In the days of Noah, every inclination of the thoughts of man’s heart was only evil all the time. In spite of being brought up in a violent and corrupt culture, the LORD found Noah righteous in his generation.

By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith. Hebrews 11:7

Noah was declared righteous by his faith. He believed the LORD’s warning and demonstrated his faith by being obedient to the LORD’s commands. Although he was warned concerning things that were not yet seen, Noah had faith that the word of the LORD would come to pass and the world would be judged by a worldwide flood.

Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. Genesis 7:2-3

The clean animals as opposed to the unclean were made known to Noah before the flood. We can assume that they contained the gene pool for the future generations of clean animals that are described in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14. According to the Torah, cud-chewing animals with split hooves are declared clean and can be eaten, while “creeping things” as moles, mice and lizards are unfit to eat. Four-footed animals with paws are also declared unclean. Most clean animals are herb and grain eating animals as opposed to unclean animals which are carnivorous or scavenge such as dogs, lions and vultures.

Seven of each kind of clean animal was to be taken aboard the ark. Of the clean animals and birds, three mating pairs were to be taken. The reason was that their rapid multiplication was a matter of the highest importance. When it was time for the earth to be renovated, many of the clean animals and birds would be domesticated and furnish food for mankind. While the seventh clean animal and bird of each kind would be reserved for sacrifice to the LORD.

“Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.” And Noah did all that the LORD commanded him. Genesis 7:4-5

The rains in Noah's day would pour out for 40 days and nights. The Israelite spies searched the land of Canaan for 40 days. Because of disobedience, God made Israel wander in the wilderness for 40 years. Goliath presented himself to Israel for 40 days. Jesus was tempted for 40 days. There are many other accounts in the Bible concerning the number 40. The number forty is used by God to represent a period of testing or judgment.

Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth. Genesis 7:6-10

Noah and his sons and Noah’s spouse and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. Pairs of clean and unclean animals, birds, and all terrestrial creatures, male and female, came into the protection of the ark.

Noah’s ark was the provision to escape the coming outpouring of God’s wrath. The Hebrew word for atonement is kippur. It means literally, “covering.” Noah’s ark was covered with a coating of pitch, making it a watertight craft. Following Noah’s time in a similar vein, the Mosaic Law had sin “temporarily covered” by the blood of sacrificed animals. Kippur contains the same consonants as the quite similar word kaphar, which is translated as “pitch.” The pitch covering protected Noah and his family from the floodwaters of judgment, just as surely as believers are protected from God’s final wrath by the atoning blood of Jesus Christ.

Noah’s family took their refuge in the ark. The believer finds refuge in Christ. Noah’s refuge aboard the ark is a type or picture of the rapture, God’s provision to protect His Church from the final hour of trial. He will rapture the elect and then pour the bowls of His wrath upon the earth just as wrath was poured upon the inhabitants of the earth in Noah’s time.

In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights. Genesis 7:11-12

There are two major views by creation scientists as to the processes that occurred during the flood. In his article, “What Geologic Processes Were Operating During the Flood?” Dr. John D. Morris writes the following:

Evidently there were great subterranean chambers of water which belched forth their contents causing volcanism (volcanic eruption) and tectonism (faulting or folding or other deformation of the earth’s crust by plate movements) on a broad scale. After being emptied some collapsed to become deep sedimentary basins which uplifted later in the Flood to form mountain chains.

Today when a volcano erupts under water, or if there is an underwater earthquake or mud slide, it causes a tsunami or tidal wave; a dynamic energy wave which pushes water toward the continents, devastating coastal areas. At the start of the Flood all the fountains of the great deep were rent open sending repeated pulses of water toward the continents from every direction bringing sediments and marine fossils to the land. Cyclic ocean currents and tidal actions would have left their imprint on these sediments.

Along the mid-ocean ridges once molten rock and other super hot fluids would have encountered the relatively cold ocean waters, evaporating huge volumes of sea water, ultimately yielding intense rainfall and precipitating their dissolved solids.

Torrential rain poured down. This was a special rain for forty days and forty nights but it continued for a hundred and fifty days, through the first half of the Flood. This continually replenished source of water would have bombarded the earth, eroding and redepositing sediments on a global scale.

According to creation scientists Carl Baugh and Walter Brown, when God created a firmament around the earth it was a protective canopy which provided a greenhouse effect as well as protection from ultraviolet and other harmful light rays from the sun.

In their view, the canopy was a clear solid crystalline hydrogen/water composite. It was located approximately 11 miles above the earth where the temperatures would be around minus 130 to 180 Fahrenheit. It was held up by a much stronger magnetic field than the earth currently has and resulted in a higher percentage of atmospheric oxygen.

On the same day that all the fountains of the great deep broke forth, the windows of heaven were opened. An internal meltdown of the earth happened. Psalm 46 verse 6 describes God initiating this sad moment in history. It says “The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted.” From this moment on a chain reaction of events are unfolding. First began the tremendous pressure and heat buildup within the earth. As the pressure increased extensive ripping apart of the earth's crust occurs. Superheated water within the earth is blown up on the surface. Extensive volcanism takes place with enormous amounts of gas, rocks and dust blown into the atmosphere. The volcanoes are so big that large holes are blown through the solid canopy. As the frozen, crystalline firmament shatters, the floodgates of heaven are opened. This and the rapid deterioration of the magnetic field cause the canopy to collapse and rain down for forty days and nights. In addition tremendous amounts of molten material pour out onto the surface.

On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in. Genesis 7:13-16

In Noah’s time there was a special period of one week, followed immediately by the outpouring of the flood. During this week, the eight humans and the animals traveled to Noah. They then rested in God’s provision for salvation from the flood, the great ark, and it was closed tightly by God against others entering in. There is a symbolic picture of the ark and its birds and animals found in the New Testament.

Peter was residing in the city of Joppa at the home of Simon the tanner. Many homes in the ancient Middle East had outdoor stairways leading to a flat roof. Peter ascended one such stairway to a roof to pray. Becoming hungry and wanting something to eat while a meal was being prepared downstairs, Peter fell into a trance. He saw Heaven open and something resembling a large heavenly sheet brought to earth by its four corners. The sheet contained a wide variety of animals, including reptiles and birds. A voice spoke to Peter, commanding, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” (See Acts 10:10–13.)

Peter protested the command from Heaven because, according to Mosaic Law, Jews are forbidden to eat ceremonially unclean animals, describing some of the animals on the sheet. The voice from Heaven responded that nothing is considered impure that God has made to be clean. Three times Peter protested and three times the voice responded. While Peter wondered about the interpretation of what he had seen and experienced, three men approached him, and he snapped out of his reverie. Cornelius, a devout Gentile, had sent the men. Peter, an apostle with a special with a special calling to his Jewish people, had been called in a dream and by the three men to travel to Caesarea, to dine at the house of an “unclean Gentile.” Peter was to share the message of salvation with this Roman centurion and his family.

The sheet held at four corners formed an ark-like shape full of animals which are described in a similar manner to those on Noah’s ark. Peter saw in his vision symbolized the gentile nations. Although Peter saw both clean and unclean animals in his vision, God had demonstrated to Peter not to call any person whom God can save impure or unclean.

There is a symbolic picture that can be drawn from the biblical record of pairs of clean and unclean animals entering the ark. “Every creature that has the breath of life in it” entered into Noah’s ark for seven days. It is a picture of Jews and Gentiles, “clean and formerly unclean” people, with the Holy Spirit (the breath of new life) in them, joining the Church over seven years before the rapture closes the salvation door.

The floodwaters came upon the earth after the seven days elapsed. On that seventh day, the Lord shut everyone in the ark (Genesis 7:16). On the day the Lord’s wrath is to be poured out, on that very day, the Church will be lifted away from the earth to meet the Lord in the air.

For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than twenty feet. Every living thing that moved on the earth perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left and those with him in the ark. Genesis 7:17-23

Few doctrines in Scripture are as clearly taught as the global nature of the Great Flood in Noah's day. Genesis clearly teaches that “the waters . . . increased greatly . . . and the mountains were covered” (Genesis 7:18-20).

Through the centuries, few Christians questioned this doctrine. The Bible said it, and that was enough—until the late 1700s that is. For the first time the globe was being explored—the extremely lofty Himalayan Mountains were surveyed, capped by Mt. Everest at 29,035 feet in elevation. Did the waters cover them? Is there enough water on the planet to do so? The questions seemed so far-fetched that many European churchmen dismissed the idea that the Flood was global, adopting the local flood concept which still dominates Christian colleges and seminaries today. Like dominos, other doctrines soon began to fall—the young age for the earth, the special creation of plants and animals, and the inerrancy of Scripture.

We now know, of course, that the earth has plenty of water to launch a global flood. It has been calculated that if the earth's surface were completely flat, with no high mountains and no deep ocean basins, that water would cover the earth to a depth of about 8,000 feet. But is there enough water to cover a 29,035 foot mountain?

The key is to remember that the Flood didn't have to cover the present Earth, but it did have to cover the pre-Flood Earth, and the Bible teaches that the Flood fully restructured the earth. "The world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished" (II Peter 3:6). It is gone forever. The earth of today was radically altered by that global event.

That Flood accomplished abundant geologic work. Eroding sediments here, redepositing them there; pushing up continents, elevating plateaus, denuding terrains, etc., so that the earth today is quite different from before. Today even mountain ranges rise high above the sea.

Mt. Everest and the Himalayan range, along with the Alps, the Rockies, the Appalachians, the Andes, and most of the world's other mountains are composed of ocean-bottom sediments, full of marine fossils laid down by the Flood. Mt. Everest itself has clam fossils at its summit. These rock layers cover an extensive area, including much of Asia. They give every indication of resulting from cataclysmic water processes. These are the kinds of deposits we would expect to result from the worldwide, world-destroying Flood of Noah's day.

The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. When he opened the Abyss, smoke rose from it like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. And out of the smoke locusts came down upon the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth. They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any plant or tree, but only those people who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. They were not given power to kill them, but only to torture them for five months. And the agony they suffered was like that of the sting of a scorpion when it strikes a man. During those days men will seek death, but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them.

The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces. Their hair was like women's hair, and their teeth were like lions' teeth. They had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the thundering of many horses and chariots rushing into battle. They had tails and stings like scorpions, and in their tails they had power to torment people for five months. They had as king over them the angel of the Abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek, Apollyon.

The demonic locusts are directed to torture people who are not protected by the seal of God. The torment of their sting is to last for five months. The 144,000 were sealed so that they would be protected from this trumpet plague. The 144,000 will remain on earth along with the church during the first six trumpet judgments. Just as the Hebrew children worked among the Egyptians and were not subject to the plagues poured upon Egypt, so will those who are sealed by God (the elect and the 144,000), will not be subjected to the trumpet plagues.

A month according to the Hebrew Calendar is a period of 30 days. The floodwaters of judgment during the days of Noah remained on the earth for 150 days (5 months). Jesus warned the people of God that as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the second coming. Before the Lord Jesus returns, those who took the mark of the beast will be tormented by the sting of locust-like demons for five months.

If the first trumpet judgment of Revelation is sounded on the 1st day of the first month of the Hebrew ceremonial calendar, this fifth trumpet would sound on the new moon of the fifth month. Those tormented by the sting of the demonic locusts would suffer but not die until the end of the ninth month. The 25th day of the ninth month (Kislev) is the Feast of Dedication (Chanukah or the Festival of Lights), when the second temple defiled by Antiochus Epiphanes was rededicated to the LORD. Likewise, the third temple defiled by the Antichrist will be cleansed and rededicated as the Millennial Temple where Christ will be enthroned.