Lesson ID8 - The Departure from the Ark. Gen. 8:15-22 - Part 2 (series: Lessons on Genesis)

by John Lowe
(Woodruff, S.C.)

22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

Prior to the Flood, man learned the three R’s:
1. Rebellion against God was realized—it came right out in the open.
2. Revelation from God was rejected by man. Noah’s witness did not reach them.
3. Repentance was absolutely repudiated; there was no return to God at all. Man refused the refuge that God provided, and for 120 years Noah had no converts.

There are three R’s. Men were in rebellion, they rejected the revelation, and there was no repentance on their part.

The Flood had interrupted the normal cycle of the seasons for a year, but in this verse, God declares that the course of nature would never again be interrupted. While the earth remained, and man lived upon it, there shall be summer and winter. “While the earth remaineth” strongly suggests that the earth will not always exist. But as long as it does remain, God’s providence will carefully preserve the regular succession of times and seasons.

The guarantee we are given in this verse gives us hope and courage as we face an unknown future. Each time we go to bed for the night or turn the calendar to a new month, we should be reminded that God is concerned about our Planet Earth and its inhabitants.

We’re prone to take for granted sunrise and sunset, the changing face of the moon and the changing seasons, but all of these functions are evidence that God is on the throne and keeping His promises. All creation preaches a constant sermon, day after day, season after season that assures us of God’s loving care. We can trust His Word, because “there has not failed one word of all his good promise” (1 Ki. 8.56).

Now as this man Noah comes out of the ark he stands in a very unique position. He stands in the position of being the head of the human race again—the same position Adam had. It is said that we are all related to Adam, but we have closer kin than that—we are all related in that we can trace our lineage back to Noah; we are all related to Noah. In one sense, Noah is the father of all of us.

Noah faced a new world where longevity of life began to decline immediately; the earth was subject to storms and severe weather, blazing heat, freezing cold, seismic action, and natural disasters.


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1 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished
2 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering:
3 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;
4 And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand; When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.
5 And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:
6 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;


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i It was God who provided the sacrifices because He commanded Noah to take the clean animals with him on the ark (Ge. 7.2, 3). What we have given to God, He has first given to us (1 Chron. 29.14), and we don’t give to God because He lacks anything (Ps. 50.7-15) or needs anything (Acts 17. 24, 25). Our giving brings delight to God, but it doesn’t enrich God personally. Rather giving enriches the worshipper (Phil. 4.18).