(My apologies for the recurring theme of death. It’s not a fixation. Really!)
Whenever you see the numbers 4 or 40 in scripture, look for a lesson on the Messiah. The fourth day brought lights to rule the heavens. Esau, a type of antichrist, married two Hittite women when he was forty years old. Jacob was mourned for forty days. Israel ate manna for forty years. There are probably dozens of other examples. Noah and the flood is one of the best known.
The obvious analogy one can draw between the flood story and the Messiah is in the salvation of Noah and his family. The analogy might even be stronger than you think. For example, the Hebrew word translated “pitch” in Genesis 6:14 comes from the same root as the Hebrew word translated “mercy seat” in Exodus 25:17. Noah’s ark was covered with pitch to shelter the survivors from God’s wrath. Moses’ ark was covered with the mercy seat to be a buffer between us and God’s overwhelming presence. The first ark contained God’s chosen people and miraculously provided sustenance. The second ark contained emblems of God’s Law, guidance, and sustenance, all given to God’s people and carried by them through the Wilderness.
But the forty in Genesis 6 and 7 isn’t directly connected to the ark itself, but to the destruction from which it saved. It rained for forty days and forty nights, covering the whole earth, crushing and drowning millions, possibly billions of people. How can such unimaginable destruction contain a teaching on the Messiah?
The truth is that the Messiah does not only save us from death, but he saves us through and by death. God cannot look directly on our corrupt, tainted flesh, which is why we need the buffer of Messiah. He enables our purification and resurrection into a perfected form so that we can stand in the divine presence without being destroyed. But purification only comes through the removal of dross by intense and repeated heat, and resurrection only comes after death. In a world in which there is very little silver, there must be very great destruction to achieve any state of purity.
The Messiah brings the flood by which we are cleansed of violence and tyranny. He brings the fire by which the dross is separated from the silver. He brings the thousand little deaths by which we are given opportunities to grow and become purified. Ultimately, he takes us through Death itself to be resurrected and stand judgment before the Bema Seat. The more we survive and grow through flood and fire here in our mortality, the more gold, silver, and gems will remain in us then.
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