The Sound of a Hammer God Must Punish Sin — E.A. Johnston

Heavenly Father, all glory to your name, it is my prayer that through this message today you will speak to hearts and that your Holy Spirit will disturb folks. I pray these things in the strong name of Jesus.

Amen. I want to introduce you, friends, to a man named Noah. I'm sure you've heard of Noah and his ark, but did you know that Noah was a preacher? A Bible tells us so in the second epistle of Peter in chapter 2 and verse 5.

And spared not the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly. Well, if Noah was a preacher then, who was his audience?

Noah, the Preacher of Righteousness

It was the antediluvians that he lived among. The next question you may ask is, why did they need preaching too? I'll tell you why, friend, as the answer is found in the book of Genesis in chapter 6. Here now is the word of God.

And may the Spirit of the Lord attend the reading of his holy word. These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations. And Noah walked with God. And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Let me pause here, friends, to say, here is Noah. And he's out walking with God in sweet communion with him. And here is Noah's generation. And they're walking away from God. For they are in love with their sins.

We see this in verse 11. The earth also was corrupt before God. And the earth was filled with violence. That kind of reminds me of the day in which we live. We live in a corrupt, sin-soaked society that's spinning out of control.

And the streets of our cities are soaked with the blood of violent crimes and murder. At this very moment, the moral climate of the earth is like a filthy sewer. As it spills out across the land with sexual perversion, fornication, adultery, drunkenness, and vice.

Well, what does God do about the corrupted earth in Noah's day? We see what takes place in verse 12 and following. And God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt. For all flesh had corrupted its way upon the earth.

And God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh is come before me. For the earth is filled with violence through them. And behold, I will destroy them with the earth. I will stop there. What happens next is that God gives Noah a job to do.

And he gives Noah a burden to carry. The job is to build an ark of gopher wood that has a lot of rooms in it. So the animal kingdom can be put on board to preserve them in the coming flood. God tells Noah why he must build this ark to specifications.

We see in verse 17. And behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life from under heaven, and everything that is in the earth shall die.

I will pause there. When God tells Noah that in man and beast is the breath of life, it demonstrates what a terrible calamity and horrible judgment is about to fall upon them. That God intends to drown the whole world and everyone and everything in it.

I don't know about you, friend, but I can't hold my breath too long underwater. But the people of Noah's day were soon to find out. I said earlier that God gave this man Noah a job to do and a burden to carry.

The job was in building the ark of safety. The burden to carry was for his fellow man. It just tore Noah up inside to think that his friends and neighbors would soon be drowned. This is when Noah began to preach the righteousness of God to them and to warn them about the coming flood of judgment.

The Hammer as a Warning of Coming Judgment

And it wasn't long that the inhabitants of the land took notice and began to hear a pounding in the forest. It was the sound of a hammer pounding away on wood. And that sound of the hammer echoed through the forest.

And it was magnified in the ears of the people because every hammer blow on that ark of safety was a sermon and a warning to them that Almighty God would send a judgment and destruction upon them. And Noah just pounded away on that hammer as he cried out to his friends and neighbors, Thus saith the Lord, flee from the wrath to come.

I'm telling you, friends, flee from the wrath to come. And old Noah just kept on pounding and pounding away. And he kept on preaching as he continued to obey God and build that ark. The title of my sermon today, friends, is The Sound of a Hammer, God Must Punish Sin.

That God is a God that must punish sin is a theme that runs through my Bible. We hear the words of the Apostle Peter in the second epistle as he emphasizes that God is a God who must punish sin. He writes,.

For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgment, and spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly, and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly.

I will stop there, friends. Have you ever in your lifetime seen more ungodliness in the world as there is in our day? Governments have legalized sin and they promote evil. I remember a society where marriage was between a man and a woman, and there was still a sense of shame in society back then.

But today the moral floodgates are pushed wide open, and evil is called good and good evil. And today men do what's right in their own eyes and have thrown out the Bible as an archaic work of literature that no longer pertains to society.

People think that because God isn't punishing their sin now, He never will, and folks just sin all they want to, because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.

And that's where we are today, friends. Listen to me, friend. You can put it down big and plain and straight and black and white that just because God is long-suffering, that doesn't mean He's grown tolerant to your sin.

God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, he shall also reap. We are in desperate times, and your children and grandchildren grow up without God in a godless society, and the people in Noah's day were just as bad as we are today.

They were just as wicked and just as violent as we are. But Noah warned them. He cared about their souls. Every time he walked into the woods to clear out some more lumber, he carried a burden for them, and every hammer blow on that ark was a sermon and a warning to them.

Yes, friends, in the days of Noah, when he was building the ark, the inhabitants of his country would observe him and his family as he labored building the ark and preaching righteousness to them. But they mocked, they laughed at such a spectacle of an old man building such a monstrosity as an ark when it was obvious to anyone with any sense that there was no need for it.

They just held their stomachs and laughed and laughed as they ridiculed and pointed at him. But God Almighty was watching the whole sad scene, and it grieved him in his heart, and he looked down and beheld their wickedness.

And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And he repented to the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast and the creeping thing and the birds of the air, for it repenteth me that I have made them. I will stop there, friends.

The Corruption of the Human Heart

Imagine, friends, here is a land of people whose hearts are corrupt and their lives are an overflow of that corruption. They grieve a holy God by their sinfulness, and it was not just their wicked behavior, but also their evil thoughts that grieved God.

So God calls this man Noah, a man that the scripture says of. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations. And Noah walked with God. Here is a man in the midst of an evil nation who stood out from his countrymen, in that he walked with God Almighty, while the other inhabitants of the land just grieved the heart of God through their wickedness and sin.

Noah stood out in his generation like a bluebird in a lemon tree, and their destruction came upon them suddenly, and they were all drowned except Noah and his family. Christ spoke of this in the Gospels, saying, they were eating and drinking and being given in marriage up until the very day that the flood came and destroyed them.

Surely had the people of Noah's day known in advance the overwhelming size of the tragedy which would soon befall them, what rains and floods would surround and engulf them, what the extent of the raging waters would drown them and their cattle and all the beasts of the field, that their homes would float and then sink, and that they would be helpless in the swirling waters to alleviate their entire circumstance.

Imagine the sorrow and regret that filled their hearts as they were drowning and watching their children drown beside them, how they must have hated themselves for not heeding the warnings of Noah and rejecting the visual image of an ark being built in a clearing in the forest.

They saw it take shape with their own eyes, and every day they heard the sound of that descending hammer blow as its repeated warnings were felt upon them, but that fell on deaf ears, how they now regretted that they did not put passage on the ark of safety.

Rather, they laughed, they mocked, and they were drowned. Surely had they known all this, they would have not become so foolish and reckless. Rather, they would have become grave and serious and reformed themselves and repented before God to avoid such a horrible land as drowning.

Today, in the land, people go about their normal activities of their day. They eat and drink. They laugh and enjoy themselves. They pursue their goals and careers. They build, they gather, they work, they labor, and they do wickedly against a holy God for any sin is grievous to Almighty God.

Man is sinful. Man is corrupt. He enters this world with a ruined nature and a bent toward sin. Job says this about the condition of man. How much more abominable and filthy is man which drinketh iniquity like water, meaning man can't get enough of sin.

And because of sin, friend, man is alienated from God. Your average person today cares little about eternity. They're ignorant of a final judgment and a burning hell. And there are so few preachers of righteousness today that even speak or warn of such things.

In church today, you'll hear of God's love, but you'll seldom hear about God's wrath for sin and sinners and a burning hell prepared for them. There are few preachers of righteousness today warning men to flee from the wrath to come.

Rather, they speak peace, peace, when there is no peace for the wicked. Although we have a Bible to warn us of these things and bring us to repentance before God, many today are unconcerned about spiritual things.

They could care less about serious matters of eternity. And just about everyone you would ask would tell you that they are all right in the eyes of God, that He is just fine with them the way they are, and they won't go to a place called hell.

They think that the God of today wouldn't send people to such a terrible place. He is just a God of love who loves everyone just the way they are. And many preach that nonsense. But the record shows and the fact remains that God will judge every man at a future judgment and that God must punish sin and every person outside of Christ who dies in their sins will enter a Christless eternity and be forever separated from God.

Awakening Sinners to the Terror of the Lord

A person has to be awakened to his lost condition before he can even realize these solemn things. Only the Holy Spirit of God can awaken you, friend, to your danger, that you stand on the wrong side of God and are under His condemnation for sin.

Listen, friend, I'm here to warn you. If you were driving in a torrential rainstorm and the bridge up ahead of you was out and I approached you with my headlights blinking and my horn blowing and I warned you that the bridge was out, if you ignored my warnings and kept on going, you would plunge down to a watery grave.

The Apostle Paul states in 2 Corinthians,. Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men. You must be awakened to the fact that you're on the wrong side of a offended God and you are in great danger and peril.

Listen, friend, the Bible declares in Psalms that God is angry with the wicked every day. If you turn not, He will whet His sword. He hath bent His bow and made it ready. It's as if the mythological sword of Damocles hangs above your head by a thread and it glistens with your own blood.

God stands against you because of sin and at any moment He can remove you from this world. A sudden accident or calamity can remove you from this world and send you into another world you were quite unprepared for.

Are you prepared to meet the God of eternity? Can't you see that you are just steps away from sinking down to the blackness of hell? You're sick with sin and an enemy of a pure God. God requires perfection to get into His holy heaven and no man is perfect.

One day, at a future judgment, you will be held up against the strictness and severity of God's unbending law and if you stand there in your own merits, you will fail that test. You must stand there in the merits of another.

Christ’s Substitution and the Hammer of Calvary

Listen, friend, I know I am a sinner and I need a substitute for sin and so do you, friend, so do you. I've told you all about Noah and his hammer pounding on that ark. Now I want to introduce you to a man named Jesus and tell you about another hammer that sounded at a place called Calvary.

You've heard of Jesus? Jesus came into this world doing good, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, even raising the dead to life. Yet what happened? Men cried away with Him and nailed Him to a cross.

He was crucified between two common criminals on that hill at Calvary. His hands and feet were fastened to that cross, hammered there with nails. Remember that Noah's hammer was a sermon warning of a coming judgment on sin?

Well, Calvary's hammer sounded forth as well and the Son of God was fastened to that cross. Every stroke of the Roman's hammer was an explanation point that God must punish sin. God must punish sin. God must punish sin.

Look at that blessed man on the cross, friend. Look at that bloodstained Savior from sin as He hangs there with His arms outstretched, beckoning you to come to Him and believe on Him. Look at that man on the cross, friend.

He is the friend of sinners. He died for sin. When all is against Him, His love flows out to a world of guilty sinners. Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by Me.

The cross is the place where wicked men sought to get rid of Him, but by His death it becomes the place where His saving power flows out to all who come in repentance, confessing they are sinners and own Him as their Savior and Lord.

In this was manifested the love of God toward us because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him. Listen, friend. You have been warned in this message today of your great danger of dying in your sins.

Repentance, Faith, and Refuge in Christ

You must repent toward God and believe on His Son, Jesus Christ, for pardon of sin. Jesus is the only remedy and refuge for sin, but you must come to Him and believe on Him so you may have eternal life and a glory-filled heaven.

Herein is love, not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. You've heard the gospel story today, and I want you to take full advantage of this gospel opportunity to come to Christ now for forgiveness of sin.

Don't let this door of grace swing shut in your face, friend. God tells us that He will not always strive with man. Listen to God's Word as recorded by the prophet Isaiah, who declares, I'm going to sing a hymn, friend.

If God's been dealing with your soul through this message, then I want you to come to Christ as I sing. As I sing this hymn now, friend, you come as I sing. My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand. When darkness fails His lovely face, I rest on His unchanging grace.

In every high and stormy gale, my anchor holds within the veil. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand. When He shall come with trumpet sound, oh, may I then in Him be found.

Dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand.