A FLOOD? OR FOREGIVENESS?

We are told that God possesses three important attributes: He is loving; He is foregiving; He is merciful. It says so in the Bible, and since the Bible is the word of God, it obviously must be true. There are many biblical stories to illustrate these qualities. Let us examine the story of Noah's Ark to check the credibility.

God was upset at the sinful ways of humankind, so as punishment for their sins, He created a flood caused by forty days and forty nights of rain. Prior to the flood, He told Noah, "Make thee an ark of gopher wood." This ark was to be-by current measurements--520 feet, 8 inches long by 86 feet, 9.3 inches wide, and 52 feet high.Noah, as we all know, was also instructed to gather two of every animal and place them on the ark to save them from the impending flood. The ark would then sail for 371 days until the flooding subsided.

The story of the ark brings in  to question numerous issues that the Bible fails to address. First is the conundurm of the animals.There were, and still are, millions of species of animal life on earth. How was it possible that Noah could fit two of every species on his ark? There is an additional problem with the "two of every species" demand. What about those animlas unique to North America? Europe? Australia? The islands dotting the Pacific, Atlantic and Caribbean seas? How could Noah have possibly navigated the globe to rescue these animals? And assuming he did collect all these speices, how could he have adequately fed such a diversified diet for a year with the earth covered with water? Then there is the question of how one stores a years worth of food for millions of animals.

Finally, this brings us to the original premise of a loving, foregiving and merciful God. The great flood covered the earth, virtually wiping out all of humankind as punishment for their sinful ways. That means that along with the evil sinners, untold numbers of innocent babies, children, mothers, fathers and grandparents also perished in the flood. Can a six month old infant be a terrible sinner? How about a five year old? God must have thought so because he deliberately drowned them. He apparently cared more about horses and goats and elephants and worms than He did children and the elderly and infirmed.

If any story illustrates the illogical and contradictory nature of Bible stories,surely it is the story of Noah's ark. It paints a picture of a vengeful, unfeeling, merciless God. Somebody needs to get their stories straight.