“But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.” Genesis 6:8
Noah lived in exceptionally wicked times. As bad as things are today, in Matthew 24:27-38 we read that Yeshua said that just like it was during Noah’s lifetime, so it will be when He returns. The people were eating, drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage, carrying on regardless of Noah taking many years to build the ark, whilst constantly warning them about the coming rain and floods. Similarly, today we can preach about the end times, of people’s need for Yeshua and His soon return, but we are largely ignored, and people’s lives goes on unchanged. We read in Hebrews 11:7 that by faith Noah, being warned by Yehovah, was moved with fear, prepared an ark to save his household and, as a result, the remainder of the world was condemned. Yet Noah was made righteous because of his faith. Noah’s faith and his resulting obedience to fulfil Yehovah’s instructions, meant he, his wife, their three sons and their wives, were saved from certain death, along with the animals, birds and other living creatures which he took into the ark. Noah believed Yehovah and, as a result, was saved. But was he a perfect and sinless man? Of course not. The Scriptures tell us that all have sinned and come short of the glory of Yehovah, that there are no righteous people, not even one, in terms of their own righteousness. Let us look briefly at Noah’s “feet of clay”, the evidence that he was an imperfect sinner, saved only because of the grace and mercy of Yehovah. In Genesis 9:20-24 we read that Noah planted a vineyard and drank so much of the home-made wine, he became drunk. He was so drunk he went and lay naked on the bed in his tent. When Ham, one of his sons, saw his father was naked, a shameful thing to have happen to the family patriarch, he went and gossiped about his father’s embarrassing situation to his brothers. Mercifully, Shem and Japheth took a garment, walked backwards into the tent and laid it over their father’s body so they would not see and shame him any more than he was already. So, we see that even Noah was not above reproach, and that it was only because of his faith AND his obedience that the lives of so many were preserved. Similarly, faith and obedience are what Yehovah requires of me and you.