The Promise of the Rainbow

God remembered Noah and every animal with him in the boat. God sent a wind over the earth, and the waters began to go down. The rain stopped. Little by little, day after day, the water sank lower — until one day, with a gentle bump, the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. Noah opened the window and sent out a raven, and then a dove, to see if the earth was dry. The first time, the dove found no place to land, and came back. Noah waited seven days and sent her out again — and in the evening she came back with a fresh olive leaf in her beak! Then Noah knew the water was almost gone. He waited seven more days and sent the dove out once more, and this time she did not come back at all.

At last God said to Noah, “Come out of the boat — you and your wife, your sons and their wives, and every living thing with you.” So they all came out onto the clean, washed earth — the people, and the animals, and the birds, everything stretching and hopping and flying out into the sunshine. The first thing Noah did was build an altar to the Lord and offer a gift to him on it. And the Lord was pleased, and said that he would never again destroy every living thing with a flood. As long as the earth remains, there will be seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and spring, day and night.

God blessed Noah and his sons and told them to have many children and fill the earth again. And God said, “Look — I am making my covenant with you, my forever promise, and with your children, and with every living creature: never again will a flood destroy the whole earth. And this is the sign of my promise: I have set my bow in the clouds. When the clouds gather over the earth and my bow appears in them, I will remember my forever promise between me and you and every living soul.” And there in the sky, arched over the whole wet green world, was a rainbow — God’s bow in the clouds. And whenever clouds gather and the bow shines in them, God sees it, and remembers his forever promise: never again will a flood cover the whole earth.