The Worldwide Flood

Answers Bible Curriculum Unit 3 Lesson 26

This week in Sunday school, we consider whether the account of Genesis 6-9 can be fairly interpreted as describing a local flood. Why do many Christians accept or are open to accepting a local flood explanation? What details of the biblical text, beyond the descriptors of total destruction, preclude a local flood interpretation? And how does a local flood view actually call into question the very faithfulness of God?

Our main text for the lesson is Genesis 6:1-9:19.

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okay actually it’s time to get started so everybody please find your seats good morning welcome to Sunday school good to see you we’re again today looking at the Genesis flood last week we read the entire flood account we noted the level of detail regarding the timing of the flood and how it just further points to the fact that we were looking at true history this was written as history not as myth not as an extended allegory not as hyperbole we also saw how emphatic the account of the flood is when it comes to every land and air creature except those on the ark as dying in the flood it was indeed a global catastrophe with absolute destruction but there’s still another question could noses have been exaggerating when he said all creatures on earth died could he have meant all creatures and only a certain area after all the hebrew word that has translated earth throughout these passages in genesis it can also be translated land so perhaps we’re only talking about a certain land and not necessarily all the land that is on earth could the Genesis flood have been a local flood is it possible moreover that all land creatures and people only existed in one place during those days so that you could have let’s say a certain valley in which everyone lived and a flood coming upon that valley and truly destroying all flesh because they only lived in that one small area could the rest of the earth have been undisturbed we’re going to talk about these ideas head-on today as we really seek to answer the question was the flood global or not I mean sir this question has implications for whether we can really trust what the Bible says how we are to understand the geological and paleontological record so that rock layers and fossils that we find today and also whether God is really a God who keeps his promises and a number of important issues tied up with the question of whether the flood was global or not we’re gonna approach this main question from a couple different angles here’s our agenda we’re going to re-examine some key descriptions of the flood and Genesis seven eight we’re gonna test the rainbow promise of God given in Genesis nine and we’re gonna consider some of the flood legends and extra biblical evidence that has to do with whether the flood was global or not let’s pray before we continue our great God thank you for your word help us be able to understand it this morning help me be able to explain it helped me to be accurate and helpful and God I pray that we would have a greater confidence in your word and in his true interpretation but also a a greater appreciation of the forces that we are up against that would have us compromise what your word actually says in order to sit with man’s ideas I pray Lord if you’d protect us from that impulse but that we would stand upon your word in Jesus name Amen let’s start in Genesis chapter 7 please open your Bibles there we’ve already read the whole flood narrative but this time we want to look at just a few sections Genesis 7 and 8 and examines some details that are particularly relevant for whether the flood was truly global or not we’re starting in Genesis chapter 7 verses 11 to 12 and you see some other first references there we’ll be looking at each of those each of those ones so Genesis 7 verses 11 to 12 fallen long in me as I read in the six hundredth year of Noah’s life in the second month on the seventeenth day of the month on the same day all the Fountains of the great deep burst open and the floodgates of the sky were opened the rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights I’ll skip down to verses 17 to 24 then the flood came upon the earth for forty days the water increased and lifted up the ark so that it rose above the earth the water prevailed and increased greatly upon the earth and the ark floated on the surface of the water the water prevailed more and more upon the earth so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered the waters prevailed 15 cubits higher and the mountains were covered all flesh that moved on the earth perished birds and cattle and beasts and every swarming thing that swarms upon the earth and all mankind of all that was on the dry land all in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life died thus he and that’s God blotted out every living thing that was upon the face the land from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky and they were blotted out from the earth and only Noah was left together with those that were with him in the ark the water prevailed upon the earth 150 days now finally look at the first two verses of chapter 8 but God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the cattle that were with him in the ark and God caused a wind to pass over the earth and the water subsided also The Fountains of the deep and the floodgates of the sky were closed and the rain from the sky was restrained from these details I want to make some certain observations notice what words and ideas are repeated in these sections of text first of all we see a lot of the inclusive language the word all and every is used multiple times not just to describe the death of living things but also how the waters you’ve been prevailed upon the earth and we do see 40 days and 40 nights that description repeated we see just repeated the the phrases Fountains of the great deep and flood gates of the sky I also see the idea of rain being repeated and the idea of prevailing and increasing when talking about the water that is repeated multiple times in the text and know precisely from where the floodwaters came we have flood gates of the sky and Fountains of the great deep and notice the first reference actually says all the Fountains of the great deep notice how high the waters rise in the flood it says all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered covered by water and the water prevailed 15 cubits higher now there’s that cubit again remember a cubit is an ancient measurement of length of about 18 to 20 inches and at the length of the elbow to the fingertips and to get a better idea of what this detail about cubits actually means let’s work with a cubit of about 20 inches and do a little bit of math if the water prevailed 15 cubits higher than the highest mountain peaks on earth at that time many feet above those mountains was that so the math here would be 15 cubits times 20 inches 20 inches per cubit and that gives you 300 inches but we don’t want inches we want feet so how many theater in 300 inches 300 inches divided by 12 inches per foot and you get 25 feet so if we’re working with the cubit of about 20 inches the waters on the earth were so high that they were even 25 feet above the highest mountains all the high mountains everywhere this is how high the waters rose above the earth now with this data let’s consider it the theoretical situation imagine a valley surrounded by high mountains with the ark sitting in the middle let’s say a flood happens only in this valley the waters begin to rise and so does the ark finally the water reaches the tops of the mountains what would happen if the water which arrives even slightly above the mountains of this valley it would spill over right it would just go right over to the other side that’s just how water works that’s how gravity works so is it possible for water to cover the hills or mountains of this valley by 25 feet and still be contained in the valley no it’s snow it’s clearly not we’d have some sort of ridiculous situation like what this picture simulates it’s it’s clearly absurd and that’s important for us to realize let’s now talk about some interpretation questions besides the descriptions of universal death what from even these few passages we’ve reexamined plainly indicates the flood had to have been global namely what we just looked at right the water covered the high mountains all the high mountains everywhere by at least 20 feet you can’t have that and have a local flood and besides is causing a global flood beyond the ability of God surely not she is God and that’s what the text leads us to understand now what about these fountains and flood gates the phrase is Fountains of the great deep and flood gates of the sky are at least partly metaphorical there are no actual gates in the sky so – what do they actually refer the underground water and rain right so yeah this is more straightforward than we might think the floodgates of the sky that’s just talking about rainfall and the Fountains of the great deep these are underground Springs underground sources of water and because it says of the great deep that’s usually a term connected with the oceans these look like they are some sort of ocean springs probably underneath the crust of the earth gushing water into the oceans and even into the air so this water is probably actually very hot when it came out of the earth and it may have actually produced the rain clouds and the waters from above or at least was partly related to that yeah so these these two terms they’re just talking about rain and water from being brought under the earth even under the oceans now do appreciate that because that means we’re having a lot of water coming from two different sources from above and below and as I noted it wasn’t just Fountains of the great deep but all the Fountains of the great deep so you can imagine that was a lot of water now based on these verses and just these these two follow-up questions that we’ve just answered could the author of Genesis been intending to communicate that he was he was describing a local flood and not the global flood so like well you know it could have been local you could it could fit both ways no there’s only one way to take this text the details here they indicate a global flood a flood where the water actually covered the entire planet the entire earth now some people assert that it was a local flood that had universal effects I even mentioned this a little bit at the beginning they certain that all those who were affected by the flood they lived in the same place that Noah did therefore when the flood came all creatures on earth were affected because they were all living in that one area now this assertion is convenient because it allows a person to seemingly confess the global effects of the flood while also keeping intact presuppositions about fossil lairs being built up over millions of years and remaining undisturbed by the flood but why should we reject the assertion that the flood was local but had global effects it’s that inclusive language that you referred to earlier yeah that particular detail and these others we’ve examined the same reason we reject a local flood is there reason we will reject a local flood with global effects you can’t have all the high mountains everywhere being covered by at least 20 feet of water and still have a local flood the descriptions of Genesis indicate global water coverage and besides it’s silly to think that no animals or people would live outside Noah’s area I mean how many years after creation is the flood taking place according to Genesis 5 the genealogy there we just add up the years in that genealogy we’re talking at thousand six hundred and fifty years considering the extremely long life spans of man at that time and animals they probably live longer and their reproductive capacity it makes no sense to say that people and animals only lived in Noah’s area including the birds you’re saying no bird lived outside that area so by now it should be clear that Moses was communicating that the flood really happened and then it was a global event it was treated as history by Moses and it was treated as global history but there’s more God’s covenant involving the rainbow in Genesis 9 it proves that the flood had to have been global and let’s examine this now look at Genesis 9 verses 8 to 17 Genesis 9 8 to 17 and just recall the context here but this point the flood has finished it’s lasted more than a year knowing his family and the animals they’ve come out of the ark Noah has just finished offering sacrifices to God and God is pleased with Noah and his sacrifice and God makes a number of promises starting with this one in verse 8 so Genesis 9 starting in verse 8 then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him saying and behold I myself to establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that is with you the birds the cattle and every beast the earth with you of all that comes out of the ark even every beast of the earth I establish my covenant with you and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood nor there shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth God said this is the sign of the covenant which I’m making between me and you and every living creature that is with you for all successive generations I set my bow in the cloud and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between me and the earth it shall come about when I bring a cloud over the earth that the bow will be seen in the cloud and I will remember my covenant which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh and never again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh when the bow is in the cloud then I will look upon it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth and God said to Noah this is the sign of the Covenant which I’ve established between me and all flesh that is on the earth now let’s make some observations on this section notice that we have God speaking to Noah and his sons but notice with whom is the Covenant verses 9 to 10 say say this covenant is with Noah and his sons and their descendants as well as all the land and air animals on the earth the covenant deed is even said to be with the earth itself we often refer to this covenant as the noahic covenant but truly this covenant embraces all creatures that were dwelling upon the earth and would dwell upon the earth notice who establishes this covenant God notice what is promised in this covenant God says he will never again destroy all the earth or he’ll never again destroy the earth and all its inhabitants with Potter and we just look back briefly at Genesis 8:21 God makes a similar promise at the end of that chapter Genesis 8 Genesis 8:21 says the Lord that’s Yahweh smelled the soothing aroma and you’re always said to himself I will never again curse the ground on account of man but the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth and I will never again destroy every living thing as I have done the way I just destroyed the earth I will never do that again now notice what are the terms for God keeping this covenant in place what does man need to do what to the people on earth need to do nothing yes actually as we just read God acknowledges man’s unchanged and continual wickedness he says I’m not gonna flood the earth again for man is evil from his youth those don’t seem like they go together but that’s the way God expressed it it’s not as if this covenant is enforced only if man cleans up his act far from it and yet God says this is my covenant for all successive generations it is even called an eternal code there’s no seeing an end to this covenant and now notice the rainbow it’s not actually called a rainbow in the text but just a bow now what is a bow Lowe is a Latin of war in English we have both to describe also those you know frilly ribbon things but this word in Hebrew actually just indicates arranged weapon not even necessarily a shape it’s it does have a certain shape the shape and curvature of a rainbow does indeed look like the weapon that many Israelites would have used and have been familiar with but it is called a bow here God says or rather notice the purpose for God setting his bow in the clouds the text says it’s for God to see and remember when he looks at the bow in the cloud he will remember his covenant and will not send another flood of the same destructive magnitude by implication though when man sees the bow in the clouds he will also remember this covenant from God now how long ago from today was this covenant given if we use again the information from the Genesis genealogy is particularly Genesis 11 now we have the flood occurring around 2,350 BC it’s almost 2200 2080 now so if we just add those two numbers together we would see how long ago this covenant was me two thousand three hundred and fifty plus two thousand two hundred and twenty we get four thousand five hundred and seventy years I’ll be how long ago this covenant was established and our rainbow is still evident in the sky today we see them all the time and they are very beautiful let’s ask some more interpretation questions what is the significance of God choosing a bow as the sign of his covenant is the shape but I think there’s more because God didn’t have to use this term didn’t have to use this side as a sign of the Covenant in saying that he set his bow in MacLeod it’s like God is saying he’s hung up his weapon God has laid aside the bow of flood judgment and he promises never to take it up again he’s put that weapon he’s put that bow in the cloud for all to see that it is truly laid aside thus seeing a rainbow should both sober us and assure us because in a sense we glimpse the weapon that once destroyed the whole earth but we also see that it’s been laid aside God keeps his promise never to use this weapon again indeed has there ever been another flood that covered the entire globe since God made this covenant no there hasn’t it’s only been this one global flood so which attribute of God does this covenant pictured in the rainbow particularly emphasized no sign of it does picture his mercy it does picture his holiness in Wrath because it was it was indeed the weapon that destroyed the earth but God also had mercy he wouldn’t do that again and he spared Noah and the flood but I think there’s something even more emphasized here yeah Dwayne for sure four thousand five hundred seventy years and he’s kept his word there has never been a flood like the one that destroyed the earth except of course if you take it as a local flood half there have been many local floods since God made this company floods that even devastated vast areas of land killing man and killing animals Mulder there have there have been many of them and they still occur today so how does believing in a local flood make God an unfaithful covenant breaker you can see the logic can she if the flood was indeed local and God promised he would never again flood the world as he had done and God has clearly violated that promise thousands of times local floods have plagued humanity throughout history and they continue to do so so the bow the rainbow far from being a sign of God’s faithfulness it would be the greatest sign of God’s hypocrisy if the flood were truly local you see there are so many problems when it comes to trying to take the Genesis flood as anything other than a global Cataclysm as we’ve already seen today the language of the flood account emphasizes universal death and destruction the description of the rising water makes the local flood impossible the rainbow covenant would be no promise at all if it were only about a local flood it would be a lie but there’s even more than that consider if the flood were a local events then the ark wasn’t necessary at all what could Noah and the rest of people on earth at that time what could they have done to escape the flood if there were only a local flood exactly just leave the area go to higher ground they could have simply migrated or when it comes to repopulating the earth afterwards if the flood was really local how could you repopulate this devastated area just just bring in people animals that were outside that area they could just migrate to this area really this whole judgement and Ark salvation is needlessly sloppy if this is only a local flood there’s almost no reason for God to do what he did and no reason for it to even be recorded if it’s only a local flood so as I say there are huge problems with taking Genesis 6 to 9 as describing anything other than a global flood but in spite of all this there are many Christian teachers who have and do assert a local flood or at least are open to its possibility how can this be when the biblical text is so clear what do you think yes ask me there’s something outside the Bible is affecting their interpretation really it comes down to this those who interpret a local flood are open to its interpretation they want to where they feel compelled to accommodate the secular thinking and wisdom of our age that’s the reason it’s not something from the text it’s something from outside the text because the prevailing wisdom of our day is naturalist uniformitarian and evolutionary I’ll define each of those terms naturalism is the belief that only natural processes not supernatural not spiritual must explain all that occurs in the world today uniformitarianism is the belief that all natural processes that we can observe right now can explain everything that took place in the past including the fossil record and the rock layers evolutionary theory sees that not only did life in the world go from molecules to man and from protoplasm to people but that really most processes if not all processes proceed according to a slow and gradual development even religion is to be explained in evolutionary terms people started out without really much organized religion they were just animus or worshipping spirits and then they believed in many gods and then eventually they progressed to believing in only one God until they progressed even more until they don’t believe in any gods at all that’s where we are today in our truly enlightened age so these ideas naturalism uniformitarianism and evolutionary theory they are what are considered wise and sophisticated today and so when the people of this age scientists especially when they do research in the fields of geology so studying the rocks and rock layers and paleontology studying the fossils they bring these assumptions they bring these worldview components into their study and what do they conclude they do not see evidence of a global flood they see layers of rock and fossils laid down gradually over millions of years that were never disrupted by any global Cataclysm and because this view is predominant and popular those who hold it ridicule and put pressure on Christians to get on board with what in their minds has been proven clearly a scientific fact only unreasonable and antiquated people would still believe in a global flood I mean after all objective science has proven otherwise and thus many Christians do today what Christians started to do in the early 1800s when Bible disbelieving geologists first started to claim that there was no evidence of a global flood in the fossil record that there was only evidence of gradual geological change the formation of the Earth’s rock layers took place over millions or billions of years under pressure Christians began placing man’s authoritative claims above the claims of the Bible and this had profound implications for some like Thomas Chalmers who was the inventor of the gap theory this meant searching for new interpretations in the biblical texts that do not come from the text itself living into ICG the Bible when it comes to the flood for others though like Friedrich Schleiermacher he’s the father of theological liberalism it meant a total denial of the historicity of the Bible slime occurred concluded you know what looking at science and reason it’s clear that the Bible is just a bunch of made-up stories it’s all there to make us feel our dependence on God there is a God why maka would say but we cannot know anything definite about him because the Bible is so unreliable so under pressure they either reinterpreted the Bible or repudiated the Bible but there wasn’t really a good reason to do that now therefore we do not need to proceed the way that these compromising Christians did in the past indeed let us not go their way science science has not disproven the Bible or a global flood rather secular scientists have given interpretations to the data according to their own worldviews in a sense they’ve made sure to discover what they already believed to be true in fact their interpretations according to their worldview when examined more closely under proper presuppositions they actually don’t make good sense at the scientific data at all now we have come to know by God’s grace as Christians that God exists now the Bible is true in every part and that Jesus is Lord we have learned that the Bible is our foundation for seeing and knowing what is true therefore we proceed according to a biblical worldview we start with a Bible and we examine the data of the world with the Bible’s truth in mind for that reason we should not vastly for a moment on anything that the Bible makes plain and is a global flood taught plainly in the Bible it is the flood was not merely a local event in Mesopotamia or something that occurred on the edge of the Black Sea the biblical text does not allow for such an interpretation neither was the flooded tranquil flood this is another theory a tranquil flood is the idea that it was a global flood but it did not disturb at all the millions of years of fossil record in the rock layers of the earth of course that’s key because you need that to preserve modern scientific theory no it couldn’t have been a tranquil flood because a tranquil flood would have been contrary to the laws of physics and would have required God to miraculously keep the flood calm for its duration and then remove the waters from the earth without any major erosion taking place if you’re saying there’s a flood that did not affect the ground of the earth at all and you have an extremely miraculous flood which really contradicts your whole purpose in trying to keep intact Naturalist uniformitarianism and evolutionary theory indeed the language of the biblical text indicates not a calm flood we had the Fountains of the great deep bursting open floodgates the sky being released this was a tumultuous time on earth and there was a chaotic flood nor was the flood mythical it was not a grand allegory or legend for Moses as we’ve seen it’s presented as detailed history and it’s affirmed by the Apostles and even by God Himself the Lord Jesus as we saw last week Jesus uses the no excuses Noah’s Flood as an analogy in the Gospels of his own coming judgment so if the flood never took place where the flood was just a big exaggeration then we have a right to question whether Jesus tells the truth whether he’s really coming back in judgment after all if it was just a myth then this is coming back and then and so it was just an exaggeration is this coming back this is judgment going to be exaggerated was it exaggerated when he proclaimed it no the flood really happened and it really was global in fact this is affirmed in the evidence that we see in the world let’s consider some extra biblical data now from a biblical worldview with biblical assumptions and presuppositions those are the same thing but there’s using both terms let’s think about how we interpret what’s in the world according to God’s Word since the flood did happen and because the flood was global what would we expect to find in the world as a result Oshin fossils on mountain yeah also some strange places what else about the same layer or even more basically lots of dead animals fossils buried all over the earth yeah fossils that are in the sign and evolutionary perspective that are supposed to be earlier Blair nonsense right yeah so evolutionary theory sees that there’s a there’s a definite progression in which fossils will appear where in the rock layers but in light of a global flood we would see that there isn’t a clear progression and the complexity of animals and how they were buried you’ll see some animals that were supposed to be earlier that are buried later and something else is supposed to be later are buried earlier that the flood would be remembered in many cultures around the world and you know what this is precisely what we see we see all of these things we do see fossils buried all over the world in various rock layers we do see marine fossils in odd places you see this picture here that’s on some mountains in Kentucky and we’ve got seashells there and we see them in deserts and even on Mount Everest there are marine fossils on Mount Everest and then we have flood legends we have flood legends across many cultures and this makes sense because the flood left only for families to repopulate the earth shortly after the flood about a hundred years or so at Babel the descendants of these families were scattered all over the world Noah Shem ham and Japheth they surely told their descendents about what happened in the flood so we should not be surprised to see stories similar to the Bible’s flood accounts in cultures all over the planet in fact we’re gonna examine a few of those flood legends in just a moment but before we do just speculate with me a little bit for a minute we’ve all played the game telephone we wouldn’t expect flood legends to line up exactly with the Bible example we would expect the major details the Genesis account to be represented in flood legends around the world but with some of the more minor details would likely be changed but they might not likely have been passed down accurately especially when we know that man is imperfect and he has a corrupted heart so he will likely change the story over time to make himself look better let’s now examine three actual flood legends that come from around the world we’re gonna look at one from Hawaii we’re gonna look at one from Babylon and look at one from Assyria and we don’t have time to actually read it the legends themselves the translations of these ancient texts but I will give you the main details on the screen I’ll read them to you and see how these flood legends compare to one another and compare to what’s given in the Bible so first we have one from Hawaii and by the way these flood legends contain some names of some people that are hard to pronounce and I don’t speak the ancient languages so I don’t know if I’m exactly pronouncing them correctly but I would be my best so in Hawaii there’s a story that after the death of the first man the earth became wicked new was the only good man left on the earth and new boots a canoe with a house on it and he filled it with animals the earth was then flooded and only knew and his family survived news canoe ended on Mauna Kea a new offered a sacrifice to the moon thinking that it was the moon that had saved him but Connie the Creator God he descended on a rainbow to correct newse mistake that’s a legend from Hawaii sounds like a one from Babylon according to a Babylonian legend after the death of art itas Zissou throws rain and there was a great flood ZZZ sooth Ross received a vision from Chronos where he was told that a flood would come on the 15th day of – EOS Zissou Ross was to build a boat and bring his friends and family aboard along with provisions and birds and four-legged animals this boat was 3,000 feet long and 1,200 feet wide by the way that’s more than half a half mile long so this is a huge boat the ether Jos sent out birds as the flood receded until they returned with muddy feet and then they did not return z3z soothe Ross offered sacrifices after the flood and was taken to dwell with the gods so there’s one from Babylon then finally here’s one from Sumeria this is the famous epic of gilgamesh in this one we have Booton apish Tim Hooton apish Tim was commanded to build a boat of reeds by the god a ax now this boat was to have six decks and to be a cube measuring 200 feet on all sides workers were hired to build the boat and they covered it with waterproofer the boat was loaded with living things and assured him his friends and relatives the God shamash sealed the door and the flood began the land according to this legend was shattered like a pot and all the people turned to clay the flood lasted six days the gods were sorry for sending the flood the boat landed on mountain a moosh and ravens and doves and swallows were released the animals were left let off the boat and then Hooten apish Tim offered sacrifices to the gods you notice commonalities between these floods and between the biblical account we in fact we can do a little bit of comparison here we do see a number of commonalities in this legend are in these legends and oh I’ll just go through these briefly I know I know you could pick them out by asked you we see that in each of these legends a Divine Being sends a flood judgment on the earth we see a man and his family were see we see a man that man builds a boat that man takes animals onto the boat that boat eventually lands on a mountain and the man offers sacrifices after passing through the flood now other details that were consistent with the Bible are in some of these especially even things about the birds but the major elements are largely consistent but when elements are missing compared to the biblical account from these legends the size of the boat in square we got half my longbow have a canoe with a house on it what else ah yes judgment for sin is definitely missing from these accounts in fact it’s really interesting I forget which one it is I think it might be the one from Babylon the reason the god send a judgment on the earth is because man is making too much noise which is kind of different right no there’s a seed of truth in there right when we know that the Bible says that there was violence on your earth is filled with violence and violence’s does make a lot of noise what else recorded consistently six days according to the epic of gilgamesh what else the number of people friends that is also not consistent and you work on the ark and which animals are brought on the ark yeah number of different details are not consistent here are some other ones the true creator God is not represented there is a divine being or divine beings but not the one God who exists as we mentioned at the dimensions of the Ark are wrong and inconsistent the details regarding the flood timing are not consistent contouring Bo promise is not represented in each one the rainbow does appear in the Hawaiian account but not the promise and it’s also missing from the other two and as we noted the reason for the flood is most noticeably absent from these accounts it was the wickedness of men and it was the violence of men on the earth and this is all very interesting but here’s a question people the earth scientists those who study ancient texts they can look at this and the question is did these other legends develop from the Bible and from the flood actually taking place or did the Bible borrow from other cultures how do we know and how we can how can we be sure now this the answer to this question depends a lot on what you believe about the Bible once you believe about the world now we know that the Bible is the Word of God and therefore it must be the original it must have the original historical record and it must describe something that actually took place in fact this this conclusion is actually supported by just comparing the various legends what details from these other accounts actually detract from their authenticity if you were to say hmmm which one of these accounts is the most reasonable which one of these counts seems to be most realistic in describing what happened you look at these other ones what stands out then their accounts that shows you hmm there’s something off here very likely to tip over especially if it’s at all what’s a motionless blood in fact many of these accounts the arc itself is not very realistic I mean a canoe with a house on it that’s not gonna do very well other things like that appear in these texts not only does the Bible contain more details than these other flood legends but the details make more sense and now we’ll learn more about how the Ark is represented in the Genesis account why it was a seaworthy boat how it was very practical for the flood we’ll talk about that next lesson but a comparison to the other flood accounts what the Bible gives is much more reasonable makes much more sense and these details when you approach them from the biblical perspective even these differing details the other accounts they’re not surprising we would expect as centuries go by that details from the original flood account or a flood record being passed down from generation to generation some of the details would get lost some of the details would be exaggerated or simplify meanwhile new elements would be added like different gods or multiple gods according to man’s corruption and is searched for religion without the true God see ones worldview greatly affects what one does with the data of the flood legends and there are many more legends beyond these three that I’ve represented to you and they do come from all over the world South America Europe Oceania Africa we see legends about the flood and all these different places now secularists someone firmly committed to his naturaliss uniformitarianism evolutionary presuppositions he will look at this and say ah see the Bible clearly borrowed from the pagans and is clearly not divine after all we have the story in all these different places apparently primitive societies all felt the same need to believe in the divine and to believe in this Cataclysm cataclysmic flood this is just an ordinary part of religious Ellucian now this view while downplaying and twisting the significance of the data these flood legends does not really answer well why these flood legends are so widespread culturally and geographically and why the Bible’s account is the most reasonable out of the flood legends now someone with a biblical worldview looks at the same data and says ah but doesn’t this make sense because there actually was a flood and because all people are descendants of the survivors of the flood this is why we see the record of the flood disseminated all over the world and the reason why the Bible’s record is so reasonable is because the Bible is a supernaturally inspired accurate and authoritative record given by God Himself of the flood event and many other things so a secularist would actually take the evidence of these flood legends and say that detracts from the Bible’s believability but actually the opposite is true this is why your worldview and your presuppositions are so important presence of the worldwide flood legends and the competency of the biblical account they only serve to affirm that God did in fact once judge the world with a worldwide flood and really that’s the main point of this lesson today this is a very apologetic focus lesson if we start with the Bible and if we proceed according to proper presuppositions that are based on the Bible then we have to acknowledge a global flood but that is consistent with what we see in the world today both in the fossil record and in the geological record and even in the flood legends so we don’t need to be hesitant about this and we certainly don’t need to compromise what the Bible says now let’s consider a few more application questions which I got think about six here as you interact with people what is the most likely response to the flood account in Genesis I think people believe it what do they think about many people will treat it just as Amit oh it never really happened there’s no trace of the street here but probably many more will actually say you know this probably did describe a flood an actual flood it’s just been exaggerated well in the most likely response that people say this was a local flood oh yes some some will totally say it never happened it is a little bit ironic when you think about it though our well today is 70 percent covered by water and many deny that there ever was a global flood Wow Mars is 0% covered by water and many think that it was once flooded with water just a little odd number two as we talk with unbelievers should we use various flood legends from around the world to prove that the Biblical Flood really happened guys prove is underlying there though the flood legends are consistent with the flood actually happening and they do support the Bible’s account it cannot prove that the Bible is accurate remember the text the biblical text itself is always the best way to show someone what is true because it is the ultimate authority this shows them reality so this is what we say the Bible is true and it’s accounts the global flood and based on that we would expect to see flood legends around the world which is what we do see which affirms the truthfulness of the Bible however if these legends did not exist the Bible would still be completely trustworthy because it is the Word of God so that’s to say this extra biblical evidence it is valuable and it does affirm the Bible but the Bible doesn’t need it the Bible does not need to be proved by extra biblical evidence because the Bible proves itself number three what elements the text of Genesis six to nine could you use to point someone to the global nature of the flood these are the things we talked about today the extremely inclusive language especially about the destruction of life on earth the description of the rising of the waters and how it covered even though all the high mountains everywhere under heaven the rainbow covenant promise and the lack of logic that exists in how people could have saved themselves from the flood if it were really just a local flood without the earth we can point people to these aspects of the text right in the Bible and with inferences and conclusions that come from the Bible now when talking with a fellow Christian who believes in or has been taught the flood was only a local event how should we approach in correcting their understanding you know part of the answer has to be that we should use a prayerful and loving attitude that truly seeks to do them benefit just going there looking to win arguments trying to do someone good and we should we should point them to examine the text more carefully some have accepted this interpretation without actually looking at the passage themselves carefully but part of our discussion with this person is going to need to address questions of what has ultimate authority can we trust the Bible above all things on the earth and we will it will be useful even to talk about what assumptions what anti-biblical assumptions undergird modern scientific assertions now people love to trust science and science is good if it proceeds according to good assumptions and when we talk about historical science origins science while most scientists the world today work with anti-biblical presuppositions like uniformitarianism and those need to be highlighted and addressed number five the rainbow has been hijacked by many different group groups as a symbol for their causes this uses a multicultural symbol it’s a symbol of hope a symbol of obtaining wealth without effort think my pecans and even as a symbol for those who engage in a sexually perverse lifestyle LGBTQ but how could you use the rainbow as a way to engage someone in the gospel Center conversation what do you think I should not be afraid of the rainbow I mean it’s one of the central aspects of the flood and it is a great way to get into a conversation about the gospel if you see someone saying say wearing a rainbow patch rainbow pin or something with a rainbow on their shirt you can ask why do you wear the rainbow and you can follow it up with do you know what the God says in the Bible about the rainbow if they seem willing to listen then you have a good opportunity to talk about God’s kindness God’s faithfulness and God’s holiness as exemplified in the flood and also in the salvation of Noah and that links directly to the gospel so we can use the rainbow to our advantage and indeed how can we connect the floods the gospel this is one of the things we’ve been talking about we can do the same things with the flood that the New Testament writers did we can show the holiness of God and the anger of God and judging the wickedness of men but we can see the kindness of God in wanting to see evil dealt with but also in preserving Noah and in giving a promise to never flood the earth again we can show that God promised that he will one day judge the earth again just as he did in the days of Noah but not with water but with fire and with his own coming I must also show that Jesus is the only Savior from that judgment so as with creation in the fall so the flood becomes a great way to talk about the good news of salvation in Jesus that’s pretty much what I have for you questions about what you heard today yeah Caleb are there any flood naraku’s that free day oldest version of the mosaic text that we have so Yin or any of the other flood narrative are there any evidence of those that predate the earliest manuscripts of the mosaic text the other flood legends other flood records do they do any of them predate the mosaic text and they do actually the oldest versions of the Old Testament that we have and even the time where Moses wrote the the flood account would be it would have been around let me say it this way Moses would have written a flood account in Genesis in the supernaturally inspired Word around 1440 BC or 1405 BC definitely sometime between coming out of Egypt and their children of Israel entering the promised land but the epic of gilgamesh may have been probably was written down earlier and some of the copies we have a bit they don’t I don’t think they necessarily predate 1400 BC but the the story was probably written down before Moses wrote it down now how significant is that well if you’re a secularist you say ah well then that means that Moses clearly borrowed from epic of gilgamesh or some of those other flood flood legends but again if we proceed according to biblical worldview that’s not a problem at all you say doesn’t matter when Moses wrote it he has the authoritative version it makes sense that other people would have written it down or talked about it because the flood actually happened and so it’s going to be remembered in different cultures around the world so as far as I know we do have some indications that other versions were written down before Moses did but again that’s not really a problem a good question now other questions if you think of any other questions based on today’s lesson be sure to email me that’s all for this week next week we’re going to look specifically at the ark consider its construction consider its shape whoa answer the questions could the ark have really handled the tumultuous waters of the flood and how did Noah get all those animals on there so I look forward to talking about that with you that’s closing prayer well God I thank you for your reliable Word lore the flood really did happen and the rainbow at bow in the clouds it’s a constant reminder to us both of your holiness but also your mercy and chiefly your faithfulness God I pray that as we’ve been saying these previous lessons that we’d be careful not to trifle with you that we would not treat you as an unholy God or a God who’s not serious about holiness you are but you are also a loving God and you provide a way of salvation to those who turn to you you did that for Noah and you do that for all those who will turn to Christ so I pray that each person listening God they would be sure that they are in the ark so to speak of Jesus and that they follow after you God that they loved you lord I pray that you’d also equip us make us bold make us loving to tell others about you so they might be spared from the judgment that is coming he might be rescued just as Noah was rescued lord thank you that you give us confidence in your word and Lord even the world in it from the various evidences in it the data it’s just affirms what your word says it’s because it really happened because you are true and your word is true well thank you thank you for your revealing yourself to us in Jesus name Amen all right thank you all I’ll see you next week