"The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days. But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and He sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded." (Genesis 7:24-Genesis 8:1) God never forgot Noah and the people and the animals on the ark. When the Scriptures say the Lord "remembers" someone or something, the word is used to indicate His faithfulness. Genesis 8:1 could also be rendered as, "God didn't forget Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and He sent a wind over the earth so the waters would recede."
"Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible." (Genesis 8:2-5) The flooding has ceased but it takes time for the water to dry up. I did some reading regarding what would have happened to plant life while the earth was covered with water for months, and I found that roots and seeds would have survived. The Lord never said He was going to destroy plant life, so I don't think the world had to start over as far as vegetation was concerned. Things would have begun to grow and sprout as soon as they were once again exposed to sunlight.
"After forty days Noah opened a window he had made in the ark and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water all over 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! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him." (Genesis 8:6-12) Noah first sent out what is an unclean animal according to Leviticus 11:15. The raven is a scavenger, and scavenger animals were unclean under the law of Moses. We are told the raven flew back and forth but not that it returned to Noah in the ark as the dove did. One commentary I consulted states that the raven would have been able to perch on the carcasses of humans and animals that rose to the surface of the waters. Gruesome, but this explains why the raven was able to survive for many days outside of the ark until the waters dried up.
The raven is not a reliable messenger for Noah. It can't tell him what he needs to know. It's so busy feasting on flesh that it's not going to bring anything plant-related back to Noah to prove to him that the trees and plants are standing out of the water now. Noah is in the ark, perched atop a mountain, and through the windows he can only see mountaintops and sky. He doesn't know whether the lowlands and pastures are dry yet. So he sends out a dove, an animal that won't feed on the carcasses of the dead, and in time the dove brings back a fresh olive leaf. The next time he sends the dove out, it doesn't return because it is able to find food for itself now that the waters are gone. This is when Noah knows for certain that God has kept His promise---that God has "remembered" him and his family and all the animals on the ark. Just as God had promised, man and the animals are going to be able to survive in the post-flood world. They've been given a fresh start, and everything they will need for this fresh start has been provided for them.
The Lord is able to give a fresh start to you and me as well. No matter where we've been and what we've done, He extends the olive branch of peace to us. No matter how many mistakes we've made, God can do miraculous things with any life that is submitted to Him. Let's bring all our failures and mistakes, and our doubts and fears, and our weaknesses and inadequacies and lay them at His feet. The God who created the universe and everything in it out of nothing is more than able to make something honorable out of you and me.
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