Noah planted a vineyard. It is worth mentioning that's he would have known a lot about cultivating fruits and vegetables from before, because people were vegetarians, even if he probably only began to do this after the Flood, as the Bible says he began to be a husbandman. After so much work building the ark, these skills were no longer needed. Many times, especially in this advanced technological era, we develop skills that are not needed later in our lives.
It is important to remember that
God takes care of us and will guide us in the right way if we just trust and
follow Him. It may or may not have been God's plan for him to simply turn to
farming, but it is never God's plan to fall into sin. Rather, He lovingly
guides us away, always providing a way of escape, as 1 Corinthians 10 : 13
says, but He gives us freedom to choose His perfect, loving plan or not.
It is almost certain that Noah
wasn't a drinker before, because he was perfect in his generations. Even if
that is taken to mean that he had no Nephilim DNA, which we mentioned before is
possible, he still found favor in the sight of God and therefore would not have
been likely to take to the sin of drunkenness. A little doubt is present
because, after all, David was a man after God's own heart and he had some
serious sin problems when he lusted after Bathsheba. But, even if Noah had
gotten drunk once or twice that certainly wasn't a common thing.
And, again, he likely hadn't. He
was too busy building the Ark and trying to plead with people to be saved. When
our minds are focused on the work of the Lord, the devil will fight us, of
course, but having something to fill our minds with which is Godly – just as
those things Philippians 4:8 tells us to focus on – it eliminates a big area
the devil can use to infiltrate, that being an idle mind. Remember that it was
when he couldn’t sleep that David went out on his roof and saw Bathsheba,
instead of praying and finding some way to possibly serve the Lord by helping
others as King. And, when the King of Persia in Esther couldn’t sleep, he had
his chronicler read back the events of several months (because the king likely
figured hearing such dull monotony would help him get to sleep) and thus the
king was reminded of something he’d neglected, that being rewarding Mordecai
for saving his life.
Either way, Noah knew the properties
of grapes and how they fermented and became usable in alcoholic beverages. He
had likely been privy to many sins which resulted from drunkenness in the world
before the Flood.
So, why did Noah do it?
Carelessness? Or, something else? We don't know, but enough is known of things
such as survivor's guilt that he could possibly have been thinking about how
sad it was that so many refused to trust in God, even as the flood waters were
going up.
If this was the case, the proper
solution was not to get drunk, but to pour out His heart to God and seek God's
peace and comfort. Looking at the Psalms, we see many times when David felt
depressed and he called on the Lord. it is amazing how many of the Psalms
start out with David so down in the dumps and end with him praising the Lord.
God has a way of giving peace in the midst of anything.
Once Noah got drunk, he passed out
naked. We could speculate as to what happened in a few areas.
For instance, did he act really
dumb beforehand, so Ham was just waiting to see what would happen? That's
unknown, but it is possible that God recorded this in Scripture because He
wished to show how easily He forgets the sins of His saints, those of us who
have trusted Christ as Savior. God removes our sins as far as the east is from
the west, and we are promised that He will remember them no more. However, the
main point here is that he would have acted in some improper way. Wine is a
mocker, the Bible warns against its use - or any alcohol - because God knows
it's addictive and destructive effects. Families are ripped apart, Money
rightfully earned to bless the person is wasted, and people are mistreated
because of the effects of it. All the ads would entice people to buy orange
juice, milk, or any other product if they were made for that product.
His nakedness was not necessarily
part of this, however. First, we would need to know if it was normal for him to
not wear clothes while sleeping. We're not told the tradition the way we are in
other circumstances later in the Bible, but if Noah was consistently naked
sleeping, it would not have been a strange thing for Ham to enter and notice it
later. Therefore, it is likely that he didn't sleep naked.
