Psalms 104:9

You have set a boundary which they shall not pass. For it is marvelous to hear the roaring of the sea, and its rush, and the waves lifted up as high as heaven, and coming as if to cover the whole earth; and yet at the shore they lay down their rush, and return to themselves, and do not overstep God's command — while men do not keep God's command. Neither shall they turn back to cover the earth, as happened under Noah, the flood.

Hear. "Thou hast set a bound which they shall not pass over, neither shall they turn again to cover the earth." What then, because now the bitterest waves have received a measure, that we must be allowed to preach such things even with freedom; because they have had their due limit assigned, because they cannot pass over the bound that is set, nor shall they return to cover the earth; what is doing in the earth itself? What workings take place therein, now that the sea hath left it bare? Although at its beach slight waves do make their noise, although Pagans still murmur round; the sound of the shores I hear, a deluge I dread not. What then; what is doing in the earth? "Who sendeth out springs in the little valleys." "Thou sendest out," he saith, "springs in the little valleys." Ye know what little valleys are, lower places among the lands. For to hills and mountains, valleys and little valleys are opposed in contrary shape. Hills and mountains are swellings of the land: but valleys and little valleys, lownesses of the lands. Do not despise low places, thence flow springs. "Thou sendest out springs in the little valleys." Hear a mountain. The Apostle saith, "I laboured more than they all." A certain greatness is brought before us: yet immediately, that the waters may flow, he hath made himself a valley: "Yet not I, but the grace of God with me." It is no contradiction that they who are mountains be also valleys: for as they are called mountains because of their spiritual greatness, so also valleys because of the humility of their spirit. "Not I," he saith, "but the grace of God with me." ...

The waters are forbidden to pass over the limits set them; they may not, and therefore they do not, turn again to cover the earth. Once they did, in Noah's flood, because God bade them, but never since, because he forbids them, having promised not to drown the world again.

These verses rather describe the wonders of the flood than the creation (Ge 7:19, 20; God's method of arresting the flood and making its waters subside is poetically called a "rebuke" (Ps 76:6; Isa 50:2), and the process of the flood's subsiding by undulations among the hills and valleys is vividly described.

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Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over; that they turn not again to cover the earth. That bound has once been passed, but it shall never be so again. The deluge was caused by the suspension of the divine mandate which held the floods in check: they knew their old supremacy, and hastened to reassert it, but now the covenant promise for ever prevents a return of that carnival of waters, that revolt of the waves: ought we not rather to call it that impetuous rush of the indignant floods to avenge the injured honour of their King, whom men had offended? Jehovah's word bounds the ocean, using only a narrow belt of sand to confine it to its own limits: that apparently feeble restraint answers every purpose, for the sea is obedient as a little child to the bidding of its Maker. Destruction lies asleep in the bed of the ocean, and though our sins might well arouse it, yet are its bands made strong by covenant mercy, so that it cannot break loose again upon the guilty sons of men.