Genesis 7

All right, so tonight we're gonna be looking at Genesis chapter 7 this is when

Noah and his family enter into the ark So we'll play the video Listen along and then we'll come back and go through verse by verse

Then the Lord said to Noah come into the ark

You and all your household Because I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation

You shall take with you seven each of every clean animal a male and his female to each of Animals that are unclean a male and his female also seven each of birds of the air male and female

To keep the species alive on the face of all the earth For after seven more days,

I will cause it to rain on the earth 40 days and 40 nights

And I will destroy from the face of the earth all living things

And Noah did according to all that the

Lord commanded him Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters were on the earth

So Noah with his sons his wife and his son's wives went into the ark because of the waters of the flood of Clean animals of animals that are unclean of birds and of everything that creeps on the earth

Two by two they went into the ark to Noah male and female as God had commanded

And It came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were on the earth in the 600th year of Noah's life in the second month the 17th day of the month on That day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up and the windows of heaven were open

And the rain was on the earth 40 days and 40 nights on the very same day

Noah and Noah's sons Shem ham and Japheth and Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark

They and every beast after its kind all cattle after their kind Every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind and every bird after its kind every bird of every sort and They went into the ark to Noah two by two of all flesh in which is the breath of life

So those that entered male and female of all flesh Went in as God commanded him and the

Lord Shut him in Now what the flood was on the earth 40 days

The waters increased and lifted up the ark and it rose high above the earth the waters prevailed and Greatly increased on the earth and the ark moved about on the surface of the waters

And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered

The waters prevailed 15 cubits upward and the mountains were covered and all flesh died that moved on the earth birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth and every man

All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life all

That was on the dry land died So he destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground both man and cat creeping thing and bird of the air

They were destroyed from the earth Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive

And the waters prevailed on the earth One hundred and fifty days

All right, like I said, this is Genesis 7 this is when Noah Enters into the ark.

There's a lot of questions that surround this story Like where did all the water come from a bigger question?

Maybe where did all the water go afterwards? Were there dinosaurs on the ark?

These are kind of the the fun questions people ask Maybe we'll get to some of these but just to review up until this point

We've covered verses or chapters 1 through 6. So chapter 1 we know gave us the six days of creation so If you just read the

Bible at face value You get the idea that the earth was created about 6 ,000 years ago or what's

Bishop Usher? Calculated a date that was like what six thousand three hundred and something years

Something like that So we got the six days of creation in chapter 1 chapter 2 tells us about day 7 when

God rested It also gave us more details about Adam and Eve Chapter 3 covered the fall of man into sin

Chapter 4 gave us the story of Cain and Abel Also at the end of that chapter

Seth was born and then it says When Seth was born and he had descendants then men began to call on the name of the

Lord And we talked about the two lines the ungodly line of Cain the godly line of Seth Chapter 5 is a genealogy of Seth, you know back to Adam to Seth to his descendants

These are the godly people on earth and that's where Noah is introduced in Chapter 5 and then in chapter 6 last week.

We talked about the two different theories about the sons of God Are they fallen angels?

procreating with Human women to produce a race called the

Nephilim of half demon half man that's what a lot of people believe and then the other point of view is that The sons of God are descendants of Seth either way the earth became totally corrupt

In chapter 6 and that's what caused God to judge the earth with the floods

So if you look at chapter 6 verses and verses 7 and 8 you see that The Lord says

I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth Both man and beast creeping thing and birds of the air for I am sorry that I have made them

But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. So that brings us

To chapter 7 any questions about anything up until this point?

I Think we have a handle on what's going on, but Marcus I Yeah, I'm not familiar with the

Jewish calendar of how they come up with that are they saying that's how old the earth is Yeah But what about But what about the time period from Adam from the time

God created everything up until the day? The flood came how long is that?

Roughly it's about 1 ,600 years so from Adam to Noah and of course

Noah is 600 years old once the flood starts It's about 16 16 45

So if you look at it that way God actually has been very very patient because man has been rebelling really since you know

Chapter 3 it might have been a week after they were created. We don't know But it took this long for God to actually send judgment 1600 years.

That's more patience than I would have I don't know about you. Yeah What struck me was it said

Noah was a righteous man, right? This was before the law this is before Moses and so forth

I Guess my question and then I'll venture a guess is what made

Noah righteous I guess it was faith. It was still faith wasn't it and obedience

Right obey. Let's see. He answered his own question. He's pretty good at this

No, we're gonna cover that because yes, we think of what the Apostle Paul said

Romans 3 There's none righteous. No, not one and then we say Jesus is the exception.

He never sinned But yeah, it does call it does call Noah righteous. So what does that mean?

We'll deal with that one second but the attributes of God one of the attributes we covered several weeks ago

God is long -suffering and Like I said, it's it's over 1600 years but finally there does come a time where God's patience if you want to put it that way runs out and The earth mankind is very very evil at this point.

People are violent and God is going to step in So look at Genesis 7 verse 1

Says then the Lord said to Noah come into the ark you and all your household

Because I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation

So we've already established that Noah is not without It's not that he's without sin, but he's righteous before God in this generation

So of all the people on earth Noah stands out he's living a godly set -apart life and that's just not the case with anybody else so What was it that justified

Noah? Was it his works? It's gonna say in a few verses that Noah did all that God commanded him.

So Noah is Obedient, but why is he obedient?

Because he has faith he believes everything that God tells him it's never rained. No one has seen

Any type of flood never not even rain never mind a flood and yet Noah believes

God and I that is why he's righteous I believe so the Hebrew word translated righteous refers to the fact that Noah is living a just life and he's

Justified in the eyes of God Romans 2 talks about even before the law or people that don't have

God's law They still have God's law written on their hearts. So he knows what's right and wrong and he's obeying

God because he has Faith and God wants to preserve this godly line.

So God is going to Essentially start over but he's going to preserve the line of Seth Through through this man

Noah and then Through Shem eventually that line will bring the

Messiah into the world In verse 2 we see that Noah is instructed to take we always think of the animals coming on two by two

Right, and if you ask people that's what they'll tell you Yeah, two of each male and female, but that's not actually the case with all the animals

We see that with some animals the clean animals how many did he take on Seven now, why is it that he would take seven of the clean animals?

Okay for sacrifices What about food? Well, I think based on I guess

I can't be certain of this It doesn't look like they ate animals until after the flood maybe they ate before but Certainly the clean animals are for sacrifice

Remember as soon as he gets off the ark, that's the first thing he does he offers a sacrifice But then they'll start eating animals

After after the flood. Yeah I've heard also that perhaps the animals were in a state of like hibernation or semi hibernation to assist in the

Right and the feeding of the animals that you know That could be we see that the main purpose of the animals being on the ark according to verse 3 was to keep the species alive

So that verse in and of itself Absolutely proves this was a worldwide flood.

I know I don't need to Convince you because we've touched on this many times, but there's still a lot of people even within evangelical

Christianity They they don't believe in the worldwide flood But here it says

God tells him bring the animals on to keep these species alive. So obviously if it was a regional flood

That wouldn't have been necessary because the animals would have been living all over the world everywhere other than that region, so I'll say it again the people who believe in a local flood or advanced this localized flood theory.

I Really do see this as just a denial of the Bible. Okay, the Bible teaches the worldwide flood and if you don't believe that That's a denial of Scripture There was another church in the area that held a conference

I think was two weeks ago and they had a Guy come in a well -known fairly well -known speaker among Baptist churches anyways, and he said something

He said that you know evangelicals because he's a fundamental bit fundamental Baptist So he's seeing apostasy everywhere in the mainline denominations and the cults

Here's what he said about evangelical Christians he said evangelicals say they believe the

Bible but they really don't and His examples was they a lot of evangelicals don't believe the earth is 6 ,000 years old he said a lot of evangelicals don't believe in a worldwide flood and according to him he saw that as a denial of Scripture and you know,

I I tend to agree with that. So I Clearly the worldwide flood

I wouldn't say it's a matter of a person's salvation But you know once you start compromising on these issues you tend to compromise on other issues and then where where does it end?

All right So Any questions so far?

We're in verse 3 Okay So let's just skip ahead verse 5.

It says and Noah did all That the Lord Commanded him.

So whatever God told him to do he did it. We see that he was obedient So Noah and his family they get on the ark

Remember, he's 600 years old and we see in verse 11 in the 600th year of Noah's life in the second month in the 17th day of the month on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up and the windows of heaven

Were open so the question of where did all the water come from remember the water is coming from both

Both sides there's coming from from above. Okay, the the canopy that is above the earth

We believe the earth's atmosphere was probably a lot different Remember on day two of creation

God separated the waters remember the waters below from the waters above so there's a lot of water

Above in the atmosphere and that's all broken up and it comes down and then the fountains of the deep

I don't know how much water was down there, but that the water comes up. So between the two it's enough to cover even the highest

Mountain and it actually says that the mountains were covered. So again, that's just more evidence of a worldwide

Flood now another question that comes up. Where did the water go? I Flood the world

Where did the water go once it started to recede I Mean it didn't

I guess it didn't go back up into the atmosphere Yeah, obviously a lot of that would have

Come back and form the oceans and whatnot. But one thing we can't forget. This is a supernatural judgment

What's happening here is supernatural so therefore It's sort of like asking how

Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, you know, how did he do that exactly? Well, there's no there's no real answer.

There's no scientific or natural answer. It's a miracle So I don't really get hung up on stuff like that.

Like I said, there's a lot of questions, but It's no problem for God and if the

Bible doesn't tell us then there really is no answer, but yeah Well, this miracle pales in comparison to creation itself, right?

this is why people look at the mountains and geo geological layers and so forth creation was a

Was an extremely powerful thing that happened, right? But isn't this why people deny the worldwide flood because they say well that how does that work?

That's impossible Well, yeah, it is impossible Just like a guy

Being crucified who dies and he's raised from the dead three days. I mean that's impossible, too

Except that with God all things are possible. So These are these questions. I think sometimes some people really want to know but other times they're called

Deconstructing questions like people are asking this to plant seeds of doubt in your mind so just be careful when

When people ask those types of questions, that's often what's behind it. All right, let's turn to second or excuse me first Peter chapter 3

First Peter chapter 3 we're gonna look at a puzzling

Verse that we never really talked about but it has to deal with the flood. So now it's a good time to look at it

As you're turning there it says here in Genesis 7 that it rained 40 days and 40 nights that number 40 is

Symbolic of a time of testing a time of trial You remember Jesus was tempted in the wilderness 40 days and 40 nights

So the number 40 has significance You're you're in 1st

Peter but 2nd Peter chapter 2 verse 5 tells us that Noah was a preacher of righteousness

So we can envision Noah Building the boat and over let's say it took over a hundred years to build something like that.

He's building the boat Some people are gonna see this and come along and say hey, what are you doing?

And that gave Noah presumably it gave Noah Opportunities to tell them about God and what

God was going to do So Noah was a preacher in some way shape or form He was telling people warning them and in theory they could have gotten on the boat with him, but nobody believed

God gave his word, but only Noah believed or Noah and His family so we know and we talked about this last week talk about it again

Now the ark is a picture of what? right, so the water that this is judgment and We receive salvation

From judgment. Okay, we get saved by trusting in Christ. They were saved by being you know in the ark

So the ark is a picture of Christ. We're in Christ. We're saved by being in Christ They're saved by being in the ark.

So the ark is a picture of Christ now look at first Peter 3 18 It says for Christ also suffered once for sins the just for the unjust

That he might bring us to God being put to death in the flesh But made alive by the

Spirit by whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison

Who formerly were disobedient when once the divine long -suffering waited in the days of Noah?

While the ark was being prepared in which a few that is eight souls were saved through water so this is a challenging verse to interpret and it's only going to get more difficult because in verse 21 if you look at verse 21

Quickly, it seems to say that it compares baptism to the flood and then it seems to say that we're saved

Through baptism does everyone see that? Okay, so I want to deal with that question, but first what's the statement about Jesus going to preach to the spirits in prison who formerly were

Disobedient in the days of Noah. So who are these spirits in prison?

Well, you remember that theory about the sons of God, right? We're going back to that How maybe they were fallen angels.

Okay, and again, I I accept this as a possibility So the idea that some people have these these angels procreated with with women and Because of that God took these fallen angels and put them in In prison in the abyss

So they're locked up chained in the bottomless pit and that they are the spirits in prison that Peter is referring to so when

Jesus died on the cross, here's the idea Jesus died on the cross and he Descended into the lower parts of the earth and he took the believers in in Hades or paradise and he brought them up to the third heaven, right?

That's one thing Jesus did in those three days, but another thing he did he went and he preached to these

Angels that were locked up in the abyss and maybe he preached something to the effect and this is total speculation

But he preached something to the effect that you know, you tried to corrupt the human race you tried to prevent

My coming into the world and you know, basically I I defeated you I went through the cross and your plan failed

That's one point of view if you think that the sons of God were fallen angels

Marcus Right Yeah, Tartarus would be if you think of the underworld the whole thing is

Hades or shield One compartment is was paradise

Abraham's bosom. The other compartment was torment or hell and Based on the story of the rich man and Lazarus There's a great goal fixed in between so that chasm in between we believe is the bottomless pit or the abyss

Yeah, I mean that would have been the same place that's the prison house for some demons

Right, right So some demons seem to be out on the loose

Others are in in Tartarus in the bottomless pit.

Yeah, Larry That I mean that's the other point of view so Like I said,

I believe the sons of God were the descendants of Seth. So some people think that Jesus His spirit in a sense was preaching through Noah that Christ was

His message was coming through Noah and the spirits in prison are actually the lost souls in Noah's day because sometimes unbelievers are talked about as being, you know

Slaves of sin or in chains of bondage or something like that Bottom line is we don't really know but it's one of those verses that are

Disputed and I had somebody leave a comment on I think it was last week's YouTube video from Genesis 6 and he said that the

He said that demons are actually spirits of the Nephilim. Okay, and I have heard that before So the

Nephilim or this remember the half -breed race between a half man half demon So they were killed in the flood

But their spirits still roam the earth and they're the unclean spirits or they are the demons and he said fallen

Angels are not demons. I Believe fallen angels are demons But he said no, they're spirits of the

Nephilim. So that that's a that's a minority position and Interesting to talk about and probably just confuses people to bring up all these different things, but it is out there

Here's the reason I wanted to talk about this though this statement in 1st Peter 3 21 and 22

Peter says there is also an antitype because he's talking about the flood and the days of Noah and then he says there is also

An antitype which now saves us and what is that? Baptism So if you just look at this just glance at it reading it for the first time

It almost sounds like Peter or some people would say this is what Peter is saying that you're saved through Baptism and I think we know that there's a lot of people in the world who believe that you're not saved until you get baptized

The Catholic Church believes that they believe that baptism is literally the thing that washes away your sin

Churches of Christ. They also believe in baptismal regeneration So, yes, you need to believe in Jesus, but that's not enough.

You're not saved until you actually, you know get dunked in the water So they would point to a verse like this and on the surface it it does seem to say that Marcus According to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration

Right Something they would point to that verse as well as they see the washing is baptism.

You need to be baptized to be saved Here's another a few vert now, you know, we don't believe this

This has been emphasized and and just about every Bible -believing Church I know they're quick to say no baptism does not save you on the other hand.

You have verses like Mark 16 16 Jesus says he who believes and is baptized will be saved

He didn't he who believes not will be condemned Acts 22 verse 16

Says now why are you waiting arise and be baptized and wash away your sins calling on the name of the

Lord? so there are verses in the Bible that do make it sound like that baptism is at least part of the gospel and salvation

So, how do we deal with this? You can either take that position or You say no

Salvation is by grace through faith and baptism is just the symbolic act act that pictures

Salvation so yes Marcus The washing of regeneration when somebody does go into Physically with their body goes down and is immersed under physical water

It's just a it's a picture It's a representation so I'm just wondering if the word baptism can be mean more than You know going to Lake Wyola right and And the word baptism means to immerse right and Sometimes it it doesn't always refer to water baptism.

It can refer to spirit baptism Right. Well, let's read this verse again.

I think the answer is in the text. So Verse 21 there is also an anti type which now saves us

Baptism keep reading not the removal of the filth of the flesh

But the answer of a good conscience toward God I mean that might be a little hint that it's not actually the water washing, you know your sin away

It's you know your heart your good conscience Toward God, so I just want to read what

John MacArthur wrote about this. I think this is helpful He said in the New Testament an anti type is an earthly expression of the spiritual reality

And that's what baptism is, right? He says it indicates a symbol picture or pattern of some spiritual truth.

Peter is teaching that the fact that eight people were in the ark and went through the whole judgment and yet were unharmed is

Analogous to the Christians experience in salvation by being in Christ the ark of one's salvation.

So The ark is a picture of Christ as we said he continues Peter is not at all referring to water baptism here, but rather to a

Figurative immersion into union with Christ as an ark of safety from the judgment of God Judgment fell on Christ Just as the judgment of the floodwaters fell on the ark

The believer who is in Christ is thus in the ark of safety That will sail over the waters of judgment into eternal glory

To be sure he is not misunderstood Peter clearly says that he is not speaking of water baptism

And of course, that's the statement about not the removal of the filth of the flesh

But the answer of a good conscience towards God now, I don't know about you, but to me that that makes sense

But if a person is still wondering, I don't know. It really sounds like I Should be baptized.

Well, yeah, you should so how about you just get back you know, if you believe in Jesus just get baptized and then you don't have to worry about it, but You know, sometimes we were so Adamant that baptism doesn't save you we almost it almost comes across like we're saying that you don't really need to be baptized and we don't want to send that message, but Salvation is still always

It's through faith. Not Having someone sprinkling water over your head that in and of itself doesn't save anybody

Something like When when the person is immersed they say

Baptized into his death and then when they come out raised to newness of life or the issue like that's a pretty common with Christ No, it's just dead

Dead to the to yourself, right? And then raised so that Christ is your life.

Yeah Yet not I but Christ liveth in me so who's gonna be controlling your life are you gonna be

Being dead to sin, yeah yeah, I think it's Romans 6 where you get the

The imagery of baptism where and that's why we do it by immersion. Not only does baptize mean

It literally means to immerse Going down under the water is a perfect picture of Christ death coming back up Perfect picture of his resurrection.

So but that's not what saves you. It's it's symbolic for The spiritual baptism and what

Christ did anyways, let's go back to Genesis 7 That was always a verse that puzzled me in 1st

Peter So I thought it was worth touching on. All right Try to finish this up in the next few minutes

Genesis 7 verse 13 It says on the very same day Noah and his sons that is

Shem ham and Japheth And Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark

They and every beast after its kind all cattle after their kind every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its

Kind why do you think he keeps bringing up after its kind after its kind after its kind? You know, nothing's in the

Bible by accident. So there's a reason why he does that Okay Marcus Right, so we usually see that at least back in the first chapter

I think it is the first two chapters we usually see it as a refutation of evolution, but One another question people ask how did he get all those animals on the ark like just the dogs and cats alone

I mean he had to bring on lions and tigers and house cats and bobcats and like no actually he didn't because We do believe in a form of evolution, right?

We reject what is called macro evolution So we do not believe monkeys

Evolve into men so that type of evolution we reject everything reproduces after its own kind But we do believe in micro evolution

So Noah didn't have to bring on a rottweiler a poodle a wolf a coyote

He didn't have to do that. He had to bring on what two dogs Whatever they whatever state they were in back then

They say, you know the dogs we have as pets evolved from wolves, is that what scientists say

I think Can you can you tell it without But That's all he had to do is bring on two felines

Two canines, whatever they were back then So they did evolve though over the next few thousand years.

Yes, they evolved into all the different types of breeds and wolves and Coyotes and everything but they all came from two, you know parents the two dogs originally

So if you look at it that way, there's actually a lot fewer animals on earth originally

Where now we just have so many different types So I don't think it would be a problem fitting all the animals the other question about dinosaurs.

Are there dinosaurs on the ark? first of all Dying the word dinosaur is a modern term it developed in the 1800s

And it's all part of the bigger narrative about the earth being billions of years old So were there large creatures like that on the ark?

Yeah, did those creatures exist I'm not doubting many of those creatures existed

But well, how could Noah fit a brontosaurus on the ark? Well, he could have brought on he probably didn't bring eggs on the ark, but he could have brought on a

Baby right. Did he bring on an elephant? Well, yeah, but he probably didn't bring on some huge, you know, woolly mammoth he probably brought on two baby elephants or something like that, so if you look at it that way and especially if they were in some sort of state of hibernation, which again is possible then

Room in the ark really isn't a problem and I would just direct all those types of questions to Ken Ham And answers in Genesis, and I've never heard him not have an answer for questions like this.

So a Lot of the a lot of these things really aren't problems that the skeptics want to bring up.

So any questions on that? God Would not put two brontosaurus on there because they're so big but babies

And when I was down visiting the ark a number of years ago they said that the largest dinosaur egg that they have ever been able to identify through Historical evidence has been no bigger than a football.

Yeah and so I mean that's How big then the baby would have been right?

But I remember in elementary school we were taught all about this and of course kids love dinosaurs, right

Tyrannosaurus rex Stegosaurus brontosaurus, but I remember

I think it was in high school or a little while later I remember reading some article where the scientists then said well, we don't even believe brontosaurus is existed

So they like changed their view and then these animals didn't exist. They were actually something else.

So At the end of the day, these are still all theories, I mean you have some fossils, but Not not really a problem here.

All right verse 15 And they went into the ark to noah two by two

Of all flesh and which is the breath of life. I mean this tells us that man and animal lived and had the type of relationship where noah could

Bring them on the ark and they weren't afraid right god doesn't actually put the fear of man into animals until after the flood

And that's when man starts hunting animals. So all of that comes later Because that's another thing.

Well, how could he have gotten all these animals onto the ark? Well They live together and it wasn't a problem things were totally different before the flood if you believe the

Bible Uh, someone asked about fish I do not think He says the breath of life.

I realize some fish I guess technically they breathe right they need oxygen, but no,

I don't think they they had any fish on the ark What do you think? Yeah, I don't think that was a problem

Right. Yeah, they would have been okay I don't know All right verse 17 now the flood was on the earth 40 days the waters increased and lifted up the ark

And it rose high above The earth so that statement along with verses 19 and 20

Where it says and the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth and all

The high hills under the whole heaven were covered again You can't read this and come to the conclusion that it was a local flood

This is universal language and that matters because the flood and the judgment of the flood is compared to the next judgment which

When christ comes back God will judge the earth again with fire If you say the flood was only local then you could say that armageddon is only going to be local too

And I just don't think that Is the case? verse 23 Only noah and those who are with him in the ark remained alive

You could make a comparison to the exclusivity of christ You know, you had to be in the ark to be saved, right?

No question about that So it is today You have to be in christ to be saved.

Oh, what about all these other religions? You know, they have their path and they're sincere Well, the imagery here is is clear only those if the ark is christ only those in christ

Live only those in christ are saved So and we know that's what jesus said in john 14.

No man comes into the father except Through me. All right, so it's always that other position, you know, you take that liberal position of denying

Six days of creation denying the flood then you end up denying that Christ is the only way of salvation.

It's always the same same road. It leads to denying god's word another thing about the ark

He says I think it's back in the other last chapter. He says, you know make

Three decks, I think there are three levels and he says a window and a door.

So how many doors were in the ark? One Jesus said in the gospel of john chapter 10 verse 9.

I am the door if anyone enters by me He will be saved

And we'll just close with verse 16 This is a great statement about God's personal care

For noah, it says in verse 16 So those that entered the ark male and female of all flesh went in as god had commanded him

And what happened? The lord shut him in so this speaks of our

Security in christ. So the ark pictures christ in the gospel one way

One door you must be in christ to be saved And then once we're in christ

What happens? We're sealed we're sealed right god sealed the door no water got in he was safe If you're in christ

You're it's sealed. It's sealed until the day of redemption paul says in ephesians 4 30.

So i'd like to close with what matthew henry said about verse 16 He says there is room enough in christ for all comers

God put adam into paradise, but did not shut him in So adam threw himself out

But when god put noah into the ark, and so when he brings a soul to christ the salvation is sure

It is not in our own keeping but in the master's hand So if the ark is christ noah represents believers and all the people who died in the flood represent