The Flood Series

Genesis 6:9-8:22

January 26, 2003

Imagine a future without dry land. A future where the earth, covered in water, has evolved into a gritty, nautical society held together by determination and ingenuity. The inhabitants of this once-flourishing planet cling to life on incredible floating cities, their existence constantly threatened by Smokers-- bands of marauding pirates who roam the featureless surface of Water world.

Centuries of global warming have caused the polar ice caps to melt, flooding the earth as civilization is left adrift. For the survivors, one chance remains: a solitary hero, known only as the Mariner. Battling the Smokers and their ruthless leader, the Deacon, the Mariner sets out with a beautiful woman and a mysterious little girl on a search for a new beginning.

That is the introduction to a movie from the nineties called Water World. What amazes me most in that movie is that man can conceive of a future world where all the world but the tip top of Mount Everest is covered with water because of man’s ecological failures, but can’t allow that God could have flooded the world that way in the past.

1. Is the flood a myth, local or universal?

I could speak today about the geological evidence - sea fossils found thousands of miles from any sea - I could speak of historical evidence - peoples from South America to China have a flood story

What does the story say?

6:13-17 What was the purpose of the flood?

7:18-24 Depth of the flood

What did the flood accomplish?

Duration of the flood

Need for an ark

7:11 Specifics of date

8:4, 13-14

There is no doubt in my mind that the flood was a universal flood that accomplished God’s purpose of judgment on man’s sinfulness.

2. How could an ark carry every living species?

according to Dr. Max D. Younce , who says by his calculations from Genesis 6:15 that the ark was 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet deep. He says this is equivalent to "522 standard stock cars or 8 freight trains of 65 cars each.

In addition there would have only been one pair of each type of animal - one pair of dogs with the genetic material for all dogs.

3. What is the point of the Noah story?

Definitely - judgment of the wicked

but. . .

The Grace of God

6:8-9, 18; 7:1; 8:1

2 Peter 2: 5 if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;

6 if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;

7 and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men

8 (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)--

9 if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment