Ham's descendent, Nimrod, founded Babel, among other cities. He was a mighty hunter. Ninevah grew out of those cities that were originally founded by Nimrod, also. And, Philistim, of whom the Philistines were descended.
During the third generation of Shem, the continents on the earth split apart and the earth was divided. And all of the sons, grandsons, great grandsons and great great grandsons of Noah spread upon the face of the earth to claim all the lands.
Today, scientists call it the "continental divide". If you take each piece of land on a map and cut them out, you can pretty much piece them together all in one great landmass. But, now they are the continents and the islands of the earth.
They formed their own languages, which is inevitable when people are split apart for long periods of time. Especially when the world was new and new things are being discovered every day and there is lack of communication among the tribes.
After all, when two different people, who don't know each other, discover the same kind of tree, they are likely to call it two different things.
This is how the different languages on earth started.
So, no matter what language someone speaks, or where they come from on earth, we must remember that we are all descended from Noah and Adam.
18 And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.
19 These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread.
20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard:
21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.
22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.
23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.
24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
26 And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years.
29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years: and he died.
We are all descended from Shem, Ham, or Japheth. Noah is our greatest grandfather after Adam.
Noah's occupation was making wine; but, it didn't come without it's downsides.
One day, Noah got drunk and passed out in his tent. Ham went into the tent, then he went out to talk about it to his brothers.
Shem and Japheth decided to do something about it, so they went in with a blanket and covered Noah up.
Back in those days, it was shame to see another man's nakedness. But, that wasn't the worse part. The worse part is having someone go out and talk about it behind your back.
When Noah woke up and found out what his son had done, since it was obvious he had been found out, as evidenced by the blanket over him, Noah was so angry that he cursed Ham's children!
Seeing evil is not going to get you in trouble near as bad as talking about it. When you talk about evil that you see, you are spreading it's effects abroad. If Ham had kept his mouth shut and stayed away, none of that anger would have had to have been dealt with.
How many times have you had to deal with people who talk about you behind your back? A lot of times, what they have to say is blown way out of proportion and can cause people to lose respect for you faster than if someone had seen something and kept their mouth shut and let you work it out for yourself.
The shame of sinning is bad enough without having to deal with people laughing behind your back and pointing fingers.
The respectful thing to do is to go and talk to the person who committed the sin in private and settled the matter without fanfare, if it is possible, first. If the matter is not taken care of, THEN it becomes okay to talk to someone else, in private and take them with you to help intercede. But, it must be made obvious that you are not intending to shame someone in public.
8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying,
9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
10 And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
11 And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
12 And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:
13 I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.
14 And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:
15 And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.
16 And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.
17 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.
A covenant is like a treaty and a promise all rolled up in one. It is more binding and contractual. That means that it is written in a contract and signed either by one or both parties, and the conditions are non-negotiable. In this case, God was the One making the covenant, asking nothing of Noah in return.
God promised that He would never again destroy the earth with a flood. That was the last great flood that will ever cover the whole earth to destroy it.
This did not mean that the earth would be here forever and for eternity. God did not promise that. He only promised that the destruction would not be by flood.
This also means that we do not have to worry about the polar ice caps thawing out and flooding the whole earth again. The earth will not be here that long. And, scientists can do nothing to stop it.
Our focus should then be on being better human beings, not preventing the earth's demise. By doing so, we will help to prevent it.
God signed the covenant with a rainbow. It was a token of His promise. To this day, we are reminded of that promise every time it rains!
1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
2 And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.
3 Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.
4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
5 And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man.
6 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.
7 And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.
God told man to procreate.
Then He told man that all the animals would fear man and run away from man, but man has dominion over them. And, man can eat them and get his nourishment from them, just as he had the fruits and vegetables up until now.
God told man that he was allowed to kill and eat all the animals, but that he was NOT allowed to kill another human being. If man did so, the punishment would be sure and severe. God said that if a man kills another man, he would die either at the hand of another man or animal.
God said man was made in His image to live; therefore, he was to go and procreate.
God gives us all life and creativity. We are to create as long as we are on this earth. Anything that interferes with our creativity is to be shunned.
God gave us all the earth as a gift. We must obey and give thanks for all we have to be creative with!
After about five months, Noah's ark rested on Mount Ararat.
In all the movies about Noah's Ark, we see Noah sending out a bird 40 days after he entered the ark. That is inaccurate. It was 40 days after his ark came to rest on the mountain that he sent the bird out.
It took a whole eleven months for the whole earth to be dried from all the waters that covered it. It took five months for the waters to abate enough for the ark to rest on the mountain.
One whole year after the flood, Noah and the animals finally came out of the ark.
A whole year!
And, the first thing Noah did was to build an altar and worship the Lord!
God promised that He would never curse the ground again because of the wickedness of man. It is in man's nature to be wicked. God knew that, and He chose to love man anyway. He also promised He would never destroy all living things as He had done this time.
For as long as the earth stayed in existence, the days, the seasons, and the years would continue.
When God rescues us from sure calamities in our lives, we must always remember Him and thank Him before anything else, as Noah and his family did. God must always come first.
And, we must know and remember that God does not seek to destroy us, no matter what problems we may face.
It took Noah 100 years to build the ark.
Once the ark was finished, God told Noah to take every clean beast in by sevens and every unclean in by the pair. (We'll go into what is considered "clean" and "unclean" later). There is a reason for this:
God did not accept offerings of unclean animals. Moreover, there had to be enough food for Noah and his family when he got off the ark. This would ensure that both could happen.
Did you know that 71 percent of the Earth's surface is covered in water?
Okay, maybe that one was too easy. But try this one on for size: Did you know that there's an absolutely massive supply of water hidden underneath the Earth's crust that's three times bigger than the oceans that sit on the surface?
Back in 2014 scientists discovered that we essentially have a reservoir of water hidden beneath our feet - though it might not look that way at first.
If an earthquake were to break the mantle, the pressure underneath would spew the water out. So, yes, the water came from below as well as above.
According to Chapter 7 of Genesis, the waters rose about 15 cubits, which equals to about 22 feet high. That's a lot of water!
But, 22 feet high is not enough to cover the highest mountains (Mount Ararat is over 16,854 feet high, so how did all the fossils from the ocean get on top of the mountains?
The best explanation is that when the watered spewed upward, some of the ocean's life was thrown onto the mountains in the storms.
A few years ago, in Texarkana,Texas people went outside after a recent storm to find fish all over the ground. We were miles from the nearest lake, and it had not flooded, so how did those fish get there?
It could have been from a water spout over the waters of a nearby lake that sucked the fish up into the storm.
Either way, the storm was so bad, raining for 40 days and 40 nights, that it is doubtful anything could have survived it. The flash floods alone could have washed all life away as it left the mountains. Twenty-two feet of rain is a lot of water coming off the mountains.
Which begs the question: How far up on the mountain did the ark actually land when it finally did? It wasn't at the top of the mountain. And, it took a lot of time for the waters to go back down once the rains stopped. The Bible says "And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days." That's about 5 months.
Noah and his family survived because they didn't question God, and were obedient.
Fallen angels came down and started mixing their genes into God's perfect gene pool, and corrupting the vision that God had for man.
They created a race of giants, the nephilem, and taught mankind all kinds of ways that were contrary to God's ways.
God was not pleased with this at all. He contemplated destroying the whole human "experiment".
But, there was one man, Noah, who was "perfect in his generations". This meant that his blood line had stayed completely human physically. And, spiritually, he worshipped God.
Because of this, God told Noah what he was going to do, and why.
God had decided to destroy all of the earth in a great flood. The only survivors were going to be Noah and his family, and pairs of all the animals. He told Noah to build a big boat.
Noah did not question what God told him to do. He just did it.
There is a reason for everything God does in our lives. He is destroying the old, and making the new. So, when God tells us that He wants us to do something, we should not question it, or listen to what others say about it. If God tells us to do something, we should do it without question. Adam and Eve learned that lesson the hard way.
He has already told us the "why". God wants perfection and goodness for us. He wants us to be fit for eternity. God cannot abide with evil and corruption. Where there is evil and corruption, it separates us from God. Therefore, all we are to do is to glorify HIM! If it doesn't glorify God, it will be cast out and destroyed!