Post 14 Genesis 7 "The Flood"

"And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark: for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation." v1

"For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth." v4

It had not yet rained on the earth, yet Noah believed the Lord and v5 testifies to this: "And Noah did according unto all that the Lord commanded him."

V11 "In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened."

I read of an archeologist digging where present day Iraq is located. I forget his name now. He dug a long time and came to many levels of civilization but finally he came to soil that showed no sign of civilization. He decided to dig a little deeper. After digging through much dirt with no sign of previous life, he found signs of another civilization. "How could this be?" he asked his wife. "Why, it's the flood!" She said to him.

Of course, we who believe the Bible need no such proof but it is very interesting. We should note here the grace of God. As I read this I see that God told Noah to "come thou and all thy house into the ark..." So it seems obvious to me that God was in the ark. Then there is the seven days that God still waited before the rain began. Seven days of grace for the world to enter the ark. Then in verse 16 "and the Lord shut him in". I believe God shut the door because Noah may have wanted to open it when people came in desperation to the ark after the floods started to rise. Isaiah 22:22 tells why they later had to remove the top to get out: "And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open and none shall shut and he shall shut and none shall open." A prophecy concerning Jesus. I personally believe it was He who was in the ark and said to enter and He who shut the door. He extends grace now as then, but as then grace will end someday and judgment will come.