Was The Noetic Flood Global? A Look At The Facts

Does the biblical account of the Noetic Flood have any evidence? What do the facts say about a worldwide flood as described in the Bible?

Why a Flood?

Why did God send the flood of His judgment on the world? Genesis 6 tells us precisely why the Flood came as it says “The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen 6:5). This sounds very much like the world we live in today but that would include me too since I am still a sinner too. The heart is naturally evil and deceitful (Jer 17:9) so we can justify ourselves in our own eyes quite easily. The only difference, thankfully, is that Christians have sought forgiveness through repentance and faith (1st John 1:9) and been declared righteous by Jesus’ imputation towards me (2nd Cor 5:21) but I am in no way better than an unsaved person. It’s only that my debt has been paid through the precious blood of the Lamb of God (John 3:16). My sinfulness remains (Rom 7) but I find myself sinning less. As Martin Luther said, “each person is at once a saint and a sinner, righteous and reprobate, saved and lost” but our standing before God has changed through Jesus Christ’s atonement (Rom 5:1, 8:1). Horizontally, I still a sinner (1st John 1:8, 10); vertically, it’s as if I’ve never sinned. That is, I am justified; just if I’d never sinned.

As in Noah’s Day

Jesus said that at the end of the age it would be “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so will it be in the days of the Son of Man” (Luke 17:26) and the similarity is “that the wickedness of man was great in the earth” and that “the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen 6:5). Can anyone look back ten, twenty, or fifty years ago and not see how sexual immorality, pornography, murder, greed, terrorism, profanity, and such things have spiked? If you like the old TV shows, then you can probably relate to what I’m saying. Would anyone seriously think that its getter better year by year or does anyone really believe that sexually explicit images and rampant sexual immorality are on the decline? There is zero evidence for that; conversely, there is empirical evidence for the growth of evil. The context of Jesus’ words is the coming judgment of God upon the unrepentant since we are doing today pretty much the same thing that those who lived in Noah’s day were doing (Luke 17:28), thusly, Jesus warned, “just as it was in the days of Lot—they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building, but on the day when Lot went out from Sodom, fire and sulfur rained from heaven and destroyed them all— so will it be on the day when the Son of Man is revealed” (Luke 17:28-30). Just like Noah warned the people of the coming judgement of God, there are those out there who are trying to plead with people today to repent and believe before it is too late. When the “Son of Man is revealed,” so is His judgment (Rev 20:12-15); that is unless a person dies before that happens (Heb 9:27).

Worldwide Accounts of a Great Flood

There are cultures on every continent and in scattered tribes around the world where there is an account of a great flood and sometimes it is specifically mentioned that it was a global or worldwide flood. Even among island natives there are various stories about a flood and it’s usually thought to have occurred thousands of years ago. Interestingly, they typically involve a deity or deities. Several African cultures have an oral tradition about a flood but so too do the people in the Asian Pacific Rim, including India but also in China, Korea, the Philippines, Polynesia (including Hawaii), North and South America, and into nearly every place where humans have lived. Why are there so many accounts of a flood? Why do they all seem to be so closely related?

Geological Facts

Has anyone ever wondered why sea fossils have been found in the highest of mountain peaks? Why are there great salt lakes in vast areas (i.e. Utah) today that reveal it was once covered by ocean water? Here in Kansas, there is evidence of a few salt lakes that have long since dried up but their salt remained. The various animal species that are around today come to these places for salt but so did the mighty Mastodons because there are numerous fossils found in these “salt licks” areas and they are still in amazing condition, partly due to the fact that they were buried deep but also within a former salt lake. According to Harold Coffin, Ph. D., there were experiments with fresh dead fish that revealed dead fish in fresh water will disintegrate very quickly and their skeletons will fall apart in less than one week, however the mostly intact fossil fish skeletons found today seem to indicate a rapid burial an in water that was sufficiently deep to prevent oxidation, bacterial decay, and breakage due to feeding by other animals. The point is, fish that end up dead in our lakes or rivers today usually decay entirely and seldom do they leave any trace of themselves, but those deeply embedded in the earth and buried in a quick amount of time, usually last for thousands and thousands of years. This quick amount of time could have been an overwhelming, almost instantaneous flood. The geological strata and their contained marine fossils seem to provide critical evidence that the ocean once covered the continents, including even the highest continental areas.

Conclusion

Someday (soon?), the world will see another flood, but not of water. Today, God’s wrath is crashing up against His dam of mercy but someday His righteous indignation will burst the dam wide open and His fierce wrath and judgment will come pouring down upon all who have not believed in the Son of God. In the Apostle Peter’s last letter, he shows that God doesn’t want this to happen as “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed” (2nd Pet 3:9-10). Today, there is still time to repent and believe (2nd Cor 6:2); tomorrow may be too late.

Article by Jack Wellman

Jack Wellman is Pastor of the Mulvane Brethren Church in Mulvane Kansas. Jack is also the Senior Writer at What Christians Want To Know whose mission is to equip, encourage, and energize Christians and to address questions about the believer’s daily walk with God and the Bible. You can follow Jack on Google Plus or check out his book Teaching Children the Gospel available on Amazon.