ACE #24: Noah's Ark and the Dinosaurs

After reading one of my Facebook friend's posts about what animals really looked like on Noah's Ark, I wondered briefly and then gave it absolutely no thought.  Then we went on a mini-vacation to Oglebay Resort in Wheeling, West Virginia and that thought took life; it became a real curious moment after we explored the Good Zoo Dinosaur Exhibit. 

We kept hearing these growling and roaring sounds as we walked along the pathways from exhibit to exhibit.  Come to find out, these dinosaurs had sound effects and were "robotic" - at least that's what our four-year-old told us. "You know robotic means they're not real. They are running on electricity or batteries or something," she explained. I obviously knew very little about robotics and dinosaurs. I know just a smidge more about Noah's Ark.

The animals on Noah's Ark came "two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive" (Genesis 6:19-20). Perhaps they really were various types of dinosaurs.  Before this visit, I'd only imagined chickens, goats, birds, cows, pigs, rabbits, camels, donkeys, and sheep - maybe a giraffe...or at least two.  You know - like those colorful children's books depict. Lions, tigers, and bears would be both scary and dangerous...

As the story goes, God became angry with and grieved by his creation of humankind because they had become evil (both violent and corrupt) in his eyesight.  As a result, he destroyed everyone and everything by a great flood except Noah. The Bible says, "Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord" and "according to all that God commanded him, so he did".  Noah was both faithful and obedient to God.  How awesome is it that God went through such lengths to give specific instructions to preserve the life of one righteous man and his family?

God entered a covenant agreement with Noah and sent a rainbow as a sign of that covenant.  While I am not sure if Noah and his family kept company with dinosaurs, I am sure that I always want to have grace in the eyes of the Lord and be in a covenant relationship with Him...just like Noah.

Study Link:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+6%3A9-22&version=NIV

 

Photo courtesy of Robert J. Lewis taken at the Good Zoo