• A Prophetic Drama That Foreshadowed Survival
    The Watchtower—1974 | November 1

    • In this prophetic drama as being fulfilled just here in our day, what does Noah’s ark picture?

      17. During what period of time was Noah’s ark built, and what therefore does it picture for this day?

      17 Well, Noah built the ark with the help of his married sons, hence far less than a century before the deluge broke. So the ark building took place during the “time of the end” of that “ancient world.” So we must look for something special during this “time of the end,” a thing from which this present generation of mankind can benefit or take advantage of during the urgency of the times. By Scripture and fulfillment of Bible prophecy it has been well established that the “time of the end” of this present “world” began in the autumn of the year 1914, while World War I was raging. Noah’s ark would therefore picture that provision for survival that God makes through Christ for his faithful worshipers as the fiery end of this system of things draws near. That divine provision is the spiritual paradise into which God has brought his faithful worshipers since the year 1919 C.E., in which they live as his people restored to his favor and under his protection.

      18. When was the repentant remnant of the “Bride” class brought into this spiritual paradise, and how?

      18 This spiritual paradise of peace and security has certainly been built up on earth since the postwar year of 1919. During World War I and its hard times and persecutions for the Christian witnesses of Jehovah, they incurred a painful measure of divine disfavor due to their compromising course and other shortcomings as Christians. Jehovah God let them be brought into bondage to religious Babylon the Great and her political, military and judicial paramours. But in the postwar year of 1919 the repentant remnant determined to harmonize their united course of action with God’s revealed purpose according to the Bible knowledge that he began unfolding to them. So God graciously used his Son Jesus Christ like a modern-day Cyrus to release his repentant people from exile under Babylon the Great. (Isa. 44:28 through 45:6) After their restoration to peaceful relationship with Jehovah God in 1919, as it were to their God-given spiritual homeland, the spiritual paradise was built up, many congregations of Jehovah’s Christian witnesses being established around the earth.​—Isa. 35:1-10; Ezek. 36:35.

      19. What kind of beauty abounds in this spiritual paradise, and like what city of ancient Israel is it for the inhabitants?

      19 Here in this spiritual paradise, in the midst of this doomed polluted “world,” is where true spiritual beauty obtains, where the fruitage of God’s spirit comes to maturity. Peace and true Christian brotherhood obtain here, and each one seeks to build up the others spiritually and to prepare them against the oncoming day of Jehovah. (2 Pet. 3:14-18) Here, as it were, is their “city of refuge,” where they are safe from the Great “Avenger of Blood” who will execute Jehovah’s vengeance against all the bloodguilty “world” in the oncoming “day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men.”​—2 Pet. 3:7; Num. 35:12, 19-27.

      20. Who are pictured by Noah’s three sons and their wives, and how was their survival foretold in Revelation?

      20 The remnant of the “Bride” of Christ, pictured by Noah’s wife, are not the only ones now occupying this spiritual paradise, this location of restored peaceful relationship with God. Since the year 1935 there have come to this spiritual paradise those who were pictured by the sons of Noah and the wives of these sons. These are the prospective earthly children of the Eternal Father, Jesus Christ, the Greater Noah. The opportunity is set before them of surviving the world’s “great tribulation,” now so near, and so to them the prophetic picture given in Revelation 7:9-17 applies. They will be used to make up the “great crowd,” concerning which it is there said: “These are the ones that come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” (Rev. 7:14) They now join with the remnant of the “Bride” of Christ in worshiping at God’s spiritual temple.

      21. (a) For those in the spiritual paradise to survive the “great tribulation,” what must they do? (b) What forms of creature life will survive with them?

      21 For the sake of surviving the “great tribulation” all those now in the spiritual paradise must remain there, like Noah and his family in the ark, the door of which God shut behind them before the deluge burst upon the world. (Gen. 7:1) Only by remaining within God’s provided place of approval, favor and protection can they hope to survive the fiery destruction of the worldly system of things. With them there will also survive under God’s protection specimens of birds, flying creatures, land animals and fishes and other marine creatures, for the earthly survivors of the “great tribulation” will carry out the divine commission to have these lower forms of creature life in subjection for the preservation and good of these living creations of God.

      22. (a) In the deluge of Noah’s day, what happened to the Garden of Eden? (b) In the coming “great tribulation,” what will happen to the spiritual paradise, and why?

      22 The coming “great tribulation” will culminate in the fiery “war of the great day of God the Almighty” at Har–Magedon. (Matt. 24:21, 22; Rev. 16:14-16) For the worshipers of Jehovah, his Christian witnesses, to get safely through that tribulation, their symbolic ark, the spiritual paradise, must remain, with them staying inside. In the deluge of Noah’s day the Garden of Eden or Paradise of Pleasure, from which Adam and Eve had been expelled, was destroyed. But what about the spiritual paradise of the remnant and the “great crowd”? Like Noah’s ark, it will survive the fiery “day of judgment.” The impending “great tribulation” from Jehovah God is not meant to destroy the spiritual paradise of His worshipers, who have striven to preserve their spirituality and Christian integrity. It is meant to destroy the unparadise-like worldly system of things. After the spiritual paradise has survived the “great tribulation,” the surviving worshipers of Noah’s God, Jehovah, will devote their efforts to restoring the literal paradise to the cleansed earth under the “new heavens” of God’s Messianic kingdom.