Discovery #2: Did Flood really happen? (Part #1)

This book is as good as its title! Frank has a simple way for dealing with the impossible.

 Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

The Great Flood: Myth, Mystery, or Fact?

Did the Flood really happen? Where do you stand on this tale where the Bible says God sent it to destroy humanity? If you’re unfamiliar or don’t recall the story, in Genesis 6:17 (NCV) God said, “I will bring a flood of water on the earth to destroy all living things that live under the sky, including everything that has the breath of life. Everything on the earth will die.” Again, according to the Bible and the Torah, this flood covered the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. Nothing survived except Noah and his family and the life he brought on board. It is one of the most recognized stories in the Bible, and yet, as science has progressed, it was probably one of the first to be rejected as pure fantasy. According to Patrick Pester in a 2023 article he wrote in Live Science, the odds are against an event like the Flood ever happening. He reports: ((https://www.livescience.com/human-behavior/religion/did-noahs-flood-really-happen))

“The one thing we know for sure from geology is that a global flood never happened,” said David Montgomery, a professor of geomorphology at the University of Washington in Seattle and author of “The Rocks Don’t Lie: A Geologist Investigates Noah’s Flood” (W. W. Norton & Company, 2012). “If you look at it as literally a global flood that covered the world’s highest mountains, I’m sorry, there’s just not enough water on Earth to do that,” he told Live Science. If the “heavens” opened and all of the water in the atmosphere came down at once as rain, the planet would be submerged — but only to a depth of about 1 inch (2.5 centimeters), according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That’s not enough water to justify a canoe, let alone a massive ark.”

Reasons to Believe

Sounds convincing, doesn’t it? So, why make a big deal about the historicity of the Flood? What lesson can we learn from it IF it happened? I think there are several reasons to defend this portion of scripture:

Reason #1: God said it. In some places, scripture is vague, and it’s hard to decipher exactly what God did or intended. With Noah and the Flood, it’s not. It is clearly reported in the Bible that God told Noah to make an ark and collect two of every kind of life to put into it. How that life managed to repopulate the earth is a matter for another day. But the story is clear:

• • Humanity was out of control in its pursuit of evil and needed to be recalibrated (destroyed).

• • God determined that only Noah and his family were worth preserving for the recalibration.

• • God instructed Noah to build an ark.

• • The ark was afloat for 40 days and 40 nights until God sent a dove to tell Noah it was OK to exit the boat.

When people try to diminish God’s work and plan, God is diminished in the eyes of His people. I think it is important to give God the benefit of the doubt that what He said happened, happened. If we cannot or will not do that, then each time someone questions God, God gets smaller and less powerful, thus opening the door for other “gods” to move in. The good news is – that more and more Christian scientists (and even some non-Christian scientists) are making discoveries that are turning traditional theories upside down and proving (or at least allowing) that what was said in the Bible might actually be true. Read Frank Turek’s book and you’ll see God in a different light — one where miracles are not only possible, they are expected.

Reason #2: The story provides a critical link to God’s overall plan. To anyone who reads the Bible, one thing is clear: God has a plan! He is not driving the bus by the seat of His pants. The story of the Flood provides some key lessons and outcomes that are critically linked to His plan:

• • There is a penalty to disobeying God. Those lost in the Flood had been warned many times to turn from their evil ways, yet they responded to God’s warnings by seeking even more disgusting ways to reject Him.

• • There are two major miracles that followed the ark. Traditional science will reject both of them, but some are proving otherwise.
    
    
    • • The 1st Miracle was: All the diversity of life on this planet developed after the Flood. What does that mean? Well, forget Darwin. If the Flood took place around 2370 BC, then God would have had to have taken all the animals Noah could fit on the ark and diversify them into the lifeforms that exist today! Science has proven that such evolution, as described by Darwin, could not have happened even in the millions of years Darwin allowed, so for God to do it in ~4,400 years would be nothing short of a miracle! Either way, nothing short of a miracle could explain the lifeforms we have on the earth today.
    
    
    • • The 2nd Miracle was: Shortly after the Flood (~100 to 300 years), humanity got out of control again! Remember the Tower of Babel? Humanity thought they were smarter than God, so they built a tower where the goal was that no future flood could reach the top. The Bible says that God “confused their speech,” so they could not communicate with each other and finish this project. Sound familiar? Moses was not the first to be “schooled” by God into learning another language! At Babel, God created the base language for every ethnicity on earth, and it happened hundreds of years before Moses!
    
    
    • • But that’s not all God did. When He confused their speech, He also created the various ethnicities that eventually spread across the world. This is a major violation of what science would tell us – all ethnicities were created by God in an instant! Yet, when you do the math, there simply wasn’t enough time for life to spring from a single-celled organism, evolve into to apes, then humanity, and then to every ethnic variation of creation. The math says that the universe just isn’t old enough for that to happen by chance or evolution. Again, only a miracle would explain the outcome.

God always has a plan and a purpose for His actions

Forget for a moment whether or not you believe this is the way it happened, and allow yourself to just ask, “If God did it this way, what was His purpose?” The Flood sets the stage for both of these miracles to happen. Without it, major parts of the Old Testament story fall apart and force us to rethink our faith in our God. Either God is taking an active part in our future because He cares for us and has a plan, or He is just letting the “chips fall where they may.” I prefer the former conclusion over the latter.

So, I think it is important that we look at the Flood to see if God’s story can triumph over the “logic” of science. One of the best efforts I’ve found on this subject comes from an organization called, “Is Genesis History?” Their mission is to use science in a way where it:

“Will strengthen confidence in Scripture, clarify understanding of the relationships of revelation, science, history, and faith, and enhance understanding of difficult questions all while being both beautiful and entertaining.” – E. Calvin Beisner, PhD

Is Genesis History? Features over a dozen scientists and scholars explaining how the world intersects with the history recorded in Genesis. From rock layers to fossils, from lions to stars, from the Bible to artifacts, this fascinating film will change the way you see the world.

This film (along with many others) can be obtained on their website at: https://isgenesishistory.com/product-category/feature-film/

In my next edition, I’ll reveal some of their findings

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