The Chinese have a story of a man called Fuhi who was saved from a Flood in a boat, along with his wife, three sons and daughters. According to their legend, everyone perished and they alone were the survivors and repopulated the world.
The ancient Babylonian story, the Epic of Gilgamesh has the story of Utnapishtim, who was warned by the gods that a flood was coming and he was to build a boat, and was to cover the ship with pitch. He was supposed to take male and female animals of all kinds, his wife and family, provisions, etc. into the ship. After the rain fell, the Flood subsided and the ship settled on the top of Mount Nisir. After the ship had rested for seven days Utnapishtim let loose a dove. Since the land had not dried the dove returned. Next he sent a swallow which also returned. Later he let loose a raven which never returned since the ground had dried.
The Aztecs had a myth of a man named Tapi. The creator told Tapi to build a boat. He was told that he should take his wife, a pair of every animal that was alive into this boat. Then the rain started and the flood came. The men and animals tried to climb the mountains but the mountains became flooded as well. Tapi decided that the water had dried up when he let a dove loose that did not return.
In India, Matsya (the incarnation of Lord Vishnu as a fish) forewarns Manu (a human) about an impending catastrophic flood and orders him to collect all the grains of the world in a boat.
Ancient Greek mythology taught that Zeus decided that he would destroy all humans. Before he did this, Prometheus, the creator of humans, warned his human son Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha. Prometheus then placed this couple in a large wooden chest. The rains started and lasted nine days and nights until the whole world was flooded.
In south Tanzania, the story is told that one day, the rivers began to flood. The god told two people to get into a ship. He told them to take lots of seed and to take lots of animals. The water of the flood eventually covered the mountains. Finally the flood stopped. Then one of the men, wanting to know if the water had dried up let a dove loose. The dove returned. Later he let loose a hawk which did not return. Then the men left the boat and took the animals and the seeds with them.
From China to America, from India to Africa, from the Middle East to Russia, basically every culture has an account of a Flood and an Ark. The name of the man changes, the name of the gods change, some of the details change, but it is striking, and demands an explanation, that every human culture has some story of a universal Flood and an Ark that saved humanity. One researcher counted over 500 Flood stories from around the world.
The Bible is not just one more legend among others. The Bible is God’s written covenant to His people, and carries the stamp of authoritative truth. Here we have the true account of what sparked all the legends, myths and tales. Here in Genesis 6 through 9, is the account of the Great Flood, the man Noah, and the Ark.
The account of the Flood is the account of a world, a whole civilisation that perished. It is an account that does not make sense if the flood was merely local, if the world was basically good, or if there were many ways to survive. The Flood stands in contrast to the idea that there are many ways to God, that humans are not really sinful, or that God does not or will not judge the world. Instead Noah’s Flood is warning to us all, that the same basic truths about God, man, and the world prevail today. In this account, we’ll see a universal condemnation, exclusive salvation, and particular condition to gain this salvation. And we’ll see why, though the circumstances have changed, it is still the same situation that confronts us today.
- The Universal Condemnation
This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God. And Noah begot three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
We’ve already seen from Genesis 6:1-9 how evil the world had become. A world of extreme sexual immorality, a world of violence, a world where the thoughts of man were only evil continually. The world had become evil to the core, and there was no remedy. We’ve seen how the bloodline of man was being corrupted, how the offspring of evil angels and humans were becoming the supermen of society, soon to overwhelm all the others.
In fact, many believe the animals are included in the statement of verse 12 that all flesh had corrupted their way. How could the animals have been corrupted? Some have thought it was that man that had corrupted animals to be used in vicious, violent or even sexually depraved ways. Others think it involved bizarre cross-breeding, again corrupting the original creation form of animals, bringing about distortions. Some would even place dinosaurs in this category, as a kind of reptilian distortion and imitation of all other animals. The fossil record clearly shows that many pre-Flood animals were carnivorous, and perhaps this was also a distortion introduced either by Satan or by wicked man, because it is only after the Flood that Noah is given permission to eat meat.
Regardless, both man and beast are implicated in this universal condemnation. Look at the universal words in verse 12 and 13: “all flesh has corrupted its way” “The end of all flesh has come before me”.
Notice the absolute universal condemnation of mankind. It does not say “most people were sinners” or “a majority of people were evil”. It says the whole race was sinful.
But here we have a world that was universally condemned as evil. What about Noah? The Bible doesn’t say that Noah was basically good. We read that 8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. (Genesis 6:8). God showed His kindness to Noah, who was also born a sinner, also had a heart full of evil inclinations. But Noah was given an undeserved gift of God’s revelation to him, God’s offer of salvation, God’s love. Noah repented and believed God.
This stands in harmony with the rest of the Bible which consistently says that all people fall under the Bible’s condemnation as being fallen and sinful.
For there is not a just man on earth who does good And does not sin. (Ecclesiastes 7:20)
The Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men, To see if there are any who understand, who seek God. They have all turned aside, They have together become corrupt; There is none who does good, No, not one. (Psalm 14:2–3)
“When they sin against You (for there is no one who does not sin), and You become angry with them and deliver them to the enemy, and they take them captive to the land of the enemy, far or near; (1 Kings 8:46)
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, (Romans 3:23)
When Peter preached his sermon to the people of Jerusalem, he said, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” (Acts 2:40)
Now this is no longer the view of most people, indeed; of most religions. Their starting point is that man is basically good, and then goes wrong. All are good and right in the sight of God, and then some people go off the path. But everyone will come back, in time, we don’t need a Saviour; we just need encouragement to keep doing good and to be the good people we are.
Now we can either conclude that people back then were particularly evil, but something in the DNA of man has improved, and we are now all basically good; or we can assume that we are born into the world in the same state as they were. If we inherit a fallen nature from our parents, then our pre-disposition is to sin. And that means unless we are rescued from that condition, we just keep doing it.
So, either the Bible is unnecessarily pessimistic about man, or it is correct. We are all either by default in rebellion to God, or we are by default good and friendly to God. But if we are basically good, then we don’t have a problem, and we don’t need salvation. If the world back then was made up of people who were basically good, just needing some correction here and there, then the Flood seems to be a massive overreaction on God’s part.
But the Flood took place, And God is Just. So we conclude that the world was universally condemned, and justly so. But out of the universal condemnation came something else.
II. The Exclusive Salvation
Make yourself an ark of gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. And this is how you shall make it: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above; and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks.
God tells Noah to make an Ark, a word that actually means something like lifeboat, and is used only one other time, to describe the basket that Moses was put into, when placed in the Nile river as a baby. It was to be made of gopherwood, which is likely cedar or cypress. He was to cover it on the inside and outside with pitch, which was waterproof resin. So how big was the Ark? 300 cubits in length, 50 cubits in width, and 30 cubits in height. While the exact length of a cubit varies by ancient standards, a commonly accepted measurement is approximately 45.72 cm (18 inches). Using this value, the ark would have been about 137 meters long, 22 meters wide, and almost 14 meters high – which is a three-storey building.
That’s twice as long as a Boeing 747, about the 1.5 X the length of a football field. Until the 19th century, this was one of the largest ships in history. Only the era of steel ships – Titanic, the Queen Mary, and modern aircraft carriers, have outranked it. But it is also not fantastically large as a wooden ship, some of the 15th century Chinese treasure ships came close to its size.
This immense size gave the Ark a total volume of approximately 42,600 cubic meters, comparable to the capacity of a modern cargo ship. Factoring in its box-like shape, the ark’s total floor area across three decks would have been around 9,300 square meters, or about 1.3 football fields or 25 tennis courts.
The Bible never actually tells us of its shape; people have imagined it as a box shape, but we don’t know that; and there is no reason to imagine Noah did shape it into the most sea-worthy shape. The ark’s design prioritised stability over speed, making it ideal for surviving turbulent waters rather than efficient travel. Scientists who studied its dimensions found it would have been able to handle waves of over 30 metres in height without capsizing.
The very top of the Ark had a window, which probably served as both ventilation and a kind of skylight.
And behold, I Myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall go into the ark—you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep themalive with you; they shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. And you shall take for yourself of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to yourself; and it shall be food for you and for them.”
Regarding storage capacity, the ark could hold roughly 15,000 tons of cargo by modern shipping standards, sufficient for its purpose of housing animals, food, and Noah’s family. It has been estimated that this space could accommodate about 125,000 sheep-sized animals, with additional room for provisions and living quarters. All the animals in there, particularly in dark conditions could have gone into a more hibernatory state, requiring less food, and mostly sleeping, requiring less cleaning. And as we’ll see next time, Noah would have taken younger animals, and only those representing the kind, not all the derivatives of that kind we see today. Today there are many descendants of the dog, of the cat, of the horse, but Noah didn’t need to take all those aboard. Notice that according to verse 20, these animals would come to Noah; Noah did not need to scour the earth for every creature. It is a well-known phenomenon to see animals en masse fleeing a place before a natural catastrophe, some kind of God-given instinct causes them to flee as they do during migrations. It is very likely that when the Flood was about to begin, the massive tectonic, volcanic, and meteorologic changes triggered these animals, and God guided them to the Ark.
Now, the implication here is that the Ark was the only means of surviving the Flood. The Ark was the exclusive means of salvation from the coming judgement of God. There was no other boat. This was not a local Flood where you could just move, and avoid the problem. This was a global, universal Flood, and the only way to escape it was through the Ark. The Ark was the only way, the unique way, the exclusive way to be saved.
Peter says, “when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. (1 Peter 3:20)
Eight people were saved out of millions or possibly billions. A few thousand animals were saved out of billions.
Here we need to take warning. The spirit of our age is to be sceptical of the idea that there is an exclusive way of salvation, and that everyone outside of that way of salvation will perish. People scoff at the idea. How could there be only one way? Do you mean to tell me that all these people who don’t accept Christ are perishing? But the Bible gives us the Flood account to show, it happened before. It can happen again. God can, very justly, hold the whole world condemned, and demand that all men come to Him through His appointed way, His Son, Jesus Christ.
Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
Whether or not our age finds it plausible or likely or fair or just, the Bible says it has already happened. The whole world perished and a few people were saved. There was one way, an exclusive way, a means of salvation that was available to all, but yet the only way.
Universal condemnation led to exclusive salvation. That exclusive salvation had to be received by meeting a particular condition.
III. The Particular Condition
Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did.
Noah did what God told him to do. But what did that mean about Noah?
By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith. (Hebrews 11:7)
Noah responded to God’s Word with faith. He first had to believe that all this was so. He had to take God at His Word. There was no evidence prior to the Flood that there would be a Flood. Indeed, no one had ever seen rain before. The earth was flourishing with life and abundance. People were building their wicked civilisation and making progress. There was a strong sense of life goes on as it ever has. Jesus even said of the time leading right up to the Flood. “For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away” (Matthew 24:38–39)
Noah had to believe that everything was going to come to an end, that everyone not on the Ark was going to perish, that life was going to fundamentally alter. He had to believe that what God said was true.
But then consider how his faith had to be tested. He had to build this Ark, which was a massive operation. He had the help of his three sons, but Noah quite likely hired labourers to work with him, people who were happy to be paid to build this crazy man’s boat, but didn’t believe him.
Think of a shortlist of what he needed to do:
He needed to gather large quantities of straight, sturdy timber would have been harvested from nearby forests.
He needed to heat or gather tree resin and have it in huge quantities.
He would have needed a large, flat area near the forest or a water source would have been cleared to accommodate construction. The site might include makeshift workshops for shaping timber and preparing materials.
He needed tools: saws, chisels, adzes. He may have needed to smelt and make some of these metal tools, or purchase them from metalworkers. He probably needed animal-driven mills, maybe water driven mills to saw and prepare wood.
He needed to move massive wooden beams to form the keel, and would have needed ramps, pulleys, some kind of cranes to lift these up the scaffolding.
Timbers needed to be joined with mortise-and-tenon joints, dowels, or wooden pegs. He needed to design and build how the food and fresh water storage would work, and simple methods to feed thousands of animals every day for a year. He needed to design ways of cleaning out waste, ventilation and light. He needed to build ramps between decks, and much more.
How long did this take? A little bit of Genesis maths gives us the answer. In 5:32 we read Noah was 500 when he had his first son. He is 600 when the Flood came. His sons were old enough to have married and assisted him with the building of the Ark, which means it was somewhere between 50 and 75 years. To work on one building project for 75 years takes endurance. This is obedience motivated by a deep faith. He believed God enough to have pursued a massive building project.
He needed to believe God’s Word, act upon God’s Word in obedience. But then he also needed to do something else. He needed to explain and teach God’s Word. Listen to the title Peter gives Noah in 2 Peter 2:5 and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly;
Noah was a preacher. He did not have a weekly congregation, most likely. But he certainly would have attracted an audience. A boat this big would have brought crowds of onlookers, likely every day. We picture how often Noah had to explain why he was doing this, what God told him was going to happen. You picture people asking him why, when this was going to happen, why God hadn’t sent a message to them, did Noah think he was the only one who would escape, and all these people would perish. As a preacher of righteousness, he would have told them that their lives were evil, that their violence and their immorality had reached such evil levels that God was prepared to wipe them all out. To keep preaching this message for fifty to seventy years requires faith.
That is the one condition to receive God’s exclusive salvation: faith. Be assured, there were many religious practices in Noah’s time, many people claiming knowledge of the spirit world, many priests and shamans and rituals. There were many claiming their own righteousness. But there is one condition: faith. Noah was the one man who treated God’s Word as true and believed them.
Faith says God can be trusted above every other source. Faith says, I will accept what God says as trustworthy, beyond even the evidence of my eyes. What He says is true of the invisible realm, of the spirit world, I will take as true. I will treat as visible what is invisible; I will treat as present what is future. God wants to be trusted on the basis of His promises alone, for that is the most personal and most intimate way of trusting a God who could overwhelm and dazzle us with power.
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. (Ephesians 2:8–9)
Still today, God has one requirement: believe what He says, trust in it, and depend on it. What He has said has become more specific, more focused, more concrete as God has revealed more truth. Today He tells us to believe that He is again going to judge all the world by the standard of His own righteousness. He has made an Ark for people to get into, and that Ark is His Son, the Messiah of the world. And what He requires is that you believe what He says, and place your trust in Jesus. Get into that Ark. Depend on the fact that His death on the cross and resurrection is the lifeboat to avoid God’s judgement on the world. Come to God and ask to be placed in Him, placed inside that Ark of Jesus.