After the Flood

A few time frame to note about the Great Flood. Incidentally, other cultures also have the legend of the Great Flood in them. In some Bible commentary, the Great Flood is believed to occur around 2319BC. From the Scripture, the Flood consisted of non-stop rain for 40 days and 40 nights. Then it took another 150 days for most of the water to recede. And it was a little time more before it was dry enough for Noah to come out.

The Flood was so great that it covered the Earth and took almost more than half a year to dry. Also Noah had to sent some birds out to see if there was dry land, imagine the view from the Ark is essentially looking out into the ocean, and Noah may not know there was dry land over the horizon. If we ask how could 40 days of rain produced so much water, then in v2, the answer is that the Flood is caused by rain (windows from heaven) as well as water coming out from underground (fountains of the deep).

One of the very first thing Noah did was to worship God. Noah also sacrificed some of the animals he brought into the Ark. Perhaps this explains God asked him to take 7 pairs of some animals while only one pair of others.

God was so moved by His actions on the magnitude of the Flood that he promised that there will never be such an event again. So in the tribulation, armageddon and other end times events, God will not try to destroy people, but rather His Will is to save as many people as possible before that Great Day (see 2 Peter 3 below).

Genesis 8

Noah’s Deliverance

 ¹ Then God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the animals that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters subsided. ² The fountains of the deep and the windows of heaven were also stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained.³ And the waters receded continually from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters decreased. ⁴ Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.
⁶ So it came to pass, at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. ⁷ Then he sent out a raven, which kept going to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth. ⁸ He also sent out from himself a dove, to see if the waters had receded from the face of the ground. ⁹ But the dove found no resting place for the sole of her foot, and she returned into the ark to him, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her, and drew her into the ark to himself. ¹⁰ And he waited yet another seven days, and again he sent the dove out from the ark. ¹¹ Then the dove came to him in the evening, and behold, a freshly plucked olive leaf was in her mouth; and Noah knew that the waters had receded from the earth. ¹² So he waited yet another seven days and sent out the dove, which did not return again to him anymore. 
¹³ And it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, that the waters were dried up from the earth; and Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and indeed the surface of the ground was dry. ¹⁴ And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dried. 
¹⁵ Then God spoke to Noah, saying, ¹⁶ “Go out of the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you. ¹⁷ Bring out with you every living thing of all flesh that is with you: birds and cattle and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, so that they may abound on the earth, and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” ¹⁸ So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him. ¹⁹ Every animal, every creeping thing, every bird, and whatever creeps on the earth, according to their families, went out of the ark.

God’s Covenant with Creation

   
²⁰ Then Noah built an altar to the LORD, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. ²¹ And the LORD smelled a soothing aroma. Then the LORD said in His heart, “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done. ²² “While the earth remains,
      Seedtime and harvest,
      Cold and heat,
      Winter and summer,
      And day and night
      Shall not cease.”

2 Peter 3

⁵ For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, ⁶ by which the worldthat then existed perished, being flooded with water. ⁷ But the heavens and the earth which are now preserved by the same word, are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
⁸ But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. ⁹ The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us,^[b] not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

The Great Flood

Interesting to see the Movie 2012, that the best solution to save humanity was to build the Arks. Of course this was God's idea to save mankind during the Great Flood. We have to keep two things in mind when reading this. God's resolve to destroy all living things, even man which he created personally and was described as "All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit". God is a just God and he had just reasons for such a devastating judgement, even on man whom he loved dearly.


However, we see that God also keeps His promise in Genesis, that out of a woman would come the saviour of the world. And in his perfect timing, he found his perfect man in Noah (not that he was 100% perfect) who walked with God and different to the rest of the others. In contrast to His terrifying judgement, we also see his truly loving side in wanting to preserve His Creation which included man as well as the animals.




Genesis 7 
 ¹ Then the LORD said to Noah, “Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation. ² You shall take with you seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two each of animals that are unclean, a male and his female; ³ also seven each of birds of the air, male and female, to keep the species alive on the face of all the earth. ⁴ For after seven more days I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and I will destroy from the face of the earth all living things that I have made.” ⁵ And Noah did according to all that the LORD commanded him. ⁶Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters were on the earth.
⁷ So Noah, with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives, went into the ark because of the waters of the flood. ⁸ Of clean animals, of animals that are unclean, of birds, and of everything that creeps on the earth, ⁹ two by two they went into the ark to Noah, male and female, as God had commanded Noah. ¹⁰ And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were on the earth. ¹¹ In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. ¹² And the rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights. 
¹³ On the very same day Noah and Noah’s sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them, entered the ark— ¹⁴ they and every beast after its kind, all cattle after their kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of every sort. ¹⁵ And they went into the ark to Noah, two by two, of all flesh in which isthe breath of life. ¹⁶ So those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him; and the LORD shut him in. 
¹⁷ Now the flood was on the earth forty days. The waters increased and lifted up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. ¹⁸ The waters prevailed and greatly increased on the earth, and the ark moved about on the surface of the waters. ¹⁹And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. ²⁰ The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered. ²¹ And all flesh died that moved on the earth: birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man. ²² All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit^[a] of life, all that was on the dry land, died. ²³ So He destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground: both man and cattle, creeping thing and bird of the air. They were destroyed from the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive. ²⁴ And the waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days.