God's Promise of Peace

By: Sarah Martin

Have you ever been in the midst of a storm where the waters seem to keep on rising, and through it all, you struggle to find peace? You may feel confused, uncertain, discouraged, or doubtful. I’ll bet you Noah could relate. When God instructed Noah to build an ark because He was going to flood the earth, this faithful servant of the Lord did not question this command. In Genesis 6:9 it says that “Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God.” So because “Noah was a righteous man”, he did not question the Lord, instead, he was obedient, even when it may have been unclear as to why God would want to destroy all that He had created.

Later in the story, we see that in Genesis 7:11-12, “...the floodgates of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights”. During this time, the waters rose and covered the earth until “Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.” (Genesis 7:22). Now, because Noah was faithful and obedient to the Lord, he, his family, and the animals God had commanded him to bring on the ark, were spared when the rest of mankind and all other living creatures perished. Eventually, the rain had stopped, and so Noah sent out first a raven, and then a dove three times to see if the waters had receded enough for land to appear. In Genesis 8:8-11 it says, “Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf!” Now, keep in mind that the dove and the olive leaf are symbols that have great significance. If we turn back to Genesis 7:23 where it says, “Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth…”, notice it says nothing about plants being destroyed. Instead, plants such as the olive tree were able to survive and withstand the flood waters.

The reason why there is great significance behind the dove and the olive leaf is because it illustrates God’s promise of peace that cannot be broken and cannot be destroyed. In this story, the heavy rain and flood waters represent the storms and the trials that flood our lives, the dove and the olive branch are a symbol of God’s peace offering, and the creatures as well as all of mankind that died, are a representation of our flesh. When we face tribulations and search for comfort in the things of this world or in other words, turn to the flesh, it quickly dies out, but like the olive leaf that withstood the flood waters, so will God’s peace stand strong in our storms. Even when things may seem uncertain or don’t make sense and become difficult to overcome, God’s absolute peace and assurance will be with you every step of the way, just like He was with Noah, and that my friends is a promise that won’t be broken.