Remarkably, Jesus said that The Last Days will be like the days of Noah. Noah, of course, lived thousands of years ago. Almost everything about human culture today is radically different than in those ancient times. Noah’s neighbors knew nothing about botox, Fear Factor, Howard Dean or the Internal Revenue Service. But according to Christ, in the most important ways, The Last Days will be very much like Noah’s days.

And the days of Noah were horrible! Some people complain today that we live in troubled times, but we can’t begin to imagine what it was like for Noah and his family in the awful times in which they lived. “The wickedness of man was great on the earth, and…every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually…The earth was corrupt in the sight of God, and the earth was filled with violence…For all flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth” (Gen. 6:5,11-12).

Things were so bad that God just couldn’t stomach it. “The LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. The LORD said, ‘I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land…for I am sorry that I have made them’” (Gen. 6:6-7).

So God told Noah to build an ark. You probably have heard the incredible details of that big boat Noah built. One hundred and fifty yards long — that’s a football field and a half. Three stories tall. In the shape of an enormous rectangular box. A floating, wooden box. God said the flood was coming in 120 years. It must have taken most if not all of that time for Noah and sons to construct, equip and supply that colossal ark.

But construction wasn’t all that Noah did during those days. The Apostle Peter described Noah as “a preacher of righteousness” (2 Peter 2:5). As a matter of fact, Noah was the world’s first preacher, so far as we know. And we know that Noah didn’t preach in any church. Of course, there were no churches in Noah’s day, but more pertinently, there were no “church-goers.” Remember? The people were “only evil continually.”

Noah must have preached out in the open. Perhaps that huge ark became something of a tourist attraction. Maybe people traveled from great distances to come see “that giant wooden box that crazy old man is building.” Whenever Noah drew a crowd, he preached.

What do you suppose Noah preached about? Do you think Noah delivered sermons with titles like: “How to Score Everything You Want From God,” “How To Have Your Best Life Now,” or “How To Be Healthy and Wealthy While There’s Still Time to Enjoy It?”

No, I imagine Noah’s preaching was more along the lines of: “Repent! Repent! Oh yeah, and did I mention, Repent! The end of the world is coming. You better get right with God while you’ve still got the chance to do it.”

Of course, nobody listened to Noah. Can you imagine how people must have responded to his message? “What kind of nut are you?” “A flood? What are you, a weatherman?” “Oh, God told you? Yeah, right!” “Don’t talk to me about the future. I’m having a hard enough time just surviving the present.” “Is that all you can do, is try to scare us? Why don’t you preach something positive for a change?” Noah preached God’s message for 120 years and never made a single convert.

Finally, God told Noah the time had come. He and his family entered the ark, sealed the doors, and “In the 600th year of Noah’s life…all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the floodgates of the sky were opened. The rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights” (Gen. 7:11-12).

In the greatest natural disaster in human history, the world as it existed at that time came to a sudden end. All of the sin, all of the violence and corruption, the godlessness and idolatry and hedonism and existentialism were washed from the face of the earth, and God started all over again, with eight righteous people, Noah and his family.

Many thousands of years later, Jesus preached about those days. Surprisingly, Jesus said that The Last Days will be like the days of Noah. “The coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah…They did not understand, until the flood came and took them all away. So will the coming of the Son of Man be” (Matt. 24:37,39).

Some people today don’t even believe that Noah’s flood ever happened. Of course, the people of Noah’s own day didn’t believe in the flood, either. Disbelief, then or now, did not and does not reduce by one iota the reality of that flood. Likewise, many people today don’t believe or don’t pay any attention to the clear message of Scripture that Christ is coming again. That this world as we know it will be done away with. That a new and better world is coming.

However, the disbelief of modern man and the complacency even of most believers does not diminish in the slightest degree the certainty, the power, and the finality of Christ’s Second Coming. We do not know if Christ will return today, or tomorrow, or 120 years from now, or one thousand years or more. But we do know that as in the days of Noah, the most important question is: Are you ready? The King is coming. Are you ready for His reign?

* * * * * *
See: “READY AND WAITING NO. 2: Nobody Is Ever Watching”