“Before the destruction of the old world by a flood, there were talented men, men who possessed skill and knowledge. But they became corrupt in their imagination, because they left God out of their plans and councils. They were wise to do what God had never told them to do, wise to do evil.”1

The human race expanded rapidly, as did wickedness. It took only ten generations before “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. . . . The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence” (Genesis 6:5, 11).

The scene was one of total depravity. There was nothing good in the human race; their hearts were so corrupted that only “evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” sprang from them. (Matthew 15:19.) As a result of the people “willfully” ignoring the word of God, they drowned in the waters of the Flood.

“The sin of the antediluvians was in perverting that which in itself was lawful. They corrupted God’s gifts by using them to minister to their selfish desires. The indulgence of appetite and base passion made their imaginations altogether corrupt. The antediluvians were slaves of Satan, led and controlled by him.”2

“God did not condemn the antediluvians for eating and drinking; He had given them the fruits of the earth in great abundance to supply their physical wants. Their sin consisted in taking these gifts without gratitude to the Giver, and debasing themselves by indulging appetite without restraint.”3

“The inhabitants of the Noachian world were destroyed, because they were corrupted through the indulgence of perverted appetite.”4

“They loved to destroy the lives of animals. They used them for food, and this increased their ferocity and violence, and caused them to look upon the blood of human beings with astonishing indifference.”5

“It was lawful for [the antediluvians] to marry. Marriage was in God’s order; it was one of the first institutions which He established. He gave special directions concerning this ordinance, clothing it with sanctity and beauty; but these directions were forgotten, and marriage was perverted and made to minister to passion.”6

What gave rise to corrupt this divine institution was to be unequally yoked. The faithful sons of Seth sadly lost their moral compass by fixing their eyes on the dazzling beauty of the impious daughters of Cain, choosing them as their wives—not for their virtues, but solely for their beauty.

“As the sons of God mingled with the sons of men, they became corrupt and, by intermarriage with them, lost, through the influence of their wives, their peculiar, holy character, and united with the sons of Cain in their idolatry. Many cast aside the fear of God and trampled upon His commandments.”7

As polygamy was introduced, the more the men multiplied their wives, and the more wickedness and misery increased.

“It was Satan’s studied effort to pervert the marriage institution, to weaken its obligations and lessen its sacredness; for in no surer way could he deface the image of God in man and open the door to misery and vice.”8

There is an old adage that says, “Tell me who you’re with and I’ll tell you who you are.” The Bible makes it clear: “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners” (1 Corinthians 15:33). That was the sad story of many in Noah’s day who knew the truth, accepted and lived the truth—but by choosing bad company, lost their moral compass even to desire salvation, and therefore they were lost.

“Those who believed when Noah began to build the ark, lost their faith through association with unbelievers who aroused all the old passion for amusement and display.”9

“As the time of their probation was closing, the antediluvians gave themselves up to exciting amusements and festivities. Those who possessed influence and power were bent on keeping the minds of the people engrossed with mirth and pleasure, lest any should be impressed by the last solemn warning.”10

“In the days of Noah the overwhelming majority was opposed to the truth, and enamored with a tissue of falsehoods. The land was filled with violence. War, crime, murder, was the order of the day. Just so will it be before Christ’s second coming.”11

The actual condition of things right now

“Professed followers of Christ are today eating and drinking with the drunken, while their names stand in honored church records. Intemperance benumbs the moral and spiritual powers and prepares the way for indulgence of the lower passions. Multitudes feel under no moral obligation to curb their sensual desires, and they become the slaves of lust. Men are living for the pleasures of sense; for this world and this life alone.”12

“Today the sin exhibited by intemperance in eating and drinking is so marked that God will not always tolerate it. Man carries to excess that which is lawful, and his whole being suffers the result of the violation of the laws which the Lord has established.”13

Diseases such as diabetes, osteoporosis, colon cancer, obesity, high blood pressure, gout, tooth decay, cardiovascular disease, and many others are undermining society, mostly due to intemperance. Research confirms that one in five deaths in the world is related to poor nutrition. The cause: excess salt, sugar, or meat-eating as well as insufficient consumption of whole grains and fruits.

Many Christians have ventured to be unequally yoked, bringing bitter experiences that many regret. The number of marriages according to God’s plan decreases every day, while divorces are on the rise—as well as same-sex marriages, approved by approximately 30 countries. Society wants to live unbridled, without restraint or accountability; immorality is the daily bread.

“A terrible picture of the condition of the world has been presented before me. Immorality abounds everywhere. Licentiousness is the special sin of this age. Never did vice lift its deformed head with such boldness as now. The people seem to be benumbed, and the lovers of virtue and true goodness are nearly discouraged by its boldness, strength, and prevalence.”14

Principles of morality and integrity have been lost because many Christians have chosen bad company, which has led us to lose sight of the Saviour. We drift along with current of the customs and pleasures of the world so much that we are at risk of losing our soul.

Today, the human race degenerated by sin is following the same path regarding terrorism. Around the world, hundreds of terrorist groups continue to sow terror in humanity. Terrorist attacks are constantly recorded around the world. It is reported that in certain belief systems, it has become increasingly acceptable to kill as many members of other religious communities as possible. Moral restrictions are disappearing.

In the last 90 years, wars have killed more people than in the previous 500 years. It is estimated that in the 20th century alone, 203 million people died from war, including 2 million children, disabling another 4–5 million. The organization Save the Children has reported that more than 100,000 babies die each year from armed conflict. Another 73 million per year die by abortion. The violence is getting worse, as prophecy has foretold. (See Hosea 4:1–3.)

Dishonesty, fraud and bankruptcy, violence and bloodshed are everywhere. Widows and orphans are robbed of everything they have. Games, horse races, and amusements of all kinds occupy the mind. This wickedness and cruelty will reach such a degree that God will reveal Himself in all His majesty. Very soon the wickedness of the world will have reached its limit—and as in the days of Noah, God will pour out His judgments.

Before the Flood, God commanded Noah to warn the world so that men might be led to repentance and escape destruction. Likewise, as the time for Christ’s second coming approaches, the Lord sends His servants with a warning to prepare for that great event. Multitudes have lived in violation of God’s law, and now, with great mercy, the Lord calls them to obey His sacred precepts. To all who forsake their sins through repentance and faith in Christ, forgiveness is offered. Yet the faithful of today are ridiculed just as Noah was.

“In Noah’s day the inhabitants of the old world laughed to scorn what they termed the superstitious fears and forebodings of the preacher of righteousness. He was denounced as a visionary character, a fanatic, an alarmist.”15

“Great and learned men declared that such a flood of waters as [Noah] foretold had never been known, and that it would never come.”16

“For one hundred twenty years [the Lord] sent them warnings through His servant Noah. But they used the probation so graciously granted them in ridiculing Noah. They caricatured him and criticized him. They laughed at him for his peculiar earnestness and intense feeling in regard to the judgments which he declared God would surely fulfill. They talked of science and of the laws controlling nature. Then they held a carnival over the words of Noah, calling him a crazy fanatic.”17

These taunts increased even more after Noah entered the ark. For seven days the people gathered around the ark, mocking and even violently uttering words of contempt and derision. Today, as in the days of Noah, Christians and Christ Himself are the object of ridicule and blasphemy. Worse yet, false stories of the life of Jesus are presented to justify and promote degrading sins through films, television, and more. The apostle described it well: “Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?” (2 Peter 3:3, 4).

“The Lord’s servants will be called enthusiasts [fanatics]. Ministers will warn the people not to listen to them. Noah received the same treatment while the Spirit of God was urging him to give the message, whether men would hear or whether they would forbear.”18

“Men will reject the solemn message of warning in our day, as they did in Noah’s time. They will refer to those false teachers who have predicted the event and set the definite time, and will say that they have no more faith in our warning than in theirs. This is the attitude of the world today. Unbelief is widespread, and the preaching of Christ’s coming is mocked at and derided. This makes it all the more essential that those who believe present truth should show their faith by their works. They should be sanctified through the truth which they profess to believe.”19

“If the Christian thrives and progresses at all, he must do so amid strangers to God, amid scoffing, subject to ridicule. He must stand upright like the palm tree in the desert.”20

“Noah’s faith and works were united. The building of the ark went on amid the jeers and the ridicule and the scoffing of old and young. When they saw the last sign given—the provisions for man and beast taken into the ark—then mirth and revelry and mocking increased. . . . Reason was perverted by gratification of appetite and low, carnal amusements; they denied the Lord God that bought them, and conscience had become unimpressible.”21

“At the end of seven days clouds began to gather. This was a new sight; for the people had never seen clouds. Previous to this time no rain had fallen; the earth had been watered by a mist. Thicker and thicker gathered the clouds, and soon rain began to fall. Still the people tried to think that this was nothing very alarming. But soon it seemed as if the windows of heaven had been opened; for the rain poured down in torrents. For a time the ground drank up the rain; but soon the water began to rise, and day by day it rose higher and higher. Each morning as the people found the rain still falling they looked at one another in despair, and each night they repeated the words, ‘Raining still!’ Thus it was, morning and evening.

“For forty days and forty nights the rain poured down. The water entered the houses and drove the people to the temples which they had erected for their idolatrous worship. But the temples were swept away. The crust of the earth was broken, and the water that had been concealed in its bowels burst forth.”22

The righteous and wicked will continue to live on Earth in their mortal state; they will be planting, building, eating, drinking—all unaware that the final, irrevocable decision has been pronounced in the heavenly sanctuary. Back in Noah’s day, the people outside continued in their carefree, pleasure-loving lives and scoffed at warnings of impending judgment—and so shall it be at the coming of the Son of man.

“Silently, unnoticed as the midnight thief, will come the decisive hour which marks the fixing of every man’s destiny, the final withdrawal of mercy’s offer to guilty men.”23

“We are to make the best of our present opportunities. There will be no other probation given to us in which to prepare for heaven. This is our only and last opportunity to form characters which will fit us for the future home which the Lord has prepared for all who are obedient to His commandments.”24

“As the violence of the storm increased, trees, buildings, rocks, and earth were hurled in every direction. The terror of man and beast was beyond description. Above the roar of the tempest was heard the wailing of a people that had despised the authority of God. . . . In that terrible hour they saw that the transgression of God’s law had caused their ruin. Yet while, through fear of punishment, they acknowledged their sin, they felt no true contrition, no abhorrence of evil. They would have returned to their defiance of Heaven, had the judgment been removed. So when God’s judgments shall fall upon the earth before its deluge by fire, the impenitent will know just where and what their sin is—the despising of His holy law. Yet they will have no more true repentance than did the old-world sinners.”25

Because of its evil, the world will be destroyed again

“By the word of God, . . . 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. . . . But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” (2 Peter 3:5–7, 10).

“Perilous is the condition of those who, growing weary of their watch, turn to the attractions of the world. While the man of business is absorbed in the pursuit of gain, while the pleasure lover is seeking indulgence, while the daughter of fashion is arranging her adornments—it may be in that hour the Judge of all the earth will pronounce the sentence: ‘Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.’ ”26

Three types of people during Noah’s time

The faithful ones who died before the Flood.

Backsliders (those also who had ignored the warning altogether)

“For one hundred and twenty years Noah proclaimed the message of warning to the antediluvian world; but only a few repented. Some of the carpenters he employed in building the ark believed the message, but died before the Flood; others of Noah’s converts backslid.”27

“Many at first appeared to receive the warning; yet they did not turn to God with true repentance. They were unwilling to renounce their sins. . . . Overcome by the prevailing unbelief, they finally joined their former associates in rejecting the solemn message. Some were deeply convicted, and would have heeded the words of warning; but there were so many to jest and ridicule, that they partook of the same spirit, resisted the invitations of mercy, and were soon among the boldest and most defiant scoffers; for none are so reckless and go to such lengths in sin as do those who have once had light, but have resisted the convicting Spirit of God.”28

Noah was the kind of believer who could be called a herald of righteousness who found grace in the eyes of the Lord. “Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. . . . Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God” (Genesis 6:8, 9). “By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith” (Hebrews 11:7).

Noah did not achieve that Christian stature by himself; it was by the grace of Jesus, by faith in Him, by not focusing on the situation of his time, but rather on maintaining uninterrupted connection with his Saviour.

Today the situation is overwhelming, but in Jesus our precious Saviour, we find everything— security, help, and peace. He is the One who clears away all our doubts; He is the Guarantor of all of our hopes, our Refuge in the storm.

Dear companions in this pilgrimage, we are still groping in the shadows and turmoil of earthly activities—but soon our Saviour will appear to bring deliverance and rest. Let us contemplate by faith the blessed beyond, as depicted by the hand of God. Soon the battle will be over and the victory won. We are soon to see the One upon whom our hopes of eternal life rest. In His presence, the trials and sufferings of this life will fade into insignificance.

“Look up, look up, and let your faith continually increase. Let this faith guide you along the narrow path that leads through the gates of the city into the great beyond, the wide, unbounded future of glory that is for the redeemed.”29