The Days of Noah Part 6: The Aftermath of the Flood

Genesis 7:24 - 8:1-5

In the previous posts, we looked at the historicity of the flood, it was a real event, Noah was a real person, a man of God.  We have looked at Noah's world, a sinful, pleasure-seeking world.  We have looked at the ark and the heart of God that provided a way of salvation from judgment and we have looked at the world-wide catastrophic terrible reality of the flood.  Today we look at the aftermath.  

The Long Long Time.  7:12 "And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights."  V24 "And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days."  8:3 "And the waters returned from off the earth continually and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated."  It was a very long time, 40 days of rain, a further 110 days of the water deepening, and then 150 days as the water receded.  It was over a year before Noah and his family got off the ark.  It was a long time.  During that whole year there was no further word from God.  God had not spoken to Noah since he closed the door (of the ark)  A year of silence from God.  Noah's family must have asked him every day "Is there any word from God? Is it nearly over?" and Noah didn't know because he had no word from God.  It was a long time.  

Many of the great men in scripture ask the question "has God forgotten me" and perhaps Noah asked the same thing, "has God forgotten me?"   And you don't know the answer.  But in Genesis 8:1 "And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged" God remembered Noah.  Remembered means Noah was in the mind of God, God hadn't forgotten Noah, and Noah was a man of faith and in that long time and those long dark days of judgment when there was no apparent communication from God, Noah had only one thing to cling to, the sheer faithfulness of God.  The integrity of God.  God had been faithful in instructing him thus far.  Trust in that.


Have you had long dark days in your life?  perhaps you are in presently in long dark days.  Trust in the integrity of God.  That is what Noah had to trust, that is what Joseph had to trust in, that is what Jonah had to trust in, that is what Job had to trust in, in his grief and his illness when God did not answer his prayers, the integrity of God in the dark days.  Job said, "Yea thou he slay me yet will I trust in him".  God is faithful, the faithful one who had taken Noah thus far would lead him home.  And Christians, trust in God when you are in darkness.  He didn't bring you thus far all these years of your life to leave you now.  If you happen to be in darkness now, God has not forgotten you.  You are on his mind, you are the apple of his eye and he will lead you home.  Someday you will hear the sweet voice of God but sometimes it is withheld in the Christian life. 1 Corin 10:13 "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it."   That means to go through it.  In dark days we are to trust in the integrity of God.  That's what Noah did.

At the end of all this long time, how did God speak to Noah?  What gave Noah the assurance that the flood was over.  God didn't use a great thundering voice like you might imagine, but he spoke through a very small thing.  Noah let the dove out for a second time and it came back with an olive leaf.  A small thing, but how important to Noah.  Gen 8:11 "And the dove came in to him in the evening; and lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf plucked off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth."  A little leaf, and Noah knew it was over.  God spoke through a very small thing.  God doesn't always speak through a powerful voice.  A dove and an olive leaf gave Noah assurance that the judgment was over.

It was the weather, a snow storm that stopped Charles Hadden Spurgeon from going to his own church and it caused him to take shelter in a little Methodist chapel that was nearer at hand.  In that chapel Spurgeon got saved through an unknown preacher and became one of the greatest preachers that England has ever known.  A small thing, a snow storm.  

The Receding Water   8:3 "And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated."
This is the more scientific  thing, some people ask "If the flood was global where did all the water go?"  Here is where all the water went.  The bible says that at the flood  the fountains of the great deep were broken up, the earth's crust was torn at the continental plates and the water from under the crust poured up in the form of steam.  These underground water sources emptied of water, when the volcanic activity ceases, the pressure that was caused by the expulsion is taken off and the open plates will close over.  The oceans are much deeper now than they were before the flood.  There are trenches under the ocean that drop like a cliff, the deepest oceans are here, this is where the fountains of the great deep used to be.  Psalm 104:5-9  "Who laid the foundations of the earth that it should not be removed for ever.  Thou coveredst it with the deep as with a garment: the waters stood above the mountains.  At thy rebuke they fled; at the voice of thy thunder they hasted away.  They go up by the mountains, they go down by the valleys unto the place which thou hast founded for them.  Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over; that they turn not again to cover the earth." V7,8  the mountains rose, the valleys sank down.  At the flood the mountains were covered, at God's rebuke the waters receded.  As they receded the mountains arose and the valleys sank down. The Hebrew word for valley is split.  As the water receded the mountains arose and the splits in the earth's crust sank down.  The water then poured off the land.  It carved great channels in the earth's land mass.  The Grand Canyon.  Its very high but down at the bottom is a little, narrow river, the Colorado river.  People say that river carved out the canyon.  That is a scientific impossibility.  Because the sides of the canyon are deeper downstream than they are upstream, that means at the beginning when the canyon was being carved, that little river would have had to flow uphill for hundreds of miles to carve the canyon.  Does water flow uphill?  

Its the same of all the river valleys on this planet.  The flow that carved out river valleys was far greater than the volume of water flowing in the rivers today.  The aftermath of the flood, the receding water is evidenced by river valleys and canyons all over the face of this planet.  This planet is covered by sedimentary rock and giant fossil graveyards that are deposited at the curves of river valleys.  The fossils we see, sea creatures at the top of Mt. Everest.  These are scientific facts.  But the thing is this.  What will you do with this?  Facts don't convert anybody.  What will you do with the facts?

Unbeliever, in the same way as the European countryside is scarred by trenches, it teaches us that the scars point back to the war.  In the same way as the scars of the twin towers in New York were the obvious evidence of terrorist attack, so this planet plainly and obviously bears the scars of the flood of judgment that God brought upon this world.  Fact after fact points to this for those who see, for those who are willing to look and think for themselves.  If you are not a Christian, look at the masses of water on this planet, the layers of sedimentary rock, the fossils that are buried in that water-logged rock,  the scars of the flood.  The whole world was judged by God because of sin, and the people who once lived here were warned but they did not heed the warning so they were swamped in the judgment.  They were unrepentant in their sin.  

Sinner, you are urged to flee from the judgment that is to come.  If you are not saved, you are exhorted to turn from your sin, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, trust in him and you will be saved.  Its no coincidence that it was a dove bearing the leaf from an olive tree that brought the message of peace to Noah, peace and the end of judgment.  Its no coincidence that God the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove upon Jesus Christ, upon the one who when he was in the garden of Gethsemane shed great drops of blood and tears in prayer among the olive trees.  He, Jesus Christ, is the message of peace to sinners.  He is the message, judgment is passed.  Judgment is over for all who are in Christ Jesus.  If you are not saved, trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and he will save you from the judgment to come. 
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The notes above were made by myself from the sermon by Paul Dowling of Whiteabbey Congregational (Reformed) at Sermon Audio.

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=12308936440