The Flood Subsides (Gen 8:1-14)

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded. Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible. After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him. By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry.?

1.?God created a crisis in the lives of Noah and the animals through the flood. In God’s timing the flood waters receded, and they were able to leave the ark. This is a lesson in persisting in faith and having patience that God does not forget us in our troubles. He is in control and will work all things for the good of those who love him. (Rom 8:28-30)

2. The flood waters receded gradually. There was a series of steps and signs that showed Noah that he was restoring the earth. Why does God sometimes work in small steps when he could make a dramatic change??

3.?Noah was in the ark for about one year. Imagine life with no seasons. Life inside the ark was like living in a waiting room. They were tossed about without any experience of what was happening outside. How is this like our experience of life in a cosmic struggle between frightening spiritual forces of good and evil??