Girl Read Your BibleShembull

Once the ark was complete, God told Noah to enter the ark along with his family. Those included on the ark were Noah's wife, his three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives. Along with pairs of animals, male and female, some designated to repopulate the earth and some for eating and sacrifice. The Lord was going to make it rain for forty days and forty nights until every living thing was wiped from the earth. The number forty is often times associated with trial or testing, as we will begin to see all throughout Scripture. This was surely a time of testing for Noah and his family; they had to trust God in the midst of all that was about to happen. In just seven more days, God would cause the rain to pour down like never before, and life as they once knew it would be completely different. This would be their first time seeing rain, and after preparing for more than one hundred years, they would finally see and understand why God had them build the ark.

They entered the ark, and the flood waters covered the earth for 150 days. The waters were so high, they covered even the peaks of the highest mountains. Once the waters began to decrease, they were able to leave the ark, and God reiterated the command He first gave to Adam. God tells Noah and his sons to"...Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth (9:1)." It's now up to Noah and his sons to repopulate the earth. Once they leave the ark, the first thing Noah does is build an altar to the Lord and sacrifice the animals that had been approved for that purpose. God is pleased and makes a promise to never again destroy all living things (8:21). He also states that the earth would have seasons, which reestablished the created order of things.

God gives Noah permission to eat any of the animals and puts the fear of man in them to protect humans. After which God says,"But you must not eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it (9:4)." The idea of blood plays a significant role in the Bible; the word blood is used 424 times within Scripture. Blood represented life for both animals and humans. If an animal was killed and was to be eaten, its blood had to be drained before it could be eaten. There are many references to how blood is used in the Bible, one of which is in Exodus 12:13 at the first Passover, which we'll be reading about in the coming weeks. God confirms His covenant with Noah and his sons and all the living creatures (9:8–11), repeating the promise He made in Genesis 8:21–22. He also gave them a sign of His covenant: He placed His rainbow in the clouds so each time the rainbow appears, He will remember the covenant He made with the world. God is faithful to keep His promises (Psalms 98:3), even when we fall short and sin time and time again. God will not go back on His Word.