J esus C hrist is com ing back again some day, to judge the nations and the world for their ungodliness and wickedness and disregard for God and His Word. This day of judgment is called in scripture, “ the day of the Lord,” “ day of the Son of man,” “ the tribulation,” the “ day of vengeance of our God,” “ the time of Jacob’s trouble” and many other highly descriptive, colorful names. The de scription of this awful day of Judgment occupies a large part of Scripture revelation, in the Old as well as the New Testament. All one needs to do is to read the scores and scores of passages about the “ day of the Lord” in the Old Testament. Jesus gave an elaborate description of this coming day in Matthew 24 and Luke 21. Almost the entire Book of the Revelation is occupied with a dramatic description of this terrible Tribulation day. This day of judgment, “ the day of the Lord,” will be ushered in at the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. There are two periods of history which, according to our Lord, are first, the flood of Noah, and second, the destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. When the disciples asked Jesus, “ Tell us, what shall be the sign of thy coming and the end of the world?” , He gave them a long list of signs, political, economic, moral, industrial and spiritual, which would announce the imminent coming of Christ and the Day of the Lord. He refers us to just two periods of history in which all of these things were also present. These two periods of history are the flood of Noah and the destruction of Sodom and the cities of the plain. Just before the return of our Lord and the judgment of the Tribulation period, the days of Noah and the days of Lot, according to Christ, will be repeated. Remember, “ As it was in the days of Noah, and the days of Lot, so shall it be in the day of the coming of the Son of man.” A ll we need to do, then, is to study the brief record of the days of Noah and of Lot, occupying less than a half-dozen chapters in the Bible, to find out what to look for just prior to Christ’s return. When these days are being repeated, Jesus will come, according to His own promise. The striking thing about all this is that the days of Noah and Lot are being repeated before our eyes. The days of Noah and Lot may be summed up under five primary headings, according to Christ. 1. It was an age of appetite. They were eating and drinking, the implication being that this was their main purpose in life. 2. It was an age of sex. They married and were given in marriage. We shall see how true this was in the days of Noah, in the days of Lot and in the present day. 3. It was a day of commercialism. Jesus adds signifi cantly, “They bought, they sold.” It was, therefore, an age of big business, and of general trading. 4. It was an agricultural age. “ They planted,” says Jesus. It was an age of great agricultural surpluses. We shall say more on this in a moment. 5. It was a construction age, for Jesus says, “ They builded.” These are the five things which Jesus mentions. We have but to turn to the Old Testament to find the record, and then to our newspapers, to see what it is the same thing again today. We may well call this the age of appetite, of sex, of commercialism, of agriculture, of building and construction. See the Record When we turn to Genesis chapter 4, which records the history of man just prior to the flood, we find the record of this age to which our Lord Jesus Christ refers
by Dr. M. R. DeHaan
And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and de stroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed (Luke 17:26-30).
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THE KING'S BUSINESS
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