Scripture
3 The Lord said, “My Spirit will not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; so his days will be one hundred twenty years.”
Audio Commentary
Abstract
Genesis 6:3 records God’s sentence on the intermarrying generation. He declares that His Spirit will not strive with man forever. The commentary calls this the most painful judgment of all. Sins of the flesh are met with punishment of the spirit. When a person keeps grieving the Spirit, God finally hands him over to his own depravity. That is how the old world became only evil. Yet the striving itself is a mercy. It comes as conviction, a guilty conscience, and the long preaching of Noah. And it never withdraws without ample warning. The commentary stresses how patient God is. It reads Methuselah’s 969 years as a prophecy of nearly a millennium of forbearance. But that patience is not endless. The 120 years are a reprieve, not a cruelty. They are time and grace to repent. And a reprieve is always a path to repentance, never a pardon of the sin.
Brief Observations
- The most painful judgment — God withdraws His striving Spirit from man. Sins of the flesh are met with punishment of the spirit, the most painful kind.
- Given over to depravity — When the Spirit stops striving, a person is left to his own broken nature. That is how the old world became only evil.
- Striving is a kindness — The Spirit strives through conviction and a guilty conscience. It is God’s kindness, meant to lead us to repentance.
- The Spirit strove through Noah — God pleaded with that generation through Noah’s preaching. Peter ties it to Christ and the eight souls saved through water.
- Patient, but not forever — God is far more patient than we would be. But He will not strive forever with the impenitent.
- David’s great fear — After his sin, David dreaded most that God’s Spirit would leave him. He knew abandonment meant being handed to his own evil.
- “Because he also is flesh” — God gives the reason plainly. Humanity is corrupt by its own devices, and cannot be trained into self-righteousness.
- 120 years — reprieve, not pardon — The shortened lifespan is grace, more time than they deserved. But a reprieve only opens a path to repentance; it never pardons the sin.
Full Commentary
God was not happy with man for inter-marrying with foreign wives. This verse was a declaration that God would remove His Spirit from man because man capitulated to his own lust of the flesh. If you continuously grieve the Holy Spirit with your sin, you should expect the Holy Spirit to depart from you. Sins of the flesh are often met with punishment of the spirit. Spiritual judgment is the most painful of all judgments.
When God’s Spirit ceases to strive with you, you’re given over to your own depravity. This kind of thing happened writ large in the old world which is why humanity became only evil all the time. Any kind of moral goodness must by definition originate in God. So if God withdraws His Spirit from you, there’s nothing left but yourself in your natural, broken state. Removal of God’s Spirit never comes without ample warning. This isn’t something you should be afraid of if you are a faithful follower of Jesus Christ. Even the people who had rebelled against God could have stayed His Spirit with them through their prayers.
So what does it look like for the Spirit of God to strive with you? In many cases it might be as simple as conviction for your sins. Your guilty conscience is God’s way of alerting you to the reality that something is wrong. Convicting the world about sin, righteousness, and judgment is a kindness of God — and scripture says God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance.
In the patriarchal case God’s Spirit strove with man through Noah’s preaching. The apostle Peter referenced this when he was teaching Christians how to live faithfully under suffering, emphasizing that Christ suffered once for Sins — the righteous for the unrighteous — to bring people to God. Let me read you a passage from 1 Peter 3:
1 Peter 3:17-22 17 For it is better, if it is God’s will, that you suffer for doing what is right than for doing evil. 18 Because Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the Spirit, 19 in whom he also went and preached to the spirits in prison, 20 who before were disobedient when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ship was being built. In it, few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. 21 This is a symbol of baptism, which now saves you—not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, angels and authorities and powers being made subject to him.
God didn’t just flood the world on a whim. He was far more patient with humanity than we can imagine. He strove with man longer than any of us would have. Remember we proposed the possibility that the life of Methuselah was itself a prophecy from God — and Methuselah lived 969 years. If the prophetic idea is true, then that means God’s long-suffering lasted at least a millennium.
But God will not strive forever. When the Holy Spirit’s conviction is met with unyielding impenitence, He will eventually leave you alone. This was king David’s greatest fear for himself after his sin with Bathsheba. While David did plead with God to undo the consequences of his sin, he was primarily concerned that God’s Spirit would not depart from him. He knew that abandonment from God meant himself being given over to the evil inside his own heart. Evil which would certainly lead him to ruin just as it led the antediluvian people to ruin.
In this verse we even see God explain exactly the reason He will not continue to strive with man: because man also is flesh. This means by their own devices humanity is incurably corrupt. We are carnal, depraved, sensual beings who are utterly lost without God’s Spirit. Quite frankly it is a waste of time and labor to train human beings at self-righteousness.
It is this corrupt nature, it is this inclination of our souls towards the flesh that resists the striving of God’s Spirit. Now we could argue about whether God’s grace is irresistible, as the Calvinists would have it, and in that case a person who resists God’s Spirit is simply a person to whom God has not given the gift of faith. We know that a sinner who adheres to sin is justly given over to his sin, we just don’t know whether that person ever truly had God’s Spirit at all.
In the wake of global corruption God would have been justified is destroying humanity immediately. But He didn’t do that. He gives them a reprieve. Instead of immediate death, their lifespans are reduced to 120 years. You could frame that as a cruelty if you only view it as a nearly 90% reduction in lifespan. But even the remaining 10% was a grace of God. It was more time than they deserved to repent and be reformed.
That’s something you’ll notice frequently in life with unrepentant sinners: they get more time than they deserve. This is God’s mercy, God’s patience, and God’s forbearance towards those who provoke Him. Something important to remember as you walk through life: a reprieve for sin is always a pathway to repentance and never a pardon of the sin.
A sin can only be pardoned by repentance and forgiveness from God Himself. Any temporary relief without repentance should be viewed as such: temporary. God’s forbearance is often longer than we can imagine, but it is always limited. Justification in Christ Jesus is the only path to lasting relationship with God.