Nineveh Presbyterian Church
|
|
Nineveh Presbyterian Church |
| PO Box 115 Nineveh New York 13813 |
An Old Testament Bible Story -
Noah's Boat and God's Rainbow
God looked for good people and found only Noah and his family.
So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Build a large boat. Make the boat 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high. Put the door on the side, and build three decks inside the boat—lower, middle, and upper. I am about to cover the earth with a flood but I will confim my covenant with you. Build and enter the boat, you and your wife and your three sons and their wives. I will send a pair of every kind of animal, a male and a female, for you to keep safe during the flood. Take enough food for your family and all the animals.”
 |
|
|
For 7 days
they came, every kind of animal,
in pairs, male and
female. They entered the Ark, just as God had commanded.
On the seventh day Noah and his family entered the Ark and God closed the door. |
 |
Noah was 600 years old. It was the seventeenth day of the second month when God closed the door of the Ark. Then underground waters erupted up from the earth, and rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky. The rain continued to fall for forty days and forty nights.
|
|
|
After 40 days, the flood waters began to recede and the underground waters stopped flowing.
In 150 days, five months from the time the flood began, the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. Two and a half months later, other mountain peaks became visible.
After another forty days, Noah opened the window he had made in the boat and released a raven. The bird flew back and forth until the floodwaters on the earth had dried up. He also released a dove to see if the water had receded and it could find dry ground. But the dove could find no place to land because the water still covered the ground. So it returned to the boat, and Noah held out his hand and drew the dove back inside.
|
|
After waiting
another seven days,
Noah released the dove again. The dove returned that evening with a fresh olive leaf in its beak and Noah knew that the floodwaters were almost gone. |
He waited another seven days and then released the dove again. This time it did not come back.
Noah was now 601 years old. On the first day of the new year, ten and a half months after the flood began, the floodwaters had almost dried up from the earth. Noah lifted back the covering of the boat and saw that the surface of the ground was drying.
Two more months went by, and at last the earth was dry !
Then God said to Noah, “Leave the boat, all of you. Release all the animals so they can be fruitful and multiply throughout the earth.”
So Noah, his wife, and his sons and their wives left the boat and all of the animals and birds came out of the boat, pair by pair.
Noah thanked God for His goodness to his family and God said to Noah: "I will never again hurt the earth and its animals because of men. I will never again destroy all living things. As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.”
Then God made a covenant with Noah and his sons, God told them: “I hereby confirm my covenant with you and your descendants, and with all the animals that were on the boat with you, the birds, the livestock, and all the wild animals, every living creature on earth. I confirm My covenant with you. Never again will floodwaters kill all living creatures; never again will a flood destroy the earth.”
|
God said, “I am giving you a sign of my covenant with you and with all living creatures, for all generations to come. I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my covenant with you and with all the earth. When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, and I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life." |
|
|
|
