The earth was dry of God’s watery judgment as of the first day of the first month of the six hundred and first year of Noah’s life. We get the sense of a new beginning. Perhaps you even recognized as you heard today’s reading, parallels to Genesis chapters one and two. The Lord blesses Noah and his sons, telling them to “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” The Lord restates that He has made man in His own image.

Yet, there are differences in this post-flood “new beginning” when compared to creation “in the beginning.” In the beginning, God granted Adam and Eve dominion over the animals when they lived in the perfection of the garden. There’s no mention of that in the post-flood world. Instead, animals are said to be full of “fear” and “dread” toward mankind. Creation groans because of sin. In the post-flood world, the Lord officially sanctions the killing of animals to eat meat.

To make sure no one is confused, God says that even though He’s allowing for the killing and eating of animals, no one—whether man or beast—is allowed to intentionally kill—murder—a human being, because God created them in His image. To murder a human is to attempt to murder God. To murder a human is to attempt to take the place of God in judgment. To murder an unbelieving human is to “doom him or her to hell” (People’s Bible Commentary). God allows for the capital punishment of man or animal who unlawfully, intentionally kills a human being. So as a side note, we can disagree on the policies and circumstances of capital punishment, but we cannot say it is ungodly or sinful.

When Noah and his family come off the ark with the animals and he offers the sweet aroma of sacrifices to the Lord in praise and thanksgiving for His mighty, merciful, and gracious deliverance, the Lord makes a wonderful promise to Noah, his family, and all the other creatures of earth.

Following the flood, the Lord promises never again to curse the ground because of man—certainly tremendous geological change took place in the year of the flood. The Lord promises never to kill all living creatures in the manner He did. God promises that things mankind relies on to survive and thrive—seasons, good harvests, and even night and day will continue as long as earth remains (although there will be disruptions because of the fall into sin).

The implication is that there will be an end of the earth and universe, but until that point, the Lord gives reassurance to the survivors of the flood. Yes, the Lord brought Noah and his family through the flood just as He promised to do, but certainly they came through the flood by way of great suffering and angst. So, as a sign of His promise the Lord puts a bow in the clouds—a rainbow.

If there was a canopy prior to the flood that collapsed to kick off the flood, then this would likely have been the very first rainbow in the sky. Though its symbolism has been co-opted for unholy uses, the rainbow is a beautiful reminder of God’s grace and mercy shown to the whole world. When Noah and his family—and all of us ever since—see a rainbow amid threatening storm clouds, we are reminded of God’s promise that there won’t be another global flood.

God promises that when He sees it, He will remember His promise. As I pointed out last week, God remembering doesn’t mean He has forgotten, but that He acts for our blessing.

The Lord brought the flood on the earth because “every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” One might assume that by judging the world with a flood, the Lord dealt once and for with this continual evil intent of the human heart. And yet, following the flood, the Lord says, “The intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth.” Noah and his family are the only people God could be talking about, because they’re the only people at the time.

Just as there was an account of the fall into sin after creation in the beginning, so in this “new beginning” there’s a recorded fall into sin. Cow’s moo. Ducks quack. Sinners sin. Noah was a believer in the Lord, a sinner for whom the Lord shone His grace upon and was declared righteous by grace. One commentator observes, “It is the seasoned man of God (Noah), ripe in experience, who is here brought low.”

Following the flood, Noah resumes farming (as he may have done prior to the flood). He plants a vineyard and enjoys the gifts of God from the fruit of his labor—nothing wrong with that. But he drinks too much wine—a sin because he loses self-control. He’s careless with his robe—and opens the door to further sin. Ham notices his dad’s nakedness, and he isn’t ashamed to try to shame and humiliate dad. The text is a little hard to figure out, but at the very least Ham thinks it’s really funny and wants his brothers to check it out. Shem and Japheth don’t go along with Ham. Out of respect, they cover their father.

So, what’s going on here? Like Cain and Abel and their sacrifices, there’s a little more than meets the eye. Shem and Japheth are Christians—true believers—just like their father. They believe that the Lord is gracious and merciful despite their sinfulness. Therefore, living out their faith they “veil their father’s weakness with the mantle of charity,” says a commentator. As the apostle Peter says, “Love covers a multitude of sin.” Just as the Lord covered Adam and Eve with animal skins following their fall into sin by which they realized they were naked, so Shem and Japheth cover their father after he sinned.

They say nothing to Ham, which perhaps should have brought heaps of burning coals on his head. But Ham took delight in his father’s sin. He pointed it out and wanted to roll around in it. “Hey guys, you won’t believe what dad has done.” Ham despised—not honored—his father, because he despised—not honored—God. Ham and his descendants—the Canaanites—openly rebelled against God, loving to practice wickedness that the Lord wouldn’t tolerate. From the wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah to the evils of those who offered their children to the fires of an idol named Molech, the Canaanites and their love of evil was a stench in God’s nostrils. Like Cain, the family line of Ham strayed from the ways of the Lord and embraced the darkness of rebellion.

In the aftermath of the flood, within the only family on earth, sin and unbelief once again takes hold, just as it did in the beginning with Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel. So, why would the Lord God, Creator of heaven, earth, and all things, make such a promise to sinners never to destroy the world through a flood?

The flood was a warning not to put off repentance as the haters of God did prior to the flood. Perhaps an Old Testament refrain sums the answer up best: “He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.” Before the flood, the Lord was patient with the world for more than 120 years. When Adam and Eve first fell into sin, the Lord knew that the intention of their hearts and the hearts of their descendants had changed from a holy desire and devotion into an unholy desire to serve themselves. Yet, God still promised a Messiah, a Savior, an offspring of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent.

God very well could have dealt with sin by destroying each and every sinner right down to Noah himself. Being sinful and unclean, all people—as we confessed earlier—deserve God’s temporal and eternal punishment. However, God had already bound Himself not to deal with sin in this way, because He promised a human Savior. To kill all people on earth would have broken that promise. The sign of a rainbow is yet another reminder of God’s promise to send the Savior. He won’t deal with sin by destroying all creation with a flood of water. God deals with sin by sending His Son to die on the cross for those sins.

“The life is in the blood.” Why? I think the death of Jesus—the precious blood of Christ—makes us look back at the command about not eating blood and realize that this restriction is actually “made in view of the sanctity of the blood of our great high priest, who is priest and sacrifice,” as again, a commentator states it. In other words, Adam and Eve were created in the image of God, but through sin they completely corrupted the image. God had planned for the salvation of the world through faith in the shed blood of Christ, who is the image of God. By the power of the Holy Spirit, He begins to restore the image of God in forgiven sinners by means of His shed blood. In anticipation of that act of redemption by the shedding of Christ’s blood, the Lord forbade the eating of blood.

Later on in the book of Leviticus, God commands the Israelites, “For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.” Much of the Old Testament sacrificial system centered around the blood of the sacrifices.

When the Israelites vowed to keep the Lord’s commands given on Mount Sinai, Moses took the blood of sacrificed animals and literally sprinkled it all over the people standing before him while he called out, “Behold, the blood of the covenant.” This was a sign to all of Israel, that if they break the Lord’s commandments, they deserve to have their blood shed.

They did break the Lord’s commands, just as we do. But on the night of Jesus’ arrest, He takes the cup of wine and says to the disciples, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” He says to you, “You broke the covenant, and I’m shedding my blood for you.”

• Thus, Scripture proclaims: “The blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, cleanses us of all sin.”

• He bought the Church “with His own blood.”

• He makes “peace with His blood.”

• His blood “cleanses our consciences.”

• “We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”

Scripture passage after Scripture passage testifies to the saving power of Jesus’ blood.

Today’s reading ends with a beautiful promise concerning offspring promised to Eve. Shem is the one. He inherits the promise of the Savior. “Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Shem,” says Noah. Japheth is prophesied to dwell in the tents of Shem and Canaan is prophesied to be servant of Shem.

You’ve probably heard the word “antisemitism.” The family line of Shem is the Shemites, from which we get the word “Semite.” Abraham, and therefore Jesus, would be descendants of Shem. The descendants of Japheth spread out to the north, east, and west. This means that most of us, if not all of us, are descendants of Japheth. So listen up. Noah prophesies that you will dwell in Shem’s tents, which you do. Okay, okay, so what does that mean? Hospitality. Shem receives you. The Savior comes from Shem, and Gentiles—descendants of Japheth and some Canaanites like Rahab—are received into the tents of Shem. You are received into salvation.

Noah prophesies that the Savior comes from Shem’s family and many from Japheth’s family will one day believe in Him and receive eternal life. You are evidence. Amen.