A Study of the Book of Genesis Sermon #8. Noah and the Flood Genesis 6:11-8:15

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1 A Study of the Book of Genesis Sermon # Bt Se Noah and the Flood Genesis 6:11-8:15 Most modern day intellectuals look at the Genesis account of a world-wide Flood at best as a myth and at worst as a children s fairy-tale. The fact of the historical truth of a world-wide flood has confirming verification even outside the Bible. The Biblical teaching concerning a world-wide flood seems to find corroboration in the flood traditions found to exist all over the world, on every continent and in nearly every culture. Tim LaHaye and John Morris have done a great job in collecting the worldwide flood traditions in their book The Ark on Ararat. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, pp ) One interesting insight that can be draw from this study is that the farther one gets (geographically) from the place where the story originated the more difference one finds in the story. But of even greater importance to us as Christians is the fact that the writers of the Bible did not view it as a myth or fairy tale.the prophet Isaiah referred to Noah in his prophecy (Isaiah 54:9). The prophet Ezekiel twice mentions Noah as one of the most righteous men in history (Ezekiel 14:14, 20). In the New Testament Peter twice mentions Noah (1 Peter 3:20, 2 Peter 2:5). And most importantly of all the Lord Jesus Christ accepted the account of Noah and the Ark as real (Matthew 24:37-39, Luke 17:26), so one cannot doubt the story of the Flood without discredit-ing Jesus Christ Himself. Let s begin reading in verse eleven, The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. (12) So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. (13) And God said to Noah, "The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. (14) "Make yourself an ark of gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. (15) And this is how you shall make it: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. (16) You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above; and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. (17) And behold, I Myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die. 1

2 (18) But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall go into the ark--you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you. (19) And of every living thing of all flesh you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. (20) Of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. (21) And you shall take for yourself of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to yourself; and it shall be food for you and for them." (22) Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did. First, The Provocation of the Flood (6:5, 11-12) In Genesis 6:5 we learned that it was the unparalleled immorality of man that was the reason for the Flood. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. In verses eleven and twelve we again are told, The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. (12) So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. The word translated corrupt (Hebrew shachath) is a very strong term and is often translated as ruined or destroyed. God said that man had through sin ruined or destroyed God s creation. So now God decides to destroy the earth. Think of what this means. Homes washed away, entire cities destroyed. Men, women and children vanishing beneath the waves as the entire Earth disappears under the waters of judgment. Nothing like it had happened before and nothing like it has happened since. It was a catastrophic judgment that enveloped the entire globe and washed away every vestige of human civilization. Second, The Postponement of the Flood God would certainly have been in His rights to have immediately carried out His judgment of sin given the gravity of man s sin according to Genesis 6:5. But instead God graciously gave man over 120 years to repent. The entire time Noah and his sons worked on the construction of the Ark (120 years), Noah also preached and warned of God s coming judgment. The book of Jude records the prophesy of Enoch, Behold, the Lord comes (15) to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him. (Jude 14-15). Enoch even prophesied of the future in naming of his son, Methuselah means when he is dead, it shall be sent. Peter under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit wrote, who 2

3 formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. (1 Peter 3:20) Now we need to remember that that Genesis 6:8 says, But Noah found grace in the sight of the LORD - he did not earn it he found it! Noah was not saved because he was worthy, or because he so much more righteous than everyone, he was saved by grace. But even God s grace does have a limit. In Noah s day, it was 120 years. The flood came and everyone was lost except Noah and his family. In the Roll Call of Faith found in the book of Hebrews we read. By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith. (Hebrews 11:7) God told Noah that there would be a flood and Noah believed. Yet if Noah has said I believe God that a flood is coming but had not followed through in obedience he would not have been saved. Verse twenty two of the text says, Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did. There were no physical signs that a flood was coming. The natural course of the seasons continued as they always had. Third, The Preparation for the Flood (6:14-16) The Hebrew word translated Ark is used in only two places in the Old Testament. In both places it basically means box or container. The only other occurrence of this particular Hebrew word comes in Exodus 2 where it refers to the basket in which the infant Moses was placed when his mother hid him in the bulrushes. The Building of the Ark Of course the greatest preparation was the construction of the Ark. God Himself gives Noah the construction details of building the Ark in verses fourteen through sixteen. "Make yourself an ark of gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. (15) And this is how you shall make it: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. (16) You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above; and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. The most crucial question in determining the size of the Ark is, How long is a cubit? I have been told that a cubit is the measurement from tip of your longest finger to the elbow. Now obviously that dimension can vary significantly from one individual to the next. The opinions of the length of a cubit are between 18 to 20 inches, with 18 inches being the length 3

4 most bible scholars believe to be the biblical cubit. Using an eighteen inch cubit the Ark would have been 450 ft long, 75 ft high and 45 ft wide. The Scripture gives no clue about the shape of Noah s Ark beyond the proportions of length, height and width. That means it was long and narrow and relatively low-slung, basically a floating barge. The Ark was designed for capacity and floating stability rather than speed and navigability. Various engineering studies have revealed that such a design ratio produces a vessel that is incredibly stable and almost impossible to capsize. The basic design is very similar to the massive supertankers that ferry oil from the Middle East to North America in our day. Again using the 18-inch cubit, and allowing for three floors inside the ark (v. 16), it contained at least 100,000 square feet of floor space, equivalent to 20 full-size basketball courts. Total storage space was over 1.5 million cubic feet, roughly the capacity of 569 standard railroad cars. The Gathering of the Animals (vv ) And of every living thing of all flesh you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. (20) Of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. (21) And you shall take for yourself of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to yourself; and it shall be food for you and for them." The simple command of God was for Noah to take into the Ark two of every sort. [NASB has kind ](v. 19.), today we would probably use the word species. For example Noah would not have to take one every vary of dog but just one pair of dogs, all dogs are just a variety of this one species. True species are few, varieties are many. That brings us to a question we cannot answer with certainty: How many animals were on the ark? We know that Noah was told to include a male and female of all the land animals. Since Noah would have to bring only two of every species, not two of every variety onto the Ark, some authorities suggest that the total number of animals would have been no more than 2,000. Others suggest as many as 16,000. But suppose the number equals 50,000. Would the ark have been large enough to accommodate them? The following quote comes from the Christian Answers website: Remember there are really only a few very large animals, such as the dinosaur or the elephant, and these could be represented by young ones. Assuming the average animal to be about the size of a sheep and using a railroad car for comparison, we note that the average double-deck stock car can accommodate 240 sheep. Thus, three trains hauling 69 cars each would have ample space to carry the 50,000 animals, filling only 37% of the ark. This would leave an additional 361 cars or enough to make five trains of 72 cars each to carry all of the 4

5 food and baggage plus Noah s family of eight people. The Ark had plenty of space. [ Could Noah's Ark really hold all the animals that were supposed to be preserved from Flood? ] When the evidence is fairly considered, it is clear that the ark was easily large enough to deliver Noah and his family and the land animals safely through the flood. Down through the years there have been many expeditions to find the Ark. The site traditionally linked to the Ark s location is Mt. Ararat, located in eastern Turkey near the borders of Armenia and Iran. The Bible only reveals that.the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat. (Genesis 8:4) The Bible does not mention its survival or its discovery. Indeed, in the view of glaciers, earthquakes and other destructive forces of nature, the Ark could only exist today if it were supernaturally preserved by God. But as Christians our confidence in the validity of the story of Noah s Ark does not rest in whether or not a discovery is ever made of the existence of the Ark today, our confidence rest in the account of the Ark that is given to us in the Word of God. Fourth, The Punishment of the Flood (7:11-25) It is Inescapable We need to get past just thinking of the Flood in the sense that one day it gently began to rain. This was a cataclysmic and terrifying judgment of God -unparalleled in human history. In Genesis 7:11 we read that, 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. Let s see if we can get a mental picture of what is happening. Great earthquakes rock the Earth, which cause the shifting of Teutonic plates, displacing massive amount of water, huge tsunami like walls of water slam into the shores, huge geysers open in the Earth s surface spraying tons of water skyward, the vapor canopy which covered the earth plummets to the ground. As the Flood began even the wicked generation of Noah finally realized before they perished that they had fallen under the hands of a living God who they had steadily refused to acknowledge or serve. Although it could not have been long before all were drowned they may have been scenes similar to those portrayed in the coming judgment in Revelation 6: In that future judgment, this time by fire, men seek to hide themselves in dens and caves saying, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! (17) For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand? (Revelation 6:16-17) The flood is inescapable and everyone and everything on Earth not in the Ark perished. Note the phrases, all flesh (Genesis 6:17, 7:21) everything that is on the earth (Genesis 5

6 6:17, 7:21), all living things (Genesis 7:4, 23), every man (Genesis 7:21), all that was on dry land (Genesis 7:22) In little more than a month water covered every inch of the earth to a depth of 15 cubits [some 22 feet] (Genesis 7:20). The Flood was so destructive that it is stated, And all flesh died that moved on the earth: (23) So He destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground: They were destroyed from the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive. (Genesis 7:21, 23) The timeline of the flood was; for 40 days the rain and rise of waters continue (7:17-20), 150 days after the rains stopped the ark touched ground (8:3-4), after ten more weeks the tops of the mountains became visible (8:5), and after twenty more weeks it was safe to disembark (8:14-15). So slightly over a year passes from beginning (7:11) to waters had dried up. (8:14). Fifth, The Protection From the Flood The Lord Invited Them In (7:1) According to 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. The Lord did not say go into the Ark but rather come into the Ark. Go would have been a command but come was a gracious invitation. God compels no one to come to Him but He invites all to come! Noah preached for 120 years and he had eight converts, all family. The Lord Sealed Shut the Door (7:16) Genesis 7:16 reminds us that it was God who controlled the entrance to the Ark. So those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him; and the LORD shut him in. No one entered after God shut the door. The Lord Delivered Them to Safety (8:4) Genesis 8:4 says Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat. Some have pointed out that on the same exact day of the same month Jesus rose from the dead. Application We do not know everything we would like to know about the Ark. Genesis 6:14 says, Make yourself an ark of gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. Although the NIV translates gopherwood as cypress we do not really know what kind of wood it was. But interestingly the Hebrew word for pitch (kopher) comes from the same Hebrew root word for atonement, which means to cover. 6

7 The Ark is a wonderful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as everyone who was on the ark was saved and everyone not on the ark was lost, so everyone who, through faith has put himself under the covering of the blood of Jesus Christ will be saved from God s future judgment; everyone who is outside of Christ will be lost. It really doesn t matter whether you are better or worse than some other person. There were probably some nice people who didn t get on board the Ark. There are some wonderful people who have never trusted in Christ for salvation. But being saved all depends on whether you are on board or not, covered from God s judgment by the means He has designed. Just as there was only one door into the Ark and God controlled it. There is only one door to Heaven and Jesus is that door. 7

8 Noah and the Flood Genesis 6:11-8:15 First, The of the Flood (6:5, 11-12) Second, The of the Flood Methuselah means when he is dead, it shall be sent (1 Peter 3:20) Third, The for the Flood (6:14-16) The Building of the Ark Using an eighteen inch cubit the Ark would have been ft long, ft high and ft wide. With three floors inside the Ark (v. 16), it contained a total storage space was over 1.5 million cubic feet, roughly the capacity of 569 standard railroad cars. The Gathering of the Animals Fourth, The of the Flood (7:11-25) Fifth, The From the Flood The Lord Invited Them In (7:1) The Lord Sealed Shut the Door (7:16) The Lord Delivered Them to Safety (8:4) 8