Noah And The Great Flood

Noah During The Great Flood

The Dove returned to Noah with a olive leaf

Long after Adam’s time, when the world was full of people, God saw what a wicked and evil place it had become.  He was sad.  He felt sorry He had made such a beautiful world, filled with wonderful living creatures, if people were going to spoil it all by their wickedness.

However, there was one man with whom God was very pleased.  He was a good man and his thoughts and deeds were noble and right.  His name was Noah.

One day God said to Noah, “I have decided that this evil on earth cannot continue.  A new start must be made; therefore a great flood will come which will destroy the wicked.  Build yourself a boat---an ark---out of good timber; cover it with tar both inside and out, and make rooms inside it and a roof over it.  Make three decks and put a door in the side.  Then, when the flood comes, you and your wife and your sons and their wives will all be safe in the boat.”

Probably Noah found this news rather startling, but he knew that he must do a God had said.  He told his three sons; name Shem, Ham and Japheth, that they would have to help him with the building of his big boat so that it would be ready in time. 

God had told him to make it 146 yards long, 24 yards wide, and 42 feet high.  Moreover, as well as taking all the Noah family into the ark, God said that Noah was also to take of every kind of living creatures---birds, animals and creeping things---in order to keep them alive, and there was to be male and a female of each so that they would be able to reproduce again on the earth when the floods had gone, for there would be nothing else left alive.

Lastly God reminded Noah, “Take all kinds of foods with you in the ark, both of you and for all the living creatures, for in seven days’ time the rain will start, and it will rain for forty days and forty nights without stopping and you will not be able to leave the ark.”

Noah did everything exactly as God had told him.

With the building of the ark finished, Noah had a thoroughly waterproof new home.  Then he and his family began to round up all the animals and birds and insects and reptiles, as God had directed, and together they all went into the ark.  Lastly Noah and his wife, Shem, Ham and Japheth and their wives went into the ark themselves, and the door was firmly closed behind them.  Then they settled down to watch the weather and wait for the promised rain.  No doubt their actions were viewed with great amusement by those who saw the building of the ark.  However, Noah’s faith in God was justified.

Seven days later, just as God had said, it began to rain; and it rained in torrents, never stopping, for forty whole days and forty whole nights.  The water rose higher and higher, and the floods covered the whole earth, drowning every living things.  There was nothing left alive in the whole world except Noah, his wife and the animals in his keeping.

Noah looked out upon the world he had known, and could see nothing but water, no matter which way he looked.  All the land and the trees and the places where people had lived were covered.  Everything was being swamped by the flood waters.  But God had promised Noah that he and his family would be saved, and Noah knew that God could be trusted.

The water was now deep enough for the ark to float, ad as it became even deeper, the ark began to drift about on the surface.

Noah could not tell where they were, for the floods had risen so high that they had covered every part of the land.  They went on rising so much that soon they were seven and half yards above the tops of the highest mountains.  There was nothing to be seen in any direction except water.

And they stayed like that for 150 days and nights.  It must have seemed a very long time.

Then a great wind began to blow, and at last the waters started to go down.  The rains stopped and gradually, for another 150 days the waters began to go lower and lower.  The ark stopped rocking to and fro, and at last it came to rest on a mountain called Ararat.

The waters continued to go down and one day, when Noah looked out he found that he could see tops of other mountains.

Noah waited for another forty days, then he opened the window in the ark and let a raven fly out.  It flew around for a while and then flew away and did not come back.

Next Noah sent out a dove to see if the flood waters had gone down, but the dove could not find anywhere to the land and, after a while, it flew back to the ark.  Noah reached out his hand and lifted it in through the window.

He waited for another week; then he sent the dove our again.

On the evening of that day it came back and, in its beak, held a fresh olive leaf.  Now, Noah knew that somewhere the water had gone down far enough for the trees to be appearing again.

He waited one more week before he sent out the dove again.  Out it flew, round and round, and out of sight.  This time it did not return, and Noah knew that it must have found somewhere to settle among trees.

A little time later, Noah was able to look out of the ark and to see that the ground was becoming drier.  In the time it became completely dry and the waters disappeared.

Then God said to Noah, “You may now leave the boat.  Take your wife with you, and your sons and their wives, and all the birds and animals, so that they can settle on the earth and start having families again to replace all those that were drowned in the great flood.”

So out came Noah and his family and all living creatures whom God had preserved during the great flood.  The first thing Noah did was to take some stones and build an altar to God, to offer a sacrifice upon it and thank Him for keeping them safe.

God was pleased and said, “Never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done this time.  As long as there is a world, summer and winter, day and night, and they shall not cease,” and as He promised, all these things have gone on ever since.

As a sign of His promised to Noah, God said, “I have out a rainbow in the cloud.  Whenever the sky is cloudy and a rainbow appear, I will remember my promised to you and to all living creatures, that a flood will never again destroy all that live on the earth.”