Most people are familiar with Noah and his Ark but few know about Noah and his alcohol. After heroic faith and faithfulness had been displayed prior to and during the Flood Noah revealed colossal failure by his drunkenness and subsequent nudity. Noah reminds us all that if we think we stand we need to take heed lest we fall. Those highest up have the greater distance to fall! And fall Noah did but this sordid story is not really so much about a failed father as about two sensitive sons and one sinning son. This one episode sets the stage not only for succeeding chapters of Genesis but succeeding generations of people as well.
Ham was apparently the first to happen upon his father’s shame and he made a beeline for his brothers to tell them all about it. Our imagination need not be overactive to hear Ham gushing in his criticism of his father’s moral collapse. We don’t know all that Ham said and did but it must have been huge given the lasting judgment leveled on him and his descendants. Ham showed his colors. A person’s insight gives him patience, and his virtue is to overlook an offense (Prv. 19: 11). Ham was neither insightful nor virtuous toward his father.
Enter the other sons – Shem and Japheth. The Bible tells us more about them. Scripture is always happy to celebrate goodness. They took a cloak, placing it on their shoulders and went into their father’s tent intentionally avoiding the sight of their father’s shame. They wrapped Noah in the veil of love. Listen to scripture echo their action:
Whoever conceals an offense promotes love, but whoever gossips about it separates friends (Prv. 17: 9).
Hatred stirs up conflicts, but love covers all offenses (Prv. 10: 12).
Above all, keep your love for one another at full strength, since love covers a multitude of sins (1Pt. 4: 8).
Love finds no joy in unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth (1Cor. 13: 6). Love finds a way to cover the sins of others rather than exploit them. That’s what you do in a healthy marriage. Parents earn a PhD in covering the sins of their children by the time they leave home and children must often duplicate the forgiving ways of Shem and Japheth. It’s a major part of being a part of the Body of Christ as well. Love receives others as Christ received us (Rm. 15: 7).
Of course, no one ever exemplified the veil of love the way Jesus did! He could look a very immoral woman in the eye and say, Neither do I condemn you…sin no more (Jhn. 8: 11). Even from His Cross He could pray, Father, forgive them, because they do not know what they are doing (Lk. 23: 34). If the Lord held all our sins against us none of us would enjoy a relationship with Him (Ps. 130: 3). Thankfully Calvary covers it all! Can we do any less in our fellowship with one another?