Genesis 7; Genesis 8; Genesis 9; Matthew 3

1 Then the Lord said to Noah, "I have seen that you are the best person among the people of this time, so you and your family can go into the boat.

2 Take with you seven pairs, each male with its female, of every kind of clean animal, and take one pair, each male with its female, of every kind of unclean animal.

3 Take seven pairs of all the birds of the sky, each male with its female. This will allow all these animals to continue living on the earth after the flood.

4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth. It will rain forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe off from the earth every living thing that I have made."

5 Noah did everything the Lord commanded him.

6 Noah was six hundred years old when the flood came.

7 He and his wife and his sons and their wives went into the boat to escape the waters of the flood.

8 The clean animals, the unclean animals, the birds, and everything that crawls on the ground

9 came to Noah. They went into the boat in groups of two, male and female, just as God had commanded Noah.

10 Seven days later the flood started.

11 When Noah was six hundred years old, the flood started. On the seventeenth day of the second month of that year the underground springs split open, and the clouds in the sky poured out rain.

12 The rain fell on the earth for forty days and forty nights.

13 On that same day Noah and his wife, his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives went into the boat.

14 They had every kind of wild and tame animal, every kind of animal that crawls on the earth, and every kind of bird.

15 Every creature that had the breath of life came to Noah in the boat in groups of two.

16 One male and one female of every living thing came, just as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord closed the door behind them.

17 Water flooded the earth for forty days, and as it rose it lifted the boat off the ground.

18 The water continued to rise, and the boat floated on it above the earth.

19 The water rose so much that even the highest mountains under the sky were covered by it.

20 It continued to rise until it was more than twenty feet above the mountains.

21 All living things that moved on the earth died. This included all the birds, tame animals, wild animals, and creatures that swarm on the earth, as well as all human beings.

22 So everything on dry land that had the breath of life in it died.

23 God destroyed from the earth every living thing that was on the land -- every man, animal, crawling thing, and bird of the sky. All that was left was Noah and what was with him in the boat.

24 And the waters continued to cover the earth for one hundred fifty days.

1 But God remembered Noah and all the wild and tame animals with him in the boat. He made a wind blow over the earth, and the water went down.

2 The underground springs stopped flowing, and the clouds in the sky stopped pouring down rain.

3

4 The water that covered the earth began to go down. After one hundred fifty days it had gone down so much that the boat touched land again. It came to rest on one of the mountains of Araratn on the seventeenth day of the seventh month.

5 The water continued to go down so that by the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains could be seen.

6 Forty days later Noah opened the window he had made in the boat, and

7 he sent out a raven. It flew here and there until the water had dried up from the earth.

8 Then Noah sent out a dove to find out if the water had dried up from the ground.

9 The dove could not find a place to land because water still covered the earth, so it came back to the boat. Noah reached out his hand and took the bird and brought it back into the boat.

10 After seven days Noah again sent out the dove from the boat,

11 and that evening it came back to him with a fresh olive leaf in its mouth. Then Noah knew that the ground was almost dry.

12 Seven days later he sent the dove out again, but this time it did not come back.

13 When Noah was six hundred and one years old, in the first day of the first month of that year, the water was dried up from the land. Noah removed the covering of the boat and saw that the land was dry.

14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the land was completely dry.

15 Then God said to Noah,

16 "You and your wife, your sons, and their wives should go out of the boat.

17 Bring every animal out of the boat with you -- the birds, animals, and everything that crawls on the earth. Let them have many young ones so that they might grow in number."

18 So Noah went out with his sons, his wife, and his sons' wives.

19 Every animal, everything that crawls on the earth, and every bird went out of the boat by families.

20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord. He took some of all the clean birds and animals, and he burned them on the altar as offerings to God.

21 The Lord was pleased with these sacrifices and said to himself, "I will never again curse the ground because of human beings. Their thoughts are evil even when they are young, but I will never again destroy every living thing on the earth as I did this time.

22 "As long as the earth continues, planting and harvest, cold and hot, summer and winter, day and night will not stop."

1 Then God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, "Have many children; grow in number and fill the earth.

2 Every animal on earth, every bird in the sky, every animal that crawls on the ground, and every fish in the sea will respect and fear you. I have given them to you.

3 "Everything that moves, everything that is alive, is yours for food. Earlier I gave you the green plants, but now I give you everything for food.

4 But you must not eat meat that still has blood in it, because blood gives life.

5 I will demand blood for life. I will demand the life of any animal that kills a person, and I will demand the life of anyone who takes another person's life.

6 "Whoever kills a human being will be killed by a human being, because God made humans in his own image.

7 "As for you, Noah, I want you and your family to have many children, to grow in number on the earth, and to become many."

8 Then God said to Noah and his sons,

9 "Now I am making my agreement with you and your people who will live after you,

10 and with every living thing that is with you -- the birds, the tame and the wild animals, and with everything that came out of the boat with you -- with every living thing on earth.

11 I make this agreement with you: I will never again destroy all living things by a flood. A flood will never again destroy the earth."

12 And God said, "This is the sign of the agreement between me and you and every living creature that is with you.

13 I am putting my rainbow in the clouds as the sign of the agreement between me and the earth.

14 When I bring clouds over the earth and a rainbow appears in them,

15 I will remember my agreement between me and you and every living thing. Floods will never again destroy all life on the earth.

16 When the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and I will remember the agreement that continues forever between me and every living thing on the earth."

17 So God said to Noah, "The rainbow is a sign of the agreement that I made with all living things on earth.

18 The sons of Noah who came out of the boat with him were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.)

19 These three men were Noah's sons, and all the people on earth came from these three sons.

20 Noah became a farmer and planted a vineyard.

21 When he drank wine made from his grapes, he became drunk and lay naked in his tent.

22 Ham, the father of Canaan, looked at his naked father and told his brothers outside.

23 Then Shem and Japheth got a coat and, carrying it on both their shoulders, they walked backwards into the tent and covered their father. They turned their faces away so that they did not see their father's nakedness.

24 Noah was sleeping because of the wine. When he woke up and learned what his youngest son, Ham, had done to him,

25 he said, "May there be a curse on Canaan! May he be the lowest slave to his brothers."

26 Noah also said, "May the Lord, the God of Shem, be praised! May Canaan be Shem's slave.

27 May God give more land to Japheth. May Japheth live in Shem's tents, and may Canaan be their slave."

28 After the flood Noah lived 350 years.

29 He lived a total of 950 years, and then he died.

1 About that time John the Baptist began preaching in the desert area of Judea.

2 John said, "Change your hearts and lives because the kingdom of heaven is near."

3 John the Baptist is the one Isaiah the prophet was talking about when he said: "This is a voice of one who calls out in the desert: 'Prepare the way for the Lord. Make the road straight for him.'"

4 John's clothes were made from camel's hair, and he wore a leather belt around his waist. For food, he ate locusts and wild honey.

5 Many people came from Jerusalem and Judea and all the area around the Jordan River to hear John.

6 They confessed their sins, and he baptized them in the Jordan River.

7 Many of the Pharisees and Sadducees came to the place where John was baptizing people. When John saw them, he said, "You are all snakes! Who warned you to run away from God's coming punishment?

8 Do the things that show you really have changed your hearts and lives.

9 And don't think you can say to yourselves, 'Abraham is our father.' I tell you that God could make children for Abraham from these rocks.

10 The ax is now ready to cut down the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

11 "I baptize you with water to show that your hearts and lives have changed. But there is one coming after me who is greater than I am, whose sandals I am not good enough to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

12 He will come ready to clean the grain, separating the good grain from the chaff. He will put the good part of the grain into his barn, but he will burn the chaff with a fire that cannot be put out."

13 At that time Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan River and wanted John to baptize him.

14 But John tried to stop him, saying, "Why do you come to me to be baptized? I need to be baptized by you!"

15 Jesus answered, "Let it be this way for now. We should do all things that are God's will." So John agreed to baptize Jesus.

16 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he came up out of the water. Then heaven opened, and he saw God's Spirit coming down on him like a dove.

17 And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love, and I am very pleased with him."