Then the people began to
multiply on the earth, and daughters were born to them. The sons of God saw the
beautiful women and took any they wanted as their wives. Then the Lord said,
“My Spirit will not put up with humans for such a long time, for they are
only mortal flesh. In the future, their
normal lifespan will be no more than 120 years.” In those days, and
for some time after, giant Nephilites lived on the earth, for whenever the sons
of God had intercourse with women, they gave birth to children who became the
heroes and famous warriors of ancient times. The Lord observed
the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they
thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. So the Lord was
sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart. And the Lord said,
“I will wipe this human race I have created from the face of the earth. Yes, and I will destroy every living thing—all
the people, the large animals, the small animals that scurry along the ground,
and even the birds of the sky. I am
sorry I ever made them.” 8 But
Noah found favor with the Lord. This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person
living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God. Genesis 6:1-9
I can’t remember when, or who said it, but it was the
description of a platypus being …the result of a beaver-duck-osaurous
being the assembled result of the committee from Hell. As memory serves, it may have been at a
committee meeting from a church (long-ago) that shall remain anonymous!
The days in which Noah lived, where everyone did what
they wanted, not regarding the lives of others, with the result being chaos of
the darkest nature, are pictured in Scripture as that which broke God’s heart;
it was anything but what the Lord had designed.
If you compare it to the peaceful, gentle, and beautiful setting
described as Eden (before sin entered the picture), you can understand why God
was so upset!
Many years ago, when our children were still in diapers,
one of them climbed out of the crib during the night and found the full
container of baby powder. In the morning
when we went into the nursery the container was no longer full. But every crack, crevice, nook, and cranny of
everything else in the room had baby powder to spare!
I compare my feeling on that morning to the events of
Noah’s days, and how God must’ve felt about his children messing up the environment. In my mind’s imaginative eye, I can see God
turning on his TV to the Jerry Springer Show, or some modern reality series
where the woman finds out her man’s been cheating on her with her best friend’s
husband, and they were planning to divorce, elope, and adopt a platypus. No church committee can match that, except,
perhaps the committee in charge of planning an orderly and dignified gay pride
parade!
If, in light of the previous descriptions, there is any
wonder left in your mind about why God decided to start-over, give me a call…I’ll
paint you a picture.
For You Today
The world news program you watch today (maybe even your local news) will
be filled with 95% of the anger, hatred, killing, disaster, and whatever other
horrible happenings form the core of 21st century culture. We are living in the days of Noah. Our prayer should always start (and end)
with: Come,
Lord Jesus!
There are about 2,000 devotional
posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions
library. To dig deeper on
today’s topic, explore some of these:
When It Hurts So Much and The Thin Line Between Black
Friday and Good Friday
This
devotional memoir first appeared on Rocky Road Devotions entitled Thanks Dad! August 11, 2016 (updated this date)
Images: Title Pixabay.com and WikiCommons
without citation are either personal property of the author, or in public
domain.
Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
