As is sometimes the case [1], I am spending my Sabbath morning preparing to teach a lesson to young children about a biblical matter. As it happens, today’s lesson happens to be on the story of Noah and the flood. For me, among the most poignant passages in scripture is in Genesis 6:1-8, which reads: “Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose. And the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. So the Lord said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.”

There is no question that the times of Noah were immensely evil. This passage gives at least some indication of some of those matters, including the fact that the leaders were men of renown, with a celebrity culture involving their brave deeds, and with their lack of restraint in taking whatever they wanted. None of these evils is unfamiliar to us. Our times are immensely evil as well. Just yesterday a series of coordinated terror attacks in Paris killed more than 120 people. Clearly such deeds are the work of great evil, yet as the matter is, they are only the tip of the iceberg. If, when we view evil, we only think of evils like mass terrorism, we are missing the mark because we are placing the standard of evil so far above ourselves that it becomes a club to use against others, and a fuel to our fears of others, without leading us to reflect upon ourselves. An awareness of evil should prompt us to reflect and to repent, recognizing that the line between good and evil cuts through every human heart and mind.

How is it that Noah’s age was viewed by God as being only evil continually? In another passage, Luke 17:26-27, we read: “And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: 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.” Truly marriage is a worthwhile aim, as is enjoying food and drink and the company of others. These things are certainly not the evil that is meant. Yet despite the fact that the people of Noah’s age were going around engaging in the normal affairs of life, God had judged their age as being devoted to only evil continually. How is this so? How is it that the evil of their hearts did not interfere with their normal actions, nor prompt in them a recognition of evil and a desire to repent of it and to seek God? Given the immense judgment that fell upon them, this is a fact that demands explanation, so that we can place the age of Noah in its proper context and also learn from it ourselves.

One of the more remarkable facts of the work of Noah is that after 120 years of preaching and demonstrating godliness through his works, and through the symbolic action of building an ark in expectation of the judgment of God through the flood, and the miraculous provision of animals entering the ark there were only eight people who were spared from the flood. All of those years of preaching and example and the miracles of God produced no repentance on the part of the people of Noah’s time, not because of Noah’s lack of skill, or because of the lack of God’s provision for Noah, but because the hearts of the people of his time were hardened against God and against Noah’s message. It is this hardening of the heart, the same problem that the Judean elites had against Jesus Christ, that led to their judgment. And it is this problem that makes our own age so evil. Any sin can be repented of, if we seek God and if we are willing to open our heart to Him and to each other. But if our hearts are so hardened that we cannot recognize how we fail to love God and others as we ought, and leads to no pangs of conscience, no lamenting or mourning or reflection, then God cannot reach us, and we will not reach His kingdom.

It is that evil that we can and should reflect on. It is easy to see the hardness in the hearts of others. We see others view people merely as things, merely as conduits for their power, or as resources to be managed or controlled, or as objects of release or gratification, without any sense of love or respect or gratitude. We see the evil of others, and fear their evil against us, and so we harden our hearts against them and fail to see others as human beings created in the image of God and only see monsters and devils, not realizing that our hardness of heart is defiling the image of God in us because our love and compassion no longer flow for them. This is the sort of darkening and evil that none of us are immune to. Let us therefore respond to evil not with evil, respond to violence not with violence, but rather seek occasion to repent of our own hardness of heart, so that we may be like God, and may be lighthouses in a world of darkness rather than among those who angrily curse at the darkness while contributing to it through our own lack of love for God and each other.

[1] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/03/14/unless-you-enter-as-a-little-child/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/01/25/and-you-shall-be-fishers-of-men/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2014/06/15/you-brought-me-here/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2014/05/25/in-the-lions-den/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/12/07/i-love-to-be-the-underdog/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/11/03/young-samuel/