Genesis 6

Ver. 1, 2. The descendants of Cain, or other profane persons who had joined them, are here called men, because they had quite cast off all regard to God and his ways, and the professors of the true religion are called the sons of God; they had a visible relation to him, lived in his church, and professed to be born from above, and to be ready to yield a cheerful and courageous obedience to his commands; ch. iv. 26. Deut. xiv. 1

Genesis 6:18

These commonly gazed upon the daughters of Cain, who seem to have been extremely handsome and jovial: : and regardless of God’s direction or allowance, they followed their fancies and 2 married them.—Such unequal marriages of professors with the carnal and profane are expressly prohibited by the law of God, and have been a common plague to families, nations, and churches: v. 16. Josh. xxiii. 12. Gen. xxiv. 3. xxvi. 34, 35. xxvii. 46. xxviii. 1, 2. and xxxviii. 2 Sam. iii. 3. with xiii. 28, 29. and xv. 1 Kings xi. Ezra ix. 1, 2, 3, 12. Neh. xiii. 24—27. Ver. 3. God’s Spirit strove with them by his inward good motions, by the cheeks which he caused their consciences to give them, and by the counsels and warnings given them by Noah, the preacher of righteousness, or others; —They were flesh, not only frail and weak in their nature, but exceedingly and obstinately corrupt, carnal, and sensual in their heart and life,—under the reign of indwelling sin, which is called flesh; Rom. viii. 1, 4, 7; 8. Jude 19. and mad on practising the manifest works of the flesh; adultery, fornication, &c. Gal. v

Genesis 6:19-21

Ver. 4. These giants, or huge-bodied men, in the pride and confidence of their stature and strength, became despisers of God and goodness, and oppressors of mankind. Ver. 5. Jer. xvii. 9, 10. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and ‘desperately wicked. I, the Lord, search the heart, and try the reins, to ‘give to every man according to his work.’” Rom. vii. 7; “The carnal mind ‘is enmity against God, and is not subject to his law, neither indeed can be.’” Mat. xv. 19; “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, ‘fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.’” Psal. lviii. 3; “The wicked ‘are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they are born.’” And liii. 1—3: “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God—corrupt ‘are they, they have done abominable iniquity—God looked down from ‘heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did under- ‘stand, that did seek God. Every one of them is gone back, they are alto- ‘gether become filthy; there is none that doth good, no not one.’” Psal. xiv. 1—4. Is. i. 2—6. Hos. iv. 1, 2. Mark vii. 21—23. Rom. i. 28—31. iii. 10—19. and viii. 8. Gal. v. 19—21. Eph. 2. 1—3. Tit. iii. 3. Ver. 6, 7. God’s repentance denotes not any change of his purpose or will within himself.—In this respect he is unchangeable, and cannot repent; Mal. iii. 6. Num. xxiii. 19. 1 Sam. xv. 29. Jam. i. 17. But it denotes the change of his providence correspondent with his fixed purpose; 1 Sam. xv. 11. Psal. cvi. 45. Jer. xviii. 10. Deut. xxxii. 30. Hos. xi. 8. It is a word suited to our capacity; and here it denotes God’s detestation of sin, and his fixed resolution to punch it, after man had made himself quite another thing than God had made him at first. Ver. 8. To find grace in the eyes of the Lord is to be freely loved and delighted in by him, in order to preservation from some remarkable destruction, or to the bestowal of some distinguished blessing; Gen. xix. 19. Exod. xxxiii. 12, 13. Tim. i. 18. Heb. iv. 16. Thus, Prov. viii. 35; “Whoso findeth Christ findeth life, and shall obtain ‘favour of the Lord.’” And xii. 2. “A good man obtaineth favour of the ‘Lord.’"—And iii. 4. and xviii

Genesis 6:22

Ver. 9. Noah was a just man, justified by faith in the imputed righteousness of Christ; iii. 22. 24. v. 1. and viii. 33. C Rom. v. 19. “By the obedience of one (Christ) shall many be made righteous;” 2 Cor. v. 21. “For God made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we “might be made the righteousness of God in him.” Is. xlv. 24, 25. and vi. 10. Jer. xxiii. 6. and xxxiii. 16. Phil. iii. 9.—He was perfect, upright, and sincere; a man of great integrity and godly sincerity, having his heart wholly consecrated for God; entire in his obedience to all God’s commandments, and watchfully keeping himself unspotted from the world; as ch. xvii. 1. Deut. xviii. 13. Job i. 1. 8. Psal. xxxvii. 37. and cxix. 1. 5, 6. Cor. xiii. 11. and iii. 9. Pet. v. 10. Rev. iii. 2. Luke i. 6. “Righteous “before God, and walking in all the commandments of the Lord blameless.” 2 Cor. i. 10. “In simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, “but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in this world.” Noah was perfect in his generation, amidst men extremely wicked, and notwithstanding their evil counsels, examples, and persecutions. Phil. ii. 15.— “Be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst “of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom ye shine as lights in the “world.” 1 Pet. ii. 15.—“That with well-doing ye may put to silence the igno- “rance of foolish men.” And iii. 16. Ver. 11. Multitudes of the most enormous sins abounded among all ranks, and were committed before God in an open and presumptuous manner, without any fear of him; nay, in defiance to his vengeance. So the wickedness of Nimrod and the Sodomites was committed; ch. x. 9. xiii. 13. and xix. 13. Ver. 13. The end of all flesh is come before me. The time for the destruction of mankind and animals, fixed in my purpose, is near at hand; as Ver. 22. Heb. xi. 7. “By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not “seen as yet, moved with fear” of the approaching flood, and notwithstanding manifold scoffs from his neighbours, prepared an ark to the saving of his house

REFLECTIONS UPON CHAP. VI.—Behold the dreadful fruits of professors intimacy and matrimonial connexions with the carnal and prophane! How sin transforms this world into a kind of hell, filled with corruption, wickedness and disorder! Behold how quickly it ripens it for a destructive deluge of divine wrath! How long and how patiently God bears with the manner of these monsters of impiety, after they seem ripened for ruin! but how sad their case when his Spirit ceaseth to strive with their consciences for their aversion and reformation!—What a blessing are upright saints in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation! How highly regarded and honoured of And what distinguished means of preserving families, nations, chure even the world, from utter ruin!