Gen 7:5, And Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him. 
	Before Easter, we considered the fact that Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. In this morning’s reading, we see that Noah … did according to all that the Lord had commanded him… This is an important truth that must be at the heart of our every activity on this earth. Because we love God, we are to be seeking every avenue of doing only those things that He commands us to do. Please keep in mind that we are not saved because of what we do. We are not loved by God because of the manner in which we conduct ourselves out from any sense of self-righteousness and self-holiness. Of our selves, we bring only filth and degradation to the throne of God’s Holiness. 
	The only manner of pleasing Him is as we live forth by the power and the guidance of the Holy Spirit in complete line with His Word. Our every ability to honor God is set absolutely in the life of Jesus Christ Who now is our life. We desire to honor God because Christ now lives His life forth from us unto others. In all truth and practical application, His Life is always and forever in complete and perfect accord with what will please the Father. 
	Please consider what the Writer to the Hebrews tells us about Noah in Heb 11:7. By faith Noah, being warned by God about things not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household, by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith. Notice several key aspects that may easily be overlooked. 
	First, it was by faith that Noah could do all that God commanded. He trusted in God to make every provision for his own obedience. It was a complete act of faith in the Word of God that enabled Noah to obey and to accomplish what the Lord directed. This is something that, sadly, many of us seem to forget. We get ideas in our minds of what God wants and then we march forward to do a great work for the Lord in the power of our determination and our feeble abilities to perform. We try to make things right and in accordance to our understanding of the issues and how we think they should be resolved. We put forth our concept of holiness and godly vindication, accusing and judging and even threatening holy retribution on those who get in our way. 
	It would have been very easy for Noah to condemn and to put the blame squarely on his neighbors and acquaintances. He could have ascended the mountain tops and declared the might and righteous wrath of God, but then he wouldn’t have had the time and the energy to do the work that God had given him to build the ark. Rather, Noah, trusting in the sovereignty of God, trusting in God’s faithfulness, and trusting in God’s perfect plan of operation, did all that God commanded. 
	And, this is the other point of this passage in Hebrews, Noah … in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household. In reverence, Noah faithfully obeyed the Lord. As he was building the ark, as he was sweating under the laboriousness of that difficult task, as he was enduring the taunts and the abuse of those on-lookers, as he was toiling with all the difficulties of loading the ark in preparation for those long days afloat, as he was making every lowly provision necessary in dealing with all those animals, he reverenced the Lord. This is only possible because Noah had a tremendous appreciation of Who God is. Noah knew that the Lord deserved all honor and adoration in even the most basic and menial tasks. 
So often, we tend to think of God in reverence only in those things that are big and mighty and spiritually apparent. We look at only the laboring that we classify as for the Lord as worthy of every consideration of God. But that was not the case with Noah. In even the most basic and fundamental chores of preparation, he held God with reverence. We are not told that he complained and grumbled. We do not read about Noah being hesitant and argumentative. We do not have it recorded that Noah stubbornly resisted and was disgruntled and mumbled and muttered as he begrudgingly did the dirty and lowly tasks at hand. What we are told is that Noah …in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household.
It was his heart of service to God in the every detail of the task that God gave him to do. Noah thought about God and venerated Him in his heart as he daily did that which was tediously necessary in preparation for the fulfillment of the Word of God. 
This is a matter as to how we regard the work that God gives us to do. It makes no difference if we are to stand before the multitudes and declare His Name, or stay at home, teaching our children of His Grace and Mercy and Love. It matters not whether we are on the front line of intense spiritual combat or tending the puss-filled wounds and emptying the bedpans of the infirm. Everything God gives us to do, we need to do with reverence unto Him in our hearts. No task is too small or insignificant or lowly for our consideration of the greatness and the majesty and the splendor of God.
	The key to this entire consideration is that we fully obey and complete the entire work that God has given us. We must do everything with humbleness of spirit and contriteness of heart to the complete course of God’s instruction.
As we read, concerning the setting up of the Lord’s tabernacle in Ex 39:32 as well as verses 42+43. Thus all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of meeting was completed; and the sons of Israel did according to all that the Lord had commanded Moses; so they did….So the sons of Israel did all the work according to all that the Lord had commanded Moses. And Moses examined all the work and behold, they had done it; just as the Lord had commanded, this they had done. So Moses blessed them. 
	God would not accept just the bare minimum that He required. Everything had to be accomplished exactly as He laid forth in order for His Shekinah glory to indwell the tabernacle. Moses gave the direct instructions as to the proper and precise manner in which the tabernacle was to be constructed. He oversaw all that the people did with precision and with the critical eye to make certain that everything was done exactly in accordance with the specific details required. 
	Then note, once the work was done, and Moses inspected it and was satisfied that God would be completely pleased with it, Moses blessed the people. This is a direct result of coming into the work of God with a heart that seeks only to bless Him with every fiber of our effort and being and skill. When we so seek to bless God, we will find that we are blessed in measure beyond our understanding or capacity to contain. He blesses us to overflowing with the splendor of Himself.
	As we read in Ps 119:1-6, How blessed are those whose way is blameless, Who walk in the law of the Lord. How blessed are those who observe His testimonies, Who seek Him with all their heart. They also do no unrighteousness; They walk in His ways. Thou hast ordained Thy precepts, That we should keep them diligently. Oh that my ways may be established To keep Thy statutes! Then I shall not be ashamed When I look upon all Thy commandments. We are given a view of the commandments of the Lord that sees them, not as onerous and stifling, but as precious and pure and the very essence of life itself. He blesses us with His Word as He opens it in our hearts and minds and beings through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
	Even Jesus experienced this wonderful blessing of pleasing the Father in completeness as we have recounted for us in Matt 3:13-17. Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan coming to John, to be baptized by him. But John tried to prevent Him, saying, "I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?" But Jesus answering said to him, "Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he permitted Him. And after being baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased." 
	This is of tremendous importance for us to comprehend. When our lives manifest that complete love for God in such a manner as to want to only do those things that please Him and are the course that He has laid forth before us, we will find ourselves enjoying the communion and the fellowship of God. We will know the very countenance of God upon our lives, being pleased with the result which the sacrifice of His Only Begotten Son has accomplished in you and in me. It is no small thing to know that God delights in our willing walk with Him as His Beloved on this earth.
	Jesus tells us of this unique relationship with God in Luke 8:19-21. And His mother and brothers came to Him, and they were unable to get to Him because of the crowd. And it was reported to Him, "Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside, wishing to see You." But He answered and said to them, "My mother and My brothers are these who hear the word of God and do it." In Jesus, as we hear and obey the Word of God, we are made part of the very family of God. 
Keep in mind that we are not made to be gods unto ourselves. We are incorporated into the very family of God by virtue of being found in Jesus Christ. Our obedience and following of the Word of God is based on the fact that we so love God that we only want to do that which will honor Him. That we do through the power and the strength and the grace and the mercy and the provision of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  
	This is further reinforced by Christ as He tells us in John 8:28+29. Jesus therefore said, "When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me. "And He who sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him." 
This is the core of what our lives now are in Jesus Christ. By virtue of His indwelling us, we too are to find that we are only doing that which we are taught and directed by God in our lives. Just as Christ only did that which was pleasing to His Father in Heaven, so are we to do only that which pleases the Heavenly Father. 
That is what is part and parcel of being incorporated into the very family of God. What was impossible of our own accord now becomes the very fabric of our lives in the fact of Jesus living His life in us. It is a growing process for us, as we learn to honor the Father by our obedience. We are taught and directed and given the faith to obey and to please Him by His Holy Spirit’s operating work in our lives. We learn obedience as we obey and honor Him with reverence in our hearts.
	This is the course of our instruction as disciples of Christ. It is just as Jesus taught by His actions and words in John 13:14-17, when he humbled Himself to wash the feet of His Disciples. "If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. "For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you. "Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master; neither is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him. "If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. 
	Our lives are to be the living testimony of our Teacher, Our Lord, Our Master, Our Beloved and Perfect Savior. As we so hold Him with reverence and appreciation and love in our hearts, so will our conduct and our behavior evidence His life fulfilled on this earth. 
The Apostle Paul highlights this for us in Phil 2:5-8, Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 
	We are daily called to the death of self that the life of Jesus can shine forth ever more fully and clearly and beautifully through the sacrifices of our wants and our desires and our thoughts of what should and should not be. Rather than trust our wits and our comprehension, we reverently trust God in His every direction in our lives! This often leads us on the road of suffering for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ, just as it was the road which He had to travel. Because of that, we should not be surprised when we face the fiery torments and tribulations of this realm. Rather, we should see them for what they are, the means by which we learn to trust and obey God with honor and praise in our hearts.
	As we are encouraged by the Writer to the Hebrews as regards Our Lord Jesus Christ, Heb 5:5-8, So also Christ did not glorify Himself so as to become a high priest, but He who said to Him, "Thou art My Son, Today I have begotten Thee"; just as He says also in another passage, "Thou art a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek." In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. 
	Why would we expect anything different in our walk on this earth? The servant is not greater than His Master. And we certainly, and most assuredly, are not greater than Christ! If He learned obedience by His suffering, so should we welcome and anticipate the same as we reverently seek to do all that God commands for us. So be it!
	And Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him. Amen.

			
 
This morning’s benediction is Deut 28:9. The Lord will establish you as a holy people to Himself, as He swore to you, if you will keep the commandments of the Lord your God, and walk in His ways. Amen.