You know what's neat about Genesis 9? God promises to never flood the earth again, but he doesn't just promise Noah, or his family, or even all the descendants of Noah who would one day read this account. He promises all of creation.
God made a covenant -- a binding, formal agreement between responsible parties -- with every creature that came off the ark with Noah. He promised the jaguars and the rhinoceri; he promised the emus and frogs and millipedes and mosquitos and mealworms. He even promised the snakes.
Now before anyone thinks I'm going all Gaia and bunny-hugger, note that right before God said all this, he told Noah he could eat all those little responsible parties. I'm not sure if there's a grand theological point there or not, but there are some mighty tasty animals, so there's that.
Still, it's important to consider that though man is undoubtedly the crown of creation and possessed of a nature that is unlike and above the rest, he's not the whole of creation. God may value a man above a sparrow, but that doesn't mean he doesn't care about sparrows.
God hasn't destroyed the earth again with a flood, because God keeps his promises. Even to snakes.
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