And God spoke to Noah, saying,
The waters have gone down and the earth is dry, yet Noah is still inside the ark. He waits, and this verse is the moment God's word comes to him.
Noah could see for himself that the ground was dry. Yet seeing was not the same as going.
His faith had faced no small test, but the prospect was comforting even from the first. "The face of the ground" was dry when he looked. Almost two months later "the earth had dried out." This stirred and comforted him, and rightly so. Yet he still waited for God's word before going out, just as he went in at His word. He will not rush ahead with the rashness of nature and its self-confidence. He depends on God and obeys His word. And the word came in due time, as it always does to those who look up to Him.
The ark had two openings, and only one of them was his.
The ark had a window in it. The door was in the Lord's keeping, but the window was for Noah's use. The One who had shut him in was the only one who could let him out. The times and the seasons were in His hand. No one can shorten the time of his journey as a prisoner of hope. But the hopes of such a prisoner may be richly fed, and his spirit stirred within him.
Three commands frame Noah's story, and all three come from the same God. What he does after the last one shows where his faith rested.
"Then God said to Noah, 'Go out from the ark.'" The same God who had said, "Make yourself an ark," and "Go into the ark," now says, "Go out from the ark." "So Noah went out … and built an altar to the LORD." ALL is simple obedience. There is the obedience of faith and the worship of faith: both go together… Superstition would have worshipped the ark, since the ark was the means of salvation. The heart always tends to let what God appoints take God's place… But Noah's faith passed beyond the ark to the God of the ark. So when he stepped out, he did not look back at it with longing, and he did not treat it as an object of worship. He built an altar to the LORD and worshipped Him — and the ark is never heard of again.
The command reaches everyone aboard, not Noah alone.
Not one thing had gone into the ark thirteen months before which did not now come out. The small and the great had been in it, and the small were as safe as the great. The creeping thing from the ditch or the hedge was as free from danger and harm as Noah himself. Precious mystery! We may be little, and we are little, as the heart knows full well. But heaven, or the coming system of glory, has fitted itself, like the ark, to receive the small as well as the great.
Commentators see more here than one man's release. It pictures how God brings people through a coming trial instead of lifting them out of it.
Now comes the faithful word of God to His waiting and watching servant: how welcome to the prisoner of hope! It is the type of those kept safe through the great hour of temptation that will come on the whole inhabited world to test those who dwell on the earth… Christ's coming to receive His own to Himself for the Father's house on high follows a different pattern. It is not the pattern of Noah passing through the scene of judgment, but of Enoch taken up to heaven before the time of trouble came, as we may see in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17.
Waiting inside a finished ark on a drying earth was a test of its own. The two birds Noah sent out show how a heart handles delay.
No doubt Noah became impatient to leave the ark once it had done its work. Nothing exposes our impatience or self-will so much as this… God stands vindicated, His truth has its witness, Noah and his house are saved — and now he wants to leave before it is God's will. It is harder to stay in the place of blessing than even to reach it… The freed raven, going back and forth, is a fitting picture of our restless, impatient spirits. The dove teaches Noah a different lesson… The dove tells him first that he must have patience.
- Word. The new world begins with God speaking. Noah moves at a word, not at the view from his window.
- Wait. He went out as he came in, at God's word. He could open the window, but only the Lord could open the door.
- Walk. Obedience and worship travel together. Noah leaves the ark and builds an altar, and the ark is never mentioned again — his faith rested on the God of the ark.
- Whole. Every creature that entered came out. The smallest was as safe as Noah himself, and the coming glory has room for small and great alike.
- Watch. The hardest test came after the rescue. The raven pictures our restlessness. The dove teaches patience. It is harder to stay in the place of blessing than to reach it.
Go out of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee.
The flood is over and the ground is dry, yet Noah does not move until God speaks. Why does a man already free to step out wait to be told? And what world is he stepping into?
Noah had already looked out and seen dry ground. He still did not move, and one writer reads that restraint as the mark of a tried faith.
His faith had been tried more than a little, but the prospect was comforting even from the first. "The face of the ground" was dry when he looked. Nearly two months later, "the earth was dry." This rightly moved and comforted him. Even so, he still waited on God's word to go out, as he went in at His word. He will not rush ahead with the impulsiveness of nature and its self-confidence. He depends on God and obeys His word. The word came in due time, as it always does to those who look up to Him.
Three commands shape Noah's whole story, and all three come from the same God.
"And God spoke to Noah, saying, go out from the ark." The same God who had said, "make yourself an ark," and "come into the ark," now says, "go out from the ark." "And Noah went out … and built an altar to the Lord." ALL is simple obedience. There is the obedience of faith and the worship of faith: both go together. Superstition would have worshipped the ark, since it was the means of salvation. The heart always tends to let the things God appoints take God's place. But Noah's faith went past the ark to the God of the ark. So when he stepped out, instead of looking back at the ark, he built an altar to the Lord and worshipped Him — and the ark is never heard of again.
The command sends Noah back to soil he had walked before the flood, but it is no longer the same soil.
He landed on the renewed earth. At that mysterious moment, all was in a great sense according to God's mind again. It was no longer corrupt, as it had been when he last walked on it in its old condition, but clean, refined by the judgment.
One writer moves from the ark's passengers to what heaven itself is made to hold.
Not one thing had gone into the ark thirteen months before that did not now come out. The small and the great had been in it, and the small were as safe as the great. The creeping thing of the ditch or the hedge was as free from all danger or harm as Noah himself. Precious mystery! We may be little, and we are little, as the heart knows full well. But heaven, or the coming system of glory, has fitted itself like the ark, to receive the small as well as the great.
Noah is not called out alone. God names his wife, his sons and their wives with him, and one writer draws a wide principle from that.
Some will say that Noah was a picture of Christ — the righteous head of a saved family, saved because of their connection with him. I grant all this. But Noah's role as a picture does not in any way interfere with the principle I am drawing from this and similar passages. I will state that principle plainly here at the start: the house of every servant of God is brought into a place of privilege, and of responsibility that follows, because of its connection with him.
Commentators also read this call out of the ark as a picture of a later rescue.
Now comes the faithful word of God to His waiting and watching servant. How welcome to the prisoner of hope! It is the picture of those kept safe through the great hour of temptation. That hour will come upon the whole inhabited world to test those who dwell on the earth.
Another writer pairs Noah with Enoch, and the two picture different groups.
Enoch is a figure of those caught up, Noah of the remnant of the Jews who go through the tribulation. In Noah the world is comforted — the figure of the millennium.
- Word in. Noah entered the ark because God spoke; the same voice, not the drying ground, moves him out.
- Word waited for. He could see the earth was dry, and still would not act on his own confidence. Faith that will not run ahead gets the word "in due time."
- Word obeyed. He goes out and builds an altar at once — worship for the God of the ark, not for the ark itself.
- Word wide enough. Everything that went in comes out again. The smallest creeping thing was as safe as Noah himself.
- Word ahead of us. Commentators read the call out of the ark as a picture of people kept safe through coming judgment. Enoch stands for another group — those caught up.
Bring forth with thee every animal which is with thee, of all flesh, fowl as well as cattle, and all the creeping things which creep on the earth, that they may swarm on the earth, and may be fruitful and multiply on the earth.
The flood is over, and God sends out every creature that came through it with Noah. Two things stand out: Noah will not move until God speaks, and the animals are named one by one and told to fill the earth again.
Noah could see for himself that the ground was dry, yet he did not move until God spoke.
His faith had been tried more than a little, but the prospect was comforting even from the first. "The face of the ground" was dry when he looked. Nearly two months later, "the earth was dry." He was rightly moved and comforted by this. Even so, he still waited on God's word to go out, just as he went in at His word. He will not rush ahead in the impulsiveness of nature and its self-confidence. He depends on God and obeys His word. And God gave the word in due time, as He always does to those who look up to Him.
The ark kept every creature alive; this verse sends them out to spread over the earth.
Meanwhile it never was the mind of God that there should be life only, but liberty. Life out of death ushers into liberty. Christ not only gives life and shelters, but does this as a preparation for the freedom of grace. With freedom He set us free. The law had long tested human nature, and its mind proved hostile to God. But now there is life, after death and judgment have done their worst to Him who is risen out of both. So there is liberty as well for those born again.
They step out onto an earth that is not the one they left.
Noah went out. He landed on the renewed earth. At that mysterious moment all was, in a great sense, according to God's mind again. It was no longer corrupt, as when he had last walked on it in its old condition, but clean, under the refining of the judgment.
God names birds, animals and creeping things one by one, and tells them to multiply. Their future is tied to man's.
Jehovah deals with the creatures set under the headship of Adam. How blessed to know, on authority beyond doubt, that "the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God"! It will "be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God." As man's sin dragged it down with himself into ruin, so shall the Second Man raise it out of its degradation and misery.
The same writer applies this directly to the day when Christ reigns openly: "the merely animal creation is to rejoice; and indeed all that is now travailing and groaning through the fall of its head."
The old world went under the water, and Noah steps out onto a new one.
In Noah, we have a plain figure of resurrection, the whole world passing away in the judgment of the flood, and a new world emerging from the baptismal waters. The apostle Peter teaches us to see in this a type of salvation (1 Peter 3:20-21). And to the man in Christ, risen with Him, the old has passed away and all things have become new. The figure is very plain here, although many a detail may be hidden from us.
Others read it forward as well as inward. Noah brought safely through the judgment is taken as "the type of those preserved through the great hour of temptation which shall come upon all the habitable world," while those taken to heaven before the trouble begins are pictured instead by Enoch.
- Word. Noah went in at God's word, and he would not come out without it. Dry ground was not permission; the command was.
- Life. The ark kept every creature alive, but life alone was never the aim — "it never was the mind of God that there should be life only, but liberty."
- Ground. They step out onto an earth refined by the judgment that passed over it — "no longer corrupt... but clean."
- Creation. God names the animals and tells them to multiply. They fell with man, their head, and the Second Man will lift them out of ruin. Creation is still waiting for the sons of God to be revealed.
- Picture. The whole scene is a figure of resurrection: the old world gone in judgment, a new world out of the water. Peter takes it up as a type of salvation.
And Noah went out, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him.
A year had passed since the door closed. The ground was dry, but Noah did not move until God spoke — and when he stepped out, everything that went in came out with him.
The ground had been dry for weeks. Noah had pulled back the ark's covering and seen it. What kept him inside was not the weather but his habit of taking direction from God.
"The face of the ground" was dry when he looked, and after nearly two more months "the earth had dried out." Though this rightly stirred and comforted him, he still waited on God's word to go out, just as he went in at His word. He will not rush ahead in the impulsiveness of nature and its self-confidence. He depends on God and obeys His word. And the word came in due time, as it always does to those who look up to Him.
That wait was harder than it looks. The real test came not while the flood raged, but after the ark had done its work.
After years of discipline and toil, Noah is in the ark. Very often the quality we are most known for, and from which we have gained most, deserts us, and we suffer much. Noah, no doubt, became impatient to leave the ark once it had done its work... God had been vindicated, His truth witnessed to, Noah and his house saved; and now he wants to leave before it is God's will. It is harder to stay in the place of blessing than even to reach it.
The earth Noah walks onto is not the earth he left.
The flood swept away the ungodly. It brought judgment and death on the world. The ark was carried up above the waters and finally rested on the cleansed earth. It taught the lesson of life for the people of God after judgment and death had been passed through. The new earth emerged from the waters of death. Noah and his family set their feet on the dry land as those saved through those waters, as risen from the dead.
Count the names here against the list of those who went in. Nothing was lost.
Not one thing had gone into the ark thirteen months before that did not now come out. The small and the great had been in it, and the small were as safe as the great. The creeping thing from the ditch or the hedge was as free from all danger or harm as Noah himself. Precious mystery! We may be little, and we are little, as the heart knows well. But heaven — the coming system of glory — has fitted itself, like the ark, to receive the small as well as the great.
The verse names four men and four women. God had invited one man.
The ground on which the Lord commands Noah to enter the ark with his household is, "for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation." Someone might object that probably all the household were righteous before God too, but the later history of one of them — Ham (Genesis 9:22-25) — forbids that thought. The force of the statement cannot be weakened in any way: the family of Noah was delivered from the judgment of the flood because of the faith of its head. True, it was not salvation; but it was so in figure (1 Peter 3:20-21). And it was no small blessing to be carried in the ark through that mighty flood.
Noah steps out and builds an altar. He does not cling to the ark that saved him.
The same God who had said, "Make yourself an ark," and "Go into the ark," now says, "Go out from the ark." "So Noah went out... and built an altar to the LORD." It is all simple obedience. There is the obedience of faith and the worship of faith: both go together... Superstition would have worshipped the ark, since it was the means of salvation. The heart always tends to put God's ordinances in God's place... But Noah's faith passed beyond the ark to the God of the ark. So when he stepped out, he did not look back at it or treat it as an object of worship. He built an altar to the LORD and worshipped Him. And the ark is never heard of again.
- In by the word. Noah entered the ark because God said so, and his household came in with him on the strength of one man's faith.
- Kept by the word. The waters that destroyed everything outside carried everything inside. The smallest creature was as safe as Noah himself.
- Out by the word. Dry ground was in plain sight. He still waited for God to speak, refusing the self-confidence that moves a day too soon.
- Out onto new ground. The eight step onto an earth that judgment has cleared, as people brought through death to the other side.
- Out into worship. The first act on the new earth is an altar, not a monument. Faith goes past the ark to the God of the ark, and the ark is never mentioned again.
All the animals, all the creeping things, and all the fowl -- everything that moves on the earth, after their kinds, went out of the ark.
The flood is over and the ark empties. Every creature that had been shut inside walks out onto a washed, empty earth, grouped by families. Why does the record name each class of creature? And why do they leave only when God says so?
Noah did not decide the moment. He had gone in when God told him, and he stayed until God told him to leave.
His faith had been tested more than a little, but the prospect was comforting from the first. "The face of the ground was dry" when he looked. Nearly two months later "the earth had dried out." Yet even though his heart was rightly stirred and comforted, he still waited for God's word before going out, just as he went in at His word. He will not rush ahead in the rashness of human nature and its self-confidence. He depends on God and obeys His word. And the word came at the right time, as it always does to those who look up to Him.
That waiting cost him something. Once the ark had done its work, staying inside became the harder test.
Noah, no doubt, became impatient to leave the ark once it had served its purpose. Nothing exposes our impatience or self-will so much as this. God has been vindicated. His truth has had its witness. Noah and his house are saved. And now he wants to leave before it is God's will. It is harder to stay in the place of blessing than to reach it.
The list leaves nothing out. It names creeping things beside beasts and birds, and the same number that went in comes out.
Not one thing had gone into the ark thirteen months before which did not now come out. The small and the great had been in it, and the small were as safe as the great. The creeping thing from the ditch or the hedge was as free from danger or harm as Noah himself. Precious mystery! We may be little, and we are little, as the heart knows full well. But heaven, the coming world of glory, has fitted itself like the ark to receive the small as well as the great.
The verse sorts the creatures into groups. The word translated "beast" carries a precise range of meaning.
The ordinary use of this word distinguishes all animals from man, and marks off four-footed animals from birds and creeping things, Gen. 8:19. The word is also used symbolically: for the ignorance of man and his acting as a creature without reason or conscience before God, and for great worldly powers, such as the four great kingdoms in Daniel 7.
They leave under orders, and the going out starts the repopulating of the world.
Nothing is said about anyone being anxious to leave the ark. Had they become so used to living there that they were hesitant to leave? God gave them orders to go out, however, including all the people and all the animals of every kind. Whether at first they returned there for shelter at night we are not told. The animals, sent back into their natural surroundings, would then breed and multiply.
Man's fall dragged the animals down with him. That link explains why they belong in the story at all.
Man, by his sin, has not only brought ruin on himself but has spoiled his home and dragged down all the creatures that depend on him. Thorns and thistles are marks of man's sin, and much more the groans of the animal creation (Gen. 3:18). Man, unlike angels, was made by God the centre of a system of things. The whole of this lower creation either suffers or rejoices with its head.
Survival was never the whole point. God's purpose reaches past shelter to freedom.
Meanwhile it never was the mind of God that there should be life only, but liberty. Life out of death brings us into liberty. Christ not only gives life and shelter; He does it to prepare us for the freedom of grace.
- Command — Noah went out as he went in: at God's word, refusing to move on his own judgment even when the ground looked dry.
- Composure — the harder discipline was staying put. It is harder to remain in the place of blessing than to reach it.
- Completeness — every creature that entered came out, the creeping thing as safe as Noah himself.
- Classes — they go out by families: beasts, birds and creeping things, each kind sent to fill the earth again.
- Consequence — creation suffers or rejoices with man, its head. So man's rescue is creation's rescue, and life through death opens into liberty.
And Noah built an altar to Jehovah; and took of every clean animal, and of all clean fowl, and offered up burnt-offerings on the altar.
Noah steps out of the ark onto an earth just emptied by judgment. The first thing he does is not build a shelter but raise an altar. That choice raises three questions: why sacrifice at a fresh start, why only clean animals, and what did God see in the rising smoke?
Until this verse the Bible records offerings but never an altar.
The word "altar" is mentioned here for the first time in the Bible. The altar is for worship. Here then worship is for the first time revealed. We worship, having passed from the old into the new, standing on the ground of resurrection. We know that death and judgment are past, and therefore we worship in spirit and in truth. Christ is our altar, and the sacrifices Noah brought are a picture of Christ too. Only the person who knows Christ and the perfect work He has done is a true worshipper.
The ark had just carried Noah through judgment. He might have treasured it. Instead it vanishes from the story here.
Everything is simple obedience. There is the obedience of faith and the worship of faith: both go together. The altar is set up where, just before, all had been a scene of death and judgment... Superstition would have worshipped the ark, as being the means of salvation. The heart always tends to put God's appointed means in God's own place. The ark was a very clear and obvious appointed means. But Noah's faith passed beyond the ark to the God of the ark. So when he stepped out of it, he cast no lingering look back at it, and he did not treat it as an object of worship or reverence. He built an altar to the Lord and worshipped Him. And the ark is never heard of again.
Noah had taken these animals aboard to keep their kinds alive. He offered them up anyway.
Before the flood Noah had been occupied with building an ark for himself and his household. After the flood we find him intent on building an altar for God... He held back none of the small stock of acceptable animals that came out with him from the ark. They had gone in with him to keep their kinds alive on the earth, yet he felt it was right to offer some of them on the altar to God. So his offering shows the thankfulness of his heart. But in it we see something more: the ground on which all blessing could now rest — a sacrifice accepted by the Lord.
The verse assumes Noah could tell a clean animal from an unclean one. Where did that knowledge come from?
Before the flood Noah already knew this essential part of an acceptable sacrifice (Gen. 7:2), though there is no record of how he learned it. But in the law we read God's definition of clean beasts and clean birds, and we find moral teaching tied to the subject (Lev. 11). So we must conclude that no man could have worked out by his own instinct which creatures God would count clean, and which He would not.
The record mentions no prayer and no song at the altar — only what God perceived.
Yet as far as we know, no prayer was spoken on that solemn occasion, and the patriarch raised no hymn of praise... It may have been a silent service. We read of nothing that God had heard, but only of what He smelled. A silent service perhaps, yet how full of meaning to Him, and instruction to us.
The altar is built to the LORD — Jehovah, as some translations print the name. One writer says that name, and not God, is the exact one here.
"And Noah," it is written in verse 20, "built an altar." To whom? To God? Most fittingly it is to Jehovah now. The two names could not be swapped without loss... It is Noah's relationship that appears here. The sacrifice offered there bore witness to the special place in which he stood.
Noah's altar did more than express thanks. The whole future of the earth rested on it.
Noah acted on this after the flood. His first recorded act was to build an altar and offer up whole burnt offerings of every clean beast and of all clean birds. For the earth after the flood was held on the ground of sacrifice.
And the rising smoke pointed forward.
In this the patriarch acknowledged that atonement was his only possible ground for standing before a holy God. That is a striking lesson for people in every age. As that lone column of smoke rose to heaven, "the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma." His mind ran on from that altar to Calvary. There, in due time, the great sacrifice would be offered, and every other sacrifice pointed to it.
- Altar first. Once rescued, Noah builds an altar before he builds a house. Obedience of faith and worship of faith go together.
- Ground, not gratitude only. The offering thanks God for the past, but its greater meaning is the ground on which all blessing could now rest.
- Costly ground. He held back none of the small stock of clean animals entrusted to him to keep their kinds alive.
- Taught ground. No one could guess by instinct which creatures God counts clean. Noah offered what God had already marked out as acceptable.
- Lasting ground. The earth after the flood was held on the ground of sacrifice — and that lone column of smoke pointed on to Calvary.
And Jehovah smelled the sweet odour. And Jehovah said in his heart, I will no more henceforth curse the ground on account of Man, for the thought of Man's heart is evil from his youth; and I will no more smite every living thing, as I have done.
Noah steps out of the ark onto a washed world and builds an altar. God is pleased — and the very reason He gave for sending the flood now becomes His reason for never sending another.
Older versions render the "pleasing aroma" as "a sweet savour." One writer gives a second rendering of the phrase, and shows what the offering secures for the one who brings it:
Here we have the sacrifice presenting a "sweet savour," or "a savour of rest," to God. It is what He finds His rest and delight in. And in its excellence the offerer finds the ground of his acceptance. The term burnt offering occurs here for the first time. We discover what it means in particular when we come to the book of Leviticus.
The flood did not improve anyone. Comparing God's words here with what He said before the judgment, one writer notes a small but sharp shift in wording:
Man had not improved, so there was no reason for God to deal with him differently. The Lord's estimate of man after the flood differed little, if at all, from that before it. Compare Genesis 6:5 with Genesis 8:21. Before the flood God spoke of evil as being constantly in the heart of His creature man. After it He declared it was innate. "The intention of man's heart is evil from his youth."
Notice the word "for" in the verse. One writer sets the reason God gives here beside the reason God gave for the flood:
It is interesting too that in Genesis 6:5 the reason for the flood was that "the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." Yet this same fact becomes a reason that God would not curse the earth again (v. 21). Since man's heart is evil from his youth, God would not again curse the earth or destroy every living thing out of it. The reason is that in the sacrifice of Christ there is a remedy for man's evil nature.
The altar changes what God's eye rests on, and the principle reaches far past Noah:
The reason God gave for not cursing is that He looks to Noah's sacrifice, not to the sin. God deals with us on the ground of what the Mediator is, instead of what we are. The sacrifice ought to be always in our hearts, but it is always before God.
But the offering did not win God over. The same writer is careful about what the sweet savour does:
There was to be no repetition of the curse. Otherwise the Lord might have been always at it, for every thought of man's heart was only evil, and that continually. But on the ground of sacrifice this was said: "the Lord smelled a sweet savour, and the Lord said in his heart, I will no more again curse." He would not again act as He had done. The effect of this sweet savour is very striking. It does not change God's mind; it reveals what He is — the source of peace.
God speaks this promise to Himself before He speaks it to anyone else:
When the Lord smelled the savour of Noah's sacrifice, He said in His heart that He would not again curse the ground. But that was just His own purpose and grace. For a time it was the secret of His own heart. In due time He made His purpose and grace known to Noah. Then Noah took the blessing in a way of special sweetness. He took it as coming from the deep, well-considered, and fully approved counsels and affections of the heart of the Lord Himself.
The pleasure was never in the dead animals themselves:
For God the sweet savour was in what the offerings meant: a new world brought in on the ground of the sacrifice of Christ, His own Son. God had no more pleasure in the actual death of Noah's animals than in those killed on Jewish altars. Hebrews 10:6 says as much: "In burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure."
And what God rests in, the believer may rest in as well:
We must have a basis of approach to God. And more than this: we must be fully accepted, to be completely at rest there. If God finds a savour of rest in the death of Christ, we find our rest there too.
- Rest offered. The aroma is also rendered "a savour of rest." Scripture names the burnt offering here for the first time, and God finds His rest and delight in it.
- Rest despite man. The flood washed the earth but not the heart; God's verdict is now even sharper — evil is there from youth, innate.
- Rest instead of curse. The same fact that justified the flood becomes the reason for never repeating it. A sacrifice now stands between God's eye and man's sin.
- Rest revealed, not negotiated. The offering did not change God's mind. It showed what He is. He spoke the promise in His own heart before telling Noah.
- Rest shared. What God rests in at Noah's altar points on to Christ. Whoever trusts that sacrifice rests where God rests.
Henceforth, all the days of the earth, seed [time] and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease.
After the flood, God makes a promise that has ruled the world ever since. As long as the earth lasts, the seasons will keep their round. Two questions follow. Why is the promise safe when man's heart has not changed? And how long do the words "while the earth remains" run?
The promise comes straight after Noah's burnt offering. That order decides everything.
No one can deny that God in His sovereignty has blessed man unconditionally. On what ground have the millions of our race since Noah's day enjoyed seedtime and harvest, summer and winter, day and night? Have these been conditional blessings?… Genesis 8:20-22 makes it clear. We have these blessings only on the ground of sacrifice — Noah's burnt offering, a type of Christ. If God gave them on the ground of men's conduct, men would have forfeited them long ago.
The flood washed the earth clean. What did it do to the heart inside man?
The cleansing of the waters of judgment had made no change in the imaginations of the thoughts of man's heart. They were still evil, and only evil. The heart was uncured, for "that which is born of the flesh is flesh," though there be water to cleanse or fire to refine. It was no change there which gave the Lord thoughts of peace and not of evil towards men.
Something new starts here. Compare it with the earlier blessing of paradise.
With the new method of dealing with men, God would bring in a stability unknown before… To man in innocence God made no such announcement. Whether the blessing of paradise lasted depended on his obedience. The flood broke the natural order of the seasons: seedtime and harvest stopped for a year. Because of the sacrifice, nothing will break that order again as long as the earth remains. Man can count on this; and man has proved it. God has often held back the earth's full crop, but the seasons have kept running their round.
Three pairs cover the whole year between them.
When God created the lights in the sky He said, "Let them be for signs and for seasons." It is well known that the different seasons on the earth come largely from the days being longer or shorter, so the earth gets more or less of the sun's heat. After the flood, God declared that while the earth remained the seasons should continue, Genesis 8:22. They fall roughly like this: seedtime, cold and winter run from October to March; harvest, heat and summer run from April to September.
The promise holds the seasons steady. It does not lift the curse on the ground.
Then after the flood God secures seedtime and harvest. Farming is blessed in a way. The curse is not gone, but man is comforted. So I should think it takes less work to get things out of the earth now than it did before the flood.
The promise has an end date. One writer traces the whole span.
The sign or token of this covenant with creation is the rainbow in the cloud. Under it the earth has continued until the present time, and it will continue throughout the millennial period. Then Christ will deliver up the kingdom to the Father. The heaven and the earth will pass away and give place to the new heaven and the new earth — the everlasting state, in which God shall be all in all.
Anyone can test the promise by looking at the record:
Few things show the divine perfection stamped on the Bible more than its unfailing accuracy about what has already been fulfilled. More than four thousand years ago, Jehovah said, "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest … shall not cease" (Gen. 8:22); and do they not continue to this day?
One writer carries the verse beyond farming, into the way God deals with what we sow.
The reaping does not come as soon as the seed is sown. So we need patience. But reap we shall — in due season, and God, not we, is Judge as to when the fitting season arrives. Still, arrive it certainly shall. Genesis 8:22 stands true even in this connection.
- Cause — The seasons keep going on the ground of Noah's burnt offering, a type of Christ. They do not rest on human conduct.
- Contrast — The flood left man's heart uncured. God's promise rests on the sacrifice He accepted, not on any change in man.
- Gift — Adam never had this. The seasons now run in a fixed order that no longer hangs on man's obedience.
- Limit — The curse on the ground is eased, not lifted. The promise runs only "while the earth remains" — through the millennium, up to the new heaven and new earth.
- Lesson — Seedtime and harvest never fail. So sowing and reaping hold good in the moral world too: the harvest is delayed, never denied.