Alright. I'm just gonna say it.... How much did that ark STINK? Golly! Do you ever sit and think of the logistics of it all? 2 of every animal, plus sacrificial animals. It's all cute in cartoons and junk, but was it hard to keep the meat eaters away from everything else? Where did they store all the food? What did they feed the meat eaters? Did they take extra animals to kill? Who cleaned up poop? And all the offspring born during the time in the ark! Yowsa! Golly. I'll bet Mrs. Noah thought of all of that. We women tend to be 'planners' don't we? I think 'planners' is a nice way of saying it ;) My hubby calls it playing the 'what if' game lol.
Noah didn't play 'what if'. He just did. He didn't say, "uhhh...God...that's a lot of poop. Mrs. Noah is gonna be kinda annoyed." He just did. Can you imagine the people making fun during his years building the ark? And the waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Building. Building. Building.
But he did. He heard and he obeyed.
Oh! That WE would have such courage and trust! Maybe you do already. In that case, I'm jealous. :D. I do not. I question. I ponder. I 'what if' myself crazy. I doubt. I search for another avenue that's much easier, therefore that MUST be it!
Sometimes what God asks of us is hard work. It will leave us being made fun of by the world. It might leave us sweaty and sore. It might leave us knee deep in poop. Uhh...figuratively of course... Unless you're a mother. And then it might be literally.
But...the REWARD! Look at what God gave Noah for his faith! Noah obeyed and spent the better part of a year in an ark filled with smelly animals and probably an unhappy family....
But because he obeyed, not only was he spared from death, he and his sons were awarded the honor of repopulating the earth! Nice bonus right? Bet it was worth it ;)
That I would be worthy of such honor of any sort from the Lord God, creator of the universe!
The title above Matthew 3 in my bible reads, 'John the Baptist prepares the way'. We're kinda like him. We prepare the way. Jesus IS coming again. We don't know when, but we know it's a fact. And as followers of Christ, it's our job to prepare the way for His coming. Thankfully, that doesn't require wearing camel hair (ouch!) or eating locusts...though I do like honey!
What does it require?
-- a love of Jesus. Well duh! Can't share Him if we don't love Him! ;)
-- a knowledge of Him. That's different. We don't all have to have the whole Word memorized...but how can we share Him if we don't KNOW Him? And the best way to know Jesus...read His Word.
-- a bit of boldness. Not necessarily proclaiming from the mountains bold...but a boldness that's willing to listen to God's prompting. You never know when He's going to ask for you to work for Him!
Does anyone have a story of 'God lead me to share ..... "? Leave it in the comments!
Let us all be John the Baptist! Preparing the way of the Lord!
Have a wonderful day! I'll see you all next monday, :D
Tomorrow's passage: Genesis 10-12 and Matthew 4
8 comments:
I agree with you on the congested interior of that Ark! I'd love to see the inside of it to see how it was designed! :) And I had never thought of Mrs. Noah organizing the "poop" out of things... ;) Good thoughts around John the Baptist... Ideas to think about for sure...
Oh, and a couple of things I made notes on was: In these chapters God gives Noah and his sons permission to eat the animals. Was the human race vegetarians until now?? I never noticed this before. Another thing that really struck me was that the Rainbow is a covenant. All my life I've thought of it as a "sign" that God wouldn't flood the earth. Here it is made clear that it's a COVENANT between God and ALL living beings on earth.
I believe this passage indeed indicates humans were vegetarian until after the flood. I think it's also very possible that all animals were, too, since God specifically warns the animals after they're released from the ark that any human blood they shed will have to be accounted for. I don't think that warning would have been necessary if they hadn't suddenly been given an appetite for meat! There is indication in Isaiah 65 that in the New Jerusalem, animals will return to their vegetarian origins ~ "The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox..."
I've often wondered too, about all the manure and the stench in the ark. But God is a God of Wonders... perhaps the manure was odourless. Maybe it dried and decomposed quickly and disappeared. Maybe there just wasn't any. Maybe the feed they brought along got processed and used entirely by the animals' and humans' bodies and no waste was generated. Some waste, if there was any, would likely have been used for fuel. There may have been a clay oven incorporated into the design of the vessel for baking bread and boiling lentils, or whatever they ate that whole year. Who knows?! It's sure interesting to think about though!!
In re-reading that chapter, it also seems like animals weren't wild, or had no fear of humans, until this point either. Interesting. Of course, if people weren't meat-eaters, I guess there would really be no reason to fear them!!
I have tried to wrap my head around the logistics of the ark too. Even the whole idea of taking enough food for everyone is mind boggling. I had wondered about how Noah got all those animals into the ark but I guess if they weren't scared (and Noah had no fear of them eating him!) it would have made the task less daunting. Interesting for sure.
In my NIV Bible there is one verse that refers to wild animals, but it's talking about the ones that were NOT on the ark. I'm thinking that God brought the animals that were on the ark to Noah, so He may have um, "sedated" them for the trip? Interesting stuff to think about. But I think if God could shut the lions' mouths in the Daniel story, He could quite easily have made sure that the animals on the ark, wild or not, would be harmless for the duration. It does say at the beginning of chapter 9 that the fear and dread of humans would "fall upon" the beasts etc. so it does seem that up until that point they were tame.
Good thoughts about John the Baptist, Sandy. I've found over the past year as I've participated in this blog and learned more about God, my willingness to do what He asks has increased. Sometimes I'm still hesitant, which I know I shouldn't be, but there has been improvement.
It would definitely be neat to know the logistical details of that ark!
All those years of building the ark, waiting and waiting while everyone else mocked - talk about faith and perserverence!
Great thoughts Sandy!
Good stuff.
I'm not reading along with you guys (got stuck last August, so I've restarted there), but trying to keep up reading here.
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