* DISCLAIMER: After taking a look around the site, I hope by now my approach to understanding these stories is clear. These articles are not sermons passing along God’s instructions for us. Rather, my intent is to illuminate the problems man has been facing time immemorial due to the inherent flaws in our nature, and provide the lessons we can take away from the failures and successes of those that have come before us. A “secular sermon” if you will. My deductions are by no means “the way” or the only interpretation of meaning. I simply hope through my sharing of them you are able to see patterns between them and the lessons you have learned in your own life.
My approach to reading Genesis was to be present and follow along intently! I simply read each chapter and reflected on what the character (sometimes that character is God) did or failed to do which brought about either success or failure. Then, if a moral could be pulled from the story (not every story provided something I felt was significant enough to share), I would jot down the verse, my takeaway, and then a recommendation for application in our lives today. I highly recommend this format of note taking, it can be very helpful when preparing recommendations based on conclusions from your analysis of data at work:
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What: raw data |
So what: deduction/conclusion |
Now what: way ahead, how to correct for success |
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The Story of Noah and the Great Flood: God bears witness to all the horrible things humanity is capable of. He decides he needs to cleanse the earth and start anew, he will do this with a great flood. God commissions his one faithful and “blameless” follower Noah to round up one mating pair of all the animals in the world and build a great boat in order to protect them from the flood. After the flood has killed all living creatures on earth, God drains the earth to be repopulated by Noah and his descendants.
Major Theme: You may not always be in control of the events in your life, but by using “the platinum rule” you can certainly influence them and by being adaptable and prudent you can definitely capitalize on them.
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What: Verse/quotation |
So what: Moral of the story |
Now what: Application/technique |
| 6:13 “So God said to Noah ‘I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. Yes, I will wipe them all from the face of the earth!'” | Its a fact of life that someday we will be confronted with a challenge we are not prepared for or be held responsible for a situation we had no part in creating. So how do we survive these confusing and painful times? Even better, how do we take these metaphorical lemons and make lemonade? The answer: adaptability. | There’s certainly no adapting to a world-ending flood of “biblical proportions”, but thankfully the problems most of us face every day are a little less severe. Adapting is also not merely a technique for overcoming unpleasant events either. Adaptability is our ability to respond to unforeseen or uncontrollable situations. Key to adaptability are our cognitive and emotional flexibility. We can remain flexible by practicing acceptance and defusion (yes, not diffusion. It means to separate from a thought or emotion). These are “openness” practices, with a different approach. One may work better for you than the other based off your inclination towards change. Acceptance is your deliberate choice to engage with your new situation. Taking the bull by the horns instead of closing your eyes and bracing for impact. By keeping your eyes open, you’re able to take in new information and more strategically navigate your new environment. Defusion is the act of identifying your inner panic alarm, the negative monologue in your head that isn’t doing anything helpful and hitting the snooze button. By not ruminating on the negative thoughts, you’re free once more to navigate your environment effectively. Focusing your attention to be able to use these is hard. Fortunately, this is exactly what meditation trains us to do! Recharge your batteries and become more adaptable all-in-one painless step. Meditate! |
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What: Verse/quotation |
So what: Moral of the story |
Now what: Application/technique |
| 6:17-18 “Look! I am about to cover the earth with a flood that will destroy every living thing. Everything on earth will die! But I solemnly swear to keep you safe in the boat, with your wife and your sons and their wives.” | It certainly pays to have friends in high places! (Get it… high places..) Alright, aside from the genocide and cosmic overlord thing I think we can all relate to the idea that to win the favor of a person in a position of influence can be very beneficial. Whether it be keeping your job when the company is downsizing, or getting selected for promotion, a recommendation on your behalf from someone of power can make a world of difference. Noah “consistently followed God’s will and enjoyed a close relationship with him.” (6:9) By doing his job well and humanizing himself by developing a relationship with his employer, Noah was able to secure his future. | Apart from exceptional performance, one way to positively influence your boss’ view of you is to abide by “the Platinum Rule“. Whereas the “golden rule” is treating others the way you would like to be treated, the Platinum Rule states you should treat others the way they want you to treat them. This simple rule can put you leagues ahead of your peers. To anyone who has ever proclaimed they wouldn’t make it to the top because they don’t know how to politic, here is your answer. This communication technique appeals to the message receiver’s “self-schema” or how they view themselves. In an interaction in which a power distance exists, the self-schema sets our expectations of how we should be treated based on our accomplishments and position. When you reaffirm someone’s sense of self, it shows them that you perceive the world the same way they do. And when people understand the way you think, and it also happens to be like theirs, they’re more likely to trust you and like you. Think of the phrase: “me, you, same same.” |
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What: Verse/quotation |
So what: Moral of the story |
Now what: Application/technique |
| 8:10-12 “Seven days later, Noah released the dove again. This time, toward the evening, the bird returned to him with a fresh olive leaf in its beak. Noah now knew that the water was almost gone. A week later, he released the dove again, and this time it did not come back.” | From this we learn the virtue of prudence. Prudence means acting with or showing care and thought for the future. By literally testing the waters, Noah was ensuring that he would not prematurely release all the living creatures entrusted to his care into a world that was not yet suitable and safe. He continuously monitored his environment and waited until the right time to act. This can also be defined as taking deliberate action. a deliberate action is one that is done consciously and intentionally. It is calculated and well planned. When we approach our lives deliberately, with clear vision and purpose, we increase the likelihood we will successfully arrive at our desired destination. | Prudence comes in many forms. You can apply the virtue of prudence to any resource you control. You can be prudent with your trust, your use of time, your words, and your actions. But how do we allow ourselves to approach every moment with concern for how it will shape our future? We can use a technique called LTPR, or listen, think, pause, and respond. Though the word choice applies directly to verbal interaction, we can apply this technique to an internal monologue, i.e. decision making, as well. When we are presented with a choice, we must first gather as clear and thorough an understanding of our situation as possible (listen). Send out your metaphorical doves, ask questions, identify your constraints and limitations, receive clarification. (side note: constraints = an imposed prohibition; limitation = organic shortcoming) Now that our environment has a defined framework, we need to generate options, potential solutions to our problem (think). We generate options by weighing our available resources against our constraints and limitations. This defines our realm of possibility. We then need to compare the consequences and advantages of each option against the others to make a decision. Once the dove returned with the olive leaf, Noah could’ve decided he had waited long enough and released the animals. But being that he only had one set of mating pairs per species it was better to be safe than sorry on this one. Pausing allows us time to visualize the detail of our decision and refine it before bringing it to life through action or word (respond). Imagine once Noah had decided to disembark from the ship, he organized a controlled release of the animals in order of size and predatory status ensuring that the smaller creatures weren’t trampled and the predators weren’t hot on the heels of the prey. |
The Story of the Tower of Babel: Sometime after Noah and his descendants have repopulated the earth, we see the effectiveness of a like-minded and consistent culture. The people of Babylonia are able to accomplish great feats by unifying their efforts. One such feat is the construction of the Tower of Babel. This was to be a monument to their civilizations greatness, a display of their intelligence and ability reaching all the way to the heavens. This concerns God “if they can accomplish this when they have just begun to take advantage of their common language and political unity, just think of what they will do later.” (11:6) In order to prevent the exponential progress of man, God scatters man across the globe and confuses their minds by changing their languages.
Major Theme: The Tower of Babel story highlights the power of communication. If you find that people aren’t able to carry out your instructions or if you feel that your teammates aren’t on the same level as you, take a look at your communication style. Are you speaking clearly and directly using terminology that your message receiver understands? Are you communicating concisely and being conscious of their ever-diminishing attention span? We learn here that the human team is a supremely capable lot, and the employment of this group capability hinges on communication. Another note for the post-dispersion world: when humans bring their diverse experiences and ideas together in a team with unity of effort, we can achieve unimaginable things. They are unimaginable because they pull from so many different experiences and connect cross-disciplinary expertise. We overcome the limitations of the old adage “you don’t know what you don’t know” when we join forces with those who do know what we don’t know. For more on the topic of effective communication, check out Joseph McCormack’s book [brief]: make a bigger impact by saying less. Link to his podcast (very quick listens, go figure…) here.
I hope you enjoyed the famous first few stories in the Book of Genesis. In the next article we’ll take a look at the life of Abraham, one of God’s most blameless, blessed, and famous servants. Until then
– SKEPTIC-ish
2 thoughts on “The Story of Noah and the Great Flood; the Tower of Babel”
The Platinum Rule should be extended to everyone you interact with, but we must be careful about mis-applying it. When you apply it as a leader it looks a lot like Servant Leadership. Not to be lost here in this world where everyone is considered to have equal importance, is that not everyone’s responsibilities are equal. I had a Squadron Commander who worked for me and one day he was out flying and his young wingman’s aircraft experienced a problem. They had to land at another airfield a few hours from ours. The maintenance crew would not be able to get there until the next day so the pilot would have to stay out overnight with the airplane while the other would fly home immediately. The Squadron Commander called me and told me he was going to stay with the jet and send the wingman home. When I asked why he told me he was practicing Servant Leadership and putting his men first. I told him that was very noble of him, but that as a Squadron Commander he had a Squadron to run with activities that affected my entire Group (over 1100 people, 42 aircraft and numerous other resources). The Lt’s only responsibility was to learn. So while they both may have been equal in importance as humans, the difference in responsibilities made their value within the organization different. Letting your people eat lunch ahead of you is not the same as putting the individual’s needs and desires ahead of the group’s.
Excellent point. When applying the platinum rule universally you may also lose a sense of yourself. Always casting aside your own judgement of how to treat and regard someone for your interpretation of how you fit into their power dynamic. A leader applying it to each of his/her subordinates may quickly find himself wiped out from fulfilling the expectation of exceptional leadership. Also of note here is, without an explicit definition of your relationship, you’re merely treating someone the way you think they want you to treat them! So much to unpack here when it comes to human dynamics. The best explanation I’ve heard of it is: human dynamics are just that. Human, and dynamic.
So my advice would be this: the platinum rule may be useful when you are the subordinate, or when you are deliberately trying to gain a position of influence within the relationship