Lesson 4: Noah’s Flood
All scripture taken from New International Version Zondervan Bible Publishers.
Was the flood of Noah’s day a worldwide flood?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Flood Initiation.
Most scientists and some Christians do not believe in a worldwide flood, but we know from Biblical history that the answer is yes.
So the Lord said,” I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the
earth – men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds
of the air – for I am grieved that I have made them.” But Noah found favor in the
eyes of the Lord. This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man,
blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God. Noah had three
sons; Shem, Ham and Japheth. Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and
was full of violence. God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the
people on earth had corrupted their ways. 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.”
Genesis 6:7-13
Notice carefully how the passage reads, there is no doubt that the flood was worldwide. Wait, there’s more.
The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the
surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains
under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the
mountains to a depth of more than twenty feet. Every living thing that moved
on the earth perished – birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that
swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the
breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth
was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that moved 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.
Genesis 7:18-23
We are told that the mountains were covered by more than twenty feet. Because water always seeks its own level, how could the mountains only be covered in one local area without also covering the mountains in all adjoining areas? But there’s more. After the flood, God made this promise…
I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters
of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.
Genesis 9:11
After the flood, God made a promise not to destroy the earth with a worldwide flood ever again and as a sign He gave Noah a rainbow. Ever since the worldwide flood of Noah’s day there have been local floods. God promised never to destroy mankind ever again by a worldwide flood.
Think about this: It had been 1600 years since creation when Noah’s flood occurred. People had spread out and explored, built cities and had left the local area, so a local flood would not have wiped out mankind.
Jesus knew that the flood killed all mankind when he stated:
“Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man.
People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day
Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.”
Luke 17:26-27
Peter was talking about God’s judgement when he made this statement.
But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and
the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world
of that time was deluged and destroyed.
2 Peter 3:5-6
Here are some interesting questions for people who believe that the flood in Noah’s day was local. Why did Noah have to take birds on the ark? They could have flown to a safe area. In fact, why did Noah have to take any of the animals? They could have migrated to areas not affected by a local flood. Why did Noah even bother with an ark? God could have told them to move away because He was going to destroy the people of that area with a flood. Why do some people refuse to believe in a worldwide flood? Because of man’s sinfulness, people do not want to believe what God has plainly written in His Word.
What can we see now that tells us of a worldwide flood in the past?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: The Present is Not the Key to the Past.
Why would God kill all those people?
God is a holy God. His holiness demands judgement. There is a good probability that as people saw Noah building the ark he would also tell them about God’s judgement that would come and plead with them to repent. A worldwide flood would always remind and warn people of God’s judgement.
Mount Everest is over 29,000 feet above sea level. Did the flood cover Mount Everest? It is quite probable that the major mountain ranges formed during the flood. We can’t be 100% certain, but most creationist believe that at the time of creation there was one landmass and when the “fountains of the deep” burst opened to release water to cover the earth, the continents broke away from the landmass and became the continents that we see today. Most of the major mountains were formed when the continents pushed against one another during the flood. The mountains that the flood covered were smaller at the start of the flood.
Where did all that water come from?
Many creationist believe that there was a water canopy above the earth which God released.
Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the skies.
Psalms 148:4
And the water below the earth.
In the six hundred 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.
Genesis 7:11
The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it, the world and all who live in it; for he
founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters.
Psalms 24:1-2
Did the flood create coal?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Coal
Are there any historical accounts outside of the Bible to verify the history of the Bible?
Yes, other cultures have the same story of Noah and a worldwide flood. This is called historical collaboration. There are about 270 cultures that have the story of a Noah’s flood, some of which are: Peru, Cherokee Indians, China Russia, India and Greece. The flood legend of China records that Fuhi, his wife, three sons and three daughters escaped a great flood and were the only people alive on earth. A flood story in Hawaii records that Nu-u and his family escaped a global flood by building a great canoe and filling it with animals. Only he and his family were left alive. Some details were lost in most of the legends; for example, the birds being sent out or landing on a mountain. But the most important information was kept: God’s wrath and judgement upon a world of sinful people, a worldwide flood, a favored family, an ark built and animals saved. It’s great when history points to the truthfulness of the Bible.
When did Noah’s flood happen?
4,400 years ago, based on Biblical history.
What would a worldwide flood do to the landscape?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Rock Layers
Is there any evidence of a pre-flood era?
The Babylonians and Assyrians recognized the pre-flood era as a source of superior literature. One Babylonian king recorded that he “loved to read the writings of the age before the Flood.” In 1891, there was a woman who found a gold chain in a chunk of coal as she was stocking her kitchen stove. A manufactured gold thread was discovered in 1844 embedded in granite. In 1885 miners in Austria broke open a block of coal and found inside a small metal cube. The edges were perfectly straight and sharp and the sides flat. A deep groove had been cut all around the middle of the cube. There was no doubt that the cube was machine-made and seemed to be part of a larger mechanism. All of these items had to have been made before the flood because how could you put things inside of coal and granite?
How large was the ark?
God commanded Noah to build an ark 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high. With these dimensions, the total volume of the ark would have been 1.45 million cubic feet and with three decks it would have had a total deck area of 98,800 square feet, which is the size of 20 standard basketball courts. The total weight: 14,500 tons.
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology
Click on: Canyons
How could Noah back in that time build an ark that big?
First…God told Noah to build an ark, but Noah and his sons probably supervised the building of it. They would have needed to hire workers to lift the huge beams that the ark had to have had. People before the flood had the skill and ability of sawing and drilling. A few 100 years after the flood, the Egyptians were sawing and drilling granite. The people in Noah’s day were more capable than you might think. Remember, people back in Bible times were just as smart and creative as we are today. We have more stuff like cars and computers, but that’s an accumulation of knowledge over time. Each generation takes the knowledge from the previous one and builds on it.
Did the flood produce most of the fossils that we see today?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Fossilization.
How did Noah fit all the animals on the ark?
God did not bring 2 of every land dwelling animal, but 2 of every kind.
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.
Genesis 6:20
Example: God did not bring Noah a Red Tail Hawk, a Broad Wing Hawk and a Golden Eagle, only one hawk. God did not bring Noah a Tiger, Lion and a Bobcat, only one cat. It has been estimated that Noah only had to bring from 9,000 – 16,000 animals on the Ark. And knowing the size, there was plenty of room for the animals and the necessary food.
But then after the flood, how did we get all the species of animals?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-gelology/
Click on: Rapid Speciation
Is there any evidence of humans being buried by a worldwide flood?
In 1971, a rock collector found some bones recently exposed by a bulldozer in hard sandstone in the state of Utah. What he found was the lower half of two human skeletons. This collector with another team of researchers excavated further and found the skeletons of ten modern humans that were buried under fifty-eight feet of rock hard sandstone. These skeletons have the appearance of being washed into place, rather than being buried as in a grave. It seems obvious that these 10 people were buried rapidly by some kind of massive flood. These skeletons indicate rapid burial in water and mud which later turned into stone; something only a flood could do.
Is there something today that we can see to show us how a worldwide flood could have affected the earth, but on a smaller scale and more recently?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Mount St. Helens
Where did all that water go after the flood?
Simply put, the waters from the flood are in the oceans that we see today. God formed the ocean basins, raising the land out of the water, so that the floodwaters ended up in what we see as the oceans. It is very possible that there was one super continent before the flood and that continent broke apart during the flood. During that process the ocean basin sunk down as the continents moved away from each other. We can’t say that based on observation; no one was there seeing this happen and taking notes. What we are doing is building a plausible model of what probably happened.
Are there evidences of a worldwide flood? Something we can see today?
Yes, there is evidence of a worldwide flood that is visible today. There are vast rock and mud deposits, burying billions of land and sea creatures along with much of the vegetation. The animals, many of whom turned into fossils are found in many rock layers and even on top of mountains; something only a worldwide flood could do. Masses of buried plants turned into huge deposits of coal and oil. The earth’s crust has massive amounts of layered sedimentary rock, sometimes miles deep. These layers of sandstone, limestone and shale laid down by water were once soft like mud, but they are now hard stone. Some of these layers extend across continents that only a global flood could accomplish. There are also volcanic rock layers extended over much of the earth that are often mixed in with the sedimentary layers and often with evidences of vast volcanic eruptions under water.
On every continent we find fossils of sea creatures in rock layers that are high above sea level. For example: most of the rock layers in the walls of the Grand Canyon contain marine fossils. Those that are at the rim are 7,000 feet above sea level. There are fossil marine gastropods that have been found in limestone beds high in the Himalayan mountains up to 20,000 feet above sea level.
How did all the animals end up all over the world?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on : Distribution of Plants and Animals.
How did Noah and his family care for all of the animals on the ark?
Studies of non-mechanized animal care show that eight people could have fed and watered 9,000 – 16,000 animals. Remember that this was a temporary, emergency care, not a long term situation that one would expect in a zoo. Noah probably stored food near each animal and drinking water could have been piped into troughs to each cage or stall. The use of self-feeders would have been relatively easy and probably essential.
What about animals with special diets? Do captive anteaters require ants? No. Neither do most insect eating animals. Meat eating animals can live on vegetables. Animals that have a special diet can adjust their food for a certain time. The ventilation in the ark was necessary to bring in fresh air and to dissipate body heat. A basic, non-mechanical ventilation system was sufficient for the ark. The density of animals on the ark was less than we find in some modern animal housing used to keep stock that are raised for food, which often required no special mechanical ventilation.
What about all the animal waste? Noah could have used sloped floors in the animal cages that would have allowed the waste to flow into large central gutters and then into collection pits, allowing gravity to do most of the work. Noah’s family could have then dumped this overboard without an excessive amount of work. God may have caused most of the animals to hibernate, sleeping more and eating less.
How does the ice age fit in?
Watch short video clip.
https://answersingenesis.org/media/video/science/flood-geology/
Click on: Ice age.