The dividing line between life and death

27 November 2021

7 The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. ²Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, ³and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. ⁴Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.” ⁵And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him. ⁶Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. ⁷And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. ⁸Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, ⁹male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. ¹⁰And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth. (Genesis 7: 1-10)

God said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family” (verse 1). Having one Christian in a family means that there is great hope that salvation will extend to the entire family. ” Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you and your family will be saved. ” (Acts 16:31) Through the faith of Noah alone, the whole family was saved. Noah and his family were saved because God recognized that Noah was right before God, even in bad times. I have found you righteous in this generation. (verse 1).

“For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. ”(II Chronicles 16: 9)

God says to Noah, Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”(verse 4). God had commanded Noah to put animals and birds in the ark to survive all over the earth (verse 2,3), but this would not have been possible with Noah’s power alone. It seems that there was a special divine intervention. I’ve heard stories like this. It is said that Mt. Bandai in Fukushima Prefecture exploded in 1888, but about a week before the explosion, the animals that were on Mt. Bandai all went down from the mountain. People wondered, but didn’t notice the mountain incident. Eventually, when even the little bird disappeared, an explosion occurred and many people’s lives were sacrificed.

The animals began to enter the ark seven days before the Flood (verse 8, 9), and on the seventh day, the day of the Flood, Noah and his family entered the ark. (Verse 7,13). Noah did everything the Lord had commanded (verse 5).

Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount: ²⁴“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. ²⁵The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. ²⁶But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. ²⁷The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” (Matthew 7: 24– 27)

Noah heard the Word of God and obeyed God’s command to build an ark. Noah was a wise man who obeyed the Word of God. That obedience to God saved himself and his family. However, the people of Noah’s day did not listen to Noah’s words to enter the ark. They were stupid people who did not obey the Word of God. That disobedience to God brought destruction to them.

Life and death were clearly divided into two. There was no middle ground. Choose life, not death, by obeying the Word of God. That choice will save you as well as your family.