#10. Period One.--Adam to Noah.# Here comes the story of the creation of man. Innocent he was at the first, but in the trial to which he is brought, man fails, and disobeys. As sinner, he now hides from the face of God, and has to be sought out by his heavenly Father. Sin created a barrier between God the Holy One and man the sinner. Then it is that God begins his work of redemption, and in Genesis 3:15 we see the first promise of that redemption that is to be fulfilled in Jesus in later days. In this period we see the first sacrifice, and in it, too, we come across the full fruitage of hatred, which culminated in murder. Man proves to be a sad failure, and the record is that God looks down from heaven to see how man is acting. "And Jehovah saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually" (Gen. 6:5). From that day to this, man when left to himself reproduces this picture, as may be seen in those lands where there is no light of the gospel of the grace of God. #The chief characters# of this period are Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Enoch, who "walked with God: and he was not; for God took him," Noah and his three sons--Shem, Ham, and Japheth. #11. Period Two.#--This lasts from #Noah to Abraham#. God blots out the human race as it then existed and begins it anew. So far, all that we know of the human race lived in the Euphrates valley, and all modern research confirms the Bible statement with regard to this. It need not be maintained that the flood was universal, in the sense that it covered the whole world, as we now know it. All that is needful to believe is that the "known world" was subject to a devastating flood that caused the human race to perish, with the exception of Noah and his family. Warned by God Noah builds the ark, and embarks in it. The rains descend and the fountains of the great deep are broken up, and the land is submerged. In due time, the rains cease, and the floods dry up, and Noah sends out first a raven, which returns not. Then he sends out a dove, which comes back to the ark, not finding any resting-place. In seven days he sends out another dove, which returns bringing an olive-leaf in her mouth. The third time he sends forth a dove, which returns not. Then in due time Noah goes forth from the ark, which had rested on Mount Ararat in Armenia. #12.# Now follows the beautiful story of the sacrifice that Noah offers, and the promise of God never again to send a deluge on the earth. This promise is confirmed by the symbol of the rainbow. Of course there had been rainbows before this, but this time God takes the rainbow and makes it a symbol of his mercy to sinful man.