After Noah lands on the “mountains of Ararat” (Genesis 8:4), he uses birds to find out when it would be safe to leave the ark. He sends out a raven, then a dove, which returns after its second tour with a “freshly plucked olive leaf” (v. 11). Clearly, the earth has become habitable again.

Until this point, Noah has been guided through every step by God’s instructions (6:13–7:4). We don’t know if God had given him specific directions on the use of birds or if he had done this on his own initiative, but it appears to be a wise step: Noah may have been using his knowledge of birds and their behaviour to determine if the waters had receded adequately. A servant of God can obtain guidance directly from God or by using his skill and knowledge of the natural world.

There is a pattern in the numbers of days involved in the story of the flood. It took seven days for Noah to get his family and all the animals to board the ark (7:4, 10) and it rained for 40 days (vv. 12, 17), with the earth remaining flooded for 150 days in total (v. 24). Noah waited 40 days after the mountaintops became visible before sending out a raven (8:6–7), and also waited seven days each to send out the dove the second and third time (vv. 10, 12). This symmetry of numbers hints that God’s world still had some order even though it looked like it had returned to chaos.

At the end of the account of the earth’s devastation is a simple yet tender observation: “But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark” (v. 1). In the midst of the unfolding chaos, God always had His faithful servant on His mind, and He remembered His promise to take care of him and creation. The same expression is used in another instance of severe punishment: when judgment was about to fall on Sodom, God “remembered Abraham” (19:29) and spared his nephew Lot and his family.

Genesis 8 also shows us the beginning of God’s act of re-creation. Just as in the beginning “the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters” (1:2), here the waters receded as God “sent a wind over the earth” (8:1). “Spirit” and “wind” are both translated from the same Hebrew word ruach, which suggests that the Holy Spirit was involved in both the creation and re-creation of the earth.

In the “hall of faith” in Hebrews 11, Noah is listed among the great biblical examples of faith (v. 7). His great faith made him construct the ark in time for it to harbour his family and all the animals amid the judgment of God. His faith also gave him the capacity to wait on board for a long time—as long as a year—until he could experience the blessing of starting life on earth all over again.