Noah Serves a Provincial Sentence - Patience as Faithful Waiting

By calculations I recently heard from a sermon at church, Noah spent about 378 days on the ark. In Canada Corrections terms, any sentence two years or greater is a federal sentence to be served in a federal prison, but anything less than two years can be served in a provincial prison. No matter the place or amount of time, I have been told by many guys that the experience is a lonely soul-searching time.

I love how the sacred texts of the past remain alive. I, like millions of others, have experienced them as new and lifegiving, even in our context today. Recently one example of that for me was hearing the story of Noah’s Ark, from Genesis 7:24-8:22, preached by chaplain Tim Wood. It brought new meaning for me because of another story I had heard, the night before in a different setting, that had interesting parallels. I saw an example of contextualization that brings the justice and hope of the liberating God alive for us and our situations. 

"It’s not hard to imagine them wondering how long they should hang on to hope in this God who seems so absent.” 

Most will know the story of Noah. Chaplain Tim talked about the context of the original writing of the Noah story and how it would have been to an Israelite audience experiencing the Babylonian exile. “Expelled from a beautiful homeland, to a place to live as strangers in a foreign environment…” sounds grim.  The other story was shared by a guy in our prison reintegration group who had recently come out of jail. His was a story that I will generalize for anonymity, but is one I have heard repeated with only small detail changes.

Tim remarked… “Days and months and years would pass... and you can imagine them beginning to wonder not only, when would this end, but where is God in this!? Are we not God’s people? And, as they sat in Babylon, it’s not hard to imagine them wondering how long they should hang on to hope in this God who seems so absent.” 

Can you picture that same phrase just as easily reading, ‘Days and months and years would pass...and you can imagine them beginning to wonder not only, when would this end, but where is God in this!? Are we [prisoners] not God’s people [too]? And, as they sat in [prison], it’s not hard to imagine them wondering how long they should hang on to hope in this God who seems so absent.’

Putting in the work to someday reenter a world that has changed extensively, can be really daunting and really hard.

A 2022 interpretation of Noah sitting on an ark; for folks serving time, could just as easily be the story of their world falling apart, facing the pre-storm uncertainty of sentencing and experiencing total destruction. The story I heard that Saturday night included landing in jail, 2 years in solitary, not knowing when parole was possible, but waiting for the so called ‘flood waters’ to subside. 

Chaplain Tim then asked… “What is the middle part where God remembers Noah? The Noah story is one big chiastic structure. ...with the center, the most important point being - that God remembered Noah. You may see the things promised to you only from a distance. But through Jesus, God has remembered you.” 

For people in prison, with unknown future outcomes, putting in the work to someday reenter a world that has changed extensively, can be really daunting and really hard. But many of them, like Noah, find themselves in the middle of the story, remembered by God. They speak to a chaplain, a loved one or a trusted volunteer and repeat the words of the Psalmist: “I waited patiently for the Lord; and he turned to me and heard my cry.” 

Later in his message we heard this refrain from Tim. “Maybe you or your family are currently in a place of waiting or struggling, wondering when God will show his face... Noah was a hero of the faith to the Israelites because of his patience, his long and steady hope and trust in a God who seemed slow and maybe even absent. His patience with God eventually allows for a new beginning. I think it is important to mention that waiting and patience do not necessarily mean a call to endure with inaction.”

We are not called to patiently wait, inactively in every instance.

For people in prison, ‘it would be harmful advice to tell them to simply wait, as if they were on a rudderless ark, for God to act.’ They are encouraged to take programming, courses, and put in the work to not just serve time, but to do the things that are restorative and transformative. They may experience a higher power, the Great Mystery, programming might flip a switch, but they too are remembered by God and have a chance at new life. Even if we are called to wait patiently for God to do what only God can do, we are not called to patiently wait, inactively in every instance. Maybe, like Noah, we can listen for the direction of God and ask what we can do or what metaphorical ark we can build to be ready for the storm? 

So, if Noah is a hero of faith because of his faithful waiting, we can learn from him. Can we also learn that from our brothers and sisters coming out of prison and the stories of their faithful waiting? I am not saying all people who serve time find God or are automatically heroes of faith but if we have hearts and ears willing to listen, there are testimonies of how God remembered them, called out to them and was there to go through the tremendous ‘flood waters’ with them.

Photo provided by the author of flooding in his area.