Creation Restored - Genesis 8:1-9:17

Genesis 8:1 – 9:17

God remembers.  In the story of Scripture, God’s salvation always comes with the idea that God first remembers.
 
Here in Genesis 8:1 we are told just that as Noah and company float around for 5 months on the ark.  “But God remembered Noah…”

What does he remember though?  Perhaps the other places in Scripture can help us here.  In Exodus, God will see the people of Israel in bondage in Egypt and it will read, “God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
 
When Mary sings the Magnificat at the proclamation of the conception of Jesus, she says, “The Lord has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy.  As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”

When John the Baptist is born, his father Zechariah says the same thing, “God showed the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham…”

So God remembers, he remembers his promises.  This is not to say he forgot.  This is to emphasize that God always has on the forefront his promise to save.  God will come through on his word.
 
It begs the question on what promise did God make to Noah?  What was the covenant that God made with him?  It goes back to the same question in chapter 6.  What was the favor that Noah found with God?

To understand what God is remembering, you have to go back to those boring genealogies in chapter 5 that list a bunch of people that you do not know.  The line of Noah stretches back to Adam.  This family thread takes us back to God’s first promise and the covenant that he made with Adam during the Fall in Genesis 3:15. God will fix the rebellion of the world through a descendant of Adam and Eve.
 
In the text, that descendant is Noah.  In him carries the hope of Christ.  That is the story of Genesis, tracing the promise of God to fix the creation.

So when God remembers Noah, he is remembering the promise he made to Adam and Eve.  The oath and the covenant to stamp the serpent’s head.  God remembers and God acts on that remembrance.
 
Same goes for you by the way.  God remembers you.  He remembers you and calls you by name.  The day will come when God will remember his final promise to come again and renew all the creation.