“And 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.” (Genesis 6:3)
Genesis 6:3 shows us that God was running out of patience with man’s sin. His warning was: “My spirit shall not always strive with man.” The Hebrew word for “strive” is LOYADHON; it can mean “shield, abide in, or rule.” It can also mean “judge” as in “judge among.” The Holy Spirit was evidently working through men like Enoch and Noah to exhort the people to Godliness, but they didn’t heed the words of these preachers of righteousness. God’s mercy endures and endures and thus He gave them 120 years in which to repent. “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6:5)
Undoubtedly much of the 120 years had passed by the time 6:5 took place, for here God is conclusive in His judgment of man’s sinful condition: “… the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and…the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth…” He then proclaimed the terrible judgment that would soon ensue: “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth.”
James R. Spillman, in his masterful book, A Conspiracy of Angelsii, presents the persuasive possibility that the scapegoat is not actually a type of Christ. In English the goat is called scapegoat and in Hebrew he is called Azazel. Spillman describes this event and its meaning perfectly.