Thru the Bible

Steve Schwetz: Welcome to Thru the Bible. In this study, we're going to be stepping into one of the most dramatic moments of human history. A moment when mankind came terrifyingly close to the end, but by the grace of God. We'll begin in Genesis 6:14. And as you find your place, Greg and I have an update, this time on China.

Greg: Yeah, we just got a real exciting report looking back over the last year, and we're really encouraged by what's in this report.

Steve Schwetz: Yeah, what are some of the high points for you on this? First of all, who's the partner that we're with on this?

Greg: It's FEBC, a ministry that I spent a few years with. Far East Broadcasting Corporation for those of you that don't know. And the interesting thing about FEBC, thank you for clarifying that, is they started ministry to China in 1949, which was before you and I were born. It's hard to believe.

And because of that length of service, they have a level of credibility in that country that I don't think any other Christian ministry has. They have an incredible amount of credibility and trust. That was the year that Mao Zedong kicked out all the foreign missionaries. And so God used FEBC to start broadcasting the Gospel in.

Many people have heard of the famous Hudson Taylor, the great missionary. Well, his grandson or great-grandson told me personally that they believe that while China was closed, about half the people that came to faith found it through Christian radio, heard the Gospel. So it’s a very rich history.

Steve Schwetz: Now the other thing I appreciated about FEBC is, even though their name is Broadcasting Corporation, they are, in terms of an international ministry partner, as aggressive as anyone in going into different delivery methods. And that's what's so exciting about this report. Believe it or not, there’s a shortwave component. They're doing justification to make sure it's being heard and they're getting responses, but it is oh so much more.

Greg: Yes, it's digital. They've even launched a weekend programming that is in support of TTB's Bible study. In other words, they get a host and a group of people and they study the Bible. And I'm sure knowing FEBC that they're using Dr. McGee's teaching as the basis of that. So it’s pretty cool stuff.

We've actually already begun the second five-year cycle of the newly produced Chinese, both the Mandarin and the Cantonese. So that's really good too. And we have some great listener responses. Do you want to share this first one?

Steve Schwetz: Yeah, this first one says, "I've listened to Thru the Bible for the second time now, and once again, I've gained so much." I love this as an aside because this person is going to be on multiple trips on the Bible bus and that's an encouragement.

"For example, the advice Moses' father-in-law gave him. Pastor McGee offers a different perspective that broadened my thinking. Also regarding the commandment, 'You shall not kill,' I've heard fellow believers ask whether wars between nations violate this commandment. The program provided a clear teaching on this. I'm grateful for the nourishment this program brings and thankful to Liangyou Radio for offering such a wonderful show."

Greg: That Liangyou Radio translates into Good Friend. That's how FEBC is known on the air as Good Friend Radio. Now, I think we have time for one more. This is a person that wrote and said, "I believe this program has deepened my understanding of the Bible. It no longer feels obscure or difficult to understand, but rather closely connected to our daily lives.

To follow God's word is to love Him, and He delights in blessing us. The five books of Moses, also known as the Torah, are highly valued by the Jewish people and are something we Christians should also study diligently." How many times have we heard that type of response? It's incredible.

Steve Schwetz: Yeah, and the five books of the Law. It's also such an encouragement to me that they're finding stuff in the Old Testament that is ministering to their heart. A lot of people think, "Ah, I don't really look at that old stuff, I just look at the New Testament," but they're finding value in the Old Testament. Absolutely. Greg, why don't you pray for us as we begin?

Greg: Father, we rejoice that Your Word is going out in Mandarin and Cantonese to China and to the speakers of those languages all over the world. We pray that You will continue to touch people's lives with the power of Your Word in Jesus' name, Amen.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Well, we come today to the flood. Now the entire human family turned from God. There's none righteous, no not one, but here was one man who walked with God. He believed God. Here's a man who still trusted God, by faith, Noah.

Now, there is a striking contrast between the fact that the days of Noah are to be duplicated before the Lord comes again to the earth. And that's not for the rapture, but coming to the earth to establish His kingdom. But there's some remarkable parallels that have already taken place.

For instance, the way this chapter opens: it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, daughters born unto them. There was this tremendous population increase and man had spread by that time pretty much over the earth. He was in North America, he was here, he was in Asia, in Europe, and in Africa. He spread in every direction.

And today we have this tremendous population explosion, and men again will increase on the face of the earth. And then there is the fact that during the Great Tribulation period, the Holy Spirit will no longer restrain evil. Now He'll still be there to convert men, but He'll not be restraining evil on the earth. We're told very definitely.

And God's overtures to men will be despised and rejected, and certainly they are today. Isn't it amazing that the only ones that are listened to today are the liberal Protestant ministers and the Roman Catholic? You hear nothing today of conservative men. Now they've attempted to make some sort of an inroad, but they've had several conventions and they're trying their best to get back in the mainstream.

But we've come to the day that if you're going to stand for God, you're going to find out that you'll not be able to talk before a TV camera very often. You've got to learn to protest and march and deny everything before that. Now, may I say to you, of course, the world in that day will be faced with the great problem of the rapture. There have been a great number of people that have left the earth. And may I say also, there were judgments in that day, and yet they did not heed them. That was the warning that God had given.

Now let's look at the flood itself. The first is the preparation that is made for it. God is giving ample opportunity. And here in verse 14, God says to Noah, "Make thee an ark of gopher wood." That's an indestructible wood, very much like our redwood here in California. "Rooms shalt thou make in it, in the ark." And the word for rooms has the idea of nests. Now the elephant would need a room, but may I say to you that the mole wouldn't need quite that much room. They just give him a little dirt in the corner and that's all that he would need.

And we're told and he shall pitch it within and without with pitch. That is, it was to be made waterproof. Now here were the instructions, "And this is the fashion which thou shalt make of it: the length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, the breadth of it 50 cubits, the height of it 30 cubits." The impression that most people have of the ark is the impression they were given by the little Sunday school card. It looked like a houseboat, and it was to me a very ridiculous sort of a travesty.

It was a caricature of the ark instead of picturing it like it actually was. To begin with, may I say to you that the instructions for the building of the ark reveal that it was quite a sizable sort of an ark. "And thou shalt make the ark and finish it, in it shall be 300 cubits." Now, if a cubit is 18 inches, that ought to give you some conception of how long this ark was.

Now, the question arises, how could they make it substantial in that day? Well, friends, you're not dealing with cavemen. You're dealing with a very intelligent man. Noah was an intelligent man. You see, the intelligence that the race has today came right through that man, and he happened to be a very intelligent man. Now he's not making an ocean-going boat to withstand 50-foot waves.

All he's doing is to have just a place for life, animal life, and man to stay over quite a period of time, by the way, but not to go through a storm, actually, just to wait out the flood. That was all. And for that reason, it might lack a great deal, and it did not have to be built as an ocean-going boat. That would give it a great deal more room. So 300 cubits, and if a cubit is 18 inches, that's 450 feet long. That's a pretty long boat, by the way.

But the relative measurement is the thing that interests me. And you put this down by, for instance, the New Mexico, one of our battleships sometime ago, but it was built 624 feet long, 106 and a fourth feet wide, and the 29 and a half mean draft. Well, may I say that you put down the comparisons and it's practically the same so that you have not a ridiculous-looking boat at all, but one that would compare favorably with the way they build ships today.

We're told here, "A window shalt thou make in the ark." Now the window wasn't a little slit made in the side of the ark. Have you ever stopped to think about the stench that might be in there with all those animals in there over that period of time? Well, a window shalt thou make in the ark, and the window went all the way around. And in a cubit shalt thou finish it above.

Now from a cubit from the top of the ark, from the roof, and the roof must have overlapped there quite a bit. And underneath there was a cubit, 18 inches, that went all the way around the ark. Now that's the way they ventilate a gymnasium today. I noticed it at the State Fair in Dallas. The building in which the animals are has that window that goes all the way around at the top.

And may I say with all the animals they had at the State Fair in Dallas, Texas, it wasn't a bad place to be. People were sitting in there eating their meals and sleeping there very comfortable, and the odor was not bad. I've heard that poor Noah had to stick his head out this little window to live. Well, that's ridiculous. We're not looking at that type of a thing. That's man's imagination. It's not what the record says here at all.

And friends, quit reading Sunday school cards. The pictures that were given to me when I was a kid, I've had to unlearn practically all of them. And that little ridiculous boat, I wish we could get rid of it. Now we're told, "And the door of the ark," now it only had one door though, and that's important. Christ said he was the way. "I am the door to the sheepfold," by the way, and he's the door to the ark.

"And the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it." Now it was three decks here, you see, and then I take it one on top or one on the bottom maybe. That would make four decks. And was there a door for each one? I personally have not come to any conclusion here. I'm rather of the opinion there was only one and not one for each floor. But that, frankly again, is beside the point.

Now God says, "And behold I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life from under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shall die." Now God is bringing the judgment upon the earth, upon animal and bird and man. "But with thee," God says, "will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou and thy sons and thy wife and thy sons' wives with thee.

"And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female. Of fowls after their kind, the cattle after their kind." And again you must understand by this time, one cow would represent the entire cow family, the Holsteins and the Jerseys and the Guernseys and all the others. And then "every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee to keep them alive."

Now that is something else that we need to pay attention to. It's repeated again in the next chapter, that Noah wasn't a Frank Buck who went out and bring them back alive. He wasn't a big game hunter. He didn't have to go after these animals; they came to him. We're told that, and we'll see in the next chapter they did come to him. They'll come to you. Now why would they? Animals in danger will do that.

I remember the first time that we went into Yosemite Valley when our daughter was just a little thing and she'd never seen snow before. And we put her down in the snow and she began to whimper, but she quit when she looked over and saw a little deer. Well, actually I believe we could have gone over and petted that little deer, but we didn't try it because I knew something about the danger of them turning on you and being able to kick and kill an individual. So we didn't approach them any closer.

But I mentioned that to the ranger. He laughed. He said, "Yes, there's snow up in the High Sierras right now. And when there's snow up there and there's danger, they come down here and are as tame as any animal could possibly be. But the minute that the snows melt and it becomes spring," he says, "they spring out of this area and you couldn't get in a country mile of any of them." Why? Well, because when an animal is in danger, he'll come. Now at the time of the flood, I don't think Noah had any problem at all. I think they all came to him.

Now in verse 21, "Take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee and for them." Now he's to do something very practical. It took a lot of hay in the ark to feed these animals. Thus did Noah according to all that God commanded him, so did he. Now somebody's going to say, "But some of those animals ate meat. They'd eat each other."

I don't think so. You say, "Why?" Well, up to the time of the flood, apparently both man and animals were not flesh eating. They just didn't eat flesh. No carnivorous animals, I assume. We are told of a day in the millennium when the lion and the lamb will lie down together and a lion's going to eat straw like an ox. And that could certainly come, that probably was the original state of the animal.

Now will you notice, we come to chapter seven. "And the Lord said unto Noah, 'Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.'" Why was he righteous? By faith, just like Abraham later on was. We're told Abraham believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness. Noah believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness. And by faith, the writer to the Hebrews said, that's the reason God saved him.

But have you ever noticed how gracious God is to this man in all of this time of judgment? It says, "Come thou." The same invitation that the Lord Jesus gives today to all mankind: "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I'll rest you." And then we're told in verse 16 here, "The Lord shut him in." Isn't that lovely? And then chapter eight opens, "And God remembered Noah."

How lovely, how wonderful. God could have very easily forgotten all about Noah. He could have years later said, "Oh my, I forgot all about that fellow down there, put him in an ark and forgot about him." Been too bad, wouldn't it? But God didn't forget. God remembered Noah. God never forgets. He remembers you. The only thing that He doesn't remember is your sin if you come to Him and your sins He remembers them no more. What a beautiful thing this is.

Now Noah and the family enter into the ark. And did you know that this story of Noah, just like the story of creation, is wandered over the face of the earth? And you read it like you read the creation story. I wish that I could give you the Babylonian account. I'm not entering into that. I did of the creation account, but all you have to do is compare them to see the difference, that these others are utterly preposterous and ridiculous.

And they're all based on this one, by the way. And the very fact that most nations, most peoples have an account of both creation and the flood, doesn't that tell you something, friends? That ought to tell you that there's a basis of truth for that. All of them wouldn't come up with a record if they had been making up the story. And if you want to know which one is accurate, just make a comparison.

The Babylonian account, of course, here is perfectly ridiculous, and you have sort of a war going on among the gods, one against the other, and that's what brought the flood. That's not the way that the Bible tells it. It's a judgment upon man for his sin. Makes sense, by the way. Now we're told here, "And for yet seven days," God says, "I will cause it to rain upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth."

Now will you notice the fact that there came to Noah, and I should call attention to this, "Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens." Now this was the basis of a lawsuit years ago against Dr. Harry Rimmer when he offered a thousand dollars to anyone that could show a contradiction in the Bible and this was what was used in a court of law. And there were several liberal theologians that testified this was a contradiction.

Why would it say two of each kind and now seven of each kind? Well, all you have to do is turn over and see Noah get out of the ark and he was offering clean beasts as sacrifices. Where would he have got the clean beasts, friends, if he hadn't taken more than the two? It's only the clean beast that he took seven. And now we know why. And those that are not clean were by twos, the male and the female. And fowls of the air by sevens, the male and the female, and that is for those that are clean, to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.

Now for seven days, the world could have knocked at the door of the ark and frankly they could have come in. God would have saved them. All you'd had to do is believe God. Now we're told verse 6, "And Noah was 600 years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth. Noah went in, his sons, his wife, his sons' wives with him into the ark because of the waters of the flood."

Then we're told here in verse nine, "There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark the male and the female as God had commanded Noah." No place does it say Noah went out and drove them in. It wasn't necessary. They came to him. "The same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened." That's verse 11. "The rain was upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights."

And now I drop down and read verse 16. "And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh as God had commanded him, and the Lord shut him in." Now we're told that the flood was 40 days upon the earth. Now the waters though prevailed, and I'm dropping down to the last verse, verse 24, chapter seven, "And the waters prevailed upon the earth 150 days."

Now that's how long that the flood lasted. Then we're going to find out that it subsided another period of time and we'll talk about that next time. Now may I in the few moments that are left to me, may I say this: What is the scientific historical evidence of the flood? I'm not going to enter into this subject other than to say that there is one of the finest books, and I highly recommend it, called *The Genesis Flood* by Henry Morris and John C. Whitcomb.

Both of these men are thoroughly qualified to write on this subject. Dr. John Whitcomb is a Ph.D. and he's professor of Old Testament in Grace Theological Seminary. And Dr. Morris is a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. And these men have joined together and have written a book on the Genesis flood. And they show that this flood was universal.

And also that it was a great catastrophe, that there's historical evidence for it, and they answer this uniformitarian argument that has been put forth today. I'll not go into these different theories that have been advanced and quite a few have been advanced for the flood. But may I say there's abundance of evidence for the flood and they answer a great deal of this.

Now next time I'm going to pick up right at this juncture and probably give from their book one or two arguments and then I'm going to move on from this. I assume that today that there is this historical evidence for the flood and it's not necessary for us to go into that and it's been answered in this very graphic and scholarly manner. Until next time, may God richly bless you, my beloved.

Steve Schwetz: Well, that moves Noah's story beyond the children's section and it anchors it in history. And we're going to learn even more as the Bible bus continues. To help you along, download Dr. McGee's free notes and outlines at ttb.org or find them right in our app. And if we can help you, just give us a call at 1-800-65-BIBLE. I'm Steve Schwetz, and for all of us at Thru the Bible, praying that you'll know just how deep, wide, long, and high God's great love for you really is.

We're grateful for our committed listening family who faithfully pray and invest in Thru the Bible as we together take the whole Word to the whole world.