This passage is rife with jokes and questions. We can ask why Noah included mosquitoes, and whether the Huntsman spider was really necessary. (Haven't heard of the Huntsman spider. Google it... I'll wait. I don't know where it falls on the seemingly very long list of Australian animals that would like to eat you, but my desire to visit Australia drops with every animal I learn about on the list.) Can you imagine Noah standing at the door of the ark watching every creeping thing creep into the ark and wondering why he had to keep such things alive? (Although, I suppose there's no record of animals that Noah perhaps 'forgot' to include. Maybe Noah spared us from something worse than mosquitoes....)
Verse 22 is so simple and complex to me. Noah did as he was commanded, and he did it all. When God told him to do something, he just did it.
Here, he's joining with Adam in exercising wise dominion over the animals. They're potentially in peril, and so to care for them, he has to actively uproot his life, sacrificing much, and save them. It benefits him in the long run, but he doesn't realize this at the time.
There's probably something in your life that you've sacrificed for in the short term that benefits you in the long run. Maybe it's children you've cared for or a job you've poured yourself into or a skillset you've worked to develop or a relationship that you've cultivated. It could be anything -- but it takes a long-term view.
Discipleship is no different -- we grow, over time, into people that learn more about God and God's grace, and over time, we fall more deeply in love with God, and over time, it's easier to obey, because we learn to trust God and we learn that this will benefit us in the long-term. Sometimes, that long-term is eternal, because maybe we can't see the benefit this side of heaven, but the time and effort we invest into our prayer life and into our church communities and into our relationships... this is never wasted. God is growing us up.
Like Noah, you're called to care for creation, as well. We exercise prudent dominion. Maybe it's caring for a pet, maybe it's joining in environmental care activities... could be any number of things. But it's a long line of Christian tradition to care for this earth that God has made and given us dominion over.
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