and
forty nights. God speaks with peculiar significance when he says that
it shall rain. It was not a common rain, but fountains of the deep as
well as the windows of heaven were opened; that is, not only did a
great mass of rain fall from heaven, but also an immense amount of
water streamed forth from the earth itself. And an immense amount of
water was necessary to cover the highest mountain tops to a depth of
fifteen cubits. It was no ordinary rain, but the rain of God's wrath,
by which he set out to destroy all life upon the face of the earth.
Because the earth was depraved, God despoiled it, and because the
godless people raged against the first and second tables of the
commandments, therefore God also raged against them, using heaven and
earth as his weapons.

33. This story is certain proof that God, though long-suffering and
patient, will not allow the wicked to go unpunished. As Peter says (2
Pet 2, 5), if he "spared not the ancient world," how much less will he
spare the popes or the emperors who rage against his Word? How much
less will he spare us who blaspheme his name when our life is unworthy
of our calling and profession, when we freely and daily sin against
our consciences? Let us, then, learn to fear the Lord, humbly to
accept his Word and obey it; otherwise punishment will overtake also
us, as Peter threatens.

Vs. 5-10. _And Noah did according unto all that Jehovah commanded him.
And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon
the earth. And Noah went in, and his sons and his wife, and his sons'
wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood. Of
clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of birds, and of
everything that creepeth upon the ground, there went in two and two
unto Noah into the ark, male and female, as God commanded Noah. And it
came to pass after the seven days, that the waters of the flood were
upon the earth._

34. This is clear from what precedes. Noah's faith is praiseworthy in
that he obeyed the Lord's command and unwaveringly entered the ark
with his sons and their wives. God truly could have saved him in
innumerable other ways; he did not employ this seemingly absurd method
because he knew no other. To him who kept Jonah for three days in the
midst of the sea and in the belly of the whale, what do you think is
impossible? But Noah's faith and obedience are to be commended because
he took no offense at this plan of salvation divin