The rain from the flood lasted 40 days. Then it was another 150 days until the waters receded. After 224 days from when the flood started the mountain tops appeared. At 264 days, Noah sent out a raven from the ark, which flew around until the waters dried from the Earth. On days 271 and 278 Noah sent out a dove. The raven represents our old nature, where we feed on what we can find, including death and garbage. The dove represents the new nature which cannot find sustenance in death and carnage but only finds rest in the resurrected ground (Believers Commentary). After this point, they removed the roof from the ark and noted the ground was dry. At 371 days from when the flood began, the Earth was dry, and Noah was commanded to take his family and all that that were with them to leave the ark. Noah and his family had been in the ark with all the animals that remined for just over a year!

In Genesis 8:17 God commands Noah saying “Bring out all the living creatures that are with you—birds, livestock, and everything that crawls upon the ground—so that they can spread out over the earth and be fruitful and multiply upon it.” Compare this to Genesis 1:28 when man was first blessed by God saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.” Animals were to be fruitful and multiply on the Earth, but the blessing on man still applied as well. We are to subdue and rule over all of creation – take care of it as God’s stewards representing Him. But that is so incredibly difficult with our sinful nature. Isiah states “We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.” (Isiah 64:6) It is only through faith that we are able to care for creation and truly do what is good. “Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm 37:3-4.

After leaving the ark, Noah makes and altar and sacrifices one of every clean animal and bird to the Lord (Genesis 9). Again, God commands Noah and his family to be fruitful and multiply (verse1). But there is now a change. Fear of man will be in every animal of creation (verse 2). It makes me wonder what life was like before this point where the fear of man was not on nature and animals trusted us. It appears that eating animals for food before this point was not considered as God commanded that all animals and plants would be food for man, but we could not take the lifeblood (verses 3-4). But because man was made in the image of God, the life of any animal that killed a man would be required (verses 5-6).

God also made a covenant with all creation that He would never again destroy all the Earth through a flood (Genesis 9:11-17). The sign of the covenant was the rainbow.

This should have been a remarkable sign leading to ongoing righteousness. But then we get the story Noah getting drunk, and Ham, faith of Canaan, seeing Noah drunk and naked and telling his brothers (Genesis 9: 22). Both Noah and Ham had sinned in this. Noah by getting drunk, and Ham by telling of Noah’s shame and not covering it like his brothers. This led to Noah cursing Canaan saying that the descendants of Caanan would be servants to the descendants of Shem and Japheth. Why Canaan instead of Ham. One explanation is that the sin of Ham had been more pronounced in Canaan, and a prophecy about how extreme the immoral conduct would also become in the land of Canaan (Believers Commentary). So, the curse was not on the sin of Ham but on the sin of Canaan himself. We see this curse come to fruition in Joshua 9;23 which states, “Now therefore you are under a curse and will perpetually serve as woodcutters and water carriers for the house of my God.” and Judges 1:28 which says “When Israel became stronger, they pressed the Canaanites into forced labor, but they never drove them out completely.”

Psalm 12 reminds us that only though God are any of us faithful. We go around boasting of our righteousness and uttering lies. It is the Lord who rescues and refines us. And in Him we will be our protection from the evil around us, even as the wicked are exalted among us.