The
‘bathtub’ ark
By Ken Ham
15 June 2002
They look cute, and they appear in ornaments, broaches, necklaces, as pictures in
children’s books and paintings on kindergarten walls in churches and schools,
representing the account of Noah’s Ark. But in a world that scoffs at the
idea of a global Flood and a man called Noah who took his family and representative
kinds of land animals on an enormous boat, what do these ‘bathtub arks’
really say?
Consider some of the serious lessons we should learn from the account of Noah’s
Flood in
Genesis 6–9.
-
The Flood was sent as a judgment because of the wickedness of man. It is a reminder
that man is responsible for his sin and will face the judgment of a Holy God.
-
The Flood is a reminder that one day there will be another global judgment, but
next time by fire (2
Peter 3:10). All who have ever lived will stand before a Holy God.
-
The Ark is a reminder of the message of salvation. Just as Noah and his family had
to go through a doorway to be saved on the Ark of salvation from the Flood, God
has provided an Ark of salvation for each of us to be saved from the judgment to
come, which places people in Hell. Our ‘Ark’ today is the Lord Jesus
Christ, who said, ‘I am the door: by me if any man enter
in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture’
(John
10:9).
Just as Peter describes in 2 Peter, most of the world today scoffs at those who
believe in Noah’s Flood and Noah’s Ark.
The majority of scientists claim there never was a global
Flood. Besides which, they claim, Noah couldn’t have fit all the animals
on board—and that the boat would have sunk.
When children see the ‘bathtub ark’—what is it really saying to
them? I suggest that, in a sense, it is reinforcing what the world is claiming:
that Noah’s Ark was just a ‘story’ or ‘fairy tale,’
and that Noah couldn’t have accommodated all the animals on board—and
certainly this kind of ark would not have survived a Flood. In the past, this issue
may not have mattered as much, but in our present world, where the majority don’t
want to believe they are sinners, under the judgment of a Holy God, they thus scoff
at the event of Noah’s Flood.
Model of Noah’s Ark, with trees and animals to scale, with fascinated onlookers
I believe that, in a subtle but real way, the ‘bathtub arks’ help the
world scoff at the account of Noah’s Ark and the Flood as given in the Bible.
In fact, one of the accusations humanists make in their books and Web sites is that
Noah could not have fit all the animals on board. The ‘bathtub ark’
certainly reinforces that.
When children look at [a realistic] model, they often gasp when they see the relative
size of people and animals (including dinosaurs). As they consider the enormous
size of this ship, they realize that Noah could fit the animals needed on the Ark,
and that this boat was built to survive the Flood. We then teach them how this Ark
is a symbol of Christ and remind them—just as Noah did—how important
it is for them to go through the ‘door’ to be saved.
Don’t you think it’s time the church turned its ‘bathtub arks’
into real ones?
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