Genesis 5

Genesis 5:20

Gen. 5:20. “Shall comfort us.” How Noah would comfort the Church of God, we may be led to understand by the manner in which the like expression is used in Ezekiel 14:22.

Gen. 5:24

Genesis 5:24

Gen. 5:24. “Enoch walked,” etc. That Enoch and Elias were translated, shows that it is not because the redemption of Christ was not sufficient, that the saints are not wholly freed from death, so as never to taste it. God saw fit that there should be these instances of it, probably partly for this end, to manifest this. If all mankind had died without one exception, it would have been ready to lead us to think it absolutely necessary that the justice or truth of God required, and that these didn’t allow of one being redeemed from it; and that the redemption of Christ in that point failed of sufficiency. What is absolutely universal, we are ready to look upon as absolutely necessary; and the translation of these saints is the more credible, because at the end of the world all the saints that are found living when Christ comes, shall be translated without dying. If all shall be translated, why not one or two before?

Gen. 5:29

Genesis 5:29

Gen. 5:29. “And he called his name Noah, saying, This same shall comfort us concerning our work, and the toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed.” Noah comforted God’s people concerning their labor and fatigue, that was the fruit of God’s curse on the ground.

1. And chiefly as the Redeemer was to be of him, who should deliver his people from all their labours and sorrows, and should procure them everlasting life in the heavenly Canaan, a better paradise than that which was lost, where the ground is not cursed, and shall spontaneously yield her rich fruit every month, where there remains a rest to the people of God, who shall rest from their labours, and their works shall follow them.
2. He first invented wine, which is to comfort him that is faint and weary with fatigue, and the toil of his hands, and which makes glad man’s heart, a remarkable type of the blood of Christ, and his spiritual benefits.
3. To him was given leave to eat flesh, as a relief from the fruit of the curse on the ground, which rendered the fruits of it less pleasant and wholesome. God gave Noah leave to feed on the flesh of other animals, to comfort him under his toil of his hands in tilling the ground. And this is another type of our feeding on Christ, and having spiritual life and refreshment in him: for, in feeding on the flesh of animals, our food and the nourishment of our lives is obtained at the expense of their lives and shedding their blood, as we come to feed on Christ by his laying down his life. And these things in Noah that should be matter of comfort under God’s curse, are the rather taken notice of in him, because in his time the curse on the ground was to be more fully executed than ever it had been before - the good constitution of the earth was to be overthrown by a flood, and its wholesomeness and fertility greatly diminished, and so the toil of his hands would be greatly increased, were it not for this relief given that has been mentioned.
4. Before Noah, God’s people did not know how far this curse would proceed; they probably foresaw that God intended to execute the curse on the ground in a much further degree than ever yet he had done. God had not comforted his people by any limits set in any promise made to them, but to Noah God made a gracious promise, setting limits to the curse, promising in some respects a certain measure of success to the labor of their hands, promising that seed-time, and harvest, etc. should not cease.