Genesis 4-7
Growing up, I never had a true understanding of what it meant to fear God. At church I learned that He is loving, kind, patient and consistent. If those are attributes of my God then why in any way would I have to fear Him?
Today, fearing God refers to a reverential awe. Reverential?? A feeling of deep respect and awe. But, 4000 years ago there was a very different meaning. Fearing God was simply that, fear. How can you not fear a God that opens the Earth to swallow people or sends plagues on countries and kingdoms? God has always been and will always be able to do all things except to force us into something. He gives us free will to choose, regardless of what is best for us.
Evil and crime was on the rise everywhere. Eventually, God said "ENOUGH!! The world is too evil!! My Spirit will no longer contend for your love." God wants to be first in all areas of our lives. When somethings becomes more important to you than God, you have just discovered your idol. From what we know about the world before the flood, the people there had many, many idols. So many of them in fact that He was only able to find ONE righteous man. So, Noah built a big boat and they survived the flood.
We still make some poor decisions that need to be dealt with. But, the beautiful thing about the love of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice is that when God sees us, He sees us through the blood of Jesus and cannot find sin in us. We don't need, and can never reach, perfection. But we don't have to. When we come to Him in the storms and floods and disasters in our lives, not only will He give us plans to build our own ark, but He will also ride with us when its time to board.
Thank you Father.