Water, Water, Everywhere
Opening Prayer
Heavenly Father, I thank You for Your abiding, comforting presence which spurs me on to grasp the future You have for me.
Read Genesis 7:1–24
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Scripture taken from the THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION, NIV Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Meditate
“When I am afraid, I put my trust in You. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?” (Psa. 56:3,4).
Think Further
Often those looking at this chapter concentrate on issues of historicity, setting out to prove that the flood did or did not happen. Questions about the reality, extent or timing of the flood may be important, but they can lead us away from what else the account might teach. There are two very different ways of looking at what happens. Starting from the perspective of God’s judgment, it is frighteningly awesome. We see that God’s decision to start again was all-consuming. The Bible does not allow us to turn God into what C. S. Lewis might call “a tame lion.” We may not always understand God’s actions, particularly in the light of what we know from elsewhere about his grace and mercy, but we can have no doubt about his power or right to act. The amount of water and the length of time it was on the earth reinforce statements about the total destruction of all life. It is the same earth, but there is no possible connection between the early years of the creation—as it were, prehistory—and the post-flood years, when history as we know it might be said to begin. However, if we start from the perspective of God’s protection of Noah we see very different things. The instruction to take pairs of all animals and seven pairs of clean (i.e., edible) animals ensured that life after the flood could continue. God himself shut them in (16), and Noah and his family were kept safe in spite of the destruction around them. Those of us who experience natural disasters, whether floods from too much water or droughts from too little, know the devastation they bring. We must be careful not to assume that they come from God’s direct decision—and we can choose, in studying them, to concentrate on the devastation or on seeds of hope.
Apply
Noah was obedient to God’s call. How have you handled God’s call to a difficult task?
Closing prayer
Lord God, in many ways these accounts of judgment are frightening, but thank You that You did allow humankind to start again.
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