One of the ways that we know that the Bible is the word of God is that the portraits of many of the great heroes of the faith include their pimples, moles, and warts. Think of those Old Testament saints revered by Judaism, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Moses, and David. Think of the human founders of Christianity, Peter and even John and Paul. The Scriptures do not airbrush their blemishes. The Scriptures are unlike any human book which would naturally do that. So it should not surprise us to find out that Noah went on the first drunk recorded in Scripture. Now remember, twice God called Noah righteous in Genesis chapter 6 through 9. But the scriptures use the story of Noah to warn the righteous of the dangers of liquor. How often folly accompanies the use of alcohol. I'm not going to dive down into the details of Noah's folly this morning. But I want to point out that this is not the only time that Genesis warns us by example of the danger of strong drink. The story of Lot in Genesis 19 festers with the same folly. Many Christians today dismiss the dangers of drinking beer or wine. They have no ears to hear the warnings of the scriptures that I just mentioned. But I want you to think about this. Neither Noah nor Lot were alcoholics. They weren't confirmed drunkards. That's not the idea. But their one-time drunkenness changed the course of their lives and the lives of their children. But the danger of alcohol is not my subject this morning. You won't have to pay me for that. Everything I just said is free. Our focus this morning is Genesis 9, 25 through 27. The words that Noah spoke, I believe, prophetically through the Holy Spirit when he came out of this drunken stupor and realized what had happened. So let's read. Genesis 9, verses 25 through 27. Genesis 9, verses 25 through 27. Then he, Noah, said, cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants he shall be to his brethren. And he said, blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem, and may Canaan be his servant. May God enlarge Japheth, and may he dwell in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be his servant. As I said, these words are prophetic concerning the futures of Noah's three sons. Many Christians, especially American Christians down through the years, have had the idea that the three great races of humankind descended from the three sons of Noah mentioned in this prophecy. How many of you have ever heard of that idea? I think most of us have. And of course the corollary to this teaching is that from Ham and Canaan came the black race and they were intended by God, because of the curse in verse 25, intended by God to be slaves. And so this morning as I cover these three verses, I want to take up the topic, the origin of the races. the origin of the races. Now, I take up this subject for two important reasons. Number one, race remains a huge issue in our society. Critical race theory has made its way from the university classroom to City Hall and the State House and the boardroom. Some states and municipalities are considering paying billions of dollars in reparations to individuals who can prove that they are descended from slaves. Race is a live issue in Christian denominations as large as the Southern Baptist Convention. Number two, I take up this issue because several groups who call themselves Christian are actually racist and white supremacist. And they still exist in 2024. They twist scripture so that they can claim the blessing of God, and we need to denounce the teachings of these groups for what they are, false doctrine, heresy. For instance, there's a movement called Christian Identity that began back in the 1960s, and some in this movement believe that the white race descended from Adam and Eve 6,000 years ago, while the other races are pre-Adamic. They believe the earth has been here for millions of years, that those other races existed for millions of years. But since these non-white races did not descend from Adam, they do not possess the image of God. Because they're not sons of Adam, they're outside of the redemption that's in Jesus Christ. I mean, you can't get much worse than this. And obviously, these are extreme views, false doctrine that find no support in the Bible. But there are still some Bible-believing Christians who are not part of these extremist movements that still have misconceptions about the origin of the races. We need to know what the Bible teaches on this important matter. So in response to false teaching like Christian identity, let me make my first point exceedingly clear. The three sons of Noah are not the forefathers of the three great races. The three sons of Noah are not the forefathers of the three great races. Now, it really doesn't take much thought or study to realize that this idea cannot be true. If the three sons of Noah were the forefathers of the three great races, I guess it would go something like this. Japheth was the forefather of the Caucasians. And since Ham, through Canaan, was the forefather of the black race, then that leaves Shem as the father of the Oriental race. Well, immediately you have some problems. First of all, Canaan was the father of what tribes? Canaan was the father of the Canaanites, OK? The Canaanites who inhabited the Promised Land when the Israelites arrived. Canaan was not the forefather of blacks who inhabited Africa. He was the forefather of the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Girgashites, the Hivites, the Sinites, the Arvidites, the Zamorites, and the Hamathites. I didn't find any more ites than that. Most of these tribes inhabited the land of Canaan and they were wiped out and dispossessed by the sons of Israel when they took the land. There is no evidence to link the Canaanite tribes to the black race. A second major problem is the supposition that Shem is the forefather of the Oriental race. Shem is the father of the Semitic peoples. Who are the Semitic peoples? You know them. They're in the news all the time. They are the Jews and the Arabs, but not the Orientals of the Far East. It's likely that the Sinaites who were a Canaanite tribe, descendants of Canaan, populated China. If you want to know more about that, come back this afternoon. We're going to talk about those kinds of things in more detail. So upon closer examination, this entire theory that each of the great races descended from one of Noah's sons falls apart. It will not hold water. In fact, both dark-skinned and light-skinned peoples came from all three of the sons, as you can see by studying the origin of the nations in Genesis 10, which we will take up this afternoon. I encourage you to stay for the second service. The service this afternoon is not going to be a discussion. I'm going to preach again. I think that we need to talk about the origin of the races and the origin of the nations on the same day. And so, stay for the meal and then stay for the service this afternoon. Now, when you look through the Bible for information about the races, you come to a second conclusion. And that is that the Bible has nothing to say about the three great races. It will surprise some of you that the Bible never uses the word race in the sense that we use it today. It uses the word race of running a race, but it never uses it in the sense of outward differences in skin color and facial features and so on. If the Bible has anything to say about race, it says that we are all of one race, the human race. So keep your finger here in Genesis 9. This is the only time I'll ask you to turn. So keep your finger here and turn with me to Acts chapter 17. Acts chapter 17. This is part of Paul's sermon at the Areopagus with the intellectuals in Athens. And so I am pulling a verse out here, but it's very much to the point of what we're talking about. In verse 26. Paul said, and God has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings. Now what Paul says here is precisely correct from a scientific point of view. Within blood types, any person of one race can give blood to any person of another race. And all races can interbreed and produce offspring. In fact, this verse suggests that divisions that God has placed among mankind have nothing to do with race. They are based on... What word does verse 26 use? They're based on nations. That word is the word ethnos, from which we get our English word ethnic. Ethnic differences are not racial differences. They're national differences. And again, as we'll see as we study Genesis chapters 10 and 11, they have to do with language more than anything. Now, while I am emphasizing the truth that the Bible does not speak in terms of race, let alone condone any form of racism, let me emphasize another fact. Historically, racism is the offspring of evolutionary thought. So let me give you a brief history lesson. Because evolutionists for two centuries have rejected the supernatural, they cannot look to the Tower of Babel as the explanation for how races developed. I'll talk about the Tower of Babel here in a few minutes. They have to come up with some kind of an evolutionary model, some kind of an evolutionary theory for the development of the races, which is what they did over 100 years ago. What they suggested is that each major tribe was isolated from the other for at least 50,000 years. And through that time, through mutation and struggle and survival of the fittest and natural selection, it produced the physical features that we connect with each race. But here's the catch. During those 50 years, not only did physical differences develop, but also mental and moral differences as well. In other words, one race was more intelligent, better able to govern than the others. And as a result of this thinking, throughout the 19th century and through about the first half of the 20th century, all evolutionists were convinced racists. Can I repeat that? Many of you have never heard that before. Throughout the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, every evolutionist was a racist. That includes Darwin, Huxley, and in Germany, a man named Ernst Haeckel. Haeckel was the most influential evolutionist in Europe until his death in 1919. Haeckel wrote of what's called social Darwinism. He believed that the laws of nature that Darwin had come up with, survival of the fittest, natural selection, he believed that those laws needed to be applied to human society. And there came to power a few years later in Germany a leader who fully embraced Haeckel's ideas and made them the basis for his racist program. His name was Adolf Hitler. Based on what these evolutionists thought and wrote, Hitler committed the German people to the survival of the fittest. Hitler believed that the struggle of World War II was necessary so that the fit would survive. And when he slaughtered millions of Jews, to his thinking that was just good science. Applied Darwinism. A Jewish biology professor at Purdue University made this comment, I don't claim that Darwin and his theory of evolution brought on the Holocaust, but I cannot deny that the theory of evolution and the atheism it engendered led to the moral climate that made a Holocaust possible, unquote. Now, I give this little history lesson because there are a lot of people around today, and they love to be on the internet, where nobody can tell them they're Nuts. And they love to rewrite history. And when they do, they blame every evil of society on Christians. And that's why this morning, you and I need to make absolutely clear that the Bible gives no basis for racism. Rather, it counters racism. by its philosophy that all human beings are of one blood, one race, and especially by its teaching that all Christians are one at an even deeper level, united in Christ. What history does teach is that the worst excesses of racism were the direct result of evolutionary theory carried to its logical conclusion. But let's return to our text. Turn back with me to Genesis 9 and our text in verses 25 through 27. If Genesis 9, verses 25 through 27, do not give us the origin of the races, what does this text teach? Well, Noah's prophecy outlines the future of three streams of nations. Notice I did not say three races, but three streams of nations, ethnos, three streams of ethnic groups. Now these three streams of nations descended from the three sons of Noah. So let's look carefully at these three verses for a few minutes. I believe that God used this unfortunate incident to give Noah prophetic insight. Noah was a preacher of righteousness, and in this case, these three verses, he was also a prophet. So I don't think we should take these words as an angry rant. by a half-drunk man over some family strife. No, I believe the Holy Spirit overshadowed this moment to lead Noah in saying these words. We have three prophecies here. The first word of prophecy in verse 25 concerned Ham in the person of his son Canaan. Now, I don't believe that the verse here, that the curse here just concerns Canaan. Canaan was the youngest son of Ham. I believe the prophecy here concerns all of Ham's descendants. I think what happened here is something like this. Noah was greatly disappointed by his youngest son, Ham, and so he delivered this curse in terms of Ham's youngest son, Canaan, but this prophecy concerns all Ham's descendants. Now the curse is that the descendants of Ham will be servant of servants. Now that phrase can be translated slave of slaves and it has been misused as an excuse to keep the blacks enslaved but as I've already explained that is not the meaning of this verse. Although some of Ham's descendants settled in Africa, Ham's youngest son Canaan and his descendants did not settle in Africa, but in Canaan, and they were never the target of the slave trade. And if you want to think about it, many of the Arab nations practiced slavery. They enslaved others. Now, many Bible scholars believe that this prophecy in verse 25 was fulfilled when the Jews conquered the Canaanite nations in the Promised Land. And I think that may be part of this, but it doesn't seem sufficient here if we look at all of these verses. I want you to notice verses 26 and verse 27 carefully. The descendants of Ham were going to serve all nations. the descendants of Shem, the descendants of Japheth, including all of their descendants. The idea here is that Ham and his descendants were going to have a worldwide service to all the other nations of the world. And perhaps that's why the superlative here, servant of servants, is used. The problem is that never in history Have the descendants of Ham been under the worldwide subjugation to the descendants of Japheth and to the descendants of Shem? That's never happened. We can't even make that statement about the descendants of Canaan. There must be some other meaning intended here. So what is this service to all nations? Now the interpretation that I'm going to share with you in the next few moments comes from Dr. Henry Morris, the father of creation science. Dr. Morris wrote extensively on the opening chapters of Genesis. So these views are his, but I have embraced them. I believe they're correct. The word servant here in verse 25 is sometimes used of a steward or of a manager of a household. You remember the experience of Joseph when he was a slave. He managed the entire household of Potiphar at one point. So, Dr. Morris suggests that the verse here may be saying that the descendants of Ham would exercise a stewardship over the physical and material aspects of creation for the good of the other nations. Now, I realize this is a lot of detail, but stick with me for a minute. Mankind has three fundamental duties as a steward of God's creation. Number one is spiritual, receiving and preserving and teaching the knowledge of God. Number two is intellectual, expanding and teaching the realm of knowledge and science and philosophy. And then number three is physical, providing the material means for man's bodily needs and comforts and thus enabling him to fulfill his intellectual and spiritual functions. And if you will, these three duties correspond roughly to the threefold nature of man, body, soul, and spirit. To some degree, human beings, every person functions in all three of those capacities. But I think in all of us, one of them normally comes to the fore, one of them normally dominates. And I think what Noah was saying here, through the Holy Spirit, he was prophesying that Ham and the nations that would descend from him would serve all mankind in the physical and technical areas, such as providing food, and clothing, and weaponry, and machinery, and transportations, and inventions, and so on. Shem and the nations that descended from him would be involved in spiritual matters. Japheth and the nations that come from him would be concerned with intellectual developments. And I think that understanding is a fairly accurate historical picture, big picture. Listen to the list of accomplishments of the Hemitic nations. And again, this list comes from Dr. Morris. And remember, the Hemitic nations, I believe, include China. So many of these developments were originally from the Chinese people. Again, we'll talk more about that in the service this afternoon. Number one, they were the original explorers and settlers of practically all parts of the world following the dispersion at Babel. Number two, they were the cultivators of most of the basic food staples of the world, such as potatoes, corn, beans, cereals, and others, as well as the first ones to domesticate most animals. Number three, they developed most of the basic types of structural forms and building tools and materials. Number four, they were the first to develop most of the usual fabrics for clothing and the various sewing and weaving devices. Number five, they discovered and invented a wide variety of medicines and surgical practices and instruments. Number six, they invented most of the concepts of basic practical mathematics, as well as surveying and navigation. Number seven, the machinery of commerce and trade, money, banks, postal systems, and so forth were developed by them. And number eight, they developed paper and ink, block printing, movable type, and other accoutrements of writing and communication. The second word of prophecy here in verse 26 has to do with Shem. Noah knew that God's blessings would rest on Shem. And so he explained, blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem. Lord there is a translation of the name for God, Yahweh. It's the covenant name of God. Shem's descendants would know a personal relationship with Yahweh. They would have a covenant relationship with Yahweh. They would be the ones who translate spiritual blessings to mankind. And in fact, This prophecy is the next revelation of the identity of the seed of woman who would deliver mankind from the serpent. He would be in the lineage of Shem. And think about it historically. Historically, we know that from the Semitic peoples come the great monotheistic religions. Judaism, Christianity, And if you want to include Islam, which I believe is a perversion of Christianity and Judaism, but they are the three great religions that proclaim what? That there is one God. The third word in verse 27 regarding Japheth is interesting in two ways. First of all, it centers on the promise that that God will enlarge Japheth. And that word enlarge is unusual. This is the only place that it's used in the Bible. And it's not a word for geographical enlargement. All of these tribes enlarge geographically. Rather, the root of this word means to make open. And so I think this has to do with intellectual opening of the mind. And again, this is Dr. Morris's view, and I wouldn't be dogmatic about it, but I think it's a good possibility. And then one other detail, and I think this is really interesting, it says, Japheth will dwell in the tents of Shem. What do you think that means? I think the idea there is that Japheth will enjoy God's blessings, the blessings that God poured out on Shem. And so, Those of us who are descendants of Japheth, many of us have indeed taken advantage of the spiritual inheritance that God gave to the Semites, Jews and Christians. So again, this seems to fit well historically. From Japheth came the Greeks and the Romans and the Europeans and the Americans who have expressed intellect and science and philosophy, and they've shared the spiritual heritage of Shem. From Rome to Europe to America, we've had a special share in the religious heritage of the East. But there's still one question that I have not really dealt with after all of this. How did the three races develop? So my final point, the races developed due to two facts. one scientific, one historical or biblical. The scientific fact is called the founder principle or the founder effect. And it's a law of genetics. How many of you remember studying genetics back in high school? How many of you would rather forget it? Yeah, genetics is rather complicated, isn't it? And most of us We probably don't remember any of the details, and we don't really want to remember any of the details. But it has to do with dominant traits and recessive traits, right? For instance, brown eyes are dominant. Blue and green eyes are recessive. If both of your parents have a recessive trait like blue eyes, then It's all but certain you're going to have blue eyes as well, because it's a recessive trait. I was reading about some genetic research the other day on heart disease among Americans. They found that Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans. On the other hand, the French eat a lot of fat, and they also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. The Japanese drink very little red wine, and they suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or the Americans. The Italians and the French drink excessive amounts of red wine, and they also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. And so based on this genetic research, the scientists drew this conclusion. Eat and drink whatever you like. It's speaking English that kills you. I read that on the internet, it has to be true, right? I thought that you needed a little levity. Some of you are fading. So, let me talk seriously about the founder principle. In a large population, under normal circumstance where there's intermarriage, Pre-association, the dominant genes tend to maintain a fairly uniform appearance of all human beings because of those dominant genes. Recessive genes, because they're recessive, they tend to remain submerged in a situation like that, even though they're still available in the gene pool of humankind. On the other hand, when a small group is forced somehow to break off totally, totally now, from the major group, then the recessive genes, for the first time, have an opportunity to be expressed in distinct physical characteristics. And in fact, the smaller the population, the more quickly and widely they will differ from that main population. Now most of us realize this. How many of you have a dog at home? How many of you have a purebred dog at home? If you have a purebred dog, then you definitely understand this because what do breeders do? They take a small number from the population and they interbreed them and interbreed them and interbreed them until recessive characteristics come out. Like what's the dog that has wrinkles, looks like a 110-year-old human being? What is it? You have the sharp A? Why did they do that? That's what we're talking about. So the same principle that dog breeders use can also happen by accident when small groups of human beings somehow break off and they're on their own, completely apart from the general population. And that can happen very quickly in that small group. And remember, the differences that we call race are actually very superficial. Skin color, and hair texture, and so forth. Now the second fact is the historic fact, the biblical fact, and that is the Tower of Babel. What happened at the Tower of Babel? Tower of Babel happened shortly after the fall. We think that by that point, there were probably 70 small tribes. And through the confusion of language, they were divided from one another, each going their own direction. And at this point, the entire population of the Earth was divided into small pools of genes. And what began to happen? Those recessive genes, those recessive characteristics began to come out in physical traits such as the dark skin of some ethnic groups and the eye folds of the Oriental, the blue eyes of the Aryans and so forth. That's how the races first formed. But here's one more point to consider. When these distinct groups begin again to intermarry, these recessive traits just as quickly are submerged again. Within just a very few generations, those distinctive features are homogenized. I mean, what happens when you take purebred dogs and interbreed them? Very quickly, you get mutts. You know, I remember when I first visited Haiti. It's been 20 years ago. And Mission for Haiti was not working in Jacmel at that point. They were working in a little town called Pignon. And the first day we were there, we toured the little town. And we saw some dogs. And they all looked exactly the same. Everywhere we went in town, the dogs looked exactly the same. There are no purebred dogs in Haiti. For all I know right now, there may not be any more dogs in Haiti. But when I was there about 20 years ago, the dogs on the island had all become homogenized back into basic dog. That's what happens when those breeders don't keep the purebred. breeding to itself. And the same thing will happen with humanity if free association is permitted. So what we call the races today are nothing but the evidence of the dispersion after the Tower of Babel thousands of years ago. I conclude this morning with this statement. While the Word of God explains the origin of the races, Jesus Christ wipes out all of the distinction between the races. In the words of the Apostle Paul, there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. Christ shed his blood for every human being. Paul teaches in Romans 5 that Jesus is the second Adam who died for every son and daughter of the first Adam, every human being. And those who trust Jesus Christ know reconciliation at every level, including race and gender and socioeconomic level and educational level. There is no difference in Jesus Christ. We have the solution to racism. It's Jesus Christ. Are you part of that solution today? I remember when I walked into that church in Haiti. I was supposed to preach to them. I couldn't understand their language. I had to preach through an interpreter. But it didn't make any difference. It didn't make any difference that I couldn't understand their language and they couldn't understand me. I knew just looking in their faces that we were brothers and sisters in Christ. You don't sense that as much here when we're all Americans as you do in that kind of a situation. I'll bet Adina and Stacy know what I'm talking about. You go on a missions trip and this is the kind of thing that happens and you say, wow, we are indeed all of God, all God's children, we are indeed one in Christ. When Christ is all in all, Race makes no difference. This is the solution. We have loud voices today proclaiming that there is no solution. That's essentially what critical race theory says. If you boil it down to one thing, it says you can't do anything about racism. I beg to differ. It's not what I can do, it's what Christ has already done. Are you part of the solution? Do you know Jesus Christ? Is He all in all to you? If not, you need to take that step. You need to trust Him. You need to follow Him. You need to let Him be all in all.