Noah's Faith - Pt 2

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. (James 2:14-18, ESV). Yesterday we saw that faith is a relationship of trust. The second principle of faith is that it possesses a readiness to obey. It was only by faith that Noah set to work building a mammoth ark. Noah's Ark was huge! If you wrongly imagine the Ark looking like some of those little cartoon arks in some children's story books, with a couple of elephants' trunks and giraffes' necks sticking out the top, think again. According to the dimensions given in Genesis 6, Noah's Ark was three stories high. Its total deck area was equivalent to the area of about 20 standard college basketball courts or 36 lawn tennis courts. The interior cubic volume of space would have been equivalent to 569 modern railroad cars. Not until 1894 would another ship this size be built! Only faith that possesses a readiness to obey would not scoff at this daunting instruction. He was further instructed to take with him “seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth." The best of modern science helps us at this point somewhat. Our first question is to ask how many is that really? If we take out all the aquatic species and others not requiring actual floor space, Noah would have had to gather some 50,000 animals! That’s quite a zoo! Again, without the readiness to obey, it would have been an impossible task to imagine. No wonder so many people thought of Noah as crazy! Noah didn't seem to worry too much about what others would think or say. In spite of the incongruity of what he was doing his faith worked. Noah's faith not only led him to believe that God exist, it also led him to do as he was told to do. Is that so different than our calling today? Faith that doesn’t show itself in works is dead. Victory is achieved when we work through the doubts and derision of others. I have often wondered what victories I might have missed simply because I didn’t possess a readiness to obey in the face of doubt. Take Noah’s example as a guide for your life today. Watch the difference it will make!