Luke 17:26-30 (NKJV) 26 “And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: 27 They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. 28 Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; 29 but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. 30 Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.
There is a lot of material in the Bible concerning how Jesus’ followers are to deal with the end-times. There are many examples in biblical history which show a clear pattern regarding how God deals with His people when bringing large-scale judgement. These two things – history and prophecy – provide the roadmap for those who are truly led by the Spirit/Breath of God.
Jesus’ statement above points us to two major events in history when God sent massive judgment that potentially put His own people in harm’s way. These show two classes of God’s people and provide us with a choice in how we face the end times, and the potential results of our choice. While many Christians’ take-away from this passage concerns only how the wicked will be surprised by judgment, Jesus’ teaching in this chapter concerns how His followers are to be prepared in order to escape. Immediately after the above verses, Jesus gave specific instructions to His followers. One statement in particular makes it abundantly clear that Jesus wanted His end-time followers to use Noah and Lot as patterns – “Remember Lot’s wife.”[1]
Also notice the underlined clause in the above verses, “the days (plural) of the Son of Man.” This refers to an extended yet specific period of time consisting of “days” (plural). It is the period of time described in Revelation which is marked out by two periods of 3.5 years. The whole time-frame is a “week” of years described in Daniel 9:24-27. The “Days of the Son of Man” are the days during which the “Lamb” opens the sequence of seven seals on the scroll of God’s judgements on the world.[2]
As in the Days of Noah
In verse 27 above Jesus stated, “until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.” While this statement appears to indicate that all were destroyed in a single day, the same day that Noah entered the ark, the Genesis account makes it clear that this was not the case.
Genesis 7:4-5 4 For after seven more days I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and I will destroy from the face of the earth all living things that I have made.
5 And Noah did according to all that the LORD commanded him.”
God gave Noah a seven-day heads-up to load up the ark and get his family situated inside. Then it took forty days for the water to slowly rise until all of the tops of the mountains were covered, and all who were outside the ark and had the breath of life died. Consequently, Jesus did not mean that everyone was destroyed on the very day Noah entered the ark, but rather that the judgement began immediately after Noah and his family were safely out of harm’s way. Noah had 120 years of advanced warning.
Heb. 11:7 (LGV) In faith Noah, being apprised about what was as yet unseen, being reverent, constructed an ark for the saving of his household. Through this he condemned the world and became an heir of the justice according to the Faith.
One of the reasons God promised to unseal the “time of the end” for His people[3] is the same reason Noah was forewarned. The proper application of the pattern established by Noah is not that we should build an ark. Nor is it that we must become “preppers” and build a bunker. God has not given us instructions yet regarding the specific physical preparations we must take apart from the general principles stated in Proverbs regarding how a wise man provides for his family and reacts to approaching danger. However, there is one outstanding thing in the story of Noah that serves as a pattern for those who are being led by the Breath of Truth.
Genesis 6:22 (NKJ) Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did.
Genesis 7:5 (NKJ) And Noah did according to all that the LORD commanded him.
Genesis 7:15-16 (NKJ) And they went into the ark to Noah, two by two, of all flesh in which is the breath of life. 16 So those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him; and the LORD shut him in.
Peter made it clear that many so-called Christians will become “scoffers” in the last days regarding the nearness of Jesus’ return.
2 Peter 3:1-8 (LGV) 1 This second letter I am now writing to you, brothers, in which I am awakening your serious contemplation by recollection,
2 to be reminded of the declarations which have been spoken previously by the holy prophets and the instruction from us, the Emissaries of the Master and Savior,
3 knowing this first: that upon the endings of the days scoffers will come, walking according to their own desires
4 and saying, “Where is the promise of His arrival? For since the fathers fell asleep, everything continues like this from the original formation.”
5 For they are willingly oblivious to this: that the skies continued from antiquity, and the land out from water and by water having been upheld by the announcement of God,
6 through which [announcement] the existing order was destroyed.
7 And the present skies and land, having been set aside by the same announcement, are reserved for fire until the Day of Justice and the destruction of ungodly men.
8 Yet, do not miss this one thing: that one day with the Master is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
The “scoffers” include professing Christians who scoff at the nearness of Jesus’ return, and at those who take the warnings and patterns of Scripture seriously. Unlike Noah who was extremely careful to obey all that God commanded him in every detail, the “scoffers” are “walking according to their own desires” which blind them to what God is doing. This is what makes them “willingly oblivious” to the pattern that Noah provides, and to “this one thing” which Peter reminded them about – that God is counting down the time of Jesus’ return in Millennial Days based on Moses’ prayer in Psalm 90.[4]
Noah was held up as an example for us by Jesus because of the two things stated above – his faith in acting regarding things not as yet seen and his unwavering obedience to every detail of what God had commanded him. Because of these two things Noah saved himself and his entire extended family. The “scoffers” in Noah’s day who were “walking according to their own desires” and thus would not listen to Noah, a “preacher of righteousness,”[5] were his relatives, the descendants of Seth who had abandoned the commandments of God. They perished in the flood. The “scoffers” in the end times will have a similar fate when they are caught unprepared.
As in the Days of Lot
Lot also was rescued by God, but only after Abraham pleaded with God not to destroy the righteous along with the wicked in Sodom.[6] Abraham was pleading for God to spare his nephew Lot and his extended family living in Sodom.
Lot was the one who chose to live in Sodom. When he first separated from Abraham, Lot only “pitched his tents near Sodom” in order to allow his herds to have much better grazing pastures in the Jordan valley.[7] But Abraham took the more difficult path, pitching his tents and keeping his herds far from Sodom. As Hebrews 11 states, Abraham’s heart and mind were firmly fixed on the covenant that God made with him, so he chose to live in tents (temporary shelters) rather than to build himself an elaborate house, and allowed God to provide for his herds rather than moving them to greener pastures near Sodom.
Abraham raised Isaac in a tent, and Isaac raised Jacob in a tent, and Jacob raised his own sons in tents. But by the time the two angels came to rescue Lot out of Sodom due to Abraham’s pleading for him and his family, Lot had been living in a house within the walls of Sodom. Lot had no wife or children when he separated from Abraham. Yet when the two angels came to rescue him, he had a wife, two unmarried daughters, and at least two married daughters with their own families. Lot had married a Sodomite woman and raised his children in Sodom. He was living in a house inside the city walls.
Genesis 19:16-17 (NKJ) 16 And while he lingered, the men took hold of his hand, his wife’s hand, and the hands of his two daughters, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city. 17 So it came to pass, when they had brought them outside, that he said, “Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed.”
When instructing His followers regarding the end-times, Jesus said, “Remember Lot’s wife,” for a reason. It was not merely to avoid looking back when fleeing. It was also to show the contrast between Noah’s escape and Lot’s escape. Noah’s faith in God, his taking seriously the warnings, and his complete obedience to God in faith that saved himself and his entire family. Lot, on the other hand, took a different path. He compromised, taking a worldly view rather than a godly view. Lot’s wife looked back because much of their family remained in the city. Lot lost most of his family, even though he was spared and his two youngest daughters. The rest of the story in Genesis 19:30-38 also shows that Lot’s two daughters who survived had been seriously corrupted by their life in Sodom.
The judgement by fire that Peter warned was coming at the end of certain Millennial Days is drawing close. God will provide the way for the faithful to escape His wrath just as He has always done. But unless we take the lesson from Noah seriously, and “trust and obey” in every detail, the outcome may not be as we expect. For those like Lot with divided loyalties, with one foot in this fallen world and one foot in the Kingdom, they will be fortunate to escape at all. There will be no hope at all for the scoffers.
1 John 2:15-17 (LGV) Do not love the world, nor the things in the world! If anyone should love the world, the love of the Father is not in him, 16 because all that is in the world, the desire of the flesh, and the desire of the eyes, and the boasting of lifestyle, is not [proceeding] out from the Father but is out from the world. 17 And the world is passing by and its desires, but the one doing the will of God remains into the age.
Written by:- Tim Warner 4windsfellowship.net
[1] v. 32
[2] Revelation 5:1 – 8:1
[3] Dan. 12:8-10 (LXX); 1 Tim. 6:15 (LGV)
[4] For a full explanation of this concept, see the series of articles titled “Pristine Apostolic Eschatology” on the following page: Last Days Overcomers https://www.4windsfellowships.net/blog/pristine-apostolic-eschatology/
[5] 2 Pet. 2:5
[6] Gen. 18:20-33
[7] Gen. 13:5-13 (NIV)
Living as a Christian in this World 