"Business
As Usual"
(The Days of
Noah)
"As it was in the Days of
Noah, so shall it also be in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they
drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah
entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all."(Luke
17:26)
“And God saw that the wickedness
of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of thoughts of his
heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that He has made man
on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart. And the Lord said, I will
destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth…But, Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord.” (Genesis 6:-5-8)
It was 'Business as Usual'.
Everything went on normally, as though nothing unusual was about to
happen, even though Noah, a 'preacher of
righteousness' (II Peter3:5), 'a just
man and perfect in his generations...[who] walked with God' (Genesis 6:9),
warned the ungodly generation of that day.
The hearts of men revealing their 'Business as Usual' attitude described
by the Lord Jesus, is what it will be like 'in the days of the Son of man',
those days before the Lord comes to rapture His church! The wicked of that day
will scoff and say:
'Where
is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things
continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they
willingly are ignorant of, that by the Word of God the heavens were of old, and
the earth standing out of the water and in the water: whereby the world that
then was, being overflowed with water, perished: But the heavens and the earth,
which are now, by the same Word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against
the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.' (II Peter 3:4-7)
These ungodly scoffers displaying their 'Business as Usual' attitude are
already questioning whether the Lord really is going to return by pointing out
that there are no changes since the beginning of time displaying their
arrogant, dark-minded denial of God's
Word and working in the past.
Peter's response uncovers their ignorance and outlines the supernatural
judgment of God in the past through the universal flood, and His plan for the
future Day of the Lord judgment of the world. Yes, God's response to the
ungodly scoffers and the wickedness of man will be the same as it was in the
days of Noah, because He will judge the world for it's wickedness through His
fiery, devastating and destructive Day of the Lord judgments the same day He
rescues His church by rapture! The only difference is He used the flood in
Noah's day, and He will use fire during the Day of the Lord!
Genesis 4-6 provide us with a clear picture of what the world was like
in Noah's day detailing various prevailing conditions of that time: The first
and one of the most crucial conditions was Religious Apostasy. In (4:3) Cain
becomes what many preachers call the first modernist.
His obvious departure from offering what was required by God could also
be described as the actions of one who subscribes to neo-orthodoxy. Whatever we
call it, it is clear God did not accept Cain's new idea of offering 'the fruit of the ground'. We must assume that Cain knew what was acceptable in the eyes of God and
instead of bringing the acceptable blood sacrifice as his brother Abel did, he
decided to offer the result of his own works described as the 'way of Cain' (Jude 11).
Every other 'religion' tries to make its mistaken approach to God
through works. But, there is one, and only one, 'true religion', and that is
the one of faith in the shed Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ on the Cross of
Calvary! Religious Apostasy was openly
evident in the 'days of Noah' and it is openly evident in our own day, which
could well be described as the 'days of the Son of man'.
The second condition prevalent in Noah's day was gathering together of
the population through City
Building. (4:17)
Population centers in our day are multiplying and growing at a phenomenal pace
and for the most part are the sin/crime capitals of our time. In the USA 85% of the population lived on
farms during the year 1850.
This number has drastically been reduced as cities, crime and corruption
have skyrocketed. One man rightly said 'God made the country, and man made the
city' referring to the man created corruption and ungodliness that gathers in the city.
Although city building in itself is not ungodly, it certainly was a common
occurrence in both the days of Noah and in the present day.
Polygamy was practiced in the days of Noah as illustrated in
(4:19). Although God allowed this to go
on it was not His will as He created only one Eve for Adam with no apparent
spare(s) in sight! The words of the Lord
Jesus Christ are clear:
'For
this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife;
and they twain (duo) shall be one flesh. Wherefore they are no more twain (duo)
but one flesh.' (Matthew 19:5, 6)
He certainly did not intend for us to have more that one wife. Although
our age is not plagued with the sin of polygamy, the multiple wives/husbands
taken by many people thru divorce is certainly very similar to and as damaging
to our social structure as polygamy was in Noah's day.
Genesis 4:21 records the first mention of musical instruments which
occurred seven generations from Adam. While the type of music is not known, the
descendants of Cain, responsible for creating these instruments, are considered
to be the ungodly line and therefore the music composed by these people could
well have been ungodly in its effect similar to the scourge we are witnessing
in our present day from rock and roll and it's multiple offshoots. What we do
know is that this generation in Noah's day did not 'call upon the name of the Lord' (Genesis 4:26) as did the line of
Seth, Adam and Eve's third son.
Metalworking and the science of metallurgy was also practiced in these
early stages of the history of man, when 'Tubal-cain, an instructor of every
artificer (forger of cutting instruments) in brass and iron' (4:22) practiced
his profession. A 'mere' 7,000 years have passed and man is continuing to mine the
earth, working metals to serve his purposes of advancing civilization. The
civilization of Noah's day was much further advanced than usually thought,
proving that the industrial characteristics of then and now were similar.
Although metalworking in itself is not considered a negative, the point being
demonstrated is the similarity of Noah's day and our present day.
The final and maybe the most obvious of all conditions in Noah's day was
the great wickedness of man:
"God
saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every
imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it
repented the Lord that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His
heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face
of the earth"(Genesis 6:5-8).
This statement by the Lord reveals His heart, His intention and also His
purpose for the judgment He brought upon the world through the universal flood!
This great wickedness of man is extremely prevalent in our day and when it
reaches God's limit it will bring His final judgment which will completely purge
the heavens and earth from the effects of sin by fire! (II Peter 3:7)
The slaughter of the unborn, the acceptance of homosexuality as an
alternate lifestyle and the resulting epidemic of AIDS, the degrees of open
nakedness/nudity practiced by the multitudes, and the widespread acceptance of
the sexual sins of those in high places of authority, demonstrates the
present-day wickedness of man and the nearness of God's impending Day of the
Lord judgment!
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