What does it mean that Noah was a preacher of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5)?

First there was Noah, called in 2 Peter 2:5 "a preacher of righteousness." We do not read that he was a proclaimer of good things or that he invited men to take refuge in the Ark. He bore his testimony in "the world of the ungodly" and presented righteousness as God's demand. If the hundred and twenty years of Genesis 6:3 be the period of God's patience, before the Flood was sent, then Noah preached for a hundred and twenty years without making a single convert. Up to the time of his entering the Ark, Noah was the one man that was righteous in the sight of God (Genesis 7:1).

How is Noah described? As "a preacher of righteousness." Noah was not a preacher of grace. The grand truth that Noah proclaimed was that God was going to destroy the world by the deluge. That was exactly the right message. I do not think we are entitled to say he said nothing more, but the characteristic of Noah was that he was "a preacher of righteousness." This is precisely what occurs in Peter; he does not bring out the grace of God at all, in his chapter. He is thundering at unrighteousness. He is giving with that trumpet of righteousness a very clear sound indeed. He is evidently giving out, in very dark and solemn words, the destruction that shall await the wicked at the great change; and he shows that the same thing has happened before, and he begins, as far as man is concerned, not with Israel saved out of Egypt by God, but looks at the whole world destroyed. He is looking at the universality of unrighteousness, and not at the gradual departure of the people that were saved, saved first and lost afterwards. "He saved Noah, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly." Peter then looks at the cities of the plain — more particularly Sodom and Gomorrah. He does not say anything about the special iniquity, but looks at it in a general way. "And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned [them] with an overthrow, making [them] an ensample unto those that after should live ungodlily; and delivered just Lot vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked. For that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds" (2 Peter 2:4-8).

Noah, we read, was a preacher of righteousness. He was constantly bearing witness in the midst of an ungodly world of impending judgment. He was "moved with fear." He realized that it was "a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" that there must be shelter from the impending judgment; he believed God, therefore he prepared the ark, to the saving of his house. The effect of that was to condemn every one who refused to believe that the flood was coming and accept the shelter which God had provided. Thus he was "a preacher of righteousness."

Verse 13 makes it plain that Noah and his family entered the ark on the very day that the storm broke. Noah had been a preacher of righteousness, just as Enoch had been a prophet of the Advent. He is the first preacher of whom we have any record, and his theme was that which stands in the very forefront of the Gospel that is preached today, as Romans 1:17 declares. Only today, it is God's righteousness revealed in Christ and established in His death and resurrection, which is presented as the basis of blessing for men. Noah had to preach God's righteousness as outraged by man's violence and corruption, and demanding judgment. Still to the very last day the door of the ark stood open, and nothing would have prevented a repentant man from entering, had such an one been found.

While Noah built the ark, he was a "Preacher of Righteousness". With his hand he was driving a nail, but with his mouth he was saying: "Judgment is coming. God will destroy the world with a flood. All will be drowned. Come, come quickly into the ark." But they did not believe. "They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all." (Luke 17:27) Did they not know? It was not a few days or months that Noak took to build the ark: but 120 years. I think that he built it on dry land. Did not the people walking past see it? Noah preached and warned. Did not the neighbours hear? "Everything is ready. The ark is big and strong, with plenty of room and food. You have no need to do anything but come. All are welcome! Everybody, come into the ark; so that all may be saved!" Perhaps they said, "No, Noah, you have said this for many years. The flood has never come: we are not afraid." Or "Today we cannot go in. Wait. We will not get ready yet. Maybe tomorrow."

The message of Noah resembled that of John the Baptist rather than that of Paul. Not grace, but righteousness, characterised it. Of Noah it is written that he was "a preacher of righteousness" (2 Peter 2:5), and of the Baptist the Saviour said, "John came to you in the way of righteousness" (Matt. 21:32). Judgement was coming and it was Noah's solemn business to announce it, if haply men would turn to God in repentance. Alas, he was met everywhere with disobedience while the long-suffering of God waited (1 Peter 3:20).

Verse 7. The days of Noah fell upon the close of God's forbearance with the former world. The rapture of Enoch had been succeeded by long centuries of human progress. God's acts and promises were become an empty tradition, which no man heeded save the vessel of His grace, whose ear was opened to receive the warning that the judgment long before denounced was in a little while to be inflicted. The effect of faith in Noah was to fill his soul with godly fear. God announced the certainty of coming wrath, and indicated the sole means of preservation. Noah's personal character was no exemption from the threatened flood. His life and safety were dependent solely upon his obedience to the warning voice of God. Because he believed in God he hearkened to this special revelation. Humbling himself beneath His mighty hand, he entered on a new and unexampled kind of testimony, whereby, as a preacher of righteousness, in act as well as word, he strove to turn the world to God. He preached for many days. For the ark was long preparing. God's long-suffering endured till the predicted time was come. And then, because none believed what all had heard, wrath came without a remedy. Noah was shut into the ark before God brought His word to pass. God shut him in. He made secure His own work of salvation, before He laid His judgment on the works of men.

Hebrews 11:7 tells us that “Noah … prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he CONDEMNED THE WORLD and became the heir of the righteousness which is by faith.” The lines on which Noah acted are well worth our careful consideration. His condemnation lay rather in what was positive than negative. By negative I mean it was not by rebuking the actions of the wicked that he condemned the world. That would be comparatively easy, and place him on the judgment seat. But he condemned the world by his actions, by his life. That is a higher thing, and reveals the whole spring of his being—faith. By mouth he was a preacher of RIGHTEOUSNESS, he placed what was positive before his hearers; by action in the preparing of the ark be passed a long, drawn-out positive condemnation upon the world.

When the Lord said, "My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years" (Gen. 6:3), the reference is, we believe, to Noah's preaching. The Spirit of Jehovah, in Genesis, and the Spirit of Christ, in 1 Peter 1:11 and 1 Peter 3:18, are identical. Being a Divine Person, the Holy Spirit can be characterized in these different ways, and in many other ways besides. Through Noah's words the Spirit was striving with men, and there was not only the warning of the coming flood but also the preaching of positive "righteousness." The earth in those days was filled with flagrant unrighteousness, which expressed itself in both violence and corruption of a most fearful sort. Noah might very well have been tempted to spend all his time declaiming against the evil, which would have involved him in a negative kind of testimony. Instead of this he preached what was positive.

In that he is a great example to us upon whom the ends of the ages are come. The times of the Gentiles are going to end with conditions similar to the days of Noah, only with an accentuated ungodliness. Many good Christian folk seem to have been tempted to spend their choicest energies in protesting against various evils. We know quite well that we should "reprove" the "unfruitful works of darkness" (Eph. 5:11), but all the same our choicest energies should be expended in preaching the gospel, wherein the righteousness of God is made known. In this age the evangelist is a preacher of righteousness in a sense altogether unknown in the days of Noah.

Had Noah merely denounced the unrighteousness of his age, he would have condemned the existing state of things without indicating what was right. As it was, he condemned it by the simple preaching of righteousness. In the light of what was right, the wrongness of existing things was plainly seen. Yet our verse in Hebrews 11 does not tell of how he "condemned the world" by what he said, but rather by what he did. Men are more impressed by our actions than by our words.

We read, "God said to Noah, The end of all flesh is come before Me" (Gen. 6:13). These words clearly intimated that God had condemned the world, and it was only a matter of time for the judgment to fall. Noah realized that the sentence of doom had gone forth from God's lips: he accepted it, and in his turn he condemned the world by building the ark as a refuge from the coming disaster. Every nail, as he drove it home, was a token of salvation for himself and his house, but a token of condemnation for the world: it made the cleavage between himself and the world more pronounced. Has not this a great voice for our hearts to-day?

God gave men then space to repent during an hundred and twenty years, and at the same time bade Noah build the ark. The point was this, judgment was coming, but there was time given in which to build that ark. And Noah built it. And now observe what goes on all that while. The Spirit of God was striving with men, who were living carelessly, while Noah was preaching and building at the same time. He was a preacher of righteousness. He was in the truth that he preached. He was a saint, and he stood a witness for God. "By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house" (Heb. 11:7).

Noah obeyed God, and preached to men. The men of the world were heedless and disobedient. God's Spirit began to strive quietly. He is doing the same now. No one saw it then. No one sees it now. Take care lest you resist that Spirit once too often. Well, Noah began to preach righteousness. What did the people say? "We do not believe in that." But what was the next thing? He began to build the ark. And here is where the power, wisdom, and triumph of faith came in. Hundreds of miles away from a lake or the sea, this man begins to build this ark. What mean you by this, Noah? There is judgment coming — is his reply. What is this for? An ark of salvation. I do not suppose the men of the world thought it was built on right lines. But he did not care one bit for that. God had given him the lines on which to build (vers. 14-16), so he cared not how they criticised his ark.

Every time his hammer gave a blow, and drove a trenail, do you know what that blow said? Judgment is coming. And so he went on. How long? Till people said, What an idiot to build a ship and no water to float it in within hundreds of miles. But on he went with his building and preaching. And by-and-by this immense vessel is reared. Doubtless curiosity took many people to see it. Perhaps the lad of ten, the father of fifty, and the grandfather of one hundred and more years saw it together. "What is that?" says the little boy. "That is Noah's ark," says the grandfather, "that he has been building away at for about one hundred and twenty years. When I was young he was at it then, and he has always been talking about judgment coming. One hundred and twenty years have cone by, and nothing has happened. Was there ever such a fool?"