Comfort in Family (Genesis 5)

 Comfort in Family

Adam and Eve lived in a perfect world. But when they had sinned the land was cursed for their own sake. To be able to live Adam would now have to toil with much sweat and frustration.

This curse is something we are quite used to nowadays, but in the days of Noah this curse was still very fresh in mind and may have played a bigger role in their thought process.

Lamech, from the line of Seth, son of Adam, experienced this curse too. He felt the hardship of  the curse and for him this was not a minor thing.

He had lived 182 years on this cursed earth when Noah was born to him. He knew of the hardships and toil of this life much more than we will ever do. We don’t live that long, but he had to go through it for 182 years and his actual age would be 777 years.

The name ‘Noah’ means rest, the opposite of that toil in Genesis 3.

Genesis 5 tells us:


[Gen 5:28-31 NKJV] 28 Lamech lived one hundred and eighty-two years, and had a son. 29 And he called his name Noah, saying, "This [one] will comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our hands, because of the ground which the LORD has cursed." 30 After he begot Noah, Lamech lived five hundred and ninety-five years, and had sons and daughters. 31 So all the days of Lamech were seven hundred and seventy-seven years; and he died.


He said Noah would be a comfort for him in all these hardships. And these words portray a principle that I believe can be generalized. 

If the family is healthy and the relationship between the parent and child is happy, having children can be a big comfort in the hardships of life.

Children were seen as a gift from God in the past and we have unfortunately lost this mentality all too often.

How blessed it is to have the innocence and simplicity of the youth around us, especially if they are our own children?

God can use family as a comfort for the curses that may be there for our own sake.

This world is not left completely without comfort. And God does not only use things like faith for comfort.

Sometimes it can be through something like a son. 

This principle as lived by Lamech can thus be applied.


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