Ready or Not

Jesus said that at the time of His return, it would resemble the time of Noah. Genesis 6 records this as a very wicked time: "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" (verse 5). Sin was full to the brim, almost like an overflowing trash can. That is what the world was like morally.

So God told Noah to build a really big boat—an ark—and in this ark, Noah would house his family and the animals while God judged the world with a mighty flood of rain.

And what was the reaction of the people living in Noah’s time? It was mockery. It had never rained up to this point. A water canopy covered the Earth, creating a greenhouse effect. But that canopy basically would be pierced, and God’s judgment would come by rain. The people didn’t believe it would happen, and they laughed at Noah and his boat and his predictions.

That is how people will react to believers before Christ returns. The Bible tells us that a specific aspect of the end times is that people will mock Christians who believe that Jesus will come back again. As 2 Peter 3:3–4 says, "Scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, ‘Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. . . . ‘ "

Of course, we see this happening right now. People say things like, "Oh, Jesus promised to come back, did He? Well, where is He?"

They didn’t believe it the first time. And they won’t believe it the second time either.