“Noah Found Grace in the Eyes of the Lord”

Genesis 6–11; Moses 8

This is an interesting study for me this week- in many ways it’s one of those things that I ‘park.’ What do I mean by that? I mean that I know there was a prophet called Noah who built an ark and that the world had degenerated to such a state that the Lord felt the need to intervene in a way that he hadn’t before or has done since. However, the fact of a global flood which destroyed all human life while all land-based animals were saved in one vessel is somewhat mind-boggling. So, I don’t really think too deeply about it as it doesn’t fit with our understanding of the history of the world. It would be easy to dismiss science and suggest that evidence of the flood has disappeared, or that it happened millions or billions of years ago (which the timeline doesn’t suggest). This isn’t the only thing I’ll explore this week as Come Follow Me indicates there are other questions and lessons to learn from the flood, but to skip over this question would be to do it a disservice.

The Flood

My friend, Ben Spackman, summarises his own view:

In my view, a literal reading of Genesis 6-9 reveals that its primary doctrinal teaching and purpose is not teaching the historical reality of a “global” flood any more than Jesus’ intent was to teach the historical reality of a good Samaritan. Moreover, scripture itself suggests that we are not supposed to read Genesis 6-9 as a documentary, as if it were modern journalistic history.

This doesn’t mean that Noah was not a real person, or that he wasn’t a prophet. I believe both of these. Ben makes the following point:

None of this means Noah wasn’t a real person; we tell stories about George Washington throwing a silver dollar across the Potomac or chopping down a cherry tree. Those didn’t happen. But it doesn’t mean Washington wasn’t a real person, only that the traditions that have come down about him aren’t accurate or historical traditions.

So, what’s the deal with the flood? As we look at ancient cultures there seems to be an archetypal story of a flood, and this may provide evidence that at some point there was such an event. This memory and the stories from surrounding cultures could have been used to illustrate the points that were being made in this story- the reality and supremacy of the God of Israel, rather than the surrounding local deities; and the importance of humanity. Ben continues:

Summarized, Israelites knew flood stories from surrounding cultures. In one of these stories,3 the gods (plural) were arbitrary and uncaring. The reason for the humanity-destroying flood was… humans were too loud and the high god couldn’t sleep. The high god was annoyed and casually went for a “just kill’em all” response to the problem. The lone family to survive the flood only does so because a low-level trickster god violates divine secrecy and reveals the plan to kill all humans where he knows a human can hear. (In the Finkel video below, this is the line starting “reed wall, reed wall!”).

Compare that with Genesis, with its One God vs many gods. The reason for the Mesopotamian flood on the one hand is an annoyed and callous divinity, whereas in Genesis, God is mourning for the constant human corruption and violence on the earth. (If I were writing a manual, I might insert a Mormon-like “And thus we see, the God of Israel is just and caring, not petty and callous.”) And God himself chooses to save the best specimen of humanity— Noah and family— to try again, instead of humanity surviving because of a rebellious trickster god who thwarts the high god.

There is also the possibility that this was a ‘local’ rather than a ‘global’ flood, and it was only seen to be universal from the perspective of those who were in it. There are concerns with any interpretation that we place on the narrative. For example, if it was localised, why was there a need to rescue the animals? Ben uses the phrase ‘cosmological flood’ rather than local or global:

…these chapters strongly reflect Genesis 1-3, where the cosmology is a flat earth above the cosmic waters below, with a solid dome overhead restraining the cosmic waters above. The sun moon and stars are embedded in that dome.

The flood story describes a reversion back to the watery pre-creation state of the first verses of Genesis, where everything is cosmic waters, the tehom (KJV “deep”) of Genesis 1:2; the exception is Noah’s boat.

In other words, Genesis does not envision or conceptualize this as a flooding of an earthly globe as much as a wiping away, an undoing of creation in its entirety. It is de-creation or un-creation, followed by re-creation, with Noah as the new Adam who is to “multiply and replenish” (Gen 9:1) just as Genesis 1:28 had it. (Catholic scholar Joseph Blenkinsopp has a commentary on Genesis 1-11 titled Creation, Un-creation, Re-recreation.) Added to this, the narrative both draws on and argues against the theology of Mesopotamian flood stories; I’m not convinced it was intended as a historical narrative at all. (This is a genre question.) This is why I prefer the term “cosmological flood,” instead of “local flood” or “global flood.”

Reading the narrative of the flood in this way means that we don’t need to get hung up on the impossibility of a global flood, rather understand the qualities of God who views humanity as the pinnacle of creation and has a plan for his children, evidenced through His covenants.

Covenants

One of the things that we sometimes skip over is the importance of Noah’s covenant with the Lord, or to give it its proper name: the Noahic Covenant. 

The Joseph Smith Translation adds to our understanding of this covenant and makes it absolutely about much more than just a bow in the heavens:

And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant, which I made unto thy father Enoch; that, when men should keep all my commandments, Zion should again come on the earth, the city of Enoch which I have caught up unto myself.          And this is mine everlasting covenant, that when thy posterity shall embrace the truth, and look upward, then shall Zion look downward, and all the heavens shall shake with gladness, and the earth shall tremble with joy; And the general assembly of the church of the firstborn shall come down out of heaven, and possess the earth, and shall have place until the end come. And this is mine everlasting covenant, which I made with thy father Enoch. And the bow shall be in the cloud, and I will establish my covenant unto thee, which I have made between me and thee, for every living creature of all flesh that shall be upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant which I have established between me and thee; for all flesh that shall be upon the earth (JST Genesis 9:21-25).

It helps us realise that covenants are eternal and that did not just begin with Abraham. In my writings about Judaism, I have explored the covenants that we find in the Tanakh (what we would now call the Old Testament): the Adamic, the Noahic, the Abrahamic, the Mosaic or Sinaitic, and the Davidic. As Latter-day Saints we can see that all of these are a part of what we would call the Abrahamic Covenant, but a focus on their individual aspects are very interesting. At this point I will quote from my comments about the Adamic and Noahic covenants:

The Adamic Covenant

The first covenant appears to be universal in nature and applicable to all of humanity as Adam and Eve are the progenitors of humanity or may be seen to be emblematic of each person. In the Genesis narrative Adam and Eve are given stewardship and dominion over all of creation; the Almighty also fixes the laws of nature as a symbol of the covenant:

Thus said the LORD: As surely as I have established My covenant with day and night—the laws of heaven and earth (Jeremiah 23:25).

These highlight the belief that the Almighty is both the Creator and that he has chosen humanity for a specific role and purpose (see Chapter 2). Upon eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, the Almighty casts Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and establishes “a new covenant- ‘be fruitful and multiply and subdue the earth’” (Robinson, 2000, 261). This command reemphasises humanity’s role in the world in being asked to ‘subdue’ it, and also to fill it. The suggestion is also that these commands continue with each subsequent generation. 

Noahic Covenant

The second covenant is similarly universal in nature, and in many ways reaffirms the covenant made with Adam. Indeed, Genesis 9 begins with the commands given in Eden:

God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fertile and increase, and fill the earth. The fear and the dread of you shall be upon all the beasts of the earth and upon all the birds of the sky—everything with which the earth is astir—and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hand (Genesis 9:1-2).

Though it is important to note that the language of the covenant is used for the first time here. In the Adamic Covenant the covenantal aspects are inferred, whereas in the conversation with Noah we read:

And God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “I now establish My covenant with you and your offspring to come, and with every living thing that is with you—birds, cattle, and every wild beast as well—all that have come out of the ark, every living thing on earth (Genesis 9:8-10).

The promise of the Almighty that forms part of the covenant is that:

I will maintain My covenant with you: never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth (Genesis 9:11).

The covenant is confirmed with an ot (token or symbol). In this case, a rainbow:

God further said, “This is the sign that I set for the covenant between Me and you, and every living creature with you, for all ages to come. I have set My bow in the clouds, and it shall serve as a sign of the covenant between Me and the earth.  When I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow appears in the clouds, I will remember My covenant between Me and you and every living creature among all flesh, so that the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh (Genesis 9:12-15).

It would appear in this summary that the only responsibility placed upon humanity is the command to fill the earth. However, the Talmud offers a further exegesis of Genesis 9 and identifies what are traditionally known as the Noachide Laws (though it is commonly believed that they were first given to Adam) that are incumbent on all of humanity. Based on Tosfeta Avodah Zarah 9, the seven laws are:

The sons of Noah were given seven commandments: courts, idolatry, [blasphemy,] forbidden sexual relations, bloodshed, theft, and [consuming] the limb of a living animal.

A similar list is found in Sanhedrin 56a:

The mitzva of establishing courts of judgment; and the prohibition against blessing, i.e., cursing, the name of God; and the prohibition of idol worship; and the prohibition against forbidden sexual relations; and the prohibition of bloodshed; and the prohibition of robbery; and the prohibition against eating a limb from a living animal.

The laws are those on which all people will ultimately be judged, and in the Jewish interpretation form the basis of laws. The importance of these have been highlighted in the modern day by a modern Noahide Movement known variously as The Bnei Noah (Children of Noah) or Noahidism. Feldman (2017) notes the importance within such an approach of the sharing of these seven laws, and their basis as a just society:

In the 1980s, the Lubavitcher Rebbe of the Chabad Hasidic movement, Menchem Mendel Schneerson, promoted the idea that gentiles had a place in the covenant with God through observance of the Seven Noahide Laws. For the Rebbe, spreading awareness of the seven laws was part of his vision for a global tikkun (rectification) that would unify mankind under a common moral code in preparation for messianic times… For the Rebbe, only a universal social contract, grounded in faith in one God, could prevent human atrocities like genocide. To this day, Chabad maintains an ongoing campaign to present diplomatic leaders with the Noahide Laws, encouraging political leaders to proclaim the universality of the laws as a moral code for all of humanity.   

Although a small movement, it highlights the importance of the laws for all of humanity in the Jewish worldview.

What does this knowledge help me understand? I guess the idea that there is a universal law, that laws are not all subjective according to culture and circumstance. There are aspects of life where there is an absolute morality to which all of humanity is expected to adhere to. This links very much with the idea of the light of Christ which gives people an innate sense of right and wrong, and while it can be ignored or overcome by our own baser instincts, the standard is always there. Just so, with aspects of the laws by which we are all to live. 

My Spirit shall not always strive with man

Looking at the state of humanity at the time of Noah is described in such a way that the depravity seems to be unmatched. One of the things that sometimes we gloss over is the idea that ‘My Spirit shall not always strive with man” (Moses 8:17). Often, we think this means the Holy Spirit, and while that is true, it is not as big a condemnation of the world or a person as if it refers to the Spirit of Christ. The idea that the spirit ceases to strive with a people is evident in the time of Noah (see Moses 8:17), the Nephites (see Mormon 5:16), and the Jaredites (see Ether 15:19). These people had all reached levels of wickedness where I think it is possible to suggest that not only the Holy Ghost, but also the Spirit of Christ, the Light of Christ ceased to strive with them. President Jospeh Fielding Smith taught:

Now the Lord has withdrawn His Spirit from the world. Do not let this thought become confused in your minds. The Spirit He has withdrawn from the world is not the Holy Ghost (for they never had that!), but it is the light of truth, spoken of in our scriptures as the Spirit of Christ, which is given to every man that cometh into the world, as you find recorded in Section 84 of the Doctrine and Covenants.

Now because of the wickedness of the world, that Spirit has been withdrawn, and when the Spirit of the Lord is not striving with men, the spirit of Satan is. Therefore, we may be sure that the time has come spoken of in Section 1 of the Doctrine and Covenants. … Peace has been taken from the earth. The devil has power over his own dominion. The Spirit of the Lord has been withdrawn. Not because the Lord desires to withdraw that Spirit, but because of the wickedness of mankind, it becomes necessary that this Spirit of the Lord be withdrawn. (The Predicted Judgments, Brigham Young University Speeches of the Year [Provo, 21 Mar. 1967], pp. 5–6.)

This highlights the depravity of the people, that even the universal inspiration that is ever present has no influence. How does this fit with the universality of the light of Christ, or as Elder Boyd K. Packer suggested:

The Spirit of Christ is always there. It never leaves. It cannot leave.

Perhaps understanding this we are able to explore the added meaning of the Spirit not ‘striving’; it does not mean that it is not there or does not dwell with them but is ignored to such an extent, that it cannot work among the people. The people have become so wicked and depraved that even the light of Christ cannot have an influence, so hardened have they become. It is there, but is ignored, and is not an active force.

A living prophet and coming to Christ

The truly humble and righteous seek out the words of the prophet of God. Those who went to hear the words of Alma and receive the ‘living water’, we learn later received baptism and all its associated blessings. Those who hearken to the prophet always find deliverance. In the days of Noah, it was a physical deliverance from the flood, today it is a spiritual deliverance from Satan and the servants of Satan;

Wherefore, meaning the church, thou shalt give heed unto all his words and commandments which he shall give unto you as he receiveth them, walking in all holiness before me; For his word ye shall receive, as if from mine own mouth, in all patience and faith. For by doing these things the gates of hell shall not prevail against you; yea, and the Lord God will disperse the powers of darkness from before you, and cause the heavens to shake for your good, and his name’s glory.” (D&C 21:4-6)

It is no coincidence that to be worthy to go to the Temple one needs to sustain the prophet; to heed his words and implement them in our lives. There are so many blessings associated with following the counsel of the prophet. As a youth, and then as a missionary I responded to the words of Ezra Taft Benson to make the Book of Mormon “the centre of our personal study, our preaching, and our missionary work.” He goes on;

The Book of Mormon is the keystone in our witness of Jesus Christ, who is Himself the cornerstone of everything we do. It bears witness of His reality with power and clarity…. Its testimony of the Master is clear, undiluted and full of power. Let us read the Book of Mormon and be convinced that Jesus is the Christ. Let us continually re-read the Book of Mormon so that we might more fully come to Christ, be committed to Him, centred in Him, consumed in Him. We are meeting the adversary every day. The challenges of this era will rival any of the past and these challenges will increase both spiritually and temporally. We must be close to Christ, we must take His name upon us daily and always remember Him and keep His commandments.” (Oct 1986 Conference)

He then quoted the words of Marion G. Romney that have stuck with me through to parenthood:

I feel certain that if, in our homes, parents will read from the  Book of Mormon  prayerfully and regularly, both by themselves and with their children, the spirit of  that great  book will come to permeate our homes and all who dwell therein. The spirit of reverence will increase; mutual respect and consideration for each other will grow. The spirit of contention will depart. Parents will counsel their children in greater love and wisdom. Children will be more responsive and submissive to the counsel of their parents. Righteousness will increase. Faith, hope, and charity—the pure love of Christ—will abound in our homes and lives, bringing in their wake peace, joy, and happiness (Ensign, May 1980, p. 67).

I once listened to a comedy show where the comedian did a satire of the story of Noah, where to those who mocked him and called him Tarzan he replied ‘How long can you tread water?’ How long can we survive under our steam without spiritually drowning, as Amos taught there is a famine in the land of hearing the word of the Lord- this can be rectified through seeking the bread of life and living water- even Jesus the Christ through his living prophets.

Which prophet is the most important for us? The living prophet. So important are they that the Lord has spoken of their rejection:

Yea, wo unto this people, because of this time which has arrived, that ye do cast out the prophets, and do mock them, and cast stones at them, and do slay them, and do all manner of iniquity unto them, even as they did of old time. And now when ye talk, ye say: If our days had been in the days of our fathers of old, we would not have slain the prophets; we would not have stoned them, and cast them out. Behold ye are worse than they; for as the Lord liveth, if a prophet come among you and declareth unto you the word of the Lord, which testifieth of your sins and iniquities, ye are angry with him, and cast him out and seek all manner of ways to destroy him; yea, you will say that he is a false prophet, and that he is a sinner, and of the devil, because he testifieth that your deeds are evil.” (Helaman 13:24-26)

And later he warns of the fate of those who reject them;

And in the days of your poverty ye shall cry unto the Lord; and in vain shall ye cry, for your desolation is already come upon you, and your destruction is made sure; and then shall ye weep and howl in that day, saith the Lord of Hosts. And then shall ye lament, and say: O that I had repented, and had not killed the prophets, and stoned them, and cast them out. Yea, in that day ye shall say: O that we had remembered the Lord our God in the day that he gave us our riches, and then they would not have become slippery that we should lose them; for behold, our riches are gone from us (Helaman 13:32-33).

I love the question: ‘How long can you tread water?’- we can survive for so long and somewhat adequately on our own, but we won’t find the safety and security that is available through following the Saviour through His living prophets. Without going into too much exploration (I’ve gone on for too long already) this is the idea behind the Tower of Babel- people are trying to reach heaven by themselves- it makes more sense when one thinks of the City of Zion where the people were taken up, they were trying to replicate it- but without putting in the real effort of a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Only a relationship with the Lord is able to bring us to where He is- no amount of effort on our behalf will get us there. This reminds me of a scene in the Voyage of the Dawn Treader where Eustace has been turned into a dragon because of his lust for wealth, he struggles to remove the scaly skin for himself; each time he manages to shed his skin with a little bit of effort but within moments he discovers that it has returned. It is only when Aslan (a type for Christ throughout the books) offers to help him remove the skin, does it have any impact:

The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. . . .Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off — just as I thought I’d done it myself the other three times, only they hadn’t hurt — and there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me — I didn’t like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on — and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again. . . . After a bit the lion took me out and dressed me . . . in new clothes (2001, pp. 117-118).

We recognise that “It is ‘by the blood’ (Moses 6:60) − meaning the blood of the Saviour− that we are sanctified. But it is through the cleansing medium of the Holy Ghost that the regenerating powers of that infinite atonement are extended to mortal man” (McConkie and Millet).  By the power of the Holy Ghost iniquity, carnality, sensuality, and every evil thing is burned out of the soul as if by fire; the cleansed person is literally born again of the water and the Spirit. 

Therefore they were called after this holy order, and were sanctified, and their garments were washed white through the blood of the Lamb. Now they, after being sanctified by the Holy Ghost, having their garments made white, being pure and spotless before God, could not look upon sin save it were with abhorrence; and there were many, exceedingly great many, who were made pure and entered into the rest of the Lord their God (Alma 13:11-12).

BH Roberts suggests:

Man’s natural powers are unequal to this task; so I believe, all will testify who have made the experiment. Mankind stand in some need of a strength superior to any they possess of themselves, to accomplish this work of rendering pure our fallen nature. Such strength, such power, such a sanctifying grace is conferred on man in being born of the Spirit — in receiving the Holy Ghost. Such, in the main, is [his] office, [his] work (BH Roberts).

Parley P. Pratt highlights the transformation that comes about because of our relationship with Christ through the Holy Ghost who:

quickens all the intellectual faculties, increases, enlarges, expands, and purifies all the natural passions and affections, and adapts them, by the gift of wisdom, to their lawful use. [He] inspires, develops, cultivates, and matures all the fine-toned sympathies, joys, tastes, kindred feelings, and affections of our nature. [He] inspires virtue, kindness, goodness, tenderness, gentleness, and charity. [He] develops beauty of person, form, and features. [he] tends to health, vigour, animation, and social feeling. [He] invigorates all the faculties of the physical and intellectual man. [He] strengthens and gives tone to the nerves. In short, [he] is, as [he] were, marrow to the bone, joy to the heart, light to the eyes, music to the ears, and life to the whole being (Pratt, P.  1978 [1855]: 61).

To suggest the transformative effect of the atonement of Christ, Tertullian, an early Church Father, writes that Christ:

reforms our birth by a new birth from heaven, he restores our flesh from all that afflicts it; he cleanses it when leprous, gives it new light when blond, new strength when paralysed… when dead he raises [us] to life.

We all went through, or began going through, that process when we were baptised. The question I ask now, is one that was asked by Alma:

And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now? Alma 5:26

Are we still being transformed each day through the atonement and grace of our Saviour? If we think about Saul, he had this one-time event on the Road to Damascus but he didn’t just end there. We look at the rest of his life and see the effect that his initial experience had in every aspect of his life. 

An interesting observation by Jim Faulconer is that:

There is a very real sense in which Paul did not choose to serve Christ but was required to do so by his experience on the road to Damascus. He owes that service; he must serve. His experience has given him no other real choice; Paul now has no more choices to make, for a slave is one who does the will of another rather than his own.

In essence, we sacrifice our will to the Saviour’s will when we enter the waters of baptism. It is our continued decision whether to live in this relationship, that is evidenced through the things that we do and the people that we are. The psychologist William James outlined some common characteristics of a religious experience; one these was that they had a noetic quality- essentially a lasting impact. If we imagine our lives as a pond, the initial rebirth in Christ as a stone falling in- do we still see the ripples of this stone in our lives today.

Lest we should forget, however, we are not expected to be the finished article. It is here that we recognise that our relationship with Christ and our sanctification through the Holy Ghost is an ongoing process. 

I believe in the atonement of Christ and his grace that I receive, but sometimes I act as though living the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a list of laws to be checked off. This relationship is dependent on a complete reliance on the Saviour and a turning over of our lives to him. Sometimes we recognise that he has a role to play in our success and our righteousness but not that it is only because of him that we can even approach being righteous. President Uchtdorf eloquently describes this situation:

Are we like Simon? Are we confident and comfortable in our good deeds, trusting in our own righteousness? Are we perhaps a little impatient with those who are not living up to our standards? Are we on autopilot, going through the motions, attending our meetings, yawning through Gospel Doctrine class, and perhaps checking our cell phones during sacrament service? Or are we like this woman, who thought she was completely and hopelessly lost because of sin? Do we love much? Do we understand our indebtedness to Heavenly Father and plead with all our souls for the grace of God? When we kneel to pray, is it to replay the greatest hits of our own righteousness, or is it to confess our faults, plead for God’s mercy, and shed tears of gratitude for the amazing plan of redemption?

Sometimes I seek for the blessings of the atonement and believe that I receive them in response to the effort I expend. To an extent this is true, but it ignores the fact that the atonement and its attendant grace is a gift- it is not a free gift as it was bought with a price.

I once read something that’s called the parable of the bicycle which tries to explain the atonement. The idea is that a child wants to buy a shiny red bike for £100 (I’ve changed it from the original dollars); the child saves and saves and eventually has £1. He is disappointed to learn that he does not have enough. His parents ask this child to give them the dollar, they then make up the rest and he is able to buy the bike. This is a lovely story but as a parable it is not an accurate representation of the atonement and our relationship with Christ. It falls down because what happens if the parents know his potential and that he could have earned £2 and they are only prepared to offer £98 in return. This boy falls short of being able to purchase the bike.

What actually happens is that the parents give the child the entire £100- they then ask for whatever the child can offer in return. Can you see the difference? In the atonement we sometimes have the view that we do 1% and the Saviour makes up the difference. However, what actually happens is that he gives 100% and our response is a sign of our love and the grace we received. Salvation comes by us being transformed through the atonement and through the Holy Spirit.

In living the Gospel of Jesus Christ we need to focus on the purpose of the commandments. They become an expression of our love rather than a point on our to-do list. President Uchtdorf outlines this in his talk ‘What matters most”

My dear brothers and sisters, we would do well to slow down a little, proceed at the optimum speed for our circumstances, focus on the significant, lift up our eyes, and truly see the things that matter most. Let us be mindful of the foundational precepts our Heavenly Father has given to His children that will establish the basis of a rich and fruitful mortal life with promises of eternal happiness. They will teach us to do “all these things … in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that [we] should run faster than [we have] strength. [But] it is expedient that [we] should be diligent, [and] thereby … win the prize.”

Brothers and sisters, diligently doing the things that matter most will lead us to the Savior of the world. That is why “we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, … that [we] may know to what source [we] may look for a remission of [our] sins.” In the complexity, confusion, and rush of modern living, this is the “more excellent way.”

Returning to Alma’s question:

And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now? (Alma 5:26)

Let us every day consider how each day we are becoming a new creature in Christ. I think the key phrase here is ‘in Christ’. Living in this relationship enables us to receive blessings and experiences that far surpass those that we would experience outside it. As we develop more of this relationship in Christ, we recognise more and more our complete dependence on him and our own nothingness.

Bonus: Was the flood the baptism of the earth?

I’ve kind of always been taught that it was without questioning it. If the earth will be renewed and celestialized, then it makes sense then the Second Coming will be its baptism of fire to follow its baptism of water. It’s a nice idea, right? Well, yes… but also no. Its origins perhaps begins in a reading of 1 Peter:

Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ (3:20-21).

The suggestion is that in the same way as the flood ‘even baptism doth now save us.’ The KJV language is somewhat confusing, and if you read closely, it is not the flood that saves us, rather it is the ark, a point made clear in other translations:

…who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight people, were saved through water. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ (NRSV).

We can find Church leaders who have taught that the flood was the baptism, but the suggestion might be, as I have done, they were repeating a nice idea without too much thought for its implications. They had received this impression, in the first instance, from the cradle of Protestant Christianity in which the Church initially developed. There is also a parallel that can be made, consider William W. Phelps:

when the flood abated . . . the world was cleansed from iniquity.

That is patently correct of both the narrative of the flood and the practice of baptism. Lorenzo Snow made a similar connection:

The destruction of the Antediluvian world, by water, was typical of receiving remission of sins through baptism. The earth had become clothed with sin as with a garment; the righteous were brought out and saved from the world of sin, even by water; the like figure, even baptism, doth now save us, says Peter…

But we also use the symbolism of the resurrection in tandem with baptism but without trying to suggest that baptism is a literal resurrection or vice versa. Phelps does continue:

After the earth had been baptized by a flood, for a remission of her sins . . . [the Lord] blessed Noah and his sons.

Others also taught similar things, Orson Pratt said:

The first ordinance instituted for the cleansing of the earth, was that of immersion in water… It was buried in the liquid element, and all things sinful upon the face of it were washed away. As it came forth from the ocean flood, like the new-born child, it was innocent, it arose to newness of life; it was its second birth from the womb of mighty waters—a new world issuing from the ruins of the old, clothed with all the innocency of its first creation.

He also said:

The Baptism of the earth, to wash away its sins, was a literal representation of the baptism of all penitent believers to wash away their sins.

Here, I think they goes too far. There is an ambiguity in Phelps’ language. The earth has no sins to be remitted- while it/she may be a living thing she there is no indication of agency and will associated with humanity. It may sound glib, but if the earth needs to be baptised what about other forms in the natural world? Trees? Animals? If I read Phelps charitably it is the idea that the earth needed to be cleansed from the sins and misdeeds of its inhabitants. What seems to be happening is that they are taking a metaphor and making it real. There are absolutely connections, but they’re just taking them too far.

This idea has persisted with writers and speakers such as Joseph Fielding Smith, Mark E. Petersen, Kelly Ogden and Andrew Skinner. Hoskisson and Smoot trace a lot of this teaching, ultimately they reject the idea of a required baptism and conclude:

It is possible that the earth, in like manner and in preparation for eventual celestialisation, was physically washed and symbolically cleansed so that it could become free from the blood and sins of the mortals who polluted its surface. So might the earth, like King Benjamin, metaphorically sing the praises of a just God for the Flood of Noah that washed away the blood and sins of the generations who inhabited or will inhabit this earth.

My conclusion is that the flood can be used to help us understand baptism but really wasn’t a baptism. The earth does not need baptism!