Genesis Deeper ㉚ God Remembered Noah · Had God Forgotten Him? (Genesis 8:1~5)
This series takes one Bible passage at a time and looks at it a little more closely. The images are free to use in worship, class, and on social media.
God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship; and God made a wind to pass over the earth. The waters subsided. The deep’s fountains and the sky’s windows were also stopped, and the rain from the sky was restrained. The waters continually receded from the earth. After the end of one hundred fifty days the waters decreased. The ship rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on Ararat’s mountains. The waters receded continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were visible.
Genesis 8:1~5 (World English Bible)
1. One Line After One Hundred Fifty Days
Today’s passage begins when the water stood highest. Chapter 7 ends with this line: “The waters flooded the earth one hundred fifty days.” (7:24) One hundred fifty days is about five months. In that time every high mountain went under, and everything on land that breathed died. All that was left was one ship on the water. (The World English Bible quoted here calls the ark “the ship.”)
Through all those days God says nothing to Noah. God’s words to Noah stop at 7:1~4, and the next ones do not come until 8:15. At the end of those silent days, chapter 8 opens like this: “God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship…”
Reading that first line raises a question. If God ‘remembered’ Noah, does that mean God had forgotten him until then?
2. Why ‘Remembered’ Feels Uneasy
Think of when we say we ‘remembered’ something. A friend we have not called in years suddenly comes to mind. A promise we let slip comes back to us too late. In everyday English, ‘remember’ often means just this: something that slipped away comes back to mind.
Read 8:1 with that meaning, and the scene becomes this. For one hundred fifty days Noah had slipped out of God’s mind, and only now did he come back into it. After all those days without a word from God, this reading can even seem likely.
But see how the Bible actually uses ‘God remembered,’ and the picture changes. Genesis has other scenes, besides chapter 8, where God remembers someone. Side by side, they share one thing.
3. Going Deeper · In the Very Verse Where God Remembers
The answer first. ‘God remembered Noah’ does not mean that God had forgotten Noah and then thought of him again. Every time Genesis says God remembered someone, God acts in that same verse, right away. In 8:1, too, God’s remembering leads straight into sending a wind over the earth.
First, a little background. The Old Testament was first written in Hebrew. In the whole Hebrew Bible, the first place the verb ‘remember’ appears is right here, in 8:1. In Genesis there are three places where God remembers someone. In all three the Hebrew is the very same word, not one letter different: vayyizkor (וַיִּזְכֹּר).
The World English Bible says “God remembered” in all three places, so an English reader can see the pattern directly on the page.
Here are the three, one after another.
“God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship; and God made a wind to pass over the earth…” (8:1)
“…God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the middle of the overthrow…” (19:29)
“God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her, and opened her womb.” (30:22)
In all three, right after ‘God remembered’ comes something God did. God remembers Noah and sends a wind. God remembers Abraham and pulls his nephew Lot out of the cities as they fall. God remembers Rachel, who had not been able to have a child, and makes it possible for her to have one (that is what ‘opened her womb’ means). In the Bible, God’s remembering does not stay in the mind. It is God actually moving for the person remembered.
Genesis also records the opposite. In prison, Joseph explained the dream of the king’s servant in charge of the wine (the chief cup bearer). As the man was about to go free, Joseph asked the man to remember him (40:14). But 40:23 says, “Yet the chief cup bearer didn’t remember Joseph, but forgot him.” Two full years passed while he forgot (41:1). The one who forgot was a human being. The Hebrew verb for ‘forget,’ shakach (שָׁכַח), appears in three verses of Genesis (27:45 · 40:23 · 41:30). Not once does it say that God forgot anything.
So 8:1 is not a scene where a forgotten man comes back to mind. It is the scene where God begins to move for Noah and the animals in the ship.
4. Word Study · Vayyizkor · Vayyissakheru · Vattanach
① remembered · vayyizkor(וַיִּזְכֹּר). The basic form is zakhar (זָכַר), meaning ‘to remember, to keep in mind.’ In Genesis this verb appears in nine verses, and in five of them the one who remembers is God. Three of those verses (8:1 · 19:29 · 30:22) tell of times God actually remembered someone. The other two (9:15 · 16) come after the flood, when God makes a promise (a covenant) to people and every living creature. There God says He will remember in the future: “I will remember my covenant…” (9:15).
② were stopped · vayyissakheru(וַיִּסָּכְרוּ). The basic form is sakar (סָכַר), meaning ‘to stop up, to close.’ Here the verb does not say someone ‘closed’ them. It says they ‘were closed.’ In all of Genesis this form appears only once, in 8:2. The World English Bible keeps that sense: the fountains and windows “were also stopped”. The text does not say who stopped them. But the one who began to move in the verse just before is God.
③ rested · vattanach(וַתָּנַח). The basic form is nuach (נוּחַ), meaning ‘to rest, to settle down.’ The World English Bible puts it simply: “The ship rested” (8:4). For one hundred fifty days the ark had only drifted on the water. Now, at the end of what began when God remembered Noah, it settles on the mountains of Ararat and finds a place to rest for the first time.
5. One More Thing · What Was Opened Is Closed
What God did after remembering does not end with one wind. This is clear when 8:2 is read next to 7:11~12, the day the flood began.
“…on the same day all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the sky’s windows opened. It rained on the earth forty days and forty nights.” (7:11~12)
“The deep’s fountains and the sky’s windows were also stopped, and the rain from the sky was restrained.” (8:2)
‘The fountains of the deep’ (ma‘yenot tehom, מַעְיְנֹת תְּהוֹם) are the springs that sent water gushing up from far below the earth. ‘The windows of the sky’ (arubbot hashshamayim, אֲרֻבֹּת הַשָּׁמַיִם) are the openings in the sky that poured down the rain. In Genesis these two appear together in only two verses: 7:11 and 8:2. The same two that burst open when the flood began are now closed in chapter 8.
The numbers match as well. Chapter 7 ends with the waters flooding the earth “one hundred fifty days” (7:24), and 8:3 says, “…After the end of one hundred fifty days the waters decreased.” What happened in the flood is being undone, piece by piece, in reverse.
And the change keeps going. While the waters go down, the ship comes to rest on the mountains of Ararat (8:4). Some months later, the tops of the mountains can be seen again (8:5). God’s remembering does not end in one verse. It carries on through all five verses of today’s passage: the wind, the closed windows, the ship at rest, the mountaintops in view.
6. For Us Today
This passage leaves us with one message. ‘God remembered Noah’ does not mean God had forgotten him and then thought of him again. It means God moved for Noah.
The text does not say what God was thinking during the one hundred fifty days on the water, and there were no words from God. But the text does make clear what God’s remembering is like. It is not a memory that slips away and comes back. It is a remembering that sends a wind over the earth. After that wind, the fountains and windows that had opened in chapter 7 are closed.
Our lives have quiet days too, days with no news at all. The few days spent waiting for test results from the hospital are like that. So are the weeks after sending in an application and waiting for a call, or the days when a family member far away has stopped writing. There are seasons, too, of praying a long time and seeing nothing change. When such days go on, a thought rises in a corner of the heart: ‘Maybe I have been forgotten.’ It can feel as if no one, not even God, thinks of us.
Noah’s place was much like that. While the wind blew and the fountains and windows were closed, Noah was inside the shut ship. He did not open the window he had made in the ship until forty days after the mountaintops could be seen (8:6). Yet long before Noah opened that window, God was already moving.
It is worth noticing, too, that in the text the change did not come all at once. The wind blows, the rain stops, the water slowly goes down, the ship comes to rest on the mountains, and only months later do the mountaintops appear. The earth became fully dry even later than that (8:13~14). What we wait for often does not resolve overnight either. Sometimes it comes first as a small change. It might be a heart a little less heavy than yesterday, an unexpected call from someone checking in, or a person who quietly stays nearby. And there are days when even that cannot be seen yet.
So if today brings no news and the thought ‘I have been forgotten’ comes, that thought does not have to be the final word. Before Noah opened the window, the wind was already blowing. In the Bible, God’s remembering is not forgetting and then recalling. It is moving for the one remembered. It may help to write down one thing you are waiting for. Next to it, you could add one line: ‘Even if I cannot see it yet, the wind may already be blowing.’ May that one line be something to hold on to through today.
“God who remembered Noah, we believe that you do not forget us, even on days when we hear no word from you. When the waiting grows long, keep us from deciding too quickly that we have been forgotten. Let the people around us know, in their own waiting, that they are not alone. Through today, help us remember that your remembering is your hand reaching toward us. Amen.”
🕊 How to Use This in Ministry
Opening question
Ask, “Has someone ever remembered you in a way that made you happy? What did they do?” and listen to the children’s answers (they remembered my birthday, they called my name, and so on). Then say, “Today the Bible tells us that God remembered Noah. Let’s find out what God did,” and move into the passage.
Activity
Divide the board in two: ‘Chapter 7: Opened’ on the left, ‘Chapter 8: Closed’ on the right. Read 7:11~12 from the World English Bible. Let the children come up and write ‘fountains of the great deep,’ ‘the sky’s windows,’ and ‘rained’ on the left. Then read 8:1~2. Have them find ‘the deep’s fountains,’ ‘the sky’s windows,’ and ‘rain’ and write them on the right. Point out that the wording differs slightly, but it names the same things. Draw lines joining each pair on the left and right. Then ask, “Before the fountains and windows were closed, what did God do first?” If they answer ‘wind,’ tell them they are right. Then find ‘God remembered Noah’ even earlier in verse 1, and write it at the top of the right side. Finally, show the image captioned ‘The rain from the sky was restrained’ from today’s images. Say, “When God remembered Noah, the sky’s windows were closed and the rain stopped.”
Application
Give each child a small card. On the front they write the name of one person to remember this week. On the back they write one thing they can do for that person (ask how they are, draw them a picture, pray for them). When they finish, say together, “God remembers me and moves for me,” and have each child put the card in their bag to take home.
🖼️ Today’s Four Images · Press and hold or right click to save
God made a wind to pass over the earth |
The rain from the sky was restrained |
God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock |
The tops of the mountains were visible |
📄 Image license CC0 (public domain) · Free to use, modify, and redistribute without attribution.
🤖 These images were created with AI (ChatGPT).
📖 Genesis Deeper ㉘ Yahweh Shut Him In · the day the fountains of the great deep burst open and the sky’s windows opened
Origin Bible · Mission Zedero
Contact joypej@gmail.com
✍️ This article was written with the help of AI and reviewed by a person.
The text is CC BY-NC 4.0. You are free to use it for noncommercial purposes with attribution.
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