By – After 500 Years, Noah Became the Father of Shem, Ham and Japheth 5: 32

After Noah Was 500 Years Old,
He Became the Father of Shem, Ham and Japheth
5: 32

After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth REFLECT: Do you have a family historian? Do you have a genealogical tree drawn up to pass down the line? Why do you suppose genealogies are less important today than they were to people in biblical times? How does Chapter 5 augment your story of fall and redemption?

Noah is the tenth generation and means rest. Contrary to what the evolutionists say, there were not billions of years between the Creation and the Flood. There were only two generations from Adam to Noah. After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth. They were not triplets. What this implies is that Noah was 500 years old before any of them were born. Shem means name, Ham means warm or hot, Japheth means fair or beautiful.

One can only imagine the ridicule that Noah endured. Before the Flood there was no rain. Yet Noah and his sons built the ark. It must have been a time of grief for the godly man as the world that he knew became more and more evil. I am sure his preaching and witnessing seemed futile. His own brothers and sisters and their families were overwhelmed by the wicked culture and were drowning in their sin. It is also likely that all this affected his own family, but we cannot be sure. We do know that he had three sons who escaped the Flood, but it seems likely that he, like the others in his line, would have had other sons and daughters who rejected his message. But Noah continued, for 120 years, to be faithful and build the ark. Mrs. Noah must have been an incredible woman (6:18, 7:7 and 13, 8: 16 and 18) to stand by his side in the mist of the evil and corruption of their world. He built and he preached, but his preaching to the world did not save it because there was no repentance except for the eight who entered the ark. His preaching did not save his generation; it condemned them (see the commentary on Hebrews, to see link click Co – The Faith of Noah).

Satan was watching all of this with sinister joy. He always looks for our weaknesses, just as he did in the garden of Eden. And at just the right moment of our greatest weakness he steps in with temptation. If we resist him, he will flee from us (James 4:7). But here, desire had given birth to sin, and sin was growing, which would eventually give birth to death (6:11 to 8:14). What we see next is the fruit of that evil generation.