If
you are like me, the divide in this country between political ideologies has
reached a point where I can scarcely believe what I read in the news. The positions held by many in this country
are, at least in my opinion, not just radical but unbelievable. Yet as hard to
believe as things have become, God foreknew this would happen and told us how
He not only sees it, but describes it.
God tells us these days are a repeat of the days leading up to His
judgment upon the entire world by the flood of Noah. The following article is by Jack Kelley of “gracethrufaith.com”. As I thought about what we are seeing today I
could not help but be reminded of it, and thought I would share it with you
today.
Just As in the Days
of Noah
A Bible Study by Jack Kelley
As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be at the coming of the Son
of Man (Matt 24:37). The time leading up to the Great Flood was a lot
like our time today in that it was characterized by a deliberate and escalating
disregard for the ways of God. Finally “the Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on
earth had become and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was
only evil all the time” (Gen. 6:5).
What Day Is This?
If you plot the lifespans of the patriarchs in Genesis 5 ,
you’ll discover it was 1656 years from Adam’s creation to the Great Flood. During that time mankind had degenerated from
human beings created in the very image of God who walked and talked with Him to
a race whose thoughts and actions were totally depraved and bent only on evil
(Gen. 6:5). It’s been about 1977 years
since man was first given the choice to be re-created by events at the Cross (2
Cor 5:17) but most of today’s world has declined. As a result, a single look around us is all
that’s needed to see that from a spiritual and moral perspective life today is
becoming pretty much “as it was in the days of Noah.”
What Planet Are You From?
I’ve made mention in previous articles of the mysterious
people in Genesis 6:4 called the Nephillim.
They were the offspring of marriages between angelic beings and
earthlings. Would these beings with super natural strength (origin of the
titans or demi-gods in mythology) be called aliens today? In many documented
alien encounters there seems to be a great interest on their part in our
reproductive system. Are aliens using humans to breed a super race again? In
the King James rendering of Daniel 2:43 there’s a curious reference to someone
“mingling themselves with the seed of men” in the last days. Is the anti-Christ
part alien or in command of beings that are part alien and part human? As it
was in the days of Noah?
Out Of The Way
But in all my years of study comparing the days of Noah with
the end of the age one insight has recently made things much clearer to me. In
Genesis 6:3 God warned of the removal of His Spirit from Earth before the
coming judgment. Some see this passage as capping man’s life span at 120 years,
but that can’t be its purpose. In Psalm
90:10 we’re told that an average man’s life span is 70 years, and Isaiah 23:15
supports this conclusion. Average life
spans before the flood were much longer than 120 years, and after the flood
soon became much shorter. Looking at the
Genesis lifespans again shows that Shem, probably the last pre-flood man,
outlived 8 of the first 9 post flood generations of his descendants, including
Abraham.
The fact is that 120 years was the time God gave man to
prepare for the coming judgment. He said He was going to remove His Spirit from
the earth prior to that judgment. In 2
Thes 2:7 a similar warning is given concerning the end of the age (but without
a deadline), and there is confusion over its interpretation just as with Gen.
6:3. The only truly literal interpretation of this passage is that sometime
before the anti-Christ can be revealed in all his power beginning the Great
Tribulation, the restraining force of the Holy Spirit must be taken out of the
way (literally out of the midst, or from among).
Then as I was reading Genesis 6 again, the most remarkable
thing happened. In my Bible Genesis 6:3 is in the right hand column about 1
inch down the page. I’ve had it highlighted for years. In the left hand column directly across from
Genesis 6:3 is another verse I highlighted some time ago. It’s Genesis 5:24 and
reads; Enoch walked with God and then he was no more because God took him away.
Seeing those two highlighted verses side by side like that caused the sequence
of events to suddenly become so obvious to me, I don’t know why I hadn’t seen
it before. First Enoch was taken alive
from earth and the Holy Spirit was withdrawn. Then in Gen. 6:5 man’s behavior
is described as having become unbearably wicked and in Gen. 7 the judgment
came, in that order.
Enoch’s name means teaching and according to Jude 14-15 he
gave the first prophecy of the 2nd coming. Hebrew tradition holds that he was
born on the 6th day of Sivan on the Hebrew calendar and was taken by God on his
birthday. The 6th of Sivan is the day we know as Pentecost, the birthday of the
Church. For these reasons Enoch is often seen as a model or type of the church,
whose calling is also to teach the world the ways of the Lord and to talk about
His coming.
You Promised You Wouldn’t Do That
The Bible declares that the Holy Spirit is sealed within
believers as a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance (Ephes. 1:13-14). Paul
wrote that the Holy Spirit will be withdrawn from earth sometime before the
anti- Christ is allowed to trigger the judgment known as the Great Tribulation
(2 Thes. 2:7). Withdrawing the Holy
Spirit without removing the Church would break God’s promise to us since it
would require “unsealing” the Holy Spirit from within us. That’s something that
God can’t do. “What I have said, that will I bring about,” He declares. “What I have planned, that will I do.” (Isaiah 46:11)
If Enoch is indeed a model of the church and if the Lord’s
prophecy of Matt 24:37 is meant to describe the sequence of end times events,
as seems likely, then one day soon we will be taken alive (raptured) from earth
like Enoch was, and the Holy Spirit will be withdrawn. Man’s behavior will
quickly become unbearably wicked and the judgment will come, all in that
order. As it was in the days of Noah.
Selah 08-21-10.
As
I contemplated where we see this world going, and the desires of many in this
country for the type of changes they wish to see, it occurred to me that in
truth, they are soon going to get exactly what they want. Unfortunately for them, God has already
foreseen what this world will look like when that happens and has chosen to
describe it for them. He calls it the
Great Tribulation.
Keep
watching.
