Evidence of Noah’s Ark in a Global Flood
Photography By Lonnie Paulson https://www.lonniepaulsonphoto.com
Why is it Important to Believe in a Global Flood?
Some theologians do not believe that Noah’s Ark was in a global flood. They believe the flood was regional. In Genesis six through nine Moses wrote about the global flood which eight people were saved from the wrath of God. Jesus valued the scriptures and Moses the author of the first five books of the Bible. “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?” (John 5:46–47 NKJV). Many Bible believing Christians like me believe that Noah’s flood was a global flood. The Bible in its writings give much evidence for a global flood and I personally do not see how anybody could read about Noah’s flood and come up with the idea of a regional flood.
Evidence of a Global Flood
“And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered” (Genesis 7:19–20 NKJV). The earth was in a global flood. Look at what God told Noah’s family. “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done” (Genesis 8:21b NKJV). Scripture proves that this could not be a regional flood. God destroyed every living thing on Earth. A regional flood would not have destroyed every living thing on the Earth. If the flood was just a regional flood, why would you have to build such a large boat? The ark was about 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high and the ark had three decks.1 If the flood was regional Noah and his family could have moved to higher ground as soon as he heard about the flood. Also, it would have taken quite a while to build such a large structure as the ark, so by the time Noah had built the ark he could have traveled with his family to higher ground. The purpose of the flood was to destroy all the people in the world. If it was just a regional flood most people would have escaped the judgment of God. The flood accumulated a lot of water. Noah remained on the ark for seven months until the water subsided. If the flood was just a regional flood you wouldn’t have to spend seven months waiting for the water to go down.2 In the book The Genesis Flood by John C. Whitcomb and Henry M. Morris the authors give a complete chronology of the duration of Noah’s flood. They come up with a complete total of 371 days which is over a year.3
Why Did God Only Save Eight People
During the time of Noah, God saw all the wickedness and evil of His creation and was sorry He made the human being. “Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart” (Genesis 6:5–6 NKJV). Following in verse seven: “So the LORD said, ‘I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them’” (Genesis 6:7 NKJV). Out of all the people of the Earth God found favor in Noah because he walked with God. So, God wanted to save his family from the wrath that He would inflict on the Earth. Along with Noah’s wife they had three sons who were married to fine women which made eight people. These eight people would be the only surviving after the global flood. We Christians look around today in the world and see all the violence and evil and we think things can’t get any worse, but in the days of Noah it was worse. When the unbelievers get wicked enough and all the elect of God has been chosen for the kingdom of God then the wrath of God will show its full anger not with a flood of water, but with fire.“But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up” (2 Peter 3:10 NKJV).
Building the Ark
God gave a 120-year count-down to the time that He would destroy all flesh on the Earth with a global flood. “And the LORD said, ‘My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years’” (Genesis 6:3 NKJV). Note that Noah’s sons had not been born yet from 120-years before the flood. Bodie Hodge, who is co-author of the book, A Flood of Evidence, has completed a table of the 120-year chronology leading up to the flood.4 At one hundred years before the flood Japheth, Noah’s first son is born. Two years later Noah had Shem. Two to three years later Ham, the youngest son, was born. Bodie Hodge speculates that between twenty to forty years all three sons found a wife. Bodie Hodge further speculates that in the last 55 to 75 years Noah spent time building the ark. So, that would be a lot of years to build such a big boat. As I stated in this article, the boat was about 450 feet long. Finally, when the ark was finished God told Noah to bring his sons, his wife and his son’s wives into the ark. “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” (Genesis 6:18 NKJV). God also instructs Noah to bring in a male and female of certain animals in the ark. “Then the LORD said to Noah, ‘Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before in this generation’” (Genesis 7:1 NKJV).
The Flood
Once they were in the ark, in seven days water started to flood the Earth as noted in Genesis 7:10. In Genesis 7:11 Moses the author of Genesis mentions that Noah was 600 years old and the flood started in the second month on the 17th day. The Jewish calendar is composed of 360-days in 12-months. I assume Moses the author of Genesis is referring to a Jewish calendar to date the time of the flood. We call the second Jewish month Iyar which would be equivalent to our modern calendar of the months April – May. Notice that Noah was 600 years old at the time of the flood. Why did people in the early parts of the book of Genesis live so long? Before the flood, the environment was different. It was more tropical on the Earth and the Earth’s atmosphere had more oxygen. The evidence of this environmental change is found in the fossil record. After the flood and during the ice age, people’s ages would shorten. Where did all that water come from to flood the entire planet? At the beginning of the flood the Bible says that “all the fountains of the great deep were broken up.” Following that the “windows of heaven were opened.” The water came from under the Earth in the form of springs and water saturated clouds. The pressure from all over the Earth may have caused continental shifts in continents. For you to better understand the power of all this water in the flood I have an extensive quote from the book, The Genesis Flood. I highly recommend this book as it is a classic and is still in print today by John Whitcomb and Henry Morris. “At the same time, waters and probably magmas were bursting up through the fractured fountains of the great subterranean deep. In the seas, these ‘fountains’ not only belched forth their waters and volcanic materials, but the corresponding earth displacements must have been continually generating powerful tsunamis. This tremendous complex of forces, diastrophic and hydrodynamic, must beyond any question have profoundly altered the antediluvian topography and geology of the earth’s crust.”5 I leave you here with a conclusive finale of Noah’s flood. “Now the flood was on the earth forty days. The waters increased and lifted up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. The waters prevailed and greatly increased on the earth, and the ark moved about on the surface of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered. And all flesh died that moved on the earth; birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man” (Genesis 7:17–21 NKJV).
How did all that Water Disappear?
God made a great wind to pass over the Earth. God stopped the water from the heavens and from the deep. “And the waters receded continually from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters decreased. Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat” (Genesis 8:3–4 NKJV). Tishrei would be the seventh month on the Jewish calendar which would encompass September and October. “And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen” (Genesis 8:5 NKJV). Tevet would be the tenth month on the Jewish calendar which would encompass December and January. How can anyone read Genesis 8:5 and think that the Bible is describing a regional flood? In another 40 days Noah opened the windows of the ark. He sent out a raven from the ark to scout the land for dry ground. He also sent out a dove. The dove returned to Noah because it could not find dry land to rest her feet. Noah waited for another seven days for the waters to recede. He sent the dove out again at this time. The dove came back to Noah in the evening with a freshly plucked olive leaf in its beak. He waited another seven days and sent out the same dove, but it did not return. “And it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, that the waters were dried up from the earth; and Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and indeed the surface of the ground was dry” (Genesis 8:13 NKJV). The first month in the Jewish calendar would be Nisan which would be spring or what we would call March–April. Noah still waited another month and on the twenty-seventh day of that month the ground was dry. The flood was over and a new life would happen with Noah’s family. God told Noah to bring his wife, his sons, and their wives out of the ark along with all the animals and to inhabit the new land and to multiply.
The Rainbow Covenant
God gave a covenant to Noah which is known by theologians as the “Rainbow Covenant.” “I set My rainbow in the cloud, and it shall be for the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. It shall be, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the rainbow shall be seen in the cloud; and I will remember My covenant which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh” (Genesis 9:13–15 NKJV). A regional flood cannot destroy all flesh on the Earth. The next time you see a rainbow in the sky, think of God’s promise. Students of science would say that the effect of the rainbow is just basic physics. Light entering water droplets which slow down the speed of light, reflected, refracted and dispersed in its individual light wave frequencies forming seven bands of independent wave frequencies of visible light, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet forming a rainbow. I would agree, but who is the author of physical science?
Photography By Lonnie Paulson https://www.lonniepaulsonphoto.com
My Last Words
Noah’s flood is very important to the Christian. Just as all scripture in both Old and New Testaments are important. Everything in the Old Testament through history and Bible prophecy points to Jesus Christ. The great flood at the time of Noah was a great judgment of all the people that lived on the Earth at that time. Though God promises not to flood the Earth globally again. He will judge the Earth in the last days. In the “Olivet Discourse” which is a sermon by Jesus on the end time judgment of unbelievers on the Earth where Jesus refers to a similarity between Noah’s flood and the end of the Earth. Jesus prophesied: “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only. But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. 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, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be”(Matthew 24:36–39 NKJV). If you do not know Christ repent and believe and follow Him as Lord and Savior for the rest of your life and into eternity.
Written by Lonnie Paulson
Evidence of Noah’s Ark in a Global Flood: End Notes
1) Ray Comfort. The Evidence Bible, Bridge-Logos Publishers, Alachua, FL 32615 (2011) p 15.
2) Ken Ham & Bodie Hodge. A Flood of Evidence, Master Books, Green Forest, AR 72638 (2016) p 94.
3) John C. Whitcomb & Henry M. Morris. The Genesis Flood; Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing Co., Phillipsburg, NJ 08865 (1961) p 3.
4) Ibid. A Flood of Evidence p 171.
5) Ibid. The Genesis Flood p 265.