Noah was a good man who walked with God and listened to what God said to him. He was a family man with a wife and three married sons. He wasn’t violent or corrupt like the world around him, so Noah stood out as someone different from the rest.

God was very unhappy with all the violence on the earth. People acted without restraint and committed much evil. Things got worse and worse, until God made a decision to send a great flood to end it all. Nevertheless, God saw Noah differently – he was delighted with him.

God spoke to Noah and told him to build a big ship, which was to be a floating refuge when the great flood came. God told Noah the way to build it. It was like a modern cargo ship. It was the length of a football pitch from end to end and about the same width as a football pitch. It was higher than a three storey building and you could have built a sports complex on its deck. There were rooms, there was a door in the side and it was built with three decks and, of course, a roof. It was built out of cypress wood, and coated with tar inside and out to make it watertight. There was to be plenty of room because God had big plans for the ship.

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God told Noah and his family to go into the ship before the flood came in order to be safe. Every kind of bird, animal and living creature needed to go in the ship too.

Noah trusted God’s words. He was frightened at what was to come, so he built the ship. He put provisions of every kind of food on board as God instructed him. Noah was a preacher who challenged people to live differently, but no-one paid any attention to him. People thought it was strange that Noah was building a ship. Only his family believed in him. Noah decided that obeying God was more important than listening to the opinions of other people. So, he continued building the ship until it was complete.

One day God said to Noah they should all get on board. The animals also entered the ship. They seemed to be coming from everywhere! Two of every kind of animal, male and female, every kind of bird and every kind of creature that moves along the ground were present and entered the ship. Finally God shut the door. That same day it started to rain. It rained for forty days and nights until the floodwaters covered the earth and all its highest peaks were submerged. Everything on board Noah’s ship survived and lived, but all creatures on the earth died. Noah and his family were saved, because he did what God commanded him to do.

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After it stopped raining, the flood waters began to recede. Some time later the ship came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. When it was safe, God commanded Noah to leave the ship and to release every living thing. So his family, all the animals and birds and everything that moved along the ground, everyone came out of the ship. Noah built an altar there and offered a sacrifice to God. On that day, Noah worshipped God. God was pleased with Noah and he promised never to flood the whole earth ever again. ‘The rainbow in the clouds will be a sign to you,’ God said, ‘and when I see it I will remember my promise to you that I will never again flood the whole earth.’

God said these comforting words: ‘As long as the earth remains, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.’

Material sourced from Genesis 6-9 and 2 Peter 2.

We would like to acknowledge with thanks the website for their helpful size comparisons based on the ship’s dimensions.

“How Big Was the Ark?” Noah’s Ark: Beyond Flannelgraph. A Ministry Defending Genesis, 23 June 2010. Web. 29 Apr. 2017.

Noah presented a sacrifice to God after leaving the ship.  Why did this please God? Click here for our study guide.

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Photo of Pigeon by George Hodan on PublicDomainPictures

Photo of Mountains by lydia harper on Unsplash

Photo of Rainbow by Axelle B on PublicDomainPictures