WHAT OF GODS MERCY?
God’s mercy regarding the Flood is just as evident as His judgment, and is seen in the fact that God provided a way of escape for those who were prepared to believe what He had said, heed the warning He gave, and avail themselves of the means of salvation which He provided by instructing Noah to build the Ark (Genesis 6:14-16). Noah is described as ‘a just man’, ‘perfect in his generations’, who ‘walked with God’,7 and who ‘found grace in the eyes of the Lord’ (Genesis 6:8-9); he was also ‘a preacher of righteousness’ (2 Peter 2:5). From this it is very reasonable to conclude that his messages, perhaps preached from the platform of the partially completed Ark, included warnings of the coming judgment and invitations to his listeners to avail themselves of the one means of escape, which he was constructing. In the event, Noah and his family alone had regard to the wrath of God, and only eight people boarded the Ark in faith and were saved—Noah, his wife, his three sons, and their three
