The Flood and Noah

While I was thinking about the Flood, two other events came to mind which while different also had some interesting similarities.

The destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah. Except for one man, Lot, no one else was found worthy. In fact, in the end, not even his wife made the cut. It would appear that not only was the whole city Godless, but they were evil to the core. Unlike the flood, It would appear that God did not even attempt to warn them of the coming destruction. This said Lot lived amongst them, with the the scripture referring to him as righteous (2 Peter 2:7). This means that his life would have borne the testimony of God's calling (which they rejected).
Nineveh; here an entire city was evil and as such God was going to wipe them out but before doing so He sent Jonah (a stubbornly unwilling vessel) to warn them of their pending doom. Without much persuasion, they all actively repented and God does not destroy them at that time.

In the flood, the world is continually evil so God pronounces judgement on the world. Noah is however saved as he is seen as righteous by God (Ezekiel 14:14,20). What is more, it takes Noah a 120 years to build the ark meaning that the world had able time to repent but chose not to. Further 2 Peter 2:5 refers to Noah as a preacher of Righteousness.

Back to the Flood. Genesis 6:1-8 sets the scene. Things went wrong when man began to multiply (Genesis 6:1). While not stated in Scripture, it is possible to conclude that there could have been millions of people on the earth at this time. Growth and numbers come self-confidence and the sense of being self-made which appears to have lead to mankind walking away from their God. We then also see how desire (coming through vision) corrupted mankind even further (Genesis 6:2). We don't really get told much about these relationships in verse 2 but they are not written about positively and the implication is that they were not wholesome. There seems to have been an active out-working of a Godless desire without any restraint. The consequence of which is summed up succinctly in Romans 6:23 i.e. the wages of sin is death!

While a sad verse, verse 3 is also encouraging in that it implies that God was and can be willing to strive with, abide with, work with mankind but He will only be able to do so if we respond to Him.

Was the world then more evil than it is today? I would say, "Yes". In Noah's time there was only one person mentioned who found grace in the sight of God. While we may feel that there are not many true son's and daughters of God around today, there are definitely more than one or two; even if you were to work out a pro rata number to compare both populations. As an aside this does not mean that the world has to be as evil before the Lord's return. The reference to "as in the days of Noah" (Matthew 24:37) is a reference to same way as people went about their lives pre-flood without any thought of God or the future, people in todays world will be doing the same with no though of of God when He returns and ultimately judges the world.

So why did Noah find grace in the eyes of God? The closest we get to an answer is in Ezekiel 14:14,20). He was righteous. While Scripture does not give us any more details on Noah (other than he was not perfect; Genesis 9:20-23), scripture does teach us about righteousness and what it means to be righteous. We can therefore deduce what sort of person Noah was and how he lived. In short he put God first in his life.

The actual judgement of the earth is covered in Genesis 7:17-23 and referred to again in Isaiah 54:9. This shows us that God's judgement, once metered out, is final and complete. No one but Noah and his family survived; no one from the line of Cain. I believe that the Bible clearly shows (in both the previous references) that the entire wold was flooded. For one, if the flood was local then an ark would not bee needed, especially if Noah and the animals had 120 years to get away from it. Second, the water went 15 cubits above the highest mountain. And lastly if the flood was local then the promise that God would not destroy the world again with a flood would have made Him to be a liar as there have been many large scale, local floods since then.

1931 China Floods - 1 to 4 million people died with many communities destroyed.
1993 Great Midwest floods
2014 Southeast European Floods
1927 Great Mississippi Flood
1954 North Sea Flood
2011 Thailand Floods

While God's judgement is severe and final, he is not willing that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9). What is more, as with Noah and the Ark, He provides us with a way to come to come through His judgement i.e. oneness with His son, Christ (1 Corinthians 10:13) which is symbolised in Communion (1 Corinthians 10:16-17, 1 John 2:1-2). John however sums it nicely, we can only be sure that we know God if we keep His commandments (1 John 2:3) i.e. the fruit of our lives will declare if God sees us as righteous too.

God created a good and perfect world (Genesis 1). Eden was perfect but because of sin, God removed man from Eden and ultimately deconstructed His world. He however did not stop there. Still wanting to have relationship with us, God creates a new, post-flood world, giving mankind a chance for a fresh start. So how does this tie into our lives.

Therefore, if anyone [is] in Christ, [he is] a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. [2Co 5:17 NKJV]

If we bow our knee to Christ and serve Him as He directs then even though we are part of a fallen world (that since the Flood has continued to fall further and further into sin) he rebirths us into new creatures who now have an eternal hope, being carried through God's judgement by the sacrifice of His son Jesus.

What a wonderful hope and assurance we have as we abide in Him, our eternal Ark.