The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination and intention of all human thinking was only evil continually, and the Lord regretted that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved at heart; so the Lord said I will destroy, blot out, and wipe away mankind, whom I have created from the face of the ground- not only man, [but] the beasts and the creeping things and the birds of the air- for it grieves Me and makes me regretful that I have made them (Genesis 6). However, Noah was found righteous before the Lord; he and his family were saved from the flood which destroyed the entire earth. Many years of Noah’s warning the people of the coming judgment from the Lord, didn’t turn their hearts to God. Consequently, God destroyed everything, man, vegetation, and animals through a great flood. He preserved the animals, which came to Noah on the last days before the flood came. After Noah and his family, together with the animals entered the ark, the rain started to fall; people assembled together to plead with Noah to open the ark; Noah then answered them with a loud voice, saying, “Have you not all rebelled against the Lord, and said that he does not exist? Therefore, the Lord brought upon you this evil, to destroy and cut you off from the face of the earth” (Jasher 6:18-19).
The Bible says that the Lord is longsuffering and compassionate. Amazingly so! Reason why the world has not been destroyed. Time and time again, God sends prophets, preachers, and messengers to warn of coming judgments, so men will repent and be saved from the destruction. He spared Nineveh, an Assyrian wicked city at the last moment, in which more than 120,000 persons did not know their right hand from their left, and also many cattle (Jonah 4:11). God was concerned even for His creation as in the animals, not accountable for sin. Sodom and Gomorrah and other cities became exceedingly wicked before the Lord. They provoked Him through their abominations; their wickedness was great before the Lord. The time came when the Lord rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heavens. He overthrew, destroyed and ended those cities, and all the valley and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But God saved Lot and his family by removing them from the path of the city’s destruction.
Light from the Word 