Your Last Days Assignment! How the Flood is Relevant to the End of the Age

In the Genesis 6, we see that when humanity had erred far from God’s plan, He gave them the space of 120 years to repent.

He declared:

…My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years (Genesis 6:3).

Just as God gave space to repent to Jezebel, Eli’s sons, and everyone else in creation, He gave the people of the pre-Flood world space to repent as well. Again, it was as if God had said, “I’m setting a timer for 120 years, and when the clock stops ticking, if the people have not repented and returned to Me, I’ll have to deal with this messy situation in a different way.”

Meanwhile, as God gave humanity 120 years of “space” to repent, Noah pleaded and preached to anyone who had ears to hear in that dark generation (see 2 Peter 2:5). Again and again, he urged people to repent and to return to God and, thus, avoid divine judgment.

Today, preachers carry out the task of preaching from a pulpit, but for Noah, his pulpit was the Ark itself. The sounds of its construction reverberating in the ears of sinners among the pre-Flood population was a constant reminder that God’s Spirit would not always strive with the violence and corruption in the world.

In Matthew 24:38 and 39, Jesus said:

For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe [Noah] entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

For 100 years, Noah preached and warned that judgment was coming. The building of the Ark was a visible reminder to the watching world that God’s clock of patience would soon run out of time, and the Flood would come. Sadly, people shrugged it off and went about their daily routines nonchalantly, as if nothing was going to happen. It is likely they regarded Noah as someone who was mentally ill. Or maybe they had heard so much about a “so-called” coming Flood, but never saw any evidence of it, that they became numb to Noah’s preaching.

Think of all the lost people today who have heard the message that Jesus is coming and the end of the age is here. They have heard this kind of warning from friends, churches, and media, and yet they shrug it off, going about their lives nonchalantly, as if they have heard no such warnings. Jesus said the people in Noah’s day ignored the warnings, going about “eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage” (Matthew 24:38). He then prophesied, “That’s the same exact way it’s going to be before the coming of the Son of man.”

Do you know people who have been forewarned that Christ is coming and time is running out — yet they continue to live their lives as if they’ve heard nothing? Everything is “business as usual” — eating and drinking, marrying, and being given in marriage — while friends, pastors, and preachers plead with them to take their warnings seriously. We are indeed witnessing a duplicate moment in time of what occurred in the days of Noah.

Because the people spurned God’s warnings and His patience, the clock eventually stopped ticking, and the Flood came just as they had been warned. Everyone was lost except Noah’s family of eight who had hearkened to the voice of the Lord. Regardless of the people’s failure to heed the warnings, Noah believed God and faithfully carried out His divine mission.

Do you see the parallel of Noah’s day with today — a time when those who preach Christ

and His coming are deemed as fanatical, overreactive, and even mentally ill? Regardless of how the world perceives the believer in Christ, we must faithfully carry out our own assignment “...warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus (Colossians 1:28).

Like Noah, We are Called to Warn Others of the Coming Judgment

Peter tells us something very important that connects the Flood to the end of times. In Second Peter 3:6 and 7 (NLT), he says, “…[God] used the water to destroy the ancient world with a mighty flood. And by the same word, the present heavens and earth have been stored up for fire. They are being kept for the day of judgment, when ungodly people will be destroyed.”

Like Noah, our job is to warn others of this coming judgment. We do it with the words of our mouth and the way we live our life. Ezekiel 3:18 and 19 alerts us of our responsibility to warn people of God’s coming judgment. Here, God says:

When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand. Yet if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul.

There is a day of judgment coming — a moment in time when every person who has ever lived will stand before God and give an account for his life (see Romans 14:12; Revelation 20:11-15). Since we have the knowledge that the wicked are going to perish without Christ, God requires us to warn them of what is coming — just as Noah warned the people of his day. If we do not love them enough to tell them of the coming judgment, God will hold us accountable, and their life’s blood will be on our hands.

On the other hand, if we do our best to warn people of what is coming, as Noah did in his generation, and they do not heed our warnings, our pleading with them frees us from being accountable for their eternal destiny. In that case, the consequences of their choice to ignore God’s warnings and reject His merciful gift of salvation will be on them, not us.

Be Ready to Give an Answer for the Hope That’s in You

Without question, we are living in the last of the last days. The infrastructure of the coming Antichrist kingdom seems to be falling into place rapidly before our eyes, and it is as if the Holy Spirit is telling God’s people, “Places! Places, everyone! Sound the alarm that Jesus is coming, and share the Good News of salvation that comes only through Christ.”

Just as He called Noah, God has called you and me to be “preachers of righteousness” in this hour. Through the apostle Peter, He instructs us:

…Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear (1 Peter 3:15).

The words “be ready always” are translated from Greek words that mean to be ready or to be prepared. It pictures an attitude of one who is set to go, eager, prompt, and raring to get started. It describes the perpetual mindset of being ready — and having such a readiness also implies preparation. Inherent in this command to be ready is that one must do everything in his ability to be equipped for the moment when he is called to action. This means to the best of our ability, we must:

• Know what we believe.

• Know why we believe it.

• Know what the Bible teaches when we try to reach people with the Gospel.

Furthermore, First Peter 3:15 states we must be ready “to give an answer” to those who inquire more deeply about the message of hope we share with them. The word “answer” here is translated from the Greek word that means to answer back, to reply, to respond, to explain, or to defend. It is the same word the apostle Paul used in Philippians 1:16 and 17 when he wrote that he had been “...set for the defense of the gospel.” By using this word, Paul acknowledged that part of his God-given responsibility was to answer questions put to him about the Gospel. Peter used this same word to unmistakably let us know that we must be ready to give an answer, explanation, or even a defense about what we believe to every person who asks about the hope we are sharing.

Peter went on to say that those we are trying to reach may “ask” for clarification about the message. The word “ask” here is translated from a word that pictures a demand for an answer to satisfy an insatiable longing to know something. Peter thus alerted us that when non-Christians finally work up the nerve to inquire more deeply about the message we’re sharing, we must be ready to give them faith-filled, intelligent answers.

Even if they do not take the message seriously or they shrug it off as though nothing has been said, God nevertheless expects us to warn others of the truth. By doing so, we will have fulfilled our God-given responsibility.

The need for repentance — a 180-degree turning to Christ and a change in one’s previous manner of life or behavior — is as critical today as it was in the days of Noah. God asks for this turning to Christ from a wicked generation in order to save them from eternal damnation in hell. Contrary to the thinking of many today, repentance is a gift that brings rewards in this life and in the life to come. God patiently waits for the unsaved, as well as the erring believers, to turn to Him because He loves mankind and because His love is longsuffering, patient, and kind (see 1 Corinthians 13:4; James 5:7).