Read part 1 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒. Read part 2 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒.
I set My bow in the clouds, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth. / And when I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow is seen in the clouds, / I will remember My covenant which is between Me and you and every living animal of all flesh, and never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all flesh. / And the bow will be in the clouds, and I will look upon it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living animal of all flesh that is upon the earth. (Gen. 9:13-16)
At the end of Genesis chapter nine, God sets a bow in the sky as a sign of His covenant with Noah. This covenant ties God the Creator with His redeemed people in a newly redeemed world. If we understand the junction at which God gave Noah this sign, and understand our role as the ark — the church — on the earth today, we also know that the situation surrounding us indeed is a severe one. But even as the old world degrades, we — His believers in the church — are those gazing upon and living unto the rainbow in the clouds as a promise of the age to come. The promise of the rainbow is not just a story in Genesis, but a fundamental understanding for living out the church life today as we face this dark age in anticipation of His return. This bow holds a deep significance for us, demonstrating Christ’s power and strength in His accomplishments to transfer the world from the old into the new.
In the original Hebrew, the word “bow” is more commonly interpreted as a weapon for battle. Why would God use a weapon to signal His relationship with the earth and with His people? The defining characteristic of a bow is that it is bowed, or bent. A bow is useful in battle because it has been bent and stretched tightly so that it can shoot with might and power. In His covenant with us, God sets a weapon as a sign that He is victorious in His purpose against corruption and death — against the usurpation of the enemy. Knowing that the rainbow is a weapon helps us to see that the situation today is one that requires strength and might to bend and to shoot in a precise and powerful way — to bring forth the age to come.
With this understanding, we first see that the rainbow, bent with its ends touching the earth, is there to defend and to secure God’s relationship with man in dealing with the earth. In His righteousness, He bent Himself to reach the earth — to come down and spend 33 and a half years as a man, in the likeness of sin, to condemn sin in the flesh (Rom. 8:3). He thereby overcame death for us all. Through one man sin entered, but through this One, the promise of the rainbow is fulfilled (Rom. 5:11-12; 19). Through this wonderful bending power, man has a way to reach God the Father in reconciliation in full! How can God, in His righteousness, say that He will never again destroy the earth through a flood? How can His righteousness reach sinful people like us? Although man is rebellious, sinful and altogether against God, just like in Noah’s time, through the altar, man has a new beginning — the establishing of a redeemed ground based upon His righteousness. Through the covenant signified by the rainbow, God bends Himself so that we may gain and express Him according to His own heart’s desire in eternity.
Second, we see that this bow is a tool set above the clouds to gain man. God is a God who touches the earth. He is not a faraway and distant God who remains in the heavens; He is working and dealing with the earth and within us. In what situation does the rainbow appear? The rainbow appears whenever God deals with the earth. The rainbow — God’s covenant with Noah — came out of the clouds: “And when I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow is seen in the clouds…” (Gen. 9:14). Our understanding from the New Testament might be that clouds are positive — like the cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 12:1. But these witnesses are saints overcoming and enduring trials and suffering on the earth (Ezek. 1:4; 28). Every day we are suffering from death in this confusing, evil, twisted age. Where there are clouds, there is rain, and where there is rain, there is the rainbow; without the clouds, we would never have the rainbow (#432). This should be our daily experience. When are His promises surpassing and real to us? When we have come to the end of our rope and our natural being has come to its end, we finally see Him and trust His hand to fulfill all that He has purposed. When we are terminated and judged, God comes to shine through us — to replace us, to justify us, and to bring us all the way into the very heart of His plan — just as a bow is seen in the clouds. Like a single stream of light shines through a prism, when we ask the Lord to shine through us, the expression is a sevenfold spectrum of light: a rainbow. This light is being shone through His church today. This bow is indeed a powerful weapon to us; it is a renewing of our Creator’s blessing that is able to persist even through the fallen and corrupted earth unto the fulfillment of New Jerusalem.
Although the church experiences the rainbow through the earthen suffering of the clouds today, the rainbow will one day be seen and realized in a cloudless, shining way. Throughout the Bible, the rainbow is all about God’s economical move on the earth and the fulfillment of His ultimate desire. In the visions of Ezekiel, the glory of Jehovah had the “appearance of the rainbow that is in the cloud on a day of rain” (Ezek. 1:28). Then in Revelation, cloudlessly, “there was a rainbow around the throne like an emerald in appearance” (Rev. 4:3). The eternal fulfillment of this rainbow is the New Jerusalem; Revelation tells us that “Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, as clear as crystal,” (21:11). Ultimately, the foundation of New Jerusalem shone out through the colorful, precious stones (Rev. 21:19-21). As we go through this salvation process, we are being transformed from earthen clay into living stones that are ultimately built into the New Jerusalem, where the “foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every precious stone” (21:19). His saints bear His appearance; Christ Himself is our rainbow, and eventually we ourselves become this rainbow (Rev. 10:1; Ezek. 1:28). Whosoever is willing to be transformed by the Lord is a part of the colors in New Jerusalem, built alongside many saints who have gone before us, holding firm the same testimony from age to age.
When we see New Jerusalem, we see the ultimate fulfillment of this covenant; that out of death there is an eternal kingdom, a new world germinated through His uncorrupted, resurrected, eternal life. From Genesis to Revelation, the Lord is seeking a people — a being, a vessel — through which to shine His light and be expressed; whosoever is willing to be judged, to build the altar, and to receive the covenant on the new land finds the real meaning and experience of eternity. Through being the ultimate and only acceptable sacrifice on the altar, the Lord Jesus bent Himself to bring us into His righteousness so that we may match Him and express Him (Phil. 2:7; 2 Cor. 5:21). From this one sacrifice on the altar comes the everlasting covenant, and from this covenant comes the life and power to overcome death and to be the full, colorful, multiplied expression of Christ on the earth today.
(Above is part 3 of a series compiled from notes of fellowship taken from gatherings on 9/17/2021 & 9/19/2021, not reviewed by the speaker.)