Where Is the Urgency to Prepare for the Coming Judgement?
When God declared judgement on the earth and against all flesh, and gave the instructions to Noah on what to do to be saved from the impending destruction, do you know what Noah did upon receiving the instructions?
Genesis 7:5 And Noah did according to all that the LORD commanded him.
Noah did not go and argue about whether Adam is the first man or not, argue about whether to pay tithes or not, he did not go and set up a prophetic program to pray for people to get visas to travel abroad, He did not organise a church excursion to Kakum National Park. No, all that he did was with a sense of urgency for the impending destruction. All his workings and everything was geared towards the building of the Ark. Upon receiving the message, he spent all his life building the Ark. So must you spend your entire life for this Ark. The Ark to build is you preparing and meeting the standard God requires. It is with this Jesus said, we should seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. (Matthew 6:33)
You think Noah did not have a family, did he not work to take care of them? Or do you suppose manna fell from heaven to feed him? He was seeking after the things of God irrespective of what he lacked or had. Whatever his situation was at the time the judgement came did not deter him from preparing for the impending destruction. If today God said, “Noah, build the Ark because I am about to destroy the earth,” then Noah would respond, “I don’t have a wife, I am looking for a visa to travel abroad, I am barren, I need children.” Exactly what we are doing now, when everything has been judged with fire.
Remember, Noah in those days, like how we have apostles, prophets, evangelists, teachers, and so on, Noah was also a preacher, a preacher of righteousness, who went about warning people about the impending judgement. I am yet to see where he was calling for those who wanted wives or husbands to come forward so he could pray for them—just imagine. It wasn’t the time for that, he wasn’t raising funds to build the next church when souls are all around us marching to the lake of fire. Are we saying without the church building no soul can be saved?
The point is judgement has come. So your destiny, your purpose, your business—whatever it is you are doing should be geared toward this end, sadly we want to gain the world when Jesus wants us to lose everything and follow Him. God hasn’t come simply because we are not ready, we want to gain the world, He is ready, but we aren’t. We are spending day and night praying and living for vanities at the neglect of our souls. Imagine someone whose name is not written in the Book of Life praying to God and asking for a child, asking for marriage, asking for a job. Really? Where is the urgency? Do we think we have all the time in the world? Do you think God sent His Son to die so that you could become a millionaire, get married, have children, or travel abroad? Certainly not.
We are not ready. Do you think God would have come to destroy the earth if the Ark wasn’t ready? No. He only came to destroy the earth as soon as the Ark was ready. So when you read here:
1 Peter 3:20 (NIV) “…when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water.”
So you see, God was patiently waiting. The judgement had come, He was ready to destroy the earth, but the Ark was not ready, so He waited patiently for it to be ready just as today He is waiting for us to be ready.
Remember Lot and his wife. God made it clear that He could not destroy the city until they had reached safety, because He showed them mercy and did not want them destroyed. The emphasis here is that until they were safe from the impending destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, God did nothing. Will God see to it that we are destroyed? Certainly not.
But what He expects is that we do according to all that He has said, so as to be saved from the impending destruction by FIRE. Looking back as Lots wife did is your choice.
Genesis 19:21 And he said to him, “See, I have favored you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. Hurry, escape there. For I cannot do anything until you arrive there.”
Luke 14:17 “And sent his servant at supper time to say to those who were invited, ‘Come, for all things are now ready.’”
And now what do you think God is waiting for? Everything is ready, and He is patiently waiting for you and me. But we are obsessed with getting promotion at the workplace, obsessed with buying land, obsessed with who to marry. Our entire life is dedicated to vanities while God is waiting for us to get the Ark ready, because He wants to save us and not destroy us. What is our Ark to be built? That we come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. As it is written here:
Ephesians 4:11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,
13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
