Genesis 7-8
Sunday Morning Bible Study
December 17, 2006
Introduction
God has given a warning that He would judge the earth because of their wickedness because …
(Gen 6:5 NKJV) …the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
Noah has been commanded to build a boat, a really big boat.
Genesis 7 – The Flood
: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.
We usually think of Noah only taking two of every animal – but he actually takes seven of each clean animal, the ones you could eat, and seven of each bird.
Was there room for all this on the ark?
The ark would have been 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high. The ark would have an internal volume of 1,518,750 cubic feet, or the equivalent of 569 standard railroad boxcars. If the average sized animal was the size of a sheep it means the ark could hold over 125,000 sheep. Assuming the shape of the ark to be rectangular there would have been over 100,000 sq. ft of floor space.
: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."
Noah was given a seven-day warning before the actual flood began.
:5 And Noah did according to all that the LORD commanded him.
:6 Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters were on the earth.
If you are trying to map out the chronology of the Bible, this is an important verse, setting the date of the flood at 1656 years after Adam’s creation.
: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.
Last week we noted that God promised to have the animals come to Noah (Gen. 6:20)
: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.
I’m going to “translate” the dates we’re given into our calendar, just for the sake of reference, but keep in mind, I’m not sure we know where in the year their calendar lined up, I’m just wanting to give us a picture of how long it took for the flood. So think of the flood as hitting on February 17.
There were two sources of water for the Great Flood of Noah.
Fountains of the great deep –
It is thought that there were “floodgates” at various locations of the earth, where the water came bursting out of.
Some have theorized that this is the origin of the Grand Canyon. Perhaps it didn’t take millions of years to carve out. Maybe just forty days.
The structure of the Grand Canyon is actually very similar to the canyons formed recently at Mount St. Helens.
An ICR article, dated July, 1986, written by Steven Austin, PhD., talks about the events that took place at Mt. St. Helens.
On the morning of May 18, 1980, at 8:32:17 a.m., an earthquake measuring five on the Richter scale shook its way up the mountain side. It dislodged the northern slope of the mountain, causing 1/2 cubic mile of landslide material to slide off the top of the mountain. 1/8 cubic mile of the landslide went into the Spirit Lake basin, displacing the water in some spots to over 860 feet above the pre-eruption level. Steam had been building up inside the volcano, and when the landslide moved out of the way, a blast equivalent to 20 million tons of TNT blast energy occurred. It leveled 150 square miles of forest in 6 minutes, enough trees to build 640,000 3-bedroom homes. The steam cloud moved north, 550 degrees Fahrenheit, at 200 mph. The volcanic eruption continued for 9 hours, with the equivalent of 400 millions tons of TNT blast energy, or 33,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs.
Six years later, scientists were finding some amazing things at the site including:
Strata - They were discovered “rapidly forming stratification”. You hear in school that the layers of earth seen on a mountain side would take millions and millions of years to accumulate. But at Mt. St. Helens, it took just days.
Erosion - They discovered “rapid erosion”. Take a tour of the Grand Canyon, and the guide will explain to you that it took millions of years for the Colorado River to carve out the huge canyon. But at Mt. St. Helens, the various flows of hot ash, water, or mud, would carve out their own canyons. One mudflow of March 19, 1982 cut one canyon up to 140 feet deep.
Coal birthing - The tree bark from the trees also settled to the bottom of Spirit Lake forming a layer of “peat”. Peat will turn into coal. The coal beds are thought to have taken a thousand years of peat for each inch of coal, while Spirit Lake is making its own coal bed rapidly.
The floodgates opening explains a lot about the earth.
Windows of heaven – water coming down like rain.
We talked about the water shield, the “canopy” suspended above the earth during creation.
It now is allowed to collapse, opening the “windows of heaven”, and with it, the protection given to the earth before the flood comes to an end. From this point on, we will see man’s lifespan decrease.
: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 is the 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.
God closed the door behind Noah.
: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.
:19 And 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.
Why should we believe in a worldwide flood? First, because the Bible talks about it. But there are also a growing number of scientists who are finding support for a worldwide, catastrophic flood.
From an article by Dr. Henry Morris, written in August, 1998 – he gave quite a few reasons, but here are some of the easier ones to understand …
1. Shells on mountain tops
All the mountains of the world have been under water at some time or times in the past. You can see this with the sedimentary rocks and marine fossils found near their summits.
2. Sedimentary rocks
Most of the earth’s crust is made up of sedimentary rocks (like sandstone, shale, limestone, etc.). These were originally formed in almost all cases under water, with material being deposited by water from various sources.
3. Fossils require rapid burial and pressure
The so-called “ages” of the sedimentary beds (which make up the “geologic column”) have been dated by the types of fossils found in the layers. But making a fossil requires rapid burial and pressure in order for the fossil to be preserved instead of being decomposed. This fits a “catastrophic” view of geology, the idea that there was a huge disaster that caused the layers, not millions of years.
4. Flood stories around the world
There are traditions of a great Flood found in hundreds of tribes in all parts of the world. This sounds like those tribes all originated from one family preserved through the disaster.
Dr. John Morris, in an article from 2001, discusses these traditions found around the world. He’s collected over 200 of these stories and analyzed them with statistics to show how many parts of the story are found in each tradition. When he puts the stories together, it sounds just like the Genesis record.
: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 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.
I mentioned earlier about the similarities of Mount St. Helens and the flood of Noah. The events on Mount St. Helens didn’t happen instantly, there were warnings.
In March, 1980, things started happening at Mount St. Helens. There were earthquakes, and bursts of steam at the volcano. In April of 1980, volcanic ash eruptions started. On the north slope of the mountain, a lava dome started forming, growing 3-5 feet per day. By the middle of May, 1980, the dome was growing up to 50 feet each day.
Geologists knew something was going to happen. The government started warning people to evacuate the area, telling them that danger was at hand.
An old man named Harry Truman (not the president) lived in a lodge north of the mountain, on the south shore of Spirit Lake. He was 80 years old, he didn’t want to move, and he didn’t think he’d be hurt. Nothing catastrophic had ever happened at Mt. St. Helens, and nothing ever would. He became a public figure as he was interviewed on news shows.
Then on the morning of May 18, 1980, at 8:32:17 a.m., it all fell apart.
57 people died, all had been warned in advance. Harry Truman was buried under 100 feet of landslide material and 100 feet of volcanic ash. He, along with the others, refused to pay heed to the warnings.
Lesson
Are you ready?
(2 Pet 3:3-7 NLT) First, I want to remind you that in the last days there will be scoffers who will laugh at the truth and do every evil thing they desire. {4} This will be their argument: "Jesus promised to come back, did he? Then where is he? Why, as far back as anyone can remember, everything has remained exactly the same since the world was first created." {5} They deliberately forget that God made the heavens by the word of his command, and he brought the earth up from the water and surrounded it with water. {6} Then he used the water to destroy the world with a mighty flood. {7} And God has also commanded that the heavens and the earth will be consumed by fire on the day of judgment, when ungodly people will perish.
I think we’re seeing some very clear signs that Jesus is coming soon. And when He comes, He’s coming to judge the earth. This time the earth won’t be destroyed by water, but by fire.
Are you ready for His return?
:24 And the waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days.
We often think that the flood was over after only forty days. But the forty days was the length of the rainstorm, not the length of the flood.
The earth remains under water for 150 days, five months beyond the 40 days.
Genesis 8 – The Flood ends
: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.
The ark comes to rest on July 17.
Where is the Ararat? I’m not sure we really know the answer to that.
For over seven hundred years, tradition has located the landing spot of Noah’s Ark on a mountain in eastern Turkey, a mountain referred to as Mount Ararat.
Recently there has been some suggestions that our location of Ararat in Turkey is wrong. In particular, a fellow named Bob Cornuke (The BASE Institute), sort of a modern Indiana Jones, has suggested another possible location in the Elburz Mountains of Iran, east of Tehran. You can go online and read about his research and his reasons for thinking this. He’s taken a couple of expeditions to the site, come back with samples of petrified wood, and pictures of an object located at 13,000 feet that looks to be the size of the Ark mentioned in Genesis. (show pictures of possible Ark – six slides)
Has the Ark been found? Mr. Cornuke is careful to say that it’s not certain yet. The folks at ICR are a bit skeptical. But it’s pretty interesting stuff!
: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.
October 1, they can see the tops of the mountains.
:6 So it came to pass, at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made.
Forty days after the mountains tops could be seen.
:7 Then he sent out a raven, which kept going to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth.
raven – A scavenger, it would have no trouble finding food and no qualms about perching on any slimy surface, so it apparently did not return to the ark
: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.
This is where the symbol of a dove with an olive branch in its mouth comes from.
The olive leaf showed that the vegetation had grown back enough to support the life being kept on the ark.
It would soon be safe to release the animals.
: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.
January 1, it seems that everything is dry.
:14 And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dried.
February 27, God speaks. Noah is still in the boat. It seems to me that Noah isn’t rushing to leave the ark.
: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.
: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."
God has brought them through. And Noah expresses thanks to God.
:1 Then God remembered Noah…
Illustration
THINGS OVERHEARD ON NOAH’S ARK
OK, who’s the wise-guy who brought the mosquitoes on board?
Help! I need some Pepto for the elephants, QUICK!
Don’t Make Me Pull This Ark Over And Come Back There!
And whatever you do, DO NOT pull this plug out.
Are We There Yet?
Lesson
Forgotten?
I know the Ark was a big boat. And I’m sure there was lots to do to keep Noah and his family busy. But I wonder what kinds of things they thought about during that long six months at sea. I wonder if they wondered if it would ever be over. So God wants to bring judgment and kill everyone. How long does that take? Can’t we get it over with? The fact that Noah kept track of the time tells me that he was watching the clock.
Do you ever wonder if God has forgotten you? Do you wonder why this difficult time just goes on and on and on?
Illustration
Listen to a teacup tell its story:
“There was a time when I was a red lump of clay. My master took me and he rolled me and he patted me over and over and over. I yelled out “Let me alone,” but he only smiled and said, “Not yet”. And then I was placed on a spinning wheel, suddenly I was spun around and around and around. “Stop it I’m getting dizzy,” I said. The master only nodded and said “Not yet.” Then he put me in an oven, I’d never felt such heat. I wondered why he wanted to burn me and I yelled and I knocked on the door and I could see him through the opening and I could read his lips. As he nodded his head he said “not yet.” Finally the door did open “whew”, and he put me on a shelf and I began to cool. “That’s better” I said. And then suddenly he grabbed me and he brushed me and he began to paint me all over. I thought I would suffocate, I thought I would gag, the fumes were horrible. And he just smiled and said, “Not yet”. And then suddenly he put me back into an oven, not the first one but one twice as hot, and I knew that I was going to suffocate. And I begged and I screamed and I yelled, and all the time I could see him through the opening, smiling and nodding his head, “Not yet, not yet.” And then I knew that there was no hope, I knew that I wouldn’t make it. I was just ready to give up when the door opened and he took me out and he put me on a shelf .Then an hour later he came back and he handed me a mirror and he said “Look at yourself”. And I did. And I said, “That can’t be me, I’m beautiful.”
Warren Wiersbe says that when God permits his children to go through the furnace, he keeps his eye on the clock and his hand on the thermostat.
God remembered Noah.
(Phil 1:6 NKJV) being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;
God remembers you.
