Joe Allotta

9) Noah lived a long time. He was a young lad when Adam’s Son Seth was still alive and lived all the way until Abraham (he’s kind of a big deal). No wonder it seems these ancient civilizations all have Flood narratives. They could literally go talk to their great⁸-grandad.

8) It took Noah 100 years to build the ark. Good thing people lived longer back then. I think it is important that God literally had Noah build it instead of just doing it for him. It fits with God’s character. It shows His patience. He is always slow to show His anger. For 100 years people could see Noah’s intense dedication and belief. His faith was literally on display, and yet still no one believed him.

7) Sometimes God closes a door and doesn’t open a window. When Noah built the ark, he built the door too big for him to close. I think that’s a beautiful picture of faith. He trusted God so much that if He didn’t step in to rescue him, then Noah and his family would die with the rest of mankind. Not to get too metaphorical on you, but sometimes when God closes a door in your life it’s to save you too.

6) 2 and 7. Might be a bad poker hand, but God can win with anything. He sent 2 of every unclean kind of animal, but 7 of every clean kind of animal. Why you may ask? Some of the clean animals are going to get sacrificed when the voyage is successful. If you kill one of the 2 animals left, it makes it harder to procreate. And let’s not forget that jerk dove who never returned when Noah sent him out the window to check for land. He finds himself a nice little tree to perch on and he’s good? What about your other bird friends? Seeing that there were 7, I bet the other 6 paired off, and he was the odd man out.

5) Dinosaurs were on the Ark too. I obviously take a pretty literal interpretation to Genesis and I know there are godly people who don’t, but if you take the book to be straight-forward communication then Noah brought Dinos on the ark too. I would assume babies. Maybe even eggs would be the better call. What did they eat? Noah probably pre-made a whole bunch of beef jerky. I actually think the Flood leads to a lot of explanations geologically and in the fossil record (but that’s for another time.) The Dinos simply died out within the next couple hundred years after the flood. Job talks about 2 dinosaurs – the Leviathan and the Behemoth. But some like crocodiles and the Loch Ness Monster live on. (No comments on Nessie… I was joking… Or was I?…)

4) His family was on the Ark for a long time. Most people quote 40-days and 40-nights but that’s just how long it rained. They were on the ark for over a year. It rained a lot – probably from a water canopy crashing down that surrounded the earth at that time creating a greenhouse effect. A lot more water came bursting forth from reservoirs beneath the earth’s crust earth. Then all that water has to drain into the oceans and what-not.

3) The Flood created the mountains. The earth was probably pretty smooth when first created. (Well technically it’s still pretty smooth, even with Everest, Denali, and the Polk City Landfill, and the deepest parts of the ocean; if planet earth was the size of a billiards ball it would be smoother than the little white cue ball.) But when the water burst forth from the earth it shifted the tectonic plates shoving them into one another creating mountains, valleys, shelves, and basins. As the water drained it cut into the soft earth canyons and rivers.

2) One of Noah’s kids married someone with Nephilim ancestry. The Nephilim were giants that were part of a curse because the sons of God slept with the daughters of men (I personally think that is talking about Seth’s descendants marrying Cain’s descendants, but you can go all sci-fi if you want to.) Yet the Nephilim should have all died out in the Flood. Thus one of Noah’s kids must have married someone with a little Nephilim blood in them because the sons of Anak show up in Numbers chapter 13.

1) I do not think that means what you think it means. God used the rainbow as a symbol to declare that He would never destroy the earth with a flood again. Obviously today, the symbol of the rainbow is now used by the LGBT community. I remember a picture right after Ireland voted to allow gay marriage that a huge rainbow shone over Dublin. Everyone declared that God sent the rainbow to show His approval. The symbol of the rainbow remains the same. It is a reminder that God is patient and slow to anger and will not destroy the earth with a flood again. Even if we are disobedient to Him and His Will. He won’t destroy us like that again.

Honorable Mention) There was a movie about Noah starring Russell Crow. It had an inaccuracy rating of 97%. The only thing they had right was that Floods have a lot of water.