What the Rainbow Means to Me
This past Sunday morning as I was driving to worship I saw something that I would say is fairly rare. It was a rainbow on the western horizon. The sun was shining and rising from the east and the rain had not yet arrived. I saw the rainbow before the storm rather than after. I always enjoy seeing rainbows. They make you stop everything you are doing for a minute and you just admire the beauty of the colors and the majesty that is suspended for just a few moments in the sky.
I could not help but think about the meaning of the rainbow. I know God placed it in the blue heaven thousands of years ago as a promise to the world that he would never flood the earth with water again. Read Genesis chapter 9. The Bible explains the rainbow. For me it has always been a comforting sight.
When I was in my twenties and working for a small congregation in Kentucky I remember having a Bible study with a young lady of about 21. She had not had the privilege my parents afforded me to have been raised attending Bible classes. In the midst of our study when we came to the account of the flood and she read about the rainbow she had never heard about it before. She did not know the meaning of the rainbow. This caused tears to come to my eyes. I was moved by the fact that she did not know something like that when it was so fundamental to me. But I was also happy that, as we studied, God was opening up his truth to both of us. It was not long before those studies led to her following Christ.
Sunday when I stepped out of my vehicle and I admired the rainbow one more time before entering the church building, I will admit that what other people have attempted to attach to the rainbow also crossed my mind. Just a week before, we had been in Milwaukee where a “Gay Pride” festival had been going on. It was our aim to avoid any parts of the festival, not out of hate or judgment or prejudice of any kind. My family simply believes what the Bible says about sexuality and marriage and the natural order that God has ordained. We believe what the Bible says about homosexuality being an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. If you are reading this I would encourage you to examine Genesis 18 and 19, Romans 1, 1 Corinthians 6, and any other passage in the Bible that speaks on this topic.
One thing that is important is that, if you will read those passages, there will be other sins that are listed that are just as forbidden as the practice of homosexuality. Balance would demand that you feel as passionate about one sin as you do another. The point of this article has nothing to do with any agenda that is positive or negative toward one group of people or toward a particular sin. It is about the responsibility to see things as God sees them. We cannot take symbols that God has created and define them as something different than the One who created all things.
There will never be any time in the future for me that the rainbow will mean anything other than what God’s word tells me. God put the rainbow in the sky, and to use it for any other purpose than the reason he put it there is blasphemy. This would be akin to taking the cross and calling it something other than the source of our redemption. It was upon a cross that our Savior in love bled and died for our sins and made us free.
Going forward, I believe it would behoove us as children of God to use the rainbow symbol to lovingly and humbly educate this next generation about the mercy and grace of Jehovah. Just like the young lady I once talked with, people need to know the true definition of the rainbow promise. I pray that we will have the desire and the strength and the knowledge to do just that. Our children and grandchildren deserve it.
God loves us. We need to love his creation. We need to love all people the same, and if we love them we will share with them the truth about what things truly mean.
I can’t help but be thankful that I have not been deceived about this beautiful symbol of God’s love. And I can’t help but recognize that what the rainbow means to me is by far the better and truer definition for my life.
“I set My rainbow in the cloud, and it shall be for the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth.” – Genesis 9:13
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AUTHOR: Jeremiah Tatum
