Dove in Fausset's Bible Dictionary

Emblem of peace (Genesis 8:7-12). After God's wrath for sin had been executed upon the earth, the dove was thrice sent forth; at the first sending she found no rest for the sole of her foot until she put herself in Noah's (or "comforter") hand, and was drawn into the ark; on the second trip, she brought back the olive leaf, the earnest of the restored earth; on the third trip, she was able to roam at large, no longer needing the ark's shelter. As the raven messenger "going forth to and fro," alighting on but never entering into the ark, symbolizes the unbelieving that have "no peace," "like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest" (Isaiah 57:20-21): so the dove, in its threefold embassy, represents respectively the first return of the soul to its rest, the loving hand of Jesus; its subsequent reception of the dovelike spirit, the earnest of the final inheritance (Ephesians 1:13-14); and its actual entrance finally on the new heaven and new earth (Revelation 21), where there will be no need of the arklike church to separate between the world and God's people, between the saved and unsaved, where all shall be safe and blessed forever and the church shall be co-extensive with the world...