Genesis 8
8
The Flood Ends
1But God did not forget about Noah. God remembered him and all the animals that were with him in the boat. God made a wind blow over the earth, and all the water began to disappear.
2Rain stopped falling from the sky, and water stopped flowing from under the earth. 3-4The water that covered the earth began to go down. After 150 days the water was low enough that the boat touched land again. The boat stopped on one of the mountains of Ararat. This was the 17th day of the seventh month. 5The water continued to go down, and by the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains were above the water.
6Forty days later Noah opened the window he had made in the boat. 7Then he sent out a raven. The raven flew from place to place until the ground was dry and the water was gone. 8Noah also sent out a dove. He wanted it to find dry ground. He wanted to know if water still covered the earth.
9The dove could not find a place to rest because water still covered the earth, so the dove came back to the boat. Noah reached out his hand and caught the dove and brought it back into the boat.
10After seven days Noah again sent out the dove. 11And that afternoon the dove came back to Noah. The dove had a fresh olive leaf in its mouth. This was a sign to show Noah that there was dry ground on the earth. 12Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again. But this time the dove didn’t come back.
13After that Noah opened the door#8:13 opened the door Literally, “removed the covering.” of the boat. He looked and saw that the ground was dry. This was the first day of the first month of the year. He was 601 years old. 14By the 27th day of the second month, the ground was completely dry.
15Then God said to Noah, 16“Leave the boat. You, your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives should go out now. 17Bring every living animal out of the boat with you—all the birds, animals, and everything that crawls on the earth. These animals will make many more animals, and they will fill the earth again.”
18So Noah went out with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives. 19All the animals, everything that crawls, and every bird left the boat. All the animals came out of the boat in family groups.
20Then Noah built an altar to honor the Lord. Noah took some of all the clean birds and some of all the clean animals and burned them on the altar as a gift to God.
21The Lord smelled these sacrifices, and it pleased him. The Lord said to himself, “I will never again curse the earth as a way to punish people. People are evil from the time they are young, but I will never again destroy every living thing on the earth as I did this time. 22As long as the earth continues, there will always be a time for planting and a time for harvest. There will always be cold and hot, summer and winter, day and night on earth.”
© 1987, 2004 Bible League International
Genesis 8
8
Chapter 8
The deep water goes away
1Then God thought of Noah, and all the wild animals and the farm animals that were with him in the ship. He caused a wind to blow over the earth. As a result, the water began to go down. 2Streams of water stopped coming up from below the earth. Rain stopped coming down from the sky. 3The deep water continued to go down for 150 days. 4On the 17th day of the seventh month, the ship stopped on the ground. It was sitting on the top of Ararat mountains. 5The water continued to go down until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared above the water.
6After 40 more days, Noah opened a window in the ship. 7He sent a raven to fly away. The raven flew away from the ship and then it returned. It continued to do this until the earth was dry.
8Then Noah sent out a dove. He wanted to see if the water had gone away from the top of the ground. 9But the dove could not find anywhere to stand. Water still covered all the ground. So it returned to Noah in the ship. Noah put out his hand and took the dove back into the ship. 10He waited for seven days. Then he sent the dove out of the ship again. 11The dove returned to Noah in the evening. It carried a fresh leaf from an olive tree in its mouth. Then Noah knew that the water had gone down. 12He waited for seven more days. Then he sent the dove out again. This time, it did not return to Noah. #8:12 A raven is a big black bird. A dove is a white or grey bird. Olives are small round fruits that grow on an olive tree.
13Noah was now 601 years old. On the first day of the first month, the water that had covered the earth was now gone. The ground had become dry. Noah made a hole in the roof of the ship and he looked around. He saw that the top of the ground was dry. 14By the 27th day of the second month, the earth had become completely dry.
15God said to Noah, 16‘Come out of the ship. Bring your wife, your sons and their wives with you. 17Bring every different kind of living animal out of the ship. Bring out the birds, the animals, and the living things that move across the ground. Now they may give birth to young ones again. They can grow in number all over the earth.’
18Noah went out of the ship, together with his wife, his sons and their wives. 19All the living animals also went out of the ship. The birds and the living things that move across the ground all went out. Every different kind of animal came out of the ship, each of them in its own group.
God makes a promise to Noah
20Then Noah built an altar to make sacrifices to the Lord. He took one from each kind of clean animal and clean bird. He offered them to the Lord as sacrifices which he burned on the altar. #8:20 When Noah left the ship, he worshipped God. He built an altar to do this. He offered a sacrifice to God on the altar. God had kept them safe and Noah wanted to thank God. He did this before he did anything else.
21The Lord smelled the sacrifice and it made him happy. The Lord said to himself, ‘I will never curse the ground again because of the bad things that people do. From the time that they are children, they want to do bad things. But I will never again destroy everything that breathes, as I have done this time.
22As long as the earth continues to be here,
the time for people to plant seeds will come each year.
The time for harvest will come each year.
Times of cold and heat will always come.
Summer and winter will always come.
Day and night will never stop.’ #8:22 As long as the earth is here, the days and the seasons will continue to happen. God has promised this. He made the universe and he continues to cause it to work properly.
MissionAssist 2018