And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters.
The waters prevailed and were greatly increased until they covered the whole earth, rose above the highest land, and made the world a world of water. They came from torrents of rain out of heaven uniting with waters bursting from the broken crust and fountains of the great deep, after forty days and forty nights of rain that began gently and grew into violent storm. Upon the face of those waters the ark went floating and riding safely, though built as an immense boat on dry land, beaten by merciless winds and flung from billow to billow amid warring elements. Only eight souls who believed were shut in by God and preserved, while all left outside were swept away after a one-hundred-and-twenty-year probation of warning had been mocked and rejected and the door of mercy shut. As those waters cleansed a morally polluted world, so fire from heaven united with fire stored in the earth will purify it in the final judgment that will suddenly overtake the pleasure-loving and unready as the flood did.
Waters Prevailing and Ark
The waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth until they covered the earth and rose to the highest land, making the earth a world of water. They rose until even the highest land was submerged and rose to a great and known height that bore up the ark while the inhabitants perished. The prevailing waters came from torrents of rain descending from heaven uniting with waters bursting from the broken crust and the fountains of the great deep broken up. The rain fell for forty days and forty nights, beginning gently and slowly at first and then pouring down in torrents and growing into a violent storm as the deep broke open and water surged from the earth with tremendous force. The breaking up of the fountains of the great deep and the opening of the windows of heaven sent waters from beneath and above that united and formed a great sea.
The ark went upon the face of the waters, floating and riding safely on their surface as it was carried over the earth and borne upon them. It had been built as an immense boat on dry land, looking as strange there as a ship set on land for repairs, needing no iron standards to hold it up and no track to carry it to the water, until the waters lifted and carried it. Amid warring elements and surging floodwaters the massive, firmly built structure was beaten by merciless winds, trembled in every fiber, and was flung from billow to billow. While it rode, the beasts within cried out in fear and pain, trees were uprooted and thrown into the boiling seething waters, wrecks of palaces and temples were tossed about upon the waters, and earth and rocks thrown up from beneath left a broken, uneven surface. Idolized trees were uprooted, inhabitants with groves, palaces and costly works for pleasure were swept away, places of idol worship were buried under masses of rubbish and earth and rocks, and fruitful trees, forests and gardens were destroyed until the lovely home became a frightful solitude of deep gorges and seamed cleft rocks.
Everyone left outside was swept away into the boiling deep while the ark floated safely upon the troubled waters. People fleeing for refuge cried for safety and pleaded unheard in the tempest, and those who clung to the ark were washed away by dashing waves and surging waters or had their hold broken by collision with rocks and trees. With terrified animals they climbed houses, trees and mountains to the tops of the mountains and the tops of the highest trees before the water reached there and flung them together into the foaming flood. Desperate people tried to break into the ark but its firm construction withstood them, and they would have given anything then for a place within it. God destroyed the people with the waters, sweeping them into the boiling deep after the last refuge was reached.
Causes of the Judgment
God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually, and that the earth was corrupt before God and filled with violence and crime. The knowledge of God had been kept continually before that long-lived race by righteous men including Seth, Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others, but the people despised the truth that had been presented to them. They lived in His house and were provided food and clothing from His liberal treasury, yet never thanked Him and were unmindful of His goodness, while the Lord whose name is Jealous is jealous for His honor against such treatment. Secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, and after centuries of patience and forbearance toward their awful presumption God came forth out of His hiding place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity by sweeping them away with a flood whose waters prevailed greatly upon the earth.
The flood came because after Adam's transgression brought sin into the world men and women grew more bold in disobeying His law, transgressed God's holy law, rebelled against it under Satan's principles, and trampled His broken law under foot. Noah was made to know God's purpose and as a preacher of righteousness warned the antediluvian world for one hundred and twenty years while building the immense ark on dry land amid mockery as probation shortened every day, that ark being shelter where the obedient could be kept until God's indignation was overpast. Only a few repented, and only eight souls out of that vast population, Noah and his family, lived to enter the ark, while death was the portion of the rebellious race swept away by the flood waters that lifted the ark, fulfilling the prophetic warning that all who would not keep the commandments of heaven should drink the waters of the flood. The rocks raised from the deep by the breaking forth of the waters remain as witnesses of that deluge and its terror and fearful outpouring, and Noah carried the law forward by teaching it to his descendants. The same cause that destroyed the antediluvian world which would not heed the admonitions given them also destroyed the inhabitants of Sodom for disobeying the laws of God's kingdom and destroyed Jerusalem because the Israelites would not heed the messages the Lord gave them, and likewise the whole world will finally be destroyed in the closing period of its history because of the transgression and impenitence of its inhabitants.
Indulgence of appetite, described as eating and drinking, with gluttony and drunkenness inflamed people's passions and led to other crimes, widespread corruption, violence and debased passions. That unbounded indulgence made them corrupt and made the wickedness of the people beyond all remedy, polluting the world morally so that God poured a flood of waters upon the earth to wash the world from its moral pollution. Since the fall God tests people just where He tested man before the fall, on appetite, and the prevailing waters bearing the ark were His judgment on that sin. The same indulgence of appetite and intemperance is now making the present world like the world in Noah's time.
God loved the people before the Flood and surrounded them with the precious things of earth in a world far more beautiful in grandeur and loveliness than present beautiful mountains, towering rocks and scenery, but they turned those blessings into a curse by using them for selfish ends to gratify pride and glorify themselves. They rejected God and His law, used their gifts for selfish ends, corrupted one another, and filled the earth with eating, drinking, marrying, fraud, murder and every crime until Noah entered the ark and the flood took all away. The Lord destroyed them and the earth because of man's sinfulness and because the earth was defiled by their violence and corrupting works, and without the curse of sin corrupting the earth it would still be a happy place, but every place inhabited by human beings is debased with sin.
Warning Given and Rejected
For one hundred and twenty years Noah as preacher of righteousness warned of coming judgment while building the immense ark on dry land, with Methuselah and his family and others receiving his instruction and helping in the work, amid mockery and derision as a visionary, fanatic and alarmist while probation shortened every day. Many believing ones kept the faith during that probation and died triumphant, while many who helped build did not believe, and Noah with his helpers worked constantly preparing an immense boat on dry land under universal scorn thrown upon God's law and upon himself, yet he did not lose reverence and love for the law but preached all the more earnestly in proportion to the ridicule. The world could not endure his message and said it could not be, laughing and mocking and scoffing because there had been no rain and rain seemed impossible and fanatical.
Dumb animals quietly entered two and two under God's invisible leadership without a visible leader as a final sign, Noah and his family entered, God's hand shut them in and shut the ungodly out, and the word was given to close the ark. Then one week, seven days, passed without rain as a trial of faith, with only a mist as before to water the earth, while the shut-in believers were mocked and derided, the people made light of them, continued their careless pleasure-loving lives, did not humble themselves, and were unaware their doom was fixed. This warns that the last call of mercy will close unheard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under God's mighty hand and get ready before everlastingly too late.
Nearly all the inhabitants thought they were right and Noah was wrong, claimed to know more than God's faithful servant, closed their ears to words of truth until darkness came upon them, and laughed and mocked God's message through him as parables with the taunt, Does he not speak in parables. By false science they explained away his statement that rain would come when no sign of it had ever existed, arguing rain could never come. Walking contrary to God's Word stirs rebellion and brings God's displeasure, and the lesson is not to be like them but to walk free from condemnation and be found loyal and true when Christ comes.
Their unbelief and scoffing did not make the message of none effect, did not hinder the predicted event, and did not prevent the message from coming true. When rain came, beginning gently then increasing in power to torrents, the waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth until they covered the earth, and the very people who had refused warning drank the waters that covered the earth and perished in them, with only Noah and his family saved in the ark. Those who rejected God's warning perished in the flood, and the Lord caused the inhabitants to drink the waters of the flood in judgment because iniquity abounded. Noah remained faithful in warning them, a lesson for those entrusted with warning the world and calling people to obey God's law.
The flood closed a one-hundred-and-twenty-year probation given in mercy with opportunity to repent of sins, overcome bad habits, form righteous characters, and find refuge in the ark, urged upon them to enter and be saved. After the final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut into the ark and mocked while no rain fell, the door of mercy was shut, the bounds of long-suffering and grace were exceeded by presuming upon mercy, despising warnings, refusing to obey, and continuing in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness, and the steady rain came. Then the prevailing waters swept the evildoers and unrepentant sinners from the face of the earth, the waters covered the surface and rose higher until the earth became a world of water and the last refuge was reached, forcing the wicked to flee from place to place seeking higher foothold, filled with remorse but not repentance, while the ark went safe upon the waters under protecting care guided by a divine hand amid tempest, thunder, lightning, uprooted trees and wrecks of palaces and temples tossed about. By the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient, God interfered to vindicate the honor of His law, repress unrighteousness, limit life, and blot out those indifferent to the law made known, revealing it is possible to go so far in sin that wrath must interpose, a warning repeated for the days of the Son of man.
Preservation of the Obedient
Only those shut in by God for believing His word were preserved when the ark rode safely on the floodwaters by divine power while every other refuge was destroyed in judgment. The forty days and forty nights of rain joined waters bursting from inside the broken crust and the foundations of the great deep, so that waters from beneath united with waters from heaven and prevailed until houses were entered and idol temples were swept away. Noah and his family were safe inside the immense boat built on dry land amid mockery during one hundred and twenty years of probation in which Noah warned of coming judgment as a preacher of righteousness, while those who had jeered and mocked were left outside and no others could enter. People fleeing for refuge cried for safety and pleaded unheard in the tempest, clung to the ark until washed away by dashing waves, climbed trees and mountains with terrified animals, and were flung into the foaming flood together, and the waters swept all the rest of the vast, impenitent, pleasure-loving, corrupt world out of existence while only eight souls, Noah and his family, were saved in the ark upon the waters. Their response to the warning determined whether they were saved, for the eight accepted the message from God and fled for refuge into the ark when the Flood lifted it, while the same message condemned the rest who rejected it and they perished in the waters. God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, which does not contradict His good and merciful character, and the same judgment warns that wrath will soon fall on all the sinful and disobedient in a general conflagration by fire when only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved.
The ark provided shelter for the few obedient who entered it, where they could be kept until the indignation of God was overpast, fulfilling the warning that those who disobeyed His commandments would perish. Only a few repented and only eight lived to enter, and the flood waters that lifted the ark swept away the rebellious race whose portion was death, fulfilling the prophetic warning that all who would not keep the commandments of heaven should drink the waters of the flood. Amid warring elements the massive, firmly built structure rode safely upon the surging waters though trembling in every fiber as it was beaten by merciless winds and flung from billow to billow while the beasts within cried out in fear and pain. Desperate people tried to break in but its firm construction withstood them, and those who clung to the outside were borne away by the surging waters or had their hold broken by collision with rocks and trees. After the door of mercy was shut and probation ended the waters covered the surface of the earth and rose higher and higher until the earth became a world of water and the last refuge was reached, yet the ark went upon the face of the waters safe under the protecting care of the God of storm and tempest, guided by a divine hand amid roar and thunder and sharp lightning while trees were uprooted into boiling seething waters and wrecks of palaces and temples were tossed about. It continued to ride safely because angels that excel in strength were commissioned to preserve it, and it provided refuge as destruction covered the world.
By the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient after the antediluvian race with a plain word from the Lord to guide them presumed upon mercy, went decidedly counter to His will, despised warnings, refused to obey, and continued in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness until they exceeded the bounds of long-suffering and the limits of grace. After a probation of one hundred and twenty years and a final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut in and mocked while no rain fell, the steady rain came and the prevailing waters swept the evildoers from the face of the earth. God thus interposed to vindicate the honor of His law, repress the increase of unrighteousness, limit human life, and prevent men spoiling one another in continual disobedience and defiance, blotting out those indifferent to the law made known while the ark went safe upon the waters. Their obedience to God's word would have spared the disobedient from perishing in the waters, for God would have saved every obedient soul though they refused His offers of mercy. Perishing in the Flood proves that whatever a person sows must also be reaped without failure, for God understands every action of life and the reaping time will come, a warning repeated for the days of the Son of man when surrounding influences take attention from God and heavenly things.
The ark's safety amid the waters shows that God will also deliver His faithful people from coming wrath, and they had warned the world but the wicked will not be allowed to destroy those waiting for translation and refusing the beast's decree and mark. Noah preserved in the ark that God had prepared proves that in coming days of destruction and calamity God will be the refuge of His believing ones amid convulsed nature, burning mountains, boiling waters, mighty earthquakes and great loss of human life. The flood proves God is mindful of what passes upon the earth, and when a crisis has come He reveals Himself and interposes to hinder opposing plans and to sustain and vindicate His people. Mercy was mingled with judgment, for Noah and his family were saved while the wicked inhabitants who disregarded the law until almost all remembrance of God had passed and wickedness, violence, crime and every kind of sin had become intensely active were swept away. This same manner of working will be repeated when defiance of the law is almost universal and His people are pressed in affliction by their fellow men, for then God will arise as protector and avenger and answer the fervent prayers of those who seek Him with all their hearts and depend upon Him as Deliverer, at a time when the whole world is fast becoming as in the days of Noah when eating, drinking, marrying, fraud, murder and every crime filled the earth until Noah entered the ark and the flood took all away.
Real History and Evidence
The account is inspired Scripture and true history, with Noah as a real man and the flood as an event that actually took place. The generation of Noah also foreshadows the present age before Christ appears in the clouds.
The rising waters that covered the earth and carried the ark buried and preserved people, animals, and trees far larger than any now living, and those remains testify that the antediluvians perished in the flood. The time when those conditions existed is known from the biblical record rather than from geology alone, for the inspired history explains the changed condition of the earth and the relics found in it. That evidence is misused when it is explained in ways that contradict the record.
The flood broke up the surface of the earth, brought great changes, and its re-formed crust preserved evidence of the abundant plant and animal life that existed before it. The prevailing waters came from torrents of rain descending from heaven uniting with the fountains of the great deep broken up, lifting the ark while sweeping away inhabitants with groves, palaces, and costly works of pleasure. They uprooted idolized trees, destroyed fruitful trees, forests, shady avenues and gardens, buried places of idol worship and works of men's hands under masses of rubbish with earth and rocks thrown up from beneath, and turned the lovely home given to man into a broken, uneven, frightful solitude. Its evidences remain in rocks raised from the deep, seamed and cleft rocks, deep gorges, caverns, channels worn by cataracts, and time-worn rocky walls, which stand as witnesses of the deluge and its terror. This destruction came after a one-hundred-and-twenty-year message through Noah that the impenitent would be destroyed, which would not have come if they had repented, but they rejected it in ingratitude and disobedience to God's law.
The flood greatly increased the curse upon the earth, which had begun at Adam's fall and grown after Cain killed Abel, and which continued to grow afterward as men disobeyed God. It defiled and broke an earth once lovely and far more beautiful in grandeur and loveliness than present mountains, towering rocks, and scenery. God loved the people before the flood and surrounded them with earth's precious things, but they turned those blessings into a curse by using them to gratify pride and glorify themselves, and the Lord destroyed them and the earth because of sinfulness, violence, and corrupting works. Without the curse of sin the earth would still be happy, but every place inhabited by human beings is debased with sin.
Measured against the great and known height reached by the waters that bore up the ark in God's destruction of the antediluvian world, the dwellers on the plain of Shinar disbelieved God's covenant never again to bring such a flood upon the earth. Many denied God and attributed the flood to natural causes, while others admitted a supreme being had destroyed the former world yet rose in rebellion against Him with hearts like Cain's. By that measure they erected the tower to go much higher so as to be beyond danger from another deluge, to ascend to the region of the clouds to ascertain the cause of the flood, and to exalt their own pride and turn future generations away from God into idolatry.
Foreshadowing Final Judgment
As in the days of Noah so it is today and so shall it be in the days of the Son of man, for wickedness kept increasing then and keeps increasing now. The dumb animals quietly entered the ark two and two under invisible divine leadership, Noah and his family entered, the hand of God shut them in, and a week passed without rain in which the shut-in believers were mocked and derided while the people would not humble themselves. The one hundred and twenty years given to repent of sins, overcome bad habits, form righteous characters and find refuge did not hinder the predicted event when refused, though Noah was denounced as visionary, fanatic and alarmist. Then rain began gently and grew in power until the waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth and swept away and destroyed every living thing that had refused to enter, while the ark went upon the face of the waters. That likeness proves the end of all things is at hand and the time left to prepare very short, with minds now diverted from eternal realities by eating, drinking, marrying, revelling, drunkenness, violence, fraud, murder and every crime, and with another general destruction of the wicked to come. The preservation of Noah in the ark God had prepared proves God will be the refuge of His believing ones amid convulsed nature, burning mountains, boiling waters, mighty earthquakes and great loss of life in the coming days of destruction and calamity.
The flood waters foreshadow the fires of the final judgment, declaring that those who persist in revolt against God are incurable. As water from heaven united with water in the bowels of the earth to cleanse the earth and sweep it of moral corruption, so fire from heaven will unite with fire stored up in the earth to purify the earth. That coming ruin will be general, a general conflagration by fire in which all the sinful and disobedient perish, and no human devising can quench the sea of fire with which God will soon sweep the earth again. The flood is therefore a warning of that great destruction by fire, before which men are again granted a period of test and trial to show whether they will be loyal to God and obey His law, after one hundred and twenty years were once granted to choose between evil and good and were deliberately refused. Only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will then be saved, as only Noah and his family, eight souls, were saved in the ark while great men, philosophers, scientific and learned men perished for unbelief.
As Noah's contemporaries did not recognize danger until the waters came and swept them away, so the same suddenness and unbelief will mark Christ's second coming. They were asleep in carnal security, absorbed in worldly pleasure and expectation of lasting prosperity, full of rioting and godless pleasure, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, putting afar off the coming judgment. They laughed at warnings, called those who would arouse them fanatics, enthusiasts and not levelheaded, boasted that all things remain as from the beginning and tomorrow shall be as this day only much more abundant, and said rain was impossible and fanatical because there had been no sign of it. Then they were taken unawares by sudden destruction with all their plans and inventions of iniquity, and thus shall it be when the Son of man is revealed and Christ comes as a thief upon presumptuous scorners and rejecters of truth, upon routine money-making without regard to principle, and upon students eager for every knowledge but the Bible. As it was then so it will be prior to Christ's second coming, when a pleasure-loving, money-making, dishonest world and a worldly, sleeping church cry peace and safety and call warning impossible, and sudden destruction overtakes the unready.
The wickedness of the world before the flood is repeated in this age, and therefore calamities, earthquakes, floods and disasters by land and by sea will increase. God looks upon the world today in judgment for its wickedness just as He looked upon it in Noah's time, and sends His messages today just as He sent them then. The last call of mercy will close and will not be heard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under the mighty hand of God and get ready before it is everlastingly too late. Many who helped build the ark did not believe the startling message, did not cleanse themselves from wrong principles, and did not overcome temptation to do and say things contrary to the mind and will of God.
Law, Mercy, and Endurance
The prevailing waters that bore up the ark vindicated God's authority and the honor of His law after long forbearance. When human wickedness, violence, crime and rebellion had become intensely active and almost all remembrance of God had passed from the earth, a crisis came and God declared the limits of His forbearance. After a probation of one hundred and twenty years with Noah's warning to turn from sin, and a final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut into the ark and mocked while no rain fell, the steady rain came when the measure of iniquity was full and the boundaries of divine mercy were passed. God then interposed in His own time to cut short the working of iniquity, repress the increase of unrighteousness, limit human life, prevent men spoiling one another in continual disobedience and defiance, cleanse the earth from moral pollution, and answer by terrible things in righteousness the prayers of the righteous for wickedness to end. Though the wicked say their way is hidden from the Lord, He beholds all the works of men and is mindful of what is passing upon the earth, hindering Satan's plans and sustaining and vindicating His people with mercy mingled with judgment.
It is possible to go so far in sin that wrath must interpose, for men exceeded the bounds of long-suffering and the limits of grace by presuming upon mercy, going decidedly counter to His will with a thus saith the Lord to guide them, despising warnings, refusing to obey, and continuing in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness until by the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient. God's patience does not make punishment uncertain, as the Flood with the destruction of Sodom warns, and as the end approaches people are called to turn from iniquity. The greatly increased waters brought punishment and death for disobedience of God's requirements, and they did not wash the drowned straight into glory. God's mercy does not keep Him from executing the final penalty for transgressing His law.
No one can get to heaven just as well by transgressing as by obeying, for obedience to all of God's law is absolutely essential to eternal life. No soul can afford to lose eternal life by transgressing even one of God's laws or showing disrespect to it, and no one should presume upon God's mercy to keep sinning and still expect to be pardoned and saved. The destruction came upon a world made like Sodom and as it was before the Flood by men transgressing God's commandments all over the world, the same transgression Adam committed. The whole world perished and the waters swept all the rest of the vast world out of existence while only Noah and his family, eight persons, were saved, so the majority are lost and only a few are saved. God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe the warning, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, which does not contradict God's good and merciful character. Believers must not be discouraged when only a few believe present truth and must not follow the majority, for following the majority keeps them out of heaven, while only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved from coming fire as Noah's family was saved, though great and wise men now also reject the Sabbath and the shortness of time as proof it cannot be true.
The Flood shows that the regular course of nature is not above God's power, for the waters rose beyond their former bounds and the boundaries that had held back the waters could be changed by the God who rules them. Like the ark riding safely on the surface of the deep amid the rising waters, God's Word outlasts the storms that threaten to destroy it and remains uncorrupted through the ages. The destruction of the world by the Flood as an act of God's severity should be gratefully remembered together with His mercy to Adam and His gracious covenant with Noah, rather than murmured against as arbitrary and severe. It sets forth the need for victory through Christ who gave His life to win the world back to favor with God and to loyalty and commandment-keeping.
Warning Work for Today
Noah fulfilled God's will in bearing the warning, and that work stands as the pattern for the last message of mercy now to be carried to regions beyond in close connection with God with power to reach hearts and minds. Only eight persons of the vast, impenitent, pleasure-loving, corrupt world were saved because they accepted Noah's warning message from God and fled for refuge into the ark when the flood lifted it upon the face of the waters, while the same message condemned the rest who rejected it. That truth requires self-denial and the lifting of the cross, and it will be a savor of life unto life to those who heed it by obeying all God's commandments and a savor of death unto death to those who refuse it. The same unbelief that prevailed before the flood will exist prior to the coming of Christ when moral darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people, yet that darkness does not change the duty to lift up the voice in warning, showing professed children of God their transgressions and the house of Jacob their sins, for all will have sufficient light to accept saving truth and be saved. Noah remained faithful in warning despite unbelief and scoffing, and their refusal to believe did not stop the flood, for the waters rose and overwhelmed the earth, a lesson for those entrusted with warning the world and calling people to obey God's law.
The history of the old world is to be read, understood, and kept before the mind as a warning while calling attention to the signs of the times, when nation rises against nation and selfishness and covetousness lead to violence, crime, and the presumptuous deeds of unholy ambition by which men seek strength by robbing others. The days of Noah were marked by selfishness and violence and crime, and those same evils prevail as this earth's history closes, so Bible believers need to take their position for righteousness and truth and not walk contrary to God's Word. Nearly all the inhabitants thought they were right and Noah was wrong, claimed to know more than God's faithful servant, closed their ears to truth, branded Noah a fanatic, explained by false science that rain could never come because no sign of it had ever existed, and laughed and mocked God's message through him as parables, even taunting that he spoke in parables. Their unbelief did not prevent the flood, and they finally drank the waters that prevailed and increased greatly until they covered the earth. Walking contrary to God's Word stirs rebellion and brings God's displeasure, and the lesson is not to be like them but to walk free from condemnation and be found loyal and true when Christ comes.
Many who helped Noah build the ark did not believe the startling message, did not cleanse themselves from all wrong principles, and did not overcome the temptation to do and say things entirely contrary to the mind and will of God. The coming of the animals two by two without a visible leader was a final sign, then the word was given to close the ark, the waters prevailed and were greatly increased upon the earth, the ark went upon the face of the waters, and the inhabitants of the old world perished when wickedness had increased as it is increasing now and time was very short. This warns that the last call of mercy will close and will not be heard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under the mighty hand of God and get ready before it is everlastingly too late. As in Noah's day, surrounding influences take attention from God and heavenly things, making it no more favorable now to form a character for eternal life, yet God still gives humanity the privilege of gaining back true manhood and womanhood so that His immortal image may be restored. After Adam and Eve fell in Eden and opened floodgates of woe, the world had become corrupt before God, and because people would not believe after one hundred and twenty years of probation in which God would have saved every obedient soul, only a few were saved in the ark, proving that whatever a person sows must also be reaped without failure.
The waters of the flood swept all the rest of the vast world out of existence while only Noah and his family, eight persons, were saved in the ark, for God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe Noah's warning, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, and that destruction does not contradict His good and merciful character. The same judgment warns that God's wrath will soon fall on all the sinful and disobedient and they will perish in a general conflagration by fire. Only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved from that coming fire as Noah's family was saved in the flood, though great men and wise men now also reject the Sabbath and the shortness of time as proof it cannot be true.
The waters prevailed and were greatly increased until they covered the whole earth, rose above the highest land, and made the world a world of water. They came from torrents of rain out of heaven uniting with waters bursting from the broken crust and fountains of the great deep, after forty days and forty nights of rain that began gently and grew into violent storm. Upon the face of those waters the ark went floating and riding safely, though built as an immense boat on dry land, beaten by merciless winds and flung from billow to billow amid warring elements. Only eight souls who believed were shut in by God and preserved, while all left outside were swept away after a one-hundred-and-twenty-year probation of warning had been mocked and rejected and the door of mercy shut. As those waters cleansed a morally polluted world, so fire from heaven united with fire stored in the earth will purify it in the final judgment that will suddenly overtake the pleasure-loving and unready as the flood did.
Waters Prevailing and Ark
The waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth until they covered the earth and rose to the highest land, making the earth a world of water. They rose until even the highest land was submerged and rose to a great and known height that bore up the ark while the inhabitants perished. The prevailing waters came from torrents of rain descending from heaven uniting with waters bursting from the broken crust and the fountains of the great deep broken up. The rain fell for forty days and forty nights, beginning gently and slowly at first and then pouring down in torrents and growing into a violent storm as the deep broke open and water surged from the earth with tremendous force. The breaking up of the fountains of the great deep and the opening of the windows of heaven sent waters from beneath and above that united and formed a great sea.
The ark went upon the face of the waters, floating and riding safely on their surface as it was carried over the earth and borne upon them. It had been built as an immense boat on dry land, looking as strange there as a ship set on land for repairs, needing no iron standards to hold it up and no track to carry it to the water, until the waters lifted and carried it. Amid warring elements and surging floodwaters the massive, firmly built structure was beaten by merciless winds, trembled in every fiber, and was flung from billow to billow. While it rode, the beasts within cried out in fear and pain, trees were uprooted and thrown into the boiling seething waters, wrecks of palaces and temples were tossed about upon the waters, and earth and rocks thrown up from beneath left a broken, uneven surface. Idolized trees were uprooted, inhabitants with groves, palaces and costly works for pleasure were swept away, places of idol worship were buried under masses of rubbish and earth and rocks, and fruitful trees, forests and gardens were destroyed until the lovely home became a frightful solitude of deep gorges and seamed cleft rocks.
Everyone left outside was swept away into the boiling deep while the ark floated safely upon the troubled waters. People fleeing for refuge cried for safety and pleaded unheard in the tempest, and those who clung to the ark were washed away by dashing waves and surging waters or had their hold broken by collision with rocks and trees. With terrified animals they climbed houses, trees and mountains to the tops of the mountains and the tops of the highest trees before the water reached there and flung them together into the foaming flood. Desperate people tried to break into the ark but its firm construction withstood them, and they would have given anything then for a place within it. God destroyed the people with the waters, sweeping them into the boiling deep after the last refuge was reached.
Causes of the Judgment
God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually, and that the earth was corrupt before God and filled with violence and crime. The knowledge of God had been kept continually before that long-lived race by righteous men including Seth, Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others, but the people despised the truth that had been presented to them. They lived in His house and were provided food and clothing from His liberal treasury, yet never thanked Him and were unmindful of His goodness, while the Lord whose name is Jealous is jealous for His honor against such treatment. Secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, and after centuries of patience and forbearance toward their awful presumption God came forth out of His hiding place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity by sweeping them away with a flood whose waters prevailed greatly upon the earth.
The flood came because after Adam's transgression brought sin into the world men and women grew more bold in disobeying His law, transgressed God's holy law, rebelled against it under Satan's principles, and trampled His broken law under foot. Noah was made to know God's purpose and as a preacher of righteousness warned the antediluvian world for one hundred and twenty years while building the immense ark on dry land amid mockery as probation shortened every day, that ark being shelter where the obedient could be kept until God's indignation was overpast. Only a few repented, and only eight souls out of that vast population, Noah and his family, lived to enter the ark, while death was the portion of the rebellious race swept away by the flood waters that lifted the ark, fulfilling the prophetic warning that all who would not keep the commandments of heaven should drink the waters of the flood. The rocks raised from the deep by the breaking forth of the waters remain as witnesses of that deluge and its terror and fearful outpouring, and Noah carried the law forward by teaching it to his descendants. The same cause that destroyed the antediluvian world which would not heed the admonitions given them also destroyed the inhabitants of Sodom for disobeying the laws of God's kingdom and destroyed Jerusalem because the Israelites would not heed the messages the Lord gave them, and likewise the whole world will finally be destroyed in the closing period of its history because of the transgression and impenitence of its inhabitants.
Indulgence of appetite, described as eating and drinking, with gluttony and drunkenness inflamed people's passions and led to other crimes, widespread corruption, violence and debased passions. That unbounded indulgence made them corrupt and made the wickedness of the people beyond all remedy, polluting the world morally so that God poured a flood of waters upon the earth to wash the world from its moral pollution. Since the fall God tests people just where He tested man before the fall, on appetite, and the prevailing waters bearing the ark were His judgment on that sin. The same indulgence of appetite and intemperance is now making the present world like the world in Noah's time.
God loved the people before the Flood and surrounded them with the precious things of earth in a world far more beautiful in grandeur and loveliness than present beautiful mountains, towering rocks and scenery, but they turned those blessings into a curse by using them for selfish ends to gratify pride and glorify themselves. They rejected God and His law, used their gifts for selfish ends, corrupted one another, and filled the earth with eating, drinking, marrying, fraud, murder and every crime until Noah entered the ark and the flood took all away. The Lord destroyed them and the earth because of man's sinfulness and because the earth was defiled by their violence and corrupting works, and without the curse of sin corrupting the earth it would still be a happy place, but every place inhabited by human beings is debased with sin.
Warning Given and Rejected
For one hundred and twenty years Noah as preacher of righteousness warned of coming judgment while building the immense ark on dry land, with Methuselah and his family and others receiving his instruction and helping in the work, amid mockery and derision as a visionary, fanatic and alarmist while probation shortened every day. Many believing ones kept the faith during that probation and died triumphant, while many who helped build did not believe, and Noah with his helpers worked constantly preparing an immense boat on dry land under universal scorn thrown upon God's law and upon himself, yet he did not lose reverence and love for the law but preached all the more earnestly in proportion to the ridicule. The world could not endure his message and said it could not be, laughing and mocking and scoffing because there had been no rain and rain seemed impossible and fanatical.
Dumb animals quietly entered two and two under God's invisible leadership without a visible leader as a final sign, Noah and his family entered, God's hand shut them in and shut the ungodly out, and the word was given to close the ark. Then one week, seven days, passed without rain as a trial of faith, with only a mist as before to water the earth, while the shut-in believers were mocked and derided, the people made light of them, continued their careless pleasure-loving lives, did not humble themselves, and were unaware their doom was fixed. This warns that the last call of mercy will close unheard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under God's mighty hand and get ready before everlastingly too late.
Nearly all the inhabitants thought they were right and Noah was wrong, claimed to know more than God's faithful servant, closed their ears to words of truth until darkness came upon them, and laughed and mocked God's message through him as parables with the taunt, Does he not speak in parables. By false science they explained away his statement that rain would come when no sign of it had ever existed, arguing rain could never come. Walking contrary to God's Word stirs rebellion and brings God's displeasure, and the lesson is not to be like them but to walk free from condemnation and be found loyal and true when Christ comes.
Their unbelief and scoffing did not make the message of none effect, did not hinder the predicted event, and did not prevent the message from coming true. When rain came, beginning gently then increasing in power to torrents, the waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth until they covered the earth, and the very people who had refused warning drank the waters that covered the earth and perished in them, with only Noah and his family saved in the ark. Those who rejected God's warning perished in the flood, and the Lord caused the inhabitants to drink the waters of the flood in judgment because iniquity abounded. Noah remained faithful in warning them, a lesson for those entrusted with warning the world and calling people to obey God's law.
The flood closed a one-hundred-and-twenty-year probation given in mercy with opportunity to repent of sins, overcome bad habits, form righteous characters, and find refuge in the ark, urged upon them to enter and be saved. After the final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut into the ark and mocked while no rain fell, the door of mercy was shut, the bounds of long-suffering and grace were exceeded by presuming upon mercy, despising warnings, refusing to obey, and continuing in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness, and the steady rain came. Then the prevailing waters swept the evildoers and unrepentant sinners from the face of the earth, the waters covered the surface and rose higher until the earth became a world of water and the last refuge was reached, forcing the wicked to flee from place to place seeking higher foothold, filled with remorse but not repentance, while the ark went safe upon the waters under protecting care guided by a divine hand amid tempest, thunder, lightning, uprooted trees and wrecks of palaces and temples tossed about. By the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient, God interfered to vindicate the honor of His law, repress unrighteousness, limit life, and blot out those indifferent to the law made known, revealing it is possible to go so far in sin that wrath must interpose, a warning repeated for the days of the Son of man.
Preservation of the Obedient
Only those shut in by God for believing His word were preserved when the ark rode safely on the floodwaters by divine power while every other refuge was destroyed in judgment. The forty days and forty nights of rain joined waters bursting from inside the broken crust and the foundations of the great deep, so that waters from beneath united with waters from heaven and prevailed until houses were entered and idol temples were swept away. Noah and his family were safe inside the immense boat built on dry land amid mockery during one hundred and twenty years of probation in which Noah warned of coming judgment as a preacher of righteousness, while those who had jeered and mocked were left outside and no others could enter. People fleeing for refuge cried for safety and pleaded unheard in the tempest, clung to the ark until washed away by dashing waves, climbed trees and mountains with terrified animals, and were flung into the foaming flood together, and the waters swept all the rest of the vast, impenitent, pleasure-loving, corrupt world out of existence while only eight souls, Noah and his family, were saved in the ark upon the waters. Their response to the warning determined whether they were saved, for the eight accepted the message from God and fled for refuge into the ark when the Flood lifted it, while the same message condemned the rest who rejected it and they perished in the waters. God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, which does not contradict His good and merciful character, and the same judgment warns that wrath will soon fall on all the sinful and disobedient in a general conflagration by fire when only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved.
The ark provided shelter for the few obedient who entered it, where they could be kept until the indignation of God was overpast, fulfilling the warning that those who disobeyed His commandments would perish. Only a few repented and only eight lived to enter, and the flood waters that lifted the ark swept away the rebellious race whose portion was death, fulfilling the prophetic warning that all who would not keep the commandments of heaven should drink the waters of the flood. Amid warring elements the massive, firmly built structure rode safely upon the surging waters though trembling in every fiber as it was beaten by merciless winds and flung from billow to billow while the beasts within cried out in fear and pain. Desperate people tried to break in but its firm construction withstood them, and those who clung to the outside were borne away by the surging waters or had their hold broken by collision with rocks and trees. After the door of mercy was shut and probation ended the waters covered the surface of the earth and rose higher and higher until the earth became a world of water and the last refuge was reached, yet the ark went upon the face of the waters safe under the protecting care of the God of storm and tempest, guided by a divine hand amid roar and thunder and sharp lightning while trees were uprooted into boiling seething waters and wrecks of palaces and temples were tossed about. It continued to ride safely because angels that excel in strength were commissioned to preserve it, and it provided refuge as destruction covered the world.
By the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient after the antediluvian race with a plain word from the Lord to guide them presumed upon mercy, went decidedly counter to His will, despised warnings, refused to obey, and continued in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness until they exceeded the bounds of long-suffering and the limits of grace. After a probation of one hundred and twenty years and a final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut in and mocked while no rain fell, the steady rain came and the prevailing waters swept the evildoers from the face of the earth. God thus interposed to vindicate the honor of His law, repress the increase of unrighteousness, limit human life, and prevent men spoiling one another in continual disobedience and defiance, blotting out those indifferent to the law made known while the ark went safe upon the waters. Their obedience to God's word would have spared the disobedient from perishing in the waters, for God would have saved every obedient soul though they refused His offers of mercy. Perishing in the Flood proves that whatever a person sows must also be reaped without failure, for God understands every action of life and the reaping time will come, a warning repeated for the days of the Son of man when surrounding influences take attention from God and heavenly things.
The ark's safety amid the waters shows that God will also deliver His faithful people from coming wrath, and they had warned the world but the wicked will not be allowed to destroy those waiting for translation and refusing the beast's decree and mark. Noah preserved in the ark that God had prepared proves that in coming days of destruction and calamity God will be the refuge of His believing ones amid convulsed nature, burning mountains, boiling waters, mighty earthquakes and great loss of human life. The flood proves God is mindful of what passes upon the earth, and when a crisis has come He reveals Himself and interposes to hinder opposing plans and to sustain and vindicate His people. Mercy was mingled with judgment, for Noah and his family were saved while the wicked inhabitants who disregarded the law until almost all remembrance of God had passed and wickedness, violence, crime and every kind of sin had become intensely active were swept away. This same manner of working will be repeated when defiance of the law is almost universal and His people are pressed in affliction by their fellow men, for then God will arise as protector and avenger and answer the fervent prayers of those who seek Him with all their hearts and depend upon Him as Deliverer, at a time when the whole world is fast becoming as in the days of Noah when eating, drinking, marrying, fraud, murder and every crime filled the earth until Noah entered the ark and the flood took all away.
Real History and Evidence
The account is inspired Scripture and true history, with Noah as a real man and the flood as an event that actually took place. The generation of Noah also foreshadows the present age before Christ appears in the clouds.
The rising waters that covered the earth and carried the ark buried and preserved people, animals, and trees far larger than any now living, and those remains testify that the antediluvians perished in the flood. The time when those conditions existed is known from the biblical record rather than from geology alone, for the inspired history explains the changed condition of the earth and the relics found in it. That evidence is misused when it is explained in ways that contradict the record.
The flood broke up the surface of the earth, brought great changes, and its re-formed crust preserved evidence of the abundant plant and animal life that existed before it. The prevailing waters came from torrents of rain descending from heaven uniting with the fountains of the great deep broken up, lifting the ark while sweeping away inhabitants with groves, palaces, and costly works of pleasure. They uprooted idolized trees, destroyed fruitful trees, forests, shady avenues and gardens, buried places of idol worship and works of men's hands under masses of rubbish with earth and rocks thrown up from beneath, and turned the lovely home given to man into a broken, uneven, frightful solitude. Its evidences remain in rocks raised from the deep, seamed and cleft rocks, deep gorges, caverns, channels worn by cataracts, and time-worn rocky walls, which stand as witnesses of the deluge and its terror. This destruction came after a one-hundred-and-twenty-year message through Noah that the impenitent would be destroyed, which would not have come if they had repented, but they rejected it in ingratitude and disobedience to God's law.
The flood greatly increased the curse upon the earth, which had begun at Adam's fall and grown after Cain killed Abel, and which continued to grow afterward as men disobeyed God. It defiled and broke an earth once lovely and far more beautiful in grandeur and loveliness than present mountains, towering rocks, and scenery. God loved the people before the flood and surrounded them with earth's precious things, but they turned those blessings into a curse by using them to gratify pride and glorify themselves, and the Lord destroyed them and the earth because of sinfulness, violence, and corrupting works. Without the curse of sin the earth would still be happy, but every place inhabited by human beings is debased with sin.
Measured against the great and known height reached by the waters that bore up the ark in God's destruction of the antediluvian world, the dwellers on the plain of Shinar disbelieved God's covenant never again to bring such a flood upon the earth. Many denied God and attributed the flood to natural causes, while others admitted a supreme being had destroyed the former world yet rose in rebellion against Him with hearts like Cain's. By that measure they erected the tower to go much higher so as to be beyond danger from another deluge, to ascend to the region of the clouds to ascertain the cause of the flood, and to exalt their own pride and turn future generations away from God into idolatry.
Foreshadowing Final Judgment
As in the days of Noah so it is today and so shall it be in the days of the Son of man, for wickedness kept increasing then and keeps increasing now. The dumb animals quietly entered the ark two and two under invisible divine leadership, Noah and his family entered, the hand of God shut them in, and a week passed without rain in which the shut-in believers were mocked and derided while the people would not humble themselves. The one hundred and twenty years given to repent of sins, overcome bad habits, form righteous characters and find refuge did not hinder the predicted event when refused, though Noah was denounced as visionary, fanatic and alarmist. Then rain began gently and grew in power until the waters prevailed and were increased greatly upon the earth and swept away and destroyed every living thing that had refused to enter, while the ark went upon the face of the waters. That likeness proves the end of all things is at hand and the time left to prepare very short, with minds now diverted from eternal realities by eating, drinking, marrying, revelling, drunkenness, violence, fraud, murder and every crime, and with another general destruction of the wicked to come. The preservation of Noah in the ark God had prepared proves God will be the refuge of His believing ones amid convulsed nature, burning mountains, boiling waters, mighty earthquakes and great loss of life in the coming days of destruction and calamity.
The flood waters foreshadow the fires of the final judgment, declaring that those who persist in revolt against God are incurable. As water from heaven united with water in the bowels of the earth to cleanse the earth and sweep it of moral corruption, so fire from heaven will unite with fire stored up in the earth to purify the earth. That coming ruin will be general, a general conflagration by fire in which all the sinful and disobedient perish, and no human devising can quench the sea of fire with which God will soon sweep the earth again. The flood is therefore a warning of that great destruction by fire, before which men are again granted a period of test and trial to show whether they will be loyal to God and obey His law, after one hundred and twenty years were once granted to choose between evil and good and were deliberately refused. Only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will then be saved, as only Noah and his family, eight souls, were saved in the ark while great men, philosophers, scientific and learned men perished for unbelief.
As Noah's contemporaries did not recognize danger until the waters came and swept them away, so the same suddenness and unbelief will mark Christ's second coming. They were asleep in carnal security, absorbed in worldly pleasure and expectation of lasting prosperity, full of rioting and godless pleasure, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, putting afar off the coming judgment. They laughed at warnings, called those who would arouse them fanatics, enthusiasts and not levelheaded, boasted that all things remain as from the beginning and tomorrow shall be as this day only much more abundant, and said rain was impossible and fanatical because there had been no sign of it. Then they were taken unawares by sudden destruction with all their plans and inventions of iniquity, and thus shall it be when the Son of man is revealed and Christ comes as a thief upon presumptuous scorners and rejecters of truth, upon routine money-making without regard to principle, and upon students eager for every knowledge but the Bible. As it was then so it will be prior to Christ's second coming, when a pleasure-loving, money-making, dishonest world and a worldly, sleeping church cry peace and safety and call warning impossible, and sudden destruction overtakes the unready.
The wickedness of the world before the flood is repeated in this age, and therefore calamities, earthquakes, floods and disasters by land and by sea will increase. God looks upon the world today in judgment for its wickedness just as He looked upon it in Noah's time, and sends His messages today just as He sent them then. The last call of mercy will close and will not be heard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under the mighty hand of God and get ready before it is everlastingly too late. Many who helped build the ark did not believe the startling message, did not cleanse themselves from wrong principles, and did not overcome temptation to do and say things contrary to the mind and will of God.
Law, Mercy, and Endurance
The prevailing waters that bore up the ark vindicated God's authority and the honor of His law after long forbearance. When human wickedness, violence, crime and rebellion had become intensely active and almost all remembrance of God had passed from the earth, a crisis came and God declared the limits of His forbearance. After a probation of one hundred and twenty years with Noah's warning to turn from sin, and a final week of testing in which Noah and the believers were shut into the ark and mocked while no rain fell, the steady rain came when the measure of iniquity was full and the boundaries of divine mercy were passed. God then interposed in His own time to cut short the working of iniquity, repress the increase of unrighteousness, limit human life, prevent men spoiling one another in continual disobedience and defiance, cleanse the earth from moral pollution, and answer by terrible things in righteousness the prayers of the righteous for wickedness to end. Though the wicked say their way is hidden from the Lord, He beholds all the works of men and is mindful of what is passing upon the earth, hindering Satan's plans and sustaining and vindicating His people with mercy mingled with judgment.
It is possible to go so far in sin that wrath must interpose, for men exceeded the bounds of long-suffering and the limits of grace by presuming upon mercy, going decidedly counter to His will with a thus saith the Lord to guide them, despising warnings, refusing to obey, and continuing in pride, self-importance and unrighteousness until by the standard of God's law the obedient were distinguished from the disobedient. God's patience does not make punishment uncertain, as the Flood with the destruction of Sodom warns, and as the end approaches people are called to turn from iniquity. The greatly increased waters brought punishment and death for disobedience of God's requirements, and they did not wash the drowned straight into glory. God's mercy does not keep Him from executing the final penalty for transgressing His law.
No one can get to heaven just as well by transgressing as by obeying, for obedience to all of God's law is absolutely essential to eternal life. No soul can afford to lose eternal life by transgressing even one of God's laws or showing disrespect to it, and no one should presume upon God's mercy to keep sinning and still expect to be pardoned and saved. The destruction came upon a world made like Sodom and as it was before the Flood by men transgressing God's commandments all over the world, the same transgression Adam committed. The whole world perished and the waters swept all the rest of the vast world out of existence while only Noah and his family, eight persons, were saved, so the majority are lost and only a few are saved. God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe the warning, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, which does not contradict God's good and merciful character. Believers must not be discouraged when only a few believe present truth and must not follow the majority, for following the majority keeps them out of heaven, while only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved from coming fire as Noah's family was saved, though great and wise men now also reject the Sabbath and the shortness of time as proof it cannot be true.
The Flood shows that the regular course of nature is not above God's power, for the waters rose beyond their former bounds and the boundaries that had held back the waters could be changed by the God who rules them. Like the ark riding safely on the surface of the deep amid the rising waters, God's Word outlasts the storms that threaten to destroy it and remains uncorrupted through the ages. The destruction of the world by the Flood as an act of God's severity should be gratefully remembered together with His mercy to Adam and His gracious covenant with Noah, rather than murmured against as arbitrary and severe. It sets forth the need for victory through Christ who gave His life to win the world back to favor with God and to loyalty and commandment-keeping.
Warning Work for Today
Noah fulfilled God's will in bearing the warning, and that work stands as the pattern for the last message of mercy now to be carried to regions beyond in close connection with God with power to reach hearts and minds. Only eight persons of the vast, impenitent, pleasure-loving, corrupt world were saved because they accepted Noah's warning message from God and fled for refuge into the ark when the flood lifted it upon the face of the waters, while the same message condemned the rest who rejected it. That truth requires self-denial and the lifting of the cross, and it will be a savor of life unto life to those who heed it by obeying all God's commandments and a savor of death unto death to those who refuse it. The same unbelief that prevailed before the flood will exist prior to the coming of Christ when moral darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people, yet that darkness does not change the duty to lift up the voice in warning, showing professed children of God their transgressions and the house of Jacob their sins, for all will have sufficient light to accept saving truth and be saved. Noah remained faithful in warning despite unbelief and scoffing, and their refusal to believe did not stop the flood, for the waters rose and overwhelmed the earth, a lesson for those entrusted with warning the world and calling people to obey God's law.
The history of the old world is to be read, understood, and kept before the mind as a warning while calling attention to the signs of the times, when nation rises against nation and selfishness and covetousness lead to violence, crime, and the presumptuous deeds of unholy ambition by which men seek strength by robbing others. The days of Noah were marked by selfishness and violence and crime, and those same evils prevail as this earth's history closes, so Bible believers need to take their position for righteousness and truth and not walk contrary to God's Word. Nearly all the inhabitants thought they were right and Noah was wrong, claimed to know more than God's faithful servant, closed their ears to truth, branded Noah a fanatic, explained by false science that rain could never come because no sign of it had ever existed, and laughed and mocked God's message through him as parables, even taunting that he spoke in parables. Their unbelief did not prevent the flood, and they finally drank the waters that prevailed and increased greatly until they covered the earth. Walking contrary to God's Word stirs rebellion and brings God's displeasure, and the lesson is not to be like them but to walk free from condemnation and be found loyal and true when Christ comes.
Many who helped Noah build the ark did not believe the startling message, did not cleanse themselves from all wrong principles, and did not overcome the temptation to do and say things entirely contrary to the mind and will of God. The coming of the animals two by two without a visible leader was a final sign, then the word was given to close the ark, the waters prevailed and were greatly increased upon the earth, the ark went upon the face of the waters, and the inhabitants of the old world perished when wickedness had increased as it is increasing now and time was very short. This warns that the last call of mercy will close and will not be heard by those blinded by peace-and-safety theories while trying to serve two masters, so all must humble themselves under the mighty hand of God and get ready before it is everlastingly too late. As in Noah's day, surrounding influences take attention from God and heavenly things, making it no more favorable now to form a character for eternal life, yet God still gives humanity the privilege of gaining back true manhood and womanhood so that His immortal image may be restored. After Adam and Eve fell in Eden and opened floodgates of woe, the world had become corrupt before God, and because people would not believe after one hundred and twenty years of probation in which God would have saved every obedient soul, only a few were saved in the ark, proving that whatever a person sows must also be reaped without failure.
The waters of the flood swept all the rest of the vast world out of existence while only Noah and his family, eight persons, were saved in the ark, for God destroyed great men and good men, philosophers, scientific men and learned men who did not believe Noah's warning, sparing Noah as the only one worthy, and that destruction does not contradict His good and merciful character. The same judgment warns that God's wrath will soon fall on all the sinful and disobedient and they will perish in a general conflagration by fire. Only the few who fear God and keep His commandments, who keep the Sabbath and believe the message of warning, will be saved from that coming fire as Noah's family was saved in the flood, though great men and wise men now also reject the Sabbath and the shortness of time as proof it cannot be true.