Yes, I’ve fallen behind! My family, Erik and I celebrated a Pesach (Passover) Seder at our home Sat. at sunset. We also went to a community Seder the following night. So, I have a good excuse for falling behind! It was a wonderful experience and very enlightening, one that I will be blogging about soon. I will try to get caught up on the Torah readings ASAP.

Today’s reading is Genesis Chapters seven and eight.

( chapter 7 v.1 ) Verse one tells us again of the righteousness of Noach’s household. What I’ve noticed in these verses is that the world was wicked. Yet this was “before” the Torah (Law). If no Law or rules existed, how could Noach be righteous and all others were not?

( v.2 ) Many have heard me ask this before, but how did Noach know unclean animals from clean animals? He certainly was not a physical Jew as this was well before Yisra’el. HaShem (“The Name”, of YHVH, thus a euphemism for the name of God) had not yet given meat to be consumed yet there is still delineation between clean and unclean. You would think this would be enough for people to stop, when defending eating unclean meat, using the argument “that was for the Jews”. You would think…

( v.4 ) We see Adonai’s (the LORD) favorite, “seven”, again!

( v.11 ) Many “scientists” tell us that forty days of rain would not be enough to flood the earth. That may very well be true. That is probably why we read in this verse that HaShem made it so that “all the fountains of the great deep were burst open”. Additionally, remember that layer of water ABOVE the sky what we read about in chapter one? Well, it’s not up there today!

( v.12-24) In the B’rit Hadashah (New Testament) we are told that the coming of the Son of Man (“second coming”) will be like the days of Noach. This is one of my main contentions with the “secret” rapture theory. Since “every eye shall see” and it will be like the days of Noach ( Matt. 24.36-44), it is in line with Scripture to believe that we will be saved through the tribulation, not from the tribulation. The Scriptures seemed to be loaded with examples of Adonai’s people being saved through strife. ( Noach throughthe flood, Lot throughthe destruction, Yisra’el throughthe plagues, Daniel throughthe lion’s den, Shadrakh, Meishakh, Aved-N’go throughthe furnace, etc. ) Additionally, the concept of a “thief in the night” seems to be clarified for those confusing it as “secret”. It is not secret, but unexpected! Noach was not secretly taken away but very visibly and unexpectedly to those caught up in the world.

And just as it happened in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: they were eating, they were drinking, they were marrying, they were being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. “It was the same as happened in the days of Lot: they were eating, they were drinking, they were buying, they were selling, they were planting, they were building; but on the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. It will be just the same on the day that the Son of Man is revealed.
- - Luke17.26-30,NASB

But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left. Therefore be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will.
- - Matt. 24.36-44,NASB

( Chapter 8 v.1 ) “God remembered”, I’ve read this in at least one other spot (Moshe maybe?) and I believe it must be an idiom or of an older meaning. I do not think HaShem forgets anything.

( v. 7 ) I never noticed the raven in the story before.

( v. 8-12 ) More seven day periods of time according to HaShem’s reckoning of time created for us on the fourth day of creation!

( v.20 ) More examples of sacrifices before the sacrificial system and clean/unclean delineations before the “Levitical Laws”.