Lessons in the Ladder Days

Candace Long: I'm Candace Long with Lessons in the Ladder Days, offering biblical commentary to make sense of the times that we're living in. In thinking about the parallel between the days of Noah and the coming day of the Lord, the big question is who escapes the coming judgment and who will have to go through the seven years of tribulation?

Today's episode is called "Why So Few Were Saved." Now the word saved is a little misleading because its definition is so broad within mainstream Christianity. I dare say the majority of believers would define the word saved as anyone who asks Jesus into their lives regardless of how they conducted their lives on a day-to-day basis.

Now I'm not trying to make people doubt their salvation, but maybe it's wise to question it from time to time, especially in light of where we are in God's timetable. The Apostle Paul tells us in Philippians 2: "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." This infers that it's not a done deal.

There are three things we're going to touch on today. Number one, if the flood is a picture of the seven-year tribulation in the day of the Lord, then who will be rescued from having to go through it? Number two, what was it about Noah that pleased God so much? And number three, what qualities do we need to emulate to escape the tribulation?

At the time of the flood, there were basically three groups of people. Number one is referred to as the righteous, represented by Noah, a group of one. He stood apart from everyone else in this story. No one came close to his character and purity of spirit. Moses writes that Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

Something about Noah caused the Lord to notice him out of all of the people on the planet and deliver him without a scratch from the devastation that was coming. Group number two was referred to by God as the wicked. This group was huge. Let's look at who was in it and who was not.

As I mentioned in the episode called "The Nephilim UFO Connection, Part 2: The Alien Story," I recounted that all of the Nephilim who lived on earth during Noah's time were able to escape the flood in their rocket ships from space ports that they had built throughout the Near East in places such as Babylon, Egypt, and Jerusalem. Now if you're not familiar with that part of the story, I encourage you to listen to that episode because it's very enlightening and you'll find it on my podcast page at candacelong.com.

So all of the fallen angels who were on earth and who spread their wickedness and corrupted the entire civilization, these escaped death. Now the ones who were destroyed in the flood, however, were their descendants, everyone who carried their DNA inside of them. Jasher, the ancient historian, wrote there were 700,000 of them.

Now the Bible doesn't record an exact number, but what we know for certain is that group number two, known as the wicked, included everyone that was left on earth at the time that the waters began to rise except for eight people. Now what were these people like? Jesus said in Matthew 24 that in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark.

For these people, it was life as usual, even during the five years when Noah separated himself to build the ark. That meant that everyone but eight people lived however they wanted to live and did whatever they felt like doing. There were no sexual boundaries. They had affairs, wife-swapping parties, incest, and homosexual encounters. They were abusive, violent, and oppressive toward others.

They sacrificed their children by putting them to death. They gave allegiance to whichever god promised them power and position in society, and they took whatever they wanted through deception or force. And most important, their blood was contaminated and compromised by Nephilim DNA.

Group number three, I call the average. It contained the seven people who hung on to Noah. Now I don't put these people in group one because Noah was the one that stood out as perfect and blameless. But these seven were saved nonetheless because they followed the one person who walked with God.

They separated themselves too, but we don't have evidence to show they would have made that choice if Noah had not been leading them. Now most of them were his children and would one day have to prove themselves before God as either righteous or wicked. During the time I was researching this episode, one of the Sabbath teachings dealt with Noah and was very insightful.

The rabbis teach that Noah's three children are pictures or *tavnit* of these three groups of people mentioned earlier. Now remember with a *tavnit*, we have to look at the natural and then let it speak to us on a spiritual level. So let's look in the natural at the names of Noah's three children to see what God may be saying to us.

The original birth order of Noah's three sons was Japheth the firstborn, then came Shem, and Ham was the youngest. But I'm going to list them as the sages do because this is the order that Moses lists them in Genesis 9:18. "The sons of Noah who went forth from the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and from these, the whole earth was peopled."

Let's look at the name Shem. In Hebrew, the word means a mark of individuality or honor. Shem is listed first because Shem represented the lineage from which Messiah would come. And so the bloodline to the Jewish people passed from Noah to Shem and then to certain descendants who carried the promised seed. Not every descendant of Shem, you recall.

Abraham had two sons, Isaac and Ishmael, but Isaac was the descendant who carried the seed of promise, not Ishmael. Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau, and Jacob was the one who carried the seed of promise. The word Shem also means name, and Jews all over the world refer to the Lord as HaShem, the name, out of regard for the holiness of His name, which is unutterable.

The next name listed was Ham, Noah's youngest son. His name is really *Ham*, spelled C-H-A-M, and it literally means hot, referring to the tropical warm climate where his descendants settled. The word also has a secondary meaning of being easily inflamed, hot under the collar, and violent. The word *Hamas*, which has the same root as the name *Ham*, means to be violent and oppressive.

Now I need to say here we are looking only at the names of Noah's sons. This is where we find the picture and the insight. This is not meant to be looked at racially. Just as it would be wrong to say that all descendants of Shem were righteous and worthy of being saved, it would be wrong to say that all descendants of Ham were violent and oppressive.

The third name mentioned is Japheth or *Yafet*, who was Noah's firstborn. The name *Yafet* means expansion or widespread. It comes from the word *Patah*, which means to make room in a moral sense, meaning to be inclusive or politically correct. This word refers to certain character traits of beauty, unity, perfection, androgyny, one world, homosexuality, all of the qualities that we see in Hellenism which will play a key role in compromising and broadening the moral standards in the final days because Hellenism is what is at war with the narrow ways of Shem, whose name is a picture for God and His righteousness.

The Talmud says that Hellenism is beautiful on the outside, but inside is evil, full of deceit. That is *Yafet* in the world. So the sages teach that the names of Noah's children, who were charged with repopulating the earth after the flood, represent the three groups of people that will be on earth during the final days before the kingdom: the righteous, the wicked, and the average.

Now these same three groups are also found in the end times doctrine of our Jewish forefathers. We have discussed earlier that the day of the Lord will fall on Rosh Hashanah, which is Tishrei 1 in the Hebrew calendar, when the world has been in existence exactly 6,000 years. At that time, we will see God's dealings with three groups of people.

Group one is the righteous, those who are regarded as the Lord regarded Noah. These are taken right then on that very day to be with Messiah in heaven for seven years. Group two is the wicked, for whom the full wrath of God has been prepared since the foundation of the world. These will have to undergo seven years of the worst time in the history of the world, and those who survive will be sentenced to eternal damnation when Messiah comes.

And then there's group three, referred to in Jewish doctrine as the average. These are those who are not taken on Rosh Hashanah but who have to live through the seven years of tribulation and are given that period of time to repent. If they repent and give their lives fully to the Lord, then God promises those people divine protection even during the judgment, and they will come into the kingdom when Messiah destroys His enemies at the battle of Armageddon.

That happens at Yom Kippur in the year 6008. That date is the official second coming of Messiah when He steps foot on the Mount of Olives as Zechariah describes so beautifully in chapter 14. At that time, the gates to the kingdom will be closed and the Book of Life sealed. There will be no more time after that for God's mercy.

So if repentance has not come to the average by that time, they will be grouped with the wicked and prevented from ever entering the kingdom. Now understanding these three groups is important because God wants you to know where you stand in this evil day. You are important to Him. If you are not where you should be and worry you might be classified as average and have to go through the tribulation, then let's look at the three things that set Noah apart from everyone else so that we can become more like Noah.

Number one, Genesis 6 says that Noah was a righteous man. He was what's called a *Tzadik*. The Hebrew word means just and lawful, someone who is and does morally right things intrinsically. Righteousness was his nature. Remember Noah came from righteous ancestry. Methuselah was his grandfather, Enoch was his great-grandfather. His natural bent was doing the right thing.

Now I'm sure you've seen children who simply had a bent to do the wrong thing. You can lay out for them all day long what you want their behavior to be, but these children consistently look for ways around the right way and they are driven, almost like a compulsion, to do what's wrong and are even energized when they have succeeded in doing wrong and getting away with it.

That kind of behavior is the total opposite of a *Tzadik*. In Judaism, a *Tzadik* is considered a miracle worker in that everything out of his or her mouth is perfect. They are a direct pipeline to God and their actions 100% of the time are a reflection of His ways. Now that doesn't mean they never make mistakes because we all have a sin nature.

But *Tzadiks* have a strong sense of conscience. If they do something wrong, they know it instinctively and repent for it right then. Number two, the passage says that Noah was blameless in his generation. Now the word for blameless is *Tamim*, which means without blemish, entire, complete, sound as far as integrity is concerned.

No gray areas, no hidden agendas, no moral lapses that would shed a poor light on the person as a whole. Noah's behavioral report card was 100% true and right. And number three, it says that Noah walked with God. Now the Hebrew word for walk is *Halak*. It means to continually be conversant with God, to follow Him, to seek His direction in everything.

A person who walks with God knows Him so well you can sense His moods, His thoughts, His heart, and everything about His nature and His ways are imprinted inside of you. Maintaining intimacy with the Father is your priority above everything else. Let me share an interesting passage from Isaiah 54. In quoting the Lord, Isaiah wrote, "In a little wrath, I hid my face from you. But with everlasting love, I will have compassion on you. For this is like the days of Noah to me, as I swore that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth."

God is teaching us in this passage about His behavior. During Noah's time, the Lord felt wrath. He said, "In a little wrath, I hid my face from you." Now the term little wrath is a sarcastic Hebrew expression that's only used one time in scripture. The expression is *sheteph ketseph*, which means anything but little.

This wrath was a gushing forth of rage, an explosion of anger. God had a fit because the very next verse says, "For this is like the days of Noah to me." You see, God exploded and brought on the flood to cleanse the filth that covered the earth. And when He exploded, He hid His face from the people.

Now there's a key lesson here because this explosive rage will be seen again at the day of the Lord, and we're not far from that day. I believe what the Lord is saying is that His rage is building and He is hiding His face from us. I've heard a number of my ministry colleagues say that the Lord is quiet right now. He is hiding.

But others are misinterpreting His silence, assuming He doesn't see or care what they're doing because they're getting away with everything. But this is the test to see what we do when no one appears to be looking. God may be hiding, but He is watching to see whether we act badly or whether we choose to walk with him.

Before we close, let's look at four practical ways we walk with God. Number one, keep the communication lines with God open always. The biggest thing that we battle in our culture today is distraction. Spending time with the Lord every day is critical because His presence and His word is our spiritual food.

To walk with God is to talk over everything with Him. I've walked with God for over 50 years and this is one spiritual discipline I've found critically important. I show up before Him each day regardless of whether I feel like it or not. A recent example is that I was having problems with where to go next in this "Days of Noah" series.

I got stuck. I looked at the pile of notes that I had for different episode ideas, but I didn't have a peace about any of them. Now I could have tried to make something up. I mean, really, who would know? But I have learned that when I'm not hearing God, I go about life and do something else after telling Him specifically what I need and then keeping my ears open to hear answers when they come.

To do that, another one of my personal disciplines is to live in quiet. I don't clutter my mind or my home with noise because my ears are always waiting for His voice. The other morning, the answer came. I woke up with this phrase impressed in my spirit: what it means to walk with God. That was it. Simply an impression.

And when I began writing it down, suddenly the writer's block was gone. He wanted me to share with you this one small incident to illustrate what it means to walk with God: wait for Him to speak, stay connected, and trust the answer will come. Number two, defend His ways even if it makes you unpopular.

Noah confronted his culture, pleading with others to return to God. He knew what was coming. God had told him and he wanted them to repent. I attended a board meeting last month where we were to vote on long-range plans for the organization. And reading the proposal, my heart sank because I knew with everything in me that we don't have a long range.

The times have changed. The day of the Lord is almost here. Now this was a secular organization, so I had to be careful in how I responded. I wanted to reflect God's sense of urgency and be a witness to that, but I had to be mindful that many of them do not see what I see. I was stuck.

To do what the organization proposed would, in my opinion, steer our members in a wrong direction. I felt they need to have time to reflect on their life's work and focus their energies on creating a lasting legacy in the arts. The meeting did not permit any discussion. They merely wanted a rubber stamp.

And I wrestled for days over the meeting because I knew that once I spoke up and challenged the direction of the organization, I would be ostracized. And yet I had to take a stand. I sought the Lord for wisdom and ultimately wrote a letter to the president expressing my views of these latter days and said I could no longer support the direction the organization is going.

I submitted my resignation and wished them well. Number three, remove unnecessary distractions from your life. I have been a consultant for a secular international client for a number of years and the work they wanted me to do had no definitive end point. As I considered my role with them, I became conflicted because it was dishonest of me to pretend everything was life as usual.

I knew it was not. I therefore proposed a short-term project that I could commit to and explained that was the only way I felt comfortable continuing to work with them. If they wanted something longer term and loose ended, I encouraged them to find another consultant. And number four, do what you see the Father doing.

This is what Jesus said in John 5: "The Son does only what he sees the Father doing." So what did the Father do at the end of day six, which is where we are? We find the answer in Genesis 2, which tells us that right before God rested on day seven, the Sabbath, he did something very unique. It says that he ended or desisted from his work.

That means he ramped things down and brought closure to everything he had been intimately involved with creating and managing. In like manner, what the Lord has been showing me over the past year or so is to bring some semblance of closure to my life's work. What is it I really want to leave behind as my legacy?

My priority now is to spend my time wisely, always conscious of His coming day. In closing, I want to leave you with something that the prophet Micah wrote in chapter 6: "What does the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God." I want to thank you for listening.

As always, you'll find this episode and all the others on my podcast page at candacelong.com. Remember, no good thing does the Lord withhold from those who walk uprightly. I hope you join me again next time for Lessons in the Ladder Days. God bless.