As a sudden beam of sunshine out of a thunder-cloud, His eye flashes
down, not as if He then began to know, but that His knowledge then
began, as it were, to act.

3. What does the stern sentence on the rotten world teach us? A very
profound truth, not only of the certain divine retribution, but of
the indissoluble connection of sin with destruction. The same word
is thrice employed in verses 11 and 12 to express 'corruption' and
in verse 13 to express 'destruction.' A similar usage is found in 1
Corinthians iii. 17, where the same Greek word is translated
'defile' and 'destroy.' This teaches us that, in deepest reality,
corruption is destruction, that sin is death, that every sinner is a
suicide. God's act in punishment corresponds to, and is the
inevitable outcome of, our act in transgression. So fatal is all
evil, that one word serves to describe both the poison-secreting
root and the poisoned fruit. Sin is death in the making; death is
sin finished.

The promise of deliverance, which comes side by side with the stern
sentence, illustrates the blessed truth that God's darkest
threatenings are accompanied with a revelation of the way of escape.
The ark is always shown along with the flood. Zoar is pointed out
when God foretells Sodom's ruin. We are no sooner warned of the
penalties of sin, than we are bid to hear the message of mercy in
Christ. The brazen serpent is ever reared where the venomous snakes
bite and burn.

4. We pass by the details of the construction of the ark to draw the
final lesson from the exact obedience of Noah. We have the statement
twice over, He did 'according to all that God commanded him.' It was