Noah and the Great Flood

Bible Study Lesson: Genesis 7:6-24

You know the story, one of the most well-known Biblical disasters of all time - Noah built an ark, God brought on the great flood to destroy the world, and the rainbow appeared in the ending. But, there is more to this Bible study lesson from Genesis as you will see below.

7:6 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.

Noah, The Ark, and the Great Flood

How Big was Noah's Ark?

It has been estimated that somewhere near 45,000 animals could possibly have been housed in the ark.

Ever Try to Tame a Lion?

Although it is amazing that all these animals could fit inside the ark, even more astounding is the fact that all the animals peacefully came and boarded without much of a problem. Could it be that they were just following God's command?

A Story of Obedience

You see, Noah did his part in obeying God by building the ark (at the expense of ridicule and insults from his neighbors) and God took care of the details of bringing in the animals and creating the rain.

There is an important lesson for us to learn from this tragic, Biblical disaster.

Many times, we ask God to help us accomplish something He has asked us to do and then spend countless hours grueling over uncontrollable details instead of keeping the main goal in mind. The project goes unfinished because we did not follow God's lead.

Nothing is Too Big for God

If we will just concentrate on building our "ark" and trust that God will take care of the rest then we can accomplish some awesome things. Projects which we believe to be monumental or beyond our meager means will be surprisingly simple if we will only allow God to use His unabashed power.

Let's follow the example of Noah and do the tasks God asks us to do and allow Him to work through us. He can handle it.

Love in Christ

- Bob

Genesis 4:1-16 - Cain and Abel