Noah - Blessings of the Fathers

Even though these interim patriarchs don't get much mention in the Bible, I suspect that most, if not all of them, were faithful followers of the one true God.  We know from latter-day revelation that Enoch's father taught him the gospel.  Most of these men weren't ordained to the priesthood until they were what we would consider as well on in years.  An exception to that rule was Enoch, who was ordained at the hand of Adam when he was in his twenties.  Another exception to rule was Noah.


And Enoch was not
because God took him

Noah's was ordained to the priesthood when he was only 10 years old.  The world was on parallel paths of great righteousness and great wickedness, as is often the case.  Noah was called to his mission early to preach repentance to those who were on the wickedness path.  Those who were extremely righteous due to the ministry of Enoch, went to the city of Zion where they were translated with Enoch.  Those who were not righteous were left as the world headed to a cataclysm of enormous proportions.

As is God's practice, he never steps into history to execute judgments upon his people unless he warns them through a prophet, who offers them the final option to repent.  This prophet was Noah.



The Bristlecone Pine is called the
Methuselah Tree because it can
live up to 1,000 years!

Noah's grandfather, Methuselah, was the son of Enoch. The only thing we really know about Methuselah is that he lived longer than anyone else on earth has lived (969 years according to the Bible.) Methuselah's son was Lamech, who became the father of Noah.  Thus Noah grew up with the blessings of the fathers and with the priesthood of God to go with it.

God called Noah a "perfect man" in his generation.  He had contact with his grandfather and probably with his great-grandfather, Enoch, as well.  He kept the commandments.  We all know the story of Noah and the ark.  What we sometimes gloss over is his call from God to preach repentance to the people before the flood came.  We can also safely supposed that Noah's father and grandfather were righteous men.  They both died around the same period of time and it was when they had died that God sent the flood.

The most important thing to remember about Noah is that he was both a patriarch and a prophet who grew up in the blessings of the fathers and passed those blessings on to his sons: Japeth, Shem, and Ham.

©Gebara Education 2016