In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. And rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights. On the very same day Noah and his sons, Shem and Ham and Japheth, and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark, they and every beast, according to its kind, and all the livestock according to their kinds, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, according to its kind, and every bird, according to its kind, every winged creature. They went into the ark with Noah, two and two of all flesh in which there was the breath of life. And those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him. And the LORD shut him in.
Comment: There wasn’t a BC/AD system of dating things but here we are given a very precise time that the deluge started. We are meant to realize that this is a time/space story. It really happened. Can you, in your mind, hear the talking and screeching that’s going? Noah’s ‘Hallelujah, the waiting is over!’ Mrs Noah’s ‘I feel so sorry for my sister, Mabel and her little ones.’ Can you hear the screeching of the parrots as they fly about, the trumpeting of the elephants, the rubbing of the sheep as the 2 lice bite its hide, the cacophony of nature’s sounds as the animals hear the beating of the rain and get used to the roll of the ark? Noah had been told what was to happen but to see it beginning must have been distressing. Or was his trust in God enough to let him just quietly go around calming relatives, with a word, and animals, with a pat. Do you believe this story? Jesus did! (Matt 24 38-39)
Prayer: Help me to grasp the truth of this story and what it means.
As I read it! 