Tough Love

^[9] This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God. ^[10] Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth. ^[11] Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. ^[12] God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. ^[13] So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. ^[14] So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. ^[15] This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high. ^[16] Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. ^[17] I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. ^[18] But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark-you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. ^[19] You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. ^[20] Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. ^[21] You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.” ^[22] Noah did everything just as God commanded him. ^[1] The LORD then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. ^[2] Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, ^[3] and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. ^[4] Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.” ^[5] And Noah did all that the LORD commanded him. ^[6] Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. ^[7] And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. ^[8] Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, ^[9] male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. ^[10] And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth. ^[11] In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month-on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. ^[12] And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights. ^[13] On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. ^[14] They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. ^[15] Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. ^[16] The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in. ^[17] For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. ^[18] The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. ^[19] They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. ^[20] The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than twenty feet. ^[21] Every living thing that moved on the earth perished-birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. ^[22] Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. ^[23] Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. ^[24] The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days. Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. All rights reserved throughout the world. Used by permission of International Bible Society.