is a miracle of God the Holy Spirit is doing. It is a heart transformation, a heart transplant as it were. A change in one's direction from being inclined, from moving towards sin, desiring only sin, to being inclined toward desiring God and the things of God. So that the one who is born again by faith receives all the benefits earned by Jesus Christ as our very own. Beloved, Jesus Christ is the good news. There's none better. He is the good news in the face of the bad news of ourselves. He is the second Adam. Whereas the first Adam chose to revolt and rebel against God, the second Adam, Jesus Christ, chose a right. He was obedient all the way to death. And His obedience reconciles, balances out, cancels out our disobedience for which He gave His life all the way to death. And in Him, those who are born again are new creations as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5.17. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, He is a new creation. The old has gone. The old that is totally unable to do any good, that is inclined toward all evil, the old is gone. The new has come. As Paul says in Ephesians 4.24, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. Well, again, this section on misery can be quite depressing, can't it? to be told how rotten we are. Yet, beloved, knowing how great are our sin and misery is only possible if one is a new creation. Knowing these things is not a prerequisite for regeneration. That's not possible because we're dead. But it is a result of the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. Knowing these things by faith is evidence of God's saving grace in one's life. And therefore, though we are not to be comforted in the midst of our sin, yet knowing our sin and having a true godly sorrow for it and having confidence of the saving work of Jesus Christ is to our comfort because it points to the work of the Holy Spirit for Jesus' sake. And it serves our eternal encouragement of belonging to Him, body and soul, in life and in death. Again, because one who doesn't care, one who doesn't believe, doesn't care. And we are called then to live as new creations because that is what we are in Christ Jesus. In essence, that's what our God teaches us. That's what He says to us. Be who you are. You are my child. You are righteous in my sight for Jesus' sake. Be who you are. We all deserve nothing except to perish in sin like those who perished in the flood. But blessed be the name of the Lord that He has delivered us from the torment of His wrath against our sin and He has brought us safely into the kingdom of His glory and love forever. And beloved, this is indeed the blessing of all who believe and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ by faith. This is your comfort as a believer. It is mine. And therefore, as a new creation in Him, now, when someone asks you, How are you? How's life? Even in the face of the most difficult hardship, you can confidently answer, In Christ Jesus, I am blessed. Amen. Let's pray together. dear heavenly father we do thank you for this hard knowledge we thank you for this knowledge of the truth of ourselves because we thank you too lord that you don't leave us there but you lift our eyes to the truth of your son our savior Jesus Christ and deliverance from the sin and misery. And Father, we pray too that through this knowledge you would continue to increase, strengthen our faith. Lead us and guide us by your Holy Spirit that we might walk before you as obedient children delighting in you. Delighting in your holiness and purity. Delighting to be who we are. new creations in Christ Jesus. We thank You, Heavenly Father, that we can say with confidence that indeed we are blessed because of Jesus Christ, our Lord. In Him we pray. Amen.