The Dove of Noah's Ark — A.W. Tozer

The Flood Narrative in Genesis

The three chapters of Genesis that Dr. Koza refers to at the beginning of this tape are chapters six, seven, and eight.

The first chapter of Genesis is about Noah's life in the second month of the seventeenth day of the month, the same day for all the fountains of the great heavens were all the cattle and the beef of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man that sailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days.

And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark. And God made a wing to pass over the earth, and the waters swayed, and the rain from heaven was restrained.

And the waters returned from off the earth continually, and after the end of a hundred and sixty days the waters were abated. It came to pass at the end of forty days that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made, but the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot.

She returned unto him into the ark for the water to fall on the face of the whole earth. And he put forth his hand and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark. She stayed yet seven days, and the dove came out with an olive from off the earth.

She stayed yet another seven days, and sent forth the dove, which returned not again unto him any more. But the dove found this strange region of the Genesis world. These early chapters of Genesis present a landscape that is as mysterious as it is lovely.

It seems as though they are sketchy and fragmentary. But when you get to Jesus' interpretation, when you look at it, the world, the judgment of the world is a dark application tool. And Judgment describes the world.

Divine Grief Over Human Corruption

The hearts of men were cold, and the thoughts and the imaginations of the hearts of men were only evil, and that continually. God saw the ways of men. First of all, the intransitory interests, corruption and violence.

It says here that he grieved God, and he repented, I think, because love, only love can grieve. Hate cannot grieve. Carelessness or indifference, they cannot grieve. God was present. God was there. The same love that later was expressed, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.

That love was here, looming over the fallen world, and grieving as an artist who chose it could never be restored again, or as a mother who had tenderly and prayerfully thought of a boy, and saw in him the image of his father, and sometimes fleeting images of herself, and when he comes a teenager or older, he goes wild and goes out to the world and sins, and gives himself to sin, and finally is taken to prison and looks through the bars with angry eyes.

His mother sees this and goes away, too grieved to weep, for tears can only come to a certain degree and follow after that. The wells of the eyes dry up. But as this mother saw the image of her loved husband, marred by sin, and the artist saw the picture that he labored over, spoiled by the vandalism, so God looked upon the race of men that he had made in his own image and after his own likeness, and to whose creation even God had put grave pains and tender loving care, and now he sees that race of men corrupt and wicked and vile and sinned in every way, vicious and wicked beyond description.

And so God did the kindest thing that he could do. It would have been cruel for God to have allowed that corrupt race of men to exist. So God put a merciful end to all flesh, and said, I will destroy the man which I have made.

Not an act of anger, but an act of kindly ticking off with polarities. And so God sent the waters, and the waters from below met the waters from above, and the dark floated yonder high and dry, with no end his family which had found grace in God's sight, and the animals of the desert had taken into the earth to prepare the seed to repopulate the earth again after the angry waters had assuaged.

And after scores of days the water rose no higher, but everything living had died, all that lived had died yonder, climbed the high mountains, climbed still higher, and finally clawed at each other in a living, squalling, shouting, screaming, angry mass of human beings and beasts.

Trying to get a bit higher and a bit higher, until finally the waters had gone over their heads, and one boy passed the other with silence in the girdle of drowning, and all that had lived were dead. They shut the ark that floated there as an everlasting picture of the Church of Christ.

He had separated things within it from the black waters of the flood, but he did separate them. They were safe there. And after the passing of the time, and Noah not being able to see out the well, Noah looked to the deep inside the ark to find out whether the waters were abated.

So he took a raven, he knew the raven was a bird of swift and strong flight, and so he put that raven out the window, and it flew up. And I want you to see this terrible picture of that bird soaring across the desolation.

For there was the desolation, sloshing, dirty, brackish, turbid waters of the flood, and there were dead things now distended and bloated and shiny as they bobbed about and turned over idly, feet sticking up now and then the shiny back as they rolled and tumbled in the waters of the flood.

These carcasses bloated tight and shiny, wet under the thigh, and all about there were the pieces, the flotsam and jetsam and parts of what had been human habitation, and the floating corpse there, and floating animals there.

They were all there, the great desolation. And across the desolation sailed a dark bird with a heart that was as dark as the desolation, for it fell at home there and it never came back to the ark. It was satisfied with what it saw, God's angry judgment in the dark waters and the floating carcasses and desolation and death.

But it was satisfied there, for you see, it was a meteor and a carrion eater, and so it spread its strong wings and sailed away from the ark to light upon a floating carcass. And there, with guttural sounds of delight, it tore at the flesh and ate itself full, and then bobbed and floated discreetly on top of the dead carcass until it had digested its rotten meal, and then rolled out of cold and sailed away to repeat itself, for it was satisfied feeding upon floating death.

The World Under God's Judgment

Now, my brethren, this describes the world in which we live. It describes it as God sees it. As we see each other, we're not so bad, and as we see all the beautiful world around us, it's lovely to see.

But this is as God sees the human race. For the human race is under the displeasure of God, alienated and without hope and without God in the world, waiting for the hour when sweet judgment shall bring upon men the desolation that looms upon the world.

It is our world, and the dark spirit of the raven inhabits the souls of men. Who inhabits the soul of truth? I'm serious and don't want any laughter. I ask you, who inhabits that man? Intelligent he is, an intelligent man, an educated man.

Who makes him the sheer devil that he is? It's the dark spirit of the raven. It's the spirit of the raven. Who makes the juvenile delinquents? Who makes the rapers and the maddags? Who makes the teachers and the crooked politicians?

Who makes the evil that's everywhere? It's the dark spirit of the raven in the souls of fallen men. The dark spirit in the hearts of men finds itself at home amidst the desolation, accepting this world, enjoying this world, and defending this world, and putting down as the hopelessly old-fashioned anyone who will dare to say as much as I have said tonight.

And so men rest on closing death and build their civilization there, for that is what we've done, ladies and gentlemen. And don't you allow yourself to be fooled by what we call progress. Don't allow yourself to be fooled by these gadgets that we call improved methods of communication.

And don't you let yourself be fooled by these gadgets we ride through the sky called improved methods of transportation. Don't you allow yourself to be fooled by the wonder drugs and the antibiotics and the space flights.

It is all fallen man. I do not say that a Christian cannot take these things which are not immoral in themselves and use them. Otherwise I wouldn't have this monkey suit on me here tonight and talking in a microphone.

But I say that this has been accepted by the world as the reason we don't need God. We don't want to go to heaven because we fixed the earth up so beautifully, and yet there is the desolation and the closing death and the extended darknesses and the ravens.

They're here, and the raven never came back. Civilization, our science-founded civilization rests upon the dark brackish waters of God-angry stranger. And God is angry with the wicked every day. And God has not suddenly gotten converted so that now he is kindly and laughs at our dirty jokes and smiles indulgently at our fleshly glooms.

He is the great God on high and lifted up whose pain fills the temple. And before whom they cry, holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty. And God can't take the black desolation any more than he ever could.

The Dove and the Restlessness of the Holy Spirit

He never came back. But after a few days, Noah opened the window again, and on his wrist there perched the lovely dove with the pink feet and the round eyes. And again, from far, looking, looking, looking for something clean enough to lay on, but she couldn't find it, and never found it.

And never would her thick, clean feet ever rest down upon torrents. Never would her thick, clean feet ever rest down upon floating sloth and ingest. Never would she rest upon the deck or be satisfied with desolation.

And this dove is a lovely, sensitive, and loving. And the dove mourns the desolation and would not lie. After the dove's wings had become tired, Noah listening heard the whirring, unmistakable whirr of the pigeon, the dove's wings.

And he opened the window, and she leaped onto his wrist and pulled her in. She couldn't take it. She found no place for the soul of her foot. Now, my friends, the application of all this, I'm not saying it's a type.

I'm only saying that it is a picture so sharp, so vivid, that it can't be missed by intelligent or spiritual people. The spirit, the spirit of God, cannot settle upon the wall, because Jesus said, He is whom the world cannot receive if sinners do not even know him.

And the most awful condemnation that can possibly be charged against the world is that there's a restless fluttering, the perpetual fluttering of the Holy Ghost that can find no place to life. He cannot find a place amidst the desolation.

He cannot find it in politics. He cannot find it in business. He cannot find it in education. He cannot find it among the whores. He cannot find it, for the wall cannot receive him, and he will not lie upon death and desolation.

The Holy Ghost cannot be received by the world. The unsaved world that talks about the spirit is not talking about the spirit of the son nor of the father, for the spirit of God will not rest upon the unregenerate and unclean world.

The Church's Need for Cleansing

So, we could stop here, and we could all go away, patting ourselves on the back, but I have more to say to you. I say that the devil cannot settle upon a church, except on rare occasions. Now, I know that the spirit inhabits the true believer in some nature.

I know that. Now, I don't know whether that's what you think out here or not. Also, I used to be divided over that question, but I have never been divided. I have always believed, and I never have a divided mind about it.

The spirit inhabits the true believer, for if any man has not the spirit of Christ, he's none of this. That is one thing. But it's quite another thing, for that same Holy Spirit likes to double-blow that with wide wings outspread to come happily down and often be terrified, and to say, I know all that the waters are abated, and judgment is over, and God is pleased.

He wants to come down unhindered and unresisted, outspread. He wants to bring power upon the church again. He wants to do it, but Christians today have yet too many marks of judgment upon them. They too much walk the wall around about them, and they're too much like the wall of God displeasure.

They do too many things that sinners do, and they live too much like sinners, and they're too much in their spirit like sinners. They accept Jesus, but it doesn't change them any. They have revivals and leave the town in the same condition it was before the revival came, which is indication enough it wasn't a revival at all.

Christians today have the marks of God's displeasure upon them. I wish I didn't have to say this. I wish that I could come every day and talk to you about John 3 .16 and Isaiah 53 and Psalm 23, but I dare not do it, I dare not do it.

I commented to somebody here, two or three people I commented and asked, What was the racial strain through this era? You're such good-looking people. And I mean that now, I'm not kidding. The people around me, the good-looking people here, they're fine-looking people.

You come from good stock, and that all is well. But, my friends, let's not forget that you're born of the loins of Adam. Until, as you may be, there rests the ungracious pleasure of a God who can't stand sin, until there's been a cleansing and a repentance and a deliverance.

But the Church itself has upon it the displeasure of God, and the Spirit seeks among us a rest for the soul with its foot. But he will not offer this judgment. He will not place among us corruption. For a Church that's where the Holy Ghost can never be present.

Churches Where God Is Not Welcome

I dare not believe this. Now, listen. I'm 62 years old, and I began to preach when I was 19. And I preached consistently with steadfastly a week off from that hour to this hour. I had a month in Florida five, six years ago when I thought I had a heart attack, and I didn't.

And I fooled them, but after that I preached consistently straight along, and I've been an observer of the human scene. And I can say to you that there are Churches where God has not been present for many long months, if not many years.

Key men, key men, have fought, have sinned, and failed to repent. And God has put a pastor after pastor comes in and goes, and breaks his spirit and goes, and comes in and breaks another spirit and goes.

And the poor trans-superintendent prayerfully sends a man hoping for the best, but the Holy Ghost can't like him in that Church. He can't come down. There's no place for the poor to be schooled. So there's dirt in that Church, there's dirt in the choir, and there's dirt on the board, and there's dirt in the pastor's home, and there's dirt among the members.

And there's gossip, and there's envy, and there's lying, and there's worldliness, and there's sin. And we try to hide behind the robes of A .B. Simpson and say, Well, he was the founder, our beloved founder.

Our beloved founder never founded dirt. He founded a Church that was clean, and he meant it to be clean. So Jesus Christ the Lord founded the great Church to be clean. And there are Churches where the Holy Ghost can never come down.

Somebody says, that's deceitful, and that's not deceitful, and that's realism, and that's Bible. And if I knew where the prophetic Church was at, you couldn't get me there by with a rock chain and a team of horses.

You couldn't pull me to such a Church. I won't go where God can go. And there are Churches where God isn't welcome. You can have our church machinery, and our young Sunday school picnics, and our morning worship, and our missionary convention, and everything looks as if it was all right.

But floating death is there, and corruption, and God won't bless, and will not bless. The raven is there, and the dark spirit of the raven finds himself at home. They'll come and join the Church of life, but the dove cannot find a place for the sole of his foot.

And I think the most awful thing to say is not liberalism. The most awful thing to say is not communism. Terrible, terrible, and devilish as it is. But I think the most ominous and awful thing today in this wide world is the whirl of the wings of the God-bidden dove.

The wings of the heavenly dove, and he can't like her. He cannot find a place for the sole of his foot. The fluttering, mourning dove that looks and waits for repentance, and waits for signs of a lifting judgment, and waits for the brackish waters to awake, and waits for the dry ground to appear, and waits for people to get right with God, and to confess, and to straighten themselves out, and to pay their debts, and to clean up their lives, and stop their evil.

Waiting, I say, and waiting. And the absence of the lighting down of the Holy Ghost is perpetual condemnation. In the year 1725, 75 German Christians met in Dusseldorf, Germany. 75 of them there were that Wednesday morning.

They had communion that morning, and there were 75 of them there, I repeat. And they sang, O dead, how now wounded, white sin and grief bowed down. And each one felt that he was more wretched than the other one, and each one felt that he had personally crucified Christ.

And while they waited there at the communion table, suddenly there came that which was described later as an instantaneous of the Savior. He came down upon them, this dove, and rested upon them from that building, not knowing, the historian said, hardly knowing whether they had died and were in heaven or whether they were still on earth, the happiest people.

And the historian says, in 20 years they did more for Christian missions than had been done by the whole Church of Christ in 200 years. And out of the Moravian Church came the Methodist Church. For John Wesley and Charles Wesley were converted through Peter Bowler, the Moravian, and Moravian theology of Theresean and Zinzendorf and others were translated and were put into hymns, and we sing them every Sunday.

And Charles Wesley took Moravian theology of Theresean and Zinzendorf and others, were translated and were put into hymns, and we sing them every Sunday. And Charles Wesley took Moravian theology that had come down as the wings of the dove and wrote our great hymns, and we sung to these hundreds of years.

And out of this kind of thing came the Christian and Missionary Alliance. My brethren, we are not sent from the Thessalonians. We are in lineal descent from the Moravians. In 1725, in Drusseldorf, John J. Austin will agree with me.

And so we have the Wesley Methodists, the Free Methodists, the Salvation Army, and all these groups that one time had fire and sometimes still do. They all trace back to that hour when there was a loving nearness of the Savior instantaneously bestowed.

Sins That Resist Spiritual Renewal

That's what we need, and that's what we can't have, and that's what nobody's looking for much anymore, except in a very theoretical kind of way. Now, why doesn't it come down? I'll tell you why. Because of the march of discredition.

Because of the desolation. Plain sins that we can't deny. Sins of action and of habit. Sins such as reveling in wealth, or sins, we Christians, such as living like kings while millions perish, and insisting on a new big car every year while millions of the heart, such as love, that crawls like a serpent over our spirit.

And spite, and resentment, and jealousy, and envy, and pride. Pride of person, and pride of creed, and pride of denomination, and pride of race, and pride of place, and pride of accomplishment. These things, you can have them and still be an evangelical Christian.

You can have them and still be a member of the elect. You can have them and still be on the board in the Alliance Church. You can have them and still be headshot in the Alliance. Brethren, the devil doesn't pick bombs.

He picks the cleanest people he can find, and dirties them up inside, and that's all he has to do. Clean rivers, which you can't find fault with their external life, but the brackish waters of judgment lie in desolation upon their rotten side.

The deep, deep, inward, what the old writers called the penetralia. That's so far in that you penetrate through it, so far your friends can't come there. In the deep of your spirit, there these things are.

And the Holy Ghost flies about and extends its wings. Tonight I believe I can hear and have been hearing the whirr of the dove, wanting to life, but he can't. In church we have sinned, because we're teasing Zion while the church goes her way, little by little, and evangelicalism is losing its sharp edge in it, and its solid creed, and little by little, we're going over to liberal side.

Have you seen the last Happy Christmas? Oh yeah, have you seen the last joke teller? Yeah, you don't have to look far. And the last fellow that can, yes, yes, you're there every place, you know. You're there everywhere.

But the Happy Christmas can hardly hold himself down. It's a little German man with a beard, and he usually gets up, they'd have communion service, and then they'd have testimony. And little Father Rohr, he'd push out into the aisle, because he couldn't testify bothered by the limitation of seats.

So he'd get out in the aisle, and he'd stand there, and pretty soon he'd begin to pounce up and down on the balls of his feet, and praise God, and he'd say, I'm God's gotten, I'm God's gotten, and nobody can hurt God's gotten.

He said, I don't take care of myself, God takes care of me. And he insisted that nobody could harm him, and the devil couldn't make him sick. He got very, very old, but he was so happy that he couldn't stay down.

Where are we? I don't know. There aren't many. There's a coldness of heart, and in order to try to cover our coldness of heart, we'll write choppy, bouncy, rotten belly choruses to keep up a little bit of delight.

And after a chorus on me, there's like this, you know, I mean, a chorus in the sense that I sing, I try to get people, I try to get people to sing, you know, I try to get them to sing, and go, I've had my old brother's chorus, and they just won't sing.

They won't sing because they're not happy to sing. A happy crowd will sing anything, and sing it well, and make their limbs unravel. But the coldness of heart, oh, the coldness of heart. I can only say this.

If there was as much coldness between the average husband and wife as there is between God and the average Christian, there would be five times as many divorces as there are now, and there are already now three times too many.

And God can't find anybody that cares enough to find one. God is going to have to find somebody that loves the church enough to please for it. That man isn't on the horizon yet. He isn't around. I am the man.

And it's my prayer and hope, and I'm writing and praying to that end, that God will send a prophet or two to the world, I don't care where they come from, in or out of this movement, a prophet or two to the world that are willing to be sacrificed, that are willing to love the church until they wound the church and wound the congregation.

You'll know good. And in the great day of God Almighty's judgment, when the blazing eyes of the man who walks in the midst of the golden candlestick looks through your service, your face will be red with shame, that you'd rather be liked by the people than tell them the truth.

You'll have to suffer before the church. But you know what I've hoped over the last ten years? I've been hoping that at least we could find an olive leaf. Looking for an olive. A soft smile coming out a little upon the evangelical church.

The sun breaks out toward God. Holy discussion. How to get into the deeper life. How to come where you can find the earth clean enough to land, to entertain. There must be cleanness before there can be fullness.

In the Old Testament, they put blood on the thumbs, on the ears, and on the big toe. Blood first. And do you know what they put next? Oil. Another type of a spirit. Always there must be blood for cleansing before the spirit can come and fullness.

Repentance Before Spiritual Fullness

Isn't the question of not understanding, my friend? You see, I've heard five different explanations of this. If you hadn't heard five, or if you hadn't heard five times five, it wouldn't make a bit of difference, because God isn't going to argue over interpretation.

He'll come when the hearth is clean enough to receive it. And we're clean enough when we've cleaned up the mess. When we pull away and it isn't until it's perfect. He has determined we will not be common Christians.

But that we will be cleansed, delighted Christians. When that time comes, you won't have to debate. When that time comes, you won't have to coach. God doesn't have to be coached. He's the one who put the idea in your head in the first place.

He's there first with the suggestion. And if you're hungry for him, it's because he made you so. And why should he make you hungry and then not feed you? And if you've heard, there isn't everybody to whom God can speak.

He says, he that hath ears, let him hear what the Spirit says unto the church. It's just people that have no ears to hear. They know doctrine, but they don't know the voice. If you can't hear, then I have no quarrel with you.

We can be friends, and we'll walk around and chat together over the grounds for the next week, and then I'll go home. You'll go back home with tragedy. But if you can hear, and you're ready to do something about it tonight, and you're ready to forgive that person right now, and go home and write a letter back to your cabin to pretend to write a letter, mail it tomorrow morning, and ask that person to forgive you for the way you've treated them.

Straighten that business deal out there, fella. You tried to get by with it. You still trying to be happy. But your heart rattles like a bell that's cracking. No happiness there. No doubt. No power. No joy.

No purity. And that's the reason. Dear Heavenly Father, it is night. Lightning down at his house. I'm afraid of it. We're going to settle for that. And if it's as good as it was last year, we'll be content.

Forget him. He fights because he can't find a clean face. Get by with it or not. The Pharisees were translated and were put into hymns that we sing on every Sunday. And Charles Wesley took Moravian theology that had come down as the wings of the dove and wrote our great hymns that we've sung for these hundreds of years.

And out of this kind of thing came the Christian and missionary alliance. My brethren, we are not the predatory. Sent from the Moravians in 1725 in Lüsseldorf, Germany. Look at us. Look at us, and you'll agree with me.

It's the Free Methodist, the Salvation Army, and all these groups that one time had fire and sometimes still do. They all trace back to that hour. This is the Savior instantaneously bestowed. That's what we need, and that's what we can't have, and that's what nobody's looking for much anymore, except in a day-theoretical kind of way.

A Final Call to Repentance and Renewal

Now, why doesn't it come down? I'll tell you why. Because of the marks of distraction. Because of the desolation. Plain sins that we can't deny. Sins of action and of habit. Sins such as revelry in wealth for the world.

Sins with Christians, such as leading like kings while millions perish. And investing on a new big car every year while millions perish. Sins of the heart, such as lust that crawls like a serpent. Such as anger and resentment and jealousy and envy and pride.

Pride of person and pride of creed and pride of denomination and pride of race and pride of place and pride of accomplishment. These things, you can have them and still be an evangelical Christian. You can have them and still be a member of the Alliance.

You can have them and still be on the board in the Alliance Church. You can have them and still be a big shot in the Alliance. Brethren, the devil doesn't pick bombs. He picks the cleanest people he can find, and dirties them up inside, and that's all he has to do.

If you can't find fault with their external lives, but the brackish waters of judgment lie in desolation upon their rotten side. The deep, deep, inward, what the old writers called the penetralia. That's the so far in which you penetrate to it, so far your friends can't come there, in the deep of your spirit.

There these sins are, and the Holy Ghost flies about in extensive wings. You have been hearing the whirr of the dove, wandering the life of intent in church we have seen. Because we're at ease in Zion while the church goes her way, little by little, and evangelicalism is losing its sharp edge, and its solid creed, and little by little we're going over to the liberal side.

Have you seen the last Happy Christmas? Or have you seen the last joke teller? You don't have to look far. And the last poet that can, yes, yes, you're there every place you know. You're there everywhere.

But the Happy Christmas can hardly hold himself down. It's a retreat. You will remember it? Oh, Father Lord, and his was it on, and it stayed on. And he used to get up, and they'd have communion service, and then they'd have testimony.

And little Father Lord, he'd push out into the aisle, because he couldn't testify, bothered by the limitation of seats. So he'd get out in the aisle, and he'd stand there until he could, and he'd begin to bounce up and down on the balls of his suit, and pray to God.

And he'd say, I'm got gotten. I'm got gotten, and nobody can hurt got gotten. But I don't take care of myself. God takes care of me. And he insisted that nobody could harm him, and the devil couldn't make him sick.

He got very, very old. But he was so happy that he couldn't sit down. Where are we? I don't know. There aren't many. There's a coldness of heart, and in order to try to cover our coldness of heart, we have to write choppy, bouncy, rock-and-billy choruses to keep up a little bit of delight.

And after a poor psalm reader like this, you know, I mean poor in the sense that I say him, has tried to get people to sing, you know, and tried to get them to sing and go out. I had an old brother who told me, they just won't sing.

They won't sing because they're not happy, you see. A happy crowd would sing anything, and sing it well, and make the wind unravel. But the coldness of heart, oh, the coldness of heart. I can only say this.

If there was as much coldness between the average husband and wife as there is between God and the average Christian, there would be five times as many divorces as there are now, and there are already now three times too many.

Coldness. Coldness in God's head, which goes on its way. And God can't find anybody that cares enough to even find one. God is going to have to find somebody that loves the church enough to plead for it.

That man isn't on the horizon yet. He isn't around. And it's my prayer, I'm out, and I'm writing and praying to that end, that God will send a prophet or two to the world. I don't care where they come from, in or out of this movement.

A prophet or two to the world that are willing to be sacrificed.