Read with Me
Genesis 8:13-19 (HCSB)
In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, the water that had covered the earth was dried up. Then Noah removed the ark’s cover and saw that the surface of the ground was drying. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was dry.
Then God spoke to Noah, “Come out of the ark, you, your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives with you. Bring out all the living creatures that are with you—birds, livestock, those that crawl on the ground—and they will spread over the earth and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” So Noah, along with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives, came out. All wildlife, all livestock, every bird, and every creature that crawls on the earth came out of the ark by their groups.
Listen with Me
The flood was much different than most people seem to believe. Far from a mere 40-day-long rainstorm, it was a cataclysm of unimaginable magnitude. It included catastrophic plate tectonics, and the breaking up and rapid separation of the supercontinent. The fractures in the earth’s crust released oceans of subterranean water into the sea, much of it super-heated water that exploded high into the air, condensing and causing torrential rain of a kind that can’t be imagined. At the same time, massive volcanic fissures opened up, not only creating openings for mountain-building lava, but also spewing ash high into the atmosphere, blocking out the sun worldwide. Tsunamis swept across the land, and subsurface landslides buried billions of living creatures in layers of sand.
Even though the torrential rain stopped after forty days, replaced by more normal storms and showers, the water didn’t begin to recede until nearly four months later, as the sea beds collapsed and the continents were raised about the surface as the single great landmass had on the third day of creation. But even so, as Moses carefully recorded for us, the ground was not dry enough to release the animals and people from the ark until one year and ten days had passed.
At that moment, God unsealed the door that had stood between those on the ark and the storm-driven waves, and He gave the command for everyone and everything to come out. (And at that moment, no one needed to be forced off the boat!)
They all came out into a completely alien world. It was no use trying to spot familiar landmarks. Everything familiar had been destroyed, torn apart by the tectonic activity or buried under thousands of feet of sediment that was even then hardening into sandstone. Even the mountains on which the ark was now resting had been raised up by the powerful volcanic activity that had accompanied the flood.
Pray with Me
Father, You are right that the picture most of us have in mind when we think about the flood is far different, far less drastic and destructive, than the reality. It really was the end of the world. You effectively pressed the “delete” button and started afresh. It’s no wonder that Noah and his family were so thankful for being preserved. It’s no wonder that the story of that flood was passed down through all the generations that followed them, although some of the details did get distorted from place to place. But through it all, Lord, You were faithful to Noah and to all those who were with him on the ark. Thank you for Your faithfulness to all those who trust in you, faithfulness that we can still see today. Amen.