AS IT WAS IN THE DAYS OF NOAH
Matthew 24:37-39
NET For just like the days of Noah
were, so the coming of the Son of Man will be.
(38) For in those days before the
flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until
the day Noah entered the ark. (39) And they knew nothing until the flood came
and took them all away. It will be the same at the coming of the Son of Man.
Much commentary has been made about “just as the days of
Noah were.” Although not everyone
agrees, many current commentators believe the “sons of God” referred to in
Genesis 6:3 were angelic entities Past
conservative exegetes would say the sons of God were the offspring of Seth and
the daughters of men (or humankind) were the female offspring of Cain.
the sons of God saw that the
daughters of humankind were beautiful. Thus they took wives for themselves from
any they chose. (Genesis 6:2 NET)
Enoch
Of course, the modern view is that “sons of God” equals
angelic beings referred to as Watchers in the book of Enoch, a non-canonical
book. Enoch gives much more information
and detailed action structures concerning this period of time. He lists angelic names, the number of those
involved, and the cosmetics, war implements, medicines, and drugs they imparted
to mankind. However, Enoch, as a person,
did not live past the flood and the survival of his writings beyond the flood
are unknown.
According to Enoch, the Watchers or fallen angelic
entities impregnated human women and produced offspring referred to as giants,
mighty men, or Nephilim. The
impregnation method of the Watchers has two viewpoints. The first is the usual (I hesitate to say
normal) system employed by normal people or animals. The second method would be either artificial
insemination or some type of DNA transfer.
These offspring were large individuals.
It is unknown if they were large babies or became extremely large after
birth. One commentator theorized they
were so initially large they had to be cut out by caesarian well before the end
of nine months but survived regardless.
But the LORD saw that the
wickedness of humankind had become great on the earth. Every inclination of the
thoughts of their minds was only evil all the time. The LORD regretted that he
had made humankind on the earth, and he was highly offended. (Genesis 6:5-6 NET)
The scripture as stated in Genesis 6:5 lets us known that
God saw the wickedness of the population but does not give much background
information concerning the source of the wickedness of their evil
thoughts. The Biblical narrative does
not contain any of the information supplied by Enoch, only that God was
offended by the wickedness and evil thoughts of humankind. It appears certain the wickedness of Noah’s
days was much greater than the current level of appalling atrocities found
today. It is believed the level of evil
will vastly increase in the coming years, particularly during the reign of the
beast (or antichrist).
A few exegetes teach the approaching “days of Noah” will
include the return of Watchers (fallen angels) and/or Nephilim to plague
mankind. The Nephilim are supposedly
dead. Enoch writes that they killed each
other and their non-human ungodly spirits are the current evil spirits and
demons. Commentators consider they
drowned in the flood. Regardless of the
nature of their death, the Nephilim are no more. Some consider Bigfoot and Yeti to be
survivors but one has never been produced.
According to the apostle Peter the Watchers (fallen angels) are now
imprisoned in Tartarus until the judgment.
For if God did not spare the
angels who sinned, but threw them into hell (tartaroo) and locked them up in chains in utter darkness, to be
kept until the judgment, and if he did not spare the ancient world, but did
protect Noah, a herald of righteousness, along with seven others, when God
brought a flood on an ungodly world, (2
Peter 2:4-5 NET)
tar-tar-o'-o From Τάρταρος Tartaros̄ (the deepest abyss of
Hades)
The
above verses from 2 Peter appear to be based on information contained from the
book of Enoch.
The Seventy Generations
Another semi-popular prophecy of Enoch concerns the
imprisonment of the Watchers and their final judgment at the end of 70
generations.
1 Enoch 10:11-15 And the
Lord said unto Michael: ‘Go, bind Semyaza and his associates who have united
themselves with women so as to have defiled themselves with them in all their uncleanness.
And when their sons have slain one another, and they have seen the destruction
of their beloved ones, bind them fast for seventy
generations in the valleys of the earth, till the day of their judgement and
of their consummation, till the judgement that is for ever and ever is
consummated. In those days they shall be led off to the abyss of fire: and to
the torment and the prison in which they shall be confined for ever. And
whosoever shall be condemned and destroyed will from thenceforth be bound
together with them to the end of all generations.
Although most do not consider this particular prophecy or
the book of Enoch as of any value, but there are some relatively important
internet writers who take this prophetic statement seriously, such as: Thomas Horn of Raiders News Network; Bob Schlenker,
of the Open Scroll Blog; and Steve Quayle; among others.
The above Enoch quote states the children of the Watchers
(Nephilim) will slay each other and the angelic Watchers will be bound for 70
generations until the day of their judgment.
There is, of course, much disagreement concerning the definition of a
generation or the length of a generation once the definition has been
chosen. Some say the length of a
generation is one’s lifespan such as 70 years, and others claim a generation is
the time period between a father and a child.
One reference, Craig Paardekooper, counted the generations between Enoch
and Jesus and arrived at a total of 70 – meaning there are 70 generations
between Enoch and Jesus in the book of Luke.
At His death, Jesus entered into the Abyss and judged the Watchers as
shown in the following scriptures.
In it he went and preached to
the spirits in prison, after they were disobedient long ago when God patiently
waited in the days of Noah as an ark was being constructed. In the ark a few,
that is eight souls, were delivered through water. (1 Peter 3:19-20 NET)
For if God did not spare the
angels who sinned, but threw them into hell and locked them up in chains in
utter darkness, to be kept until the judgment,
(2 Peter 2:4 NET)
You also know that the angels
who did not keep within their proper domain but abandoned their own place of
residence, he has kept in eternal chains in utter darkness, locked up for the
judgment of the great Day. (Jude 1:6
NET)
Jesus pronounced judgment on the Watchers and they will
supposedly be punished at the time of judgment (perhaps the White Throne
Judgment). Bob Schlenker believes these
Watchers will escape from the abyss through some entry system he refers to as a
temporary time reset that opens a stargate instigated by the CERN
supercollider.
Bob Schlenker: We've been
writing for years now about a time mission, appointed for the resetting of time
after it's hijacked temporarily for the purpose of releasing the antichrist anointing
agency and returning agents of judgment…..When time is temporarily hijacked,
one of the Enemy's agendas involves the time lock on a dimensional prison cell.
A key operation is the securing of the release of those responsible for the
Flood of Noah. We seem to be about half a millennium shy of their full sentence
of 70 generations, so that countdown timer needs to be zeroed out for an early
release. Seizing control over time will allow the Adversary to exercise a
degree of control over the stargates, for a brief season. This is actually all
part of the Sovereign God's plan.
Tom Horn seems to have either miscalculated the 70
generation time span or some reporter has hijacked the original Enoch quote and
attributed it to him.
Tom Horn Quote: “These
prophecies of Enoch mirror those of other apocryphal works, which indicate a
specific future date in which the Watchers will rise for a judgment that will
be ‘for ever and ever’ (Enoch 10:12) and also when the giant offspring of the
Watchers will return to wreak havoc upon earth.” “Because according to modern research, the
roughly estimated date for the biblical flood is between BC 2800 and 2900. When
you consider that a prophetic generation is 70 years based on Psalm 90:10 (‘The
days of our years are threescore years and ten’), Enoch’s 70 generations times
70 years equals exactly 4900 years forward from the flood, bringing us to the
current hour.
The following quote from Enoch 15:11 appears to follow
more precisely the Nephilim invasion envisioned by Tom Horn. As in Biblical scripture, there appears to be
quite a bit of difference in the several translation versions. Below is two different translations of the
same verse 15.
Enoch 15:11 (Version 1) And the spirits of the giants afflict,
oppress, destroy, attack, do battle, and work destruction on the earth, and
cause trouble: they take no food, [but nevertheless hunger]
and thirst, and cause offences. And these spirits shall rise up against the
children of men and against the women, because they have proceeded [from
them].
Enoch 15:11 (Version 2) They shall cause lamentation. No food shall
they eat; and they shall be thirsty; they shall be concealed, and shall not rise up against the sons of men,
and against women; for they come forth during the days of slaughter and
destruction. NOTE: the word “not” doesn’t
appear in all versions.
Locusts from
the Abyss
There are at least two possible last-days Nephilim
invasions presented in the book of the Revelation: the locusts and the horsemen. The hoard of locusts arising from the smoke
of the abyss (synonymous with Hades and the bottomless pit) are considered by
some to be either demons, evil spirits, or some type of demonic entity. These Revelation entities have a close
parallel to the locust swarm found in Joel 2 which do not act as normal insects
similar to the afore mentioned ones described in Revelation 9.
He opened the shaft of the abyss
and smoke rose out of it like smoke from a giant furnace. The sun and the air
were darkened with smoke from the shaft. Then out of the smoke came locusts
onto the earth, and they were given power like that of the scorpions of the
earth. (Revelation 9:2-3 NET)
The Revelation 9 locusts have: the shape of a horse; a golden crown-like
structure on their heads; faces as of men; hair as of a woman; teeth as a lion;
as a tail as of a scorpion. Their king
is the angel of the bottomless pit named Abaddon (Hebrew) or Apollyon (Greek). They appear to not be normal locusts. It has been suggested they are human created
chimeras and the abyss description is symbolic.
The 200,000,000
Horsemen of the 4 Angels
Four angels are bound in the Euphrates river. They have been prepared to kill 1/3 of the
remaining population of the earth. These
four angels have an army of 200 million horsemen whose origin is unknown. Some possible guesses by past commentators
include: a Chinese army; a Far East
combination army; hippies on Harley Davidsons; mechanized tanks; and a Nephilim
army from the abyss.
And the four angels were loosed,
which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to
slay the third part of men. And the number of the army of the horsemen were two
hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. (Revelation 9:15-16 KJV)
The riders had fiery red, dark blue, and sulfurous yellow
breastplates; the head of the horses looked like a lion’s head; fire, smoke,
and sulfur were emitted from the mouth of the horses; the horse’s tails are
like snakes.
Practical
Applications
I named this section “practical applications” because
there are several factors relating to the “days of Noah” that do not involve
Watchers, Nephilim, or demons.
Noah preached to the surrounding population during the
construction of the ark, and apparently no one paid any attention to his
warnings. Noah, his three sons, and
their wives were preparing for the coming judgment. Several aware individuals are preparing for
the coming wrath of God today, but most are not. It is highly possible that only a few readied
people will escape the coming wrath of the beast (antichrist) and later, the
wrath of God.
It has been commented by Dante Fortson, that the
protection of the ark for the 8 individuals may be a type of rapture and he
indicated a pretributional type.
However, I view it as a type of pre-wrath rapture. The Lord saw the universal wickedness and the
continual evil thoughts of everyone on the planet: this combined with the destructive, cannibalistic
nature of the Nephilim, according to the information supplied by Enoch, would make
the pre-flood era one of extreme tribulation.
A pre-wrath rapture appears to more aptly correspond to the ark as a
type of protection from the wrath of God designed to essentially destroy the
planet.
Noah and his family were storing food and supplies. We of today should be storing the Word of God
and supplying our life with attributes of the Kingdom of God.