1e. Noah’s Flood: What Must Be Washed Away?
We may feel lost, but we are never abandoned.
Few stories in the Bible have generated more questions than the account of Noah and the flood. Was it a local flood or a worldwide flood? How could all the animals fit on the ark? Where did all the water come from, and where did it go? For centuries, people have debated these questions. Yet perhaps there is another question worth considering. What if the flood story is not only about something that happened long ago, but also about something that happens within us?
Life has a way of bringing floods. There are seasons when everything familiar seems to be swept away. A loss, an illness, financial hardship, the end of a relationship, or even a spiritual crisis can leave us feeling as though the world we once knew has disappeared beneath the waters. In one form or another, perhaps we have all experienced floods.
Throughout Scripture, water often symbolizes cleansing, renewal, and transformation. It gives life, but it can also overwhelm. The ancient world frequently associated water with chaos and the unknown. Perhaps the flood represents those times when old ways of thinking, old beliefs, and even old identities must be washed away so that something new can emerge.
It is interesting that before the rains begin, Noah is instructed to build an ark. While the world around him continues as usual, Noah prepares for something that others cannot yet see. Perhaps the ark represents that quiet place within us where faith, hope, and truth are preserved when the storms of life arrive. Maybe it is that inner sanctuary that carries us through seasons when we cannot understand what God is doing.
The story tells us that Noah entered the ark with pairs of animals. Symbolically, one might wonder whether the ark contains all aspects of life itself—the gentle and the fierce, the beautiful and the ugly, the noble and the wild. Nothing is excluded. Perhaps spiritual growth is not about destroying parts of ourselves but bringing everything into the safety of awareness where transformation can occur.
Then the rains come, and for forty days and forty nights the waters rise. In Scripture, the number forty often speaks of preparation and transformation. Moses spent forty days on Mount Sinai. Israel wandered for forty years in the wilderness. Jesus fasted for forty days in the desert. Perhaps the flood represents those seasons when we are unable to stand on familiar ground. Times when we feel adrift and wonder whether the storm will ever end.
Yet even in the midst of the chaos, the ark floats. And then comes one of the most beautiful statements in the story: “But God remembered Noah.” Surely God had not forgotten him. Perhaps this is Scripture’s way of assuring us that even when we feel lost, we have not been abandoned.
Eventually, the rains cease, and Noah sends forth a dove. The first time, it returns. The second time, it returns with an olive leaf. The third time, it does not return at all. Perhaps hope also comes gradually. Rarely do we emerge from difficult seasons all at once. First comes a small sign, then another, and eventually we discover that life is returning.
When Noah finally leaves the ark, he steps into a world made new. Could it be that many of the floods we resist are not sent to destroy us, but to transform us? Could it be that what feels like an ending is often the beginning of something greater?
Perhaps every soul experiences seasons when the old world must disappear so that a new one can be born. And perhaps that is why the rainbow appears at the end of the story. Not as a reminder that storms will never come again, but as a promise that storms do not have the final word.
After the waters recede, life continues. Hope remains. And the journey home goes on.
Coming Next
Jacob Wrestling with God: Wrestling with Ourselves
What if Jacob’s mysterious nighttime struggle is not merely the story of one man, but a picture of the inner battles that ultimately transform us?