More S.O.A.P. from ‘Genesis’ (study, observe, apply, pray)… by David Niednagel

Genesis 8  Worshiping the Judge

 8:1 But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and livestock with him in the boat. …. ² The underground waters stopped flowing, and the torrential rains from the sky were stopped. ³ So the floodwaters gradually receded from the earth. After 150 days, ⁴ exactly five months from the time the flood began, the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ Two and a half months later, as the waters continued to go down, other mountain peaks became visible. … 13 Noah was now 601 years old. On the first day of the new year, ten and a half months after the flood began, the floodwaters had almost dried up from the earth. Noah lifted back the covering of the boat and saw that the surface of the ground was drying. ¹⁴ Two more months went by, and at last the earth was dry! 15 Then God said to Noah, ¹⁶ “Leave the boat, all of you—you and your wife, and your sons and their wives. ¹⁷ Release all the animals—the birds, the livestock, and the small animals that scurry along the ground—so they can be fruitful and multiply throughout the earth.” …

20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord, and there he sacrificed as burnt offerings the animals and birds that had been approved for that purpose. ²¹ And the Lord was pleased with the aroma of the sacrifice and said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of the human race, even though everything they think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood. I will never again destroy all living things. ²² As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.”   NLT

Note again, the main source of the Flood was from within the earth. No person, then or now would have maid that up. The only source we know of is rain. God did this and he revealed it. This is not “myth”! It was over a year before they could get off the Ark.

The purpose of the Flood was judgment. Ignoring sin would not be fitting for a God who is “just/fair”. If a judge never punished guilty people, the judge would be removed for not being just/righteous, or society would be total anarchy. Without punishment, sinful humans sin all the more. But if God judged everyone immediately without any mercy, no one would survive. So God sent the Flood to be a clear picture of His nature – a God of patience and mercy, but who will finally punish. Again, that is the whole point of 2 Peter 2 and 3.

Noah’s response to the Flood was worship. Noah worshiped a God who was righteous and who kept His Word and who was also merciful providing an escape on the Ark. And God was “pleased with the aroma of the sacrifices” Noah offered.

Lord God, I worship You for your righteousness and your mercy. “It was grace that taught my heart to fear and grace my fears relieved.” Again, I pray for passion and faithfulness to declare to my generation that You are a righteous Judge who keeps Your Word, and that You have provided the one and only “Ark” of deliverance in Jesus who took my judgment for me. Amen