Here is a wonderful verse: Song of Solomon 2:6.
Let his left hand be under my head,
And his right hand embrace me.
In this verse, the bride is speaking to her Bridegroom, and her request is a very romantic request. To have a man place his hand under his wife’s head is all about support, really. He is holding her head in his hand. Then to have his other hand embrace his wife—well, that is all about intimacy, right? An embrace like that is really a hug, and a hug is all about bringing someone close to you, their heart close to your heart.
Now, you know, in the Song of Solomon, Christians are pictured as the bride, and Jesus is pictured as the Bridegroom. So in this, we see a Christian asking this of the Lord:
Let His left hand be under my head,
And His right hand embrace me.
When we come to the Bible, we need the Lord to support our heads, right? In other words, we need to trust Him to give us understanding. Without His support of our heads, we will not spiritually understand anything in His Word. But that is not enough.
When we come to His Word, we also need His embrace. We need Him to bring our hearts close to His heart and just squeeze us. You know, my wife loves it when I just grab her and squeeze her, and maybe your wife does as well.
So let us bow before the Lord, and let us ask Him to support our heads and then embrace our hearts, that we might go forward in the knowledge of Who He is.
Heavenly Father, we are so thankful that when we come to You, we can come to You in terms of our Bible study just as we are. There is no requirement, no prerequisite. We just come as we are.
You said that if any man is willing, he will know. We are thankful that we do not have to know; we just have to be willing to know. If we just have the desire, the hunger, the willingness, You will do everything that is required of us—everything we need—to be brought closer to You through Your Word, to see more of You in the Bible. You will do it. It is a guarantee; it is a promise.
So, Father, we come. We claim the promise, not because we are worthy, but because the Lord Jesus is worthy. He deserves it tonight—to embrace His bride, support her head, embrace her heart.
So we come, claiming this all in the merits of our Lord Jesus. Open up our hearts, and then open up Your Word, and show us more of our Savior—not just so our heads would be full of facts about our Savior, but that our hearts would be full of devotion to our Savior. In Jesus’ name, amen.
As we have been looking at the story of Noah this weekend and the great flood, it has been our emphasis to see how Noah’s story illustrates spiritual principles concerning our union with Jesus.
In the history, God took a man and had him build an ark whereby he and his family could be saved from God’s condemnation of this world. It has been our suggestion that in this history we see illustrated the longing in God’s heart to lift up, high above the world and high above all that displeases Him, all those in any age and any generation who would turn in helplessness to Him.
Just as it was possible for Noah and his family to physically rise above the world in the ark, Christians, enabled by the life of Christ within, can spiritually rise above the world and live lives pleasing unto God.
In our first study Friday night, we looked at the fact that when Noah was 480 years old, he was given a revelation from God. According to the Bible record, Noah received that revelation by faith. That is, he believed the revelation. He said yes to the revelation.
As you read Genesis 6, God spelled it all out for Noah. He gave him a blueprint, and He told him what length the boat would be, what width the ark would be, the height of the boat, and what materials he should use to make it. The revelation God gave Noah centered in the ark.
The ark is an illustration; the spiritual reality is Christ. So, in fully developed New Testament form, what Noah received from God was all about Jesus.
Who are those Christians who rise above the world and live lives pleasing unto the Lord? They are those who have received from God by faith the revelation of Christ as an all-sufficiency.
That truth led us into our second study, which we summarized with the word abiding. Only as believers are receiving and abiding in the revelation of Christ as an all-sufficient Savior will the miracle of obedience to God become a burning reality in their lives.
Then in our third study, we looked at the next stage, which we summarized with the word rest, because the ark came to rest on the mountain. In that study, Ed shared with us seven doctrines pictured in the ark. In the ark, it was a time of teaching. Noah learned many things of the Lord, with the ark picturing the Lord.
But doctrine, as he shared with us, is not Jesus. Not even good doctrine is Jesus. As Ed was speaking, it reminded me of what Jesus said to the Pharisees:
You search the Scriptures because in them you think you have eternal life;
And it is these that bear witness of Me;
And you are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life.
They had the Bible. They had the teaching. But they did not want relationship with Jesus.
Brothers, this is an epidemic in the church in our day. Believers are equating a knowledge of the Bible with relationship with Jesus. We are ending up with nothing but cold, academic heads filled with Bible facts and hearts empty of devotion to Jesus. How sad.
We cannot know Jesus without the Bible, but we can know the Bible without Jesus. How sad to have a head so full of Bible truth, and yet have a heart empty of relationship with the One Who is truth.
Let us not settle for Bible study that does not directly center on the person of Christ. If we do, we are cheating ourselves.
You know, that is the problem with junk food. Junk food not only fills you up with empty calories; it does nothing for you. It ruins your appetite for the real thing. That is what junk food does.
There is spiritual junk food, and it is everywhere today. It is in the disguise of Bible study: “Let us learn the Bible. Let us learn the Bible. Let us memorize the Bible. Let us go through the doctrines of the Bible. Let us come to the Bible to see everything but Jesus,” when everything centers in the person of Christ.
Let us not frustrate God’s purpose for the Bible. The Bible is not a handbook for Christian living. The Bible is the revelation of Jesus Christ. It is there that you might know Him, and that I might know Him. Period. That is it.
Everything, as Ed shared, comes out of our lives only through the revelation of Christ. Without the revelation of Christ in the Word, we have nothing but an empty shell—an empty shell of a Christian life. May God deliver the church.
The ark was exactly what Noah needed, and life within the ark was more than enough to save Noah. But there came a time when the ark was not enough for God—when God wanted more for Noah. He wanted Noah out of that box, the ark, into His new creation.
That brings us in this study tonight to the final stage in the process God works in our lives to enable us to rise above the world. We have called it From Rest to Rainbow.
Tomorrow morning’s study is kind of connected, but it is what I like to call a maverick study. Is that right? Is it kind of connected? Amen. I have no retort to that.
In our last session, Ed left off with Noah and his family in the ark, sitting on top of a mountain. In this study, we will see Noah and his family come out of the ark and begin to live in a new world—a world governed by a new covenant, a rainbow covenant, that the Lord will make with Noah.
As we look at life under the rainbow tonight, may the Lord be pleased to reveal Himself and wrap up all that we have been considering in these studies. That is what the rainbow does; whether or not we get there depends upon Him.
As Ed also shared, when the flood was over and the ark came to rest on Mount Ararat, Noah and his family did not just hop out of the ark. Many, many days took place between the time the ark came to rest on the mountain and the time when the Lord told Noah and his family they could leave the ark. In fact, it was 215 days.
That is quite a long time to stay in an ark as it sits on top of a mountain. During those 215 days, there was no word from the Lord to Noah. Noah and his family sat under a silent heaven. God was not speaking.
So, what do you do when there is no word from God? When you are stuck on a mountain and nothing is happening, heaven is silent, you are trusting in the Lord, and you have learned a lot about the Lord—but it is doctrine, not Jesus? There you sit in a dark place.
We know the end of the story. We know that God finally told them to come out into a beautiful new world. But when the ark first came to rest on the mountain, Noah did not know the end of the story. He did not know what to do. But he did do something.
Let us read the record. I am going to ask if someone else would read it for us: Genesis 8:1-16.
But God remembered Noah, and all the beasts, and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided.
The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed; the rain from the heavens was restrained.
And the waters receded from the earth continually. At the end of 150 days the waters had abated.
In the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.
And the waters continued to abate until the tenth month; in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.
At the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made and sent forth a raven. It went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth.
Then he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground.
But the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her and brought her into the ark with him.
He waited another seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark.
And the dove came back to him in the evening, and behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth.
Then he waited another seven days and sent forth the dove, and she did not return to him anymore.
In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the waters were dried from off the earth. And Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry.
In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.
Then God said to Noah, “Go out from the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your sons’ wives with you.”
Okay, thank you. So what did Noah do in the ark for 215 days as he sat on top of the mountain with the flood now over? At first, when the ark came to rest on the mountain, he did nothing for two and a half months. Well, he waited. I guess that is doing something.
After those two and a half months of waiting, the land became visible to Noah and his family from the ark’s main window, which was very close to the top of the ark. But still, no word from God.
Then one and a half more months went by, and still they heard nothing from the Lord. So dear Noah decided to do something other than wait. He opened up the window and sent out a bird, and the bird he sent out was a raven.
The New American Standard Bible, in Genesis 8:7, says that when Noah sent out this raven, it flew here and there. But in the margin of the New American Standard Bible, it gives an alternate rendering: the raven went out, “going and returning.” So it seems like this raven flew all over the place, here and there, but every now and then it returned to the ark. Then one day, it did not return.
That did not seem to help Noah a whole lot, so he sent out another bird, this time a dove. The dove came right back. Noah took the dove into the ark, waited seven days, and then sent out the dove the second time. This time the dove came back with a freshly picked olive leaf in its beak. Noah took the dove back into the ark and waited seven more days.
After those seven days, he sent out the dove for the third time. This time the dove did not return. Still, God did not say a word to Noah. Birds coming and going.
So Noah waited another whole month. After that month, Noah took the covering off the top of the ark. Now Noah could see for a long distance, and he saw that the earth was all dried up. But still not knowing what to do, and not hearing anything from God as to what to do, Noah stayed inside the ark for one more month. I hope the months flew by. I do not know.
Then finally, God declared His will to Noah in Genesis 8:16 and told Noah to leave the ark.
Just like everything else in the Bible, Ed and I believe that the facts concerning the raven and the dove picture spiritual principles. The spiritual principles illustrated by the raven and the dove are particularly important to our look at Noah’s ark, because these principles become the Lord’s preparation in our lives for seeing what it means to live in union with Christ under the rainbow covenant.
The story of Noah’s ark comes to a climax when Noah and his family come out of the ark and live under the rainbow covenant. But you and I will never fully understand life with Jesus under the rainbow covenant until our hearts are prepared by the Lord with the principles illustrated by the raven and the dove. At least, that is how we see it.
When Noah put out these birds, he was not doing it to teach spiritual principles. He did not do it for spiritual reasons at all. He sent out these birds just to find out what was going on. But from the standpoint of Bible inspiration, there is a reason God recorded these facts.
We believe God, from behind the scenes, was guiding Noah’s actions here because God was writing a Bible in all this. Logically, Noah could have left the ark when it hit land and came to rest, and gone right into life under the rainbow. But that is not what the Lord did. He did not allow Noah to go right out from the ark to the rainbow. He gave the raven and the dove.
According to God’s will, Noah needed the experience of the raven and the dove before he went out to live life in union with God under the rainbow. We believe it is the same in the Christian life. We are not ready for life under the rainbow until, in our hearts, we learn the truths illustrated by the raven and the dove.
Earlier, we said that Noah was the apostle Paul of the Old Testament. Did we say that? I do not know if we said that. Did we strike that from our notes? I think—how did that get out? I do not know. But anyway, it is true.
Noah is the Old Testament apostle Paul. What I mean is that in the book of Romans we see the same truths as we see in Noah—Romans 6 through 8. Romans 6 through 8 is God’s full development of the truth we see in Noah.
We believe these birds picture what Paul writes about in Romans 7. Paul talks about the law of sin and death and the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. He talks about the old man and the new man. We believe those two truths are pictured in the raven and the dove.
Let us briefly look at these truths, beginning with the raven. Why did Noah choose a raven? Or, better question: Why did God allow Noah to choose a raven? Why did he not choose a bluebird, you know, or a hummingbird? Why the raven?
Because the raven fits perfectly with the principles the story is illustrating. In the Old Testament, the raven was declared by God to be an unclean animal. In Leviticus 11, God said, “You shall detest every raven; they are abhorrent.” I am sorry, raven fans.
My wife and Jan’s girl Chelsea are dyed-in-the-wool Raven fans. When they get together, all they discuss are the Ravens. Anyway, Proverbs 30 describes the raven as a bird that feeds on death—feeds on death.
So in the raven we see illustrated one main spiritual principle, and that is the principle the apostle Paul calls the old man. The raven is living by our own life, which by nature is that which disobeys the Lord. Every Christian alive and dead has known the experience of the raven.
In the record, the Holy Spirit tells us that the raven was restless. It had a restless nature. It went back and forth; it flew here and there. Although it does not say it, we think it is very possible that the raven flew from carcass to carcass. At this time, there may have been a lot of death in the world, and this is probably how the raven survived outside the ark without dry land: by feeding on death.
So the raven becomes a picture, and a good picture, of the sinful nature of man. As Christians, although we have been saved by the blood of Jesus, although we are one hundred percent forgiven of our sins, our sinful natures remain. By nature, we are restless, and we feed on death.
Romans 7:18 says:
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh;
For the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.
For the good that I wish, I do not do;
But I practice the very evil that I do not wish.
Every Christian who is serious with the Lord has seen this in their life. This is the raven experience. This is what our lives look like when we do the living apart from trusting Jesus to live His life through us. This is our life, and it is beyond repair.
It is a raven. It will always be a raven. Whenever I live, you will see a raven. Whenever you live, you will see a raven. It is against the Lord; it will always be against the Lord.
More Bible study will not change it. More prayer will not change it. More Christian fellowship will not change it. The more we try to change it, the more that shows we do not know, or do not believe, what God tells us about ourselves.
Noah needed to learn, as you and I need to learn, that if we are ever going to enter into life under the rainbow and enjoy sweet union with Jesus, we need to see that what makes me me, and what makes you you, is a raven. On this side of heaven, it will always be a raven.
It is a glorious day in a Christian’s life when we believe God and see that the raven cannot be changed, and we say with the apostle Paul, “Nothing good dwells in me.” That is not bad news. That is good news when we learn it.
Praise God for the day when a Christian stops trying to please God with his own life, and stops thinking that God will change his nature if he just has more faith, becomes more religious, memorizes more Scripture, makes more promises, or just tries a little harder.
No. That which is flesh is flesh; it will always be flesh. It is not God’s will to change your life. It is God’s will to replace your life—replace it with the life of His Son.
I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.
God knows that only by the life of His Son in us can we obey Him.
Hold that, because by way of preparation we also need to learn the lesson of the dove. In Genesis 8:9, the first time the dove is released, it comes back empty. It goes out, flies around, finds nothing. The second time the dove is released, it returns with an olive leaf in its beak.
Why did it do that? It was not for food. Doves do not eat olive leaves. The dove came back with a leaf because it wanted to make a nest. That is why birds carry sticks and leaves in their mouths.
When the dove went out, it was looking for its home. But it did not find its home. Its home had been destroyed in the flood, illustrating the truth that old things passed away.
The dove came back to the ark, saying, in a sense, “There is nothing for me out here. I flew all around. I cannot find it. The world is vanity. It has nothing in it that can ever bring my heart true contentment.”
The lesson of the raven is, “In our flesh dwells no good thing.” The lesson of the dove is, “The world has nothing for me.”
But in coming back with the leaf, the dove showed Noah that there was hope—hope of a home even after the flood, even after God’s judgment. There was life out there. God was moving. God was working. God was restoring.
Once we have seen, by the grace of God, that our own life cannot live the Christian life, and once we see that nothing in this world can meet our heart need, but only Jesus satisfies, then we are ready. We are ready to enjoy life under the rainbow.
Again, I am not saying that Noah understood any of this. Maybe these truths apart from the picture, because he was a godly man. But God wrote this mainly for you. He wrote it mainly for me.
The dove not coming back was this final message to Noah: “Noah, now you are ready. Now it is time to come out of the ark. Now it is time to come out, where freedom is, into a new world under the rainbow.
“Come out knowing that you are a raven, and that will never change, so stop trying to change yourself. Come out knowing that nothing in the world can meet the needs of your heart, so stop looking to the world, or anyone in the world, to meet the need of your heart.
“But come out knowing that there is hope for you. There is no life in you, but there is hope for you. There is life in Jesus Christ for you under the rainbow.”
So let us look at the rainbow, which is really the best part of this whole series. When Ed finished this afternoon, we went as far as the picture of the ark could take us. The ark pictures the Lord Jesus, but that picture can never go as far as the spiritual reality. Jesus is the reality, and He is always greater than any picture of Him.
The ark is a wonderful picture of Christ, but to go forward in the truths that come next in this story, we need now to leave the ark, just as Noah and his family had to leave the ark.
Someone could ask, “Well, if the ark is such a wonderful picture of Christ, why did they leave it? Why did they not just live inside the ark?” The ark pictured Jesus in His finished work on the cross, but that is as far as the ark can go in picturing the Lord.
In order to see more of Christ, we leave the ark and come to the next picture of Christ in the Bible record, which is the rainbow. We are not leaving Christ when we leave the ark. We are leaving the ark as a picture of Christ, and with the Holy Spirit assisting us, we are going to see Christ now as pictured in the rainbow.
Would someone read Genesis 8:18-21? Out loud. Anyone?
So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him.
Every beast, every creeping thing, and every bird—everything that moves on the earth—went out by their families from the ark.
Then Noah built an altar to the Lord, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
The Lord smelled the soothing aroma; and the Lord said to Himself, “I will never again curse the ground on account of man, for the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth; and I will never again destroy every living thing, as I have done.”
Okay, thank you. We are going to get to the rainbow covenant, but we need to see from these verses that after the flood God adopted a new posture toward man—a new position.
Try to put yourself in Noah’s shoes here. Try to imagine with me what Noah must have been thinking and feeling in that moment when God told him to come out of the ark, and he came out. I think his emotions must have been running high, just like they run high in the heart of every believer when they first realize that they have been saved from the wrath of God, that Jesus took the brunt of the storm, and they have been delivered from hell into a new creation.
I think Noah came out of the ark knowing full well that he had been spared by the grace of God. When he first came out and stood there in a beautiful new world, which he knew he did not deserve, the first thing he did was build an altar to the Lord.
That is all you can do. What are you going to do when you realize that you have been delivered, when you deserved to go down with everybody else, that Christ has gone to the cross for you and paid the debt for your sin, and all that you ever need for time and eternity will be freely supplied for you because of what Christ has done for you at the cross? What do you do? You have to worship. That is all he could do. “Thank You, Lord.”
So Noah and his family came out, offering sacrifices and thanksgiving to the Lord. We do not know exactly how many animals he offered up to God on this day, but we know it was many. Genesis 8:20 says that Noah took of every clean animal and offered it up to the Lord. That was the seventh animal that was brought on. That is lots of animals. I think there were lots and lots—thousands—of animals sacrificed that day.
When Noah first came out of the ark, on his mind was not building a house. On his mind was not planning a garden for food to eat. No, the first thing on his mind was worshiping the Lord.
We know these animal sacrifices picture the Lord Jesus, right? Any animal that was ever laid on any altar in the Old Testament pictures Christ in His sacrificial death on the cross.
In Genesis 8:21, we see the main point in terms of these animal sacrifices. When Noah offered these animals, the smoke from these offerings was considered by the Lord to be a soothing aroma. The King James Version uses the words a sweet savor. In the original language, the word is actually rest.
With the flood over, these animals—these pictures of the Lord Jesus—are laid on the altar. As the smell of the sacrifice rises up to the Lord, God is satisfied. God is pleased. His heart is at rest, and He is rejoicing.
When the story of the flood opened, it began with God grieving. But when the story ends, it ends with God happy—God satisfied. In our last study, we saw man at rest in the ark, and now here we see God at rest.
The goal is never man resting. That is great, but that is not the goal. The goal is God resting. It is not our happiness; it is God’s happiness. We praise God for our rest in Him, but more foundational is His rest in us. He delights in you, right?
We can only be truly happy when we know that God is happy with us. Notice, it was not the sight of Noah coming out of the ark that made God happy. It was not the fact that his family survived the flood that made God happy. What made the Lord happy? It was the sight of the sacrifice.
We do not read that God was happy until the sacrifice was given. When God smelled the sacrifice, that is when He decided to adopt this new position toward His people. That is when He decided to make them a promise, and that is when He decided to put His rainbow in the sky as a sign of that promise.
When God saw the sacrifice, that is when He placed upon Himself this eternal and binding vow: the vow to deal differently with His people. To Noah, of course, the sacrifice was an act of worship. To God, it was that, but it was so much more than that.
At the beginning of the story, God looked at the world, looked at His children, and His heart was grief-stricken—so much so that He repented that He had made man, as if it was all a big mistake.
But now, at the end of the story, what a difference. God smells the sacrifice, and His heart is satisfied. His heart is at rest. What happened? Why the difference?
Here is what happened: God took His eyes off man and put them on the sacrifice. Now, with His eyes on the sacrifice—the Lord Jesus—in so many words, He says, “I think I am going to look here from now on. From now on, I am going to keep My eyes on the sacrifice. If I look at My people, it will only be through the sacrifice, through the Lord Jesus.”
This is what we mean by a new posture in the heart of God toward His people. Before the flood, God’s heart was full of grief. He saw man in all his wickedness. Now, after the flood, looking at the sacrifice, His heart is happy. He is at rest, and He says, “Never again will I do what I just did.”
Look at Genesis 9:11. God says:
I will establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood, neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth.
Genesis 9:15 says:
I will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and never again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh.
Why does God say He will never again destroy man with a universal flood? Is it because in the flood sin was wiped clean from the face of the earth? No, we know that is not true.
Look carefully with me again at what God says in Genesis 8:21. This is the reason He gives for why He will never again send a universal flood and destroy man:
I will never again curse the ground on account of man, for the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth.
At first that sounds like a strange reason. God says, “I will never again destroy man with a flood.” You know why? Because man is sinful. That is what He says. His reason for not sending another universal flood is because man’s heart is evil continually.
The flood did not change the heart of man. Man’s heart was wicked before the flood and is still wicked after the flood. The flood did not change man’s nature. From his youth up, every fiber of his being is rebellious against God. All of the terrors of a universal flood had not changed man—not even a little bit.
God knows that man’s condition can never be remedied by a rod, by a law, or by some judgment. Therefore, the very reason for which God judged His people and sent the flood in the first place now becomes the reason why He will never do it again.
His reason for judgment becomes an argument for His mercy. He says, “I will never do it again.” He does not mean, “I will never do it again because man does not deserve it.” He says, “I will never do it again because from now on I am taking on a new position. I am going to keep My eye on the sacrifice.”
“Every time I look at My people, I will look at them through the sacrifice. I will not destroy them. I will see them in Jesus.”
In the book of Isaiah, we read of a time when God’s people, just like in Genesis, turned their hearts from the Lord. The Lord took it as a test upon Himself as to what He would do. Would He send another universal judgment, or would He stay true to the covenant He had made with man after the flood?
Listen as I read Isaiah 54:9-10:
For this is like the days of Noah to Me,
When I swore that the waters of Noah
Should not flood the earth again;
So I have sworn that I will not be angry with you,
Nor will I rebuke you.
For the mountains may be removed and the hills may shake,
But My lovingkindness will not be removed from you,
And My covenant of peace will not be shaken,
Says the Lord Who will have compassion on you.
After the flood, we see God’s attitude toward His people change, and God vows to have an irreversible disposition of grace toward you and toward me—toward His people.
Yes, He would chastise His people after this, but that would be for the purpose of restoration, of bringing them back. But never again would He just utterly destroy them. Never again would He take His eyes off the sacrifice. That is His eternal promise.
According to the record, God gave two signs to illustrate His new position in His heart toward His people. I am calling it a new position, a new attitude. You know what I do not mean: I am not saying that God changed. No, our God is immutable. He never changes.
But to communicate to us that He is pleased with the sacrifice—His Son—and to communicate that He is pleased with all who trust in His Son, these are the words He uses:
“God says, ‘I looked at man, and it broke My heart. Now I look at Christ, and I am forever satisfied. From now on, I will only deal with My people through Christ, and all those in Christ will receive from Me unconditional grace, unconditional forgiveness. That is My promise, and it will never have an end.’”
God gave two signs to reveal His new position of unconditional grace. The first is in Genesis 8:22. God created the seasons: summer, winter, seedtime, and harvest.
God said, “Every year, I am going to send these seasons upon the earth without fail. You will be able to count upon them, and you will be able to make plans according to them. They are My sign—My unconditional promise.”
God will never look upon the earth and say, “Man is just too sinful, so this year you are not going to have a summer.” No. How man lives will not change God’s promise. It is not based on what man does or does not do. It is based on the faithfulness of God and the sacrifice.
I am talking about your life and my life. Sin still has consequences, and it still grieves the heart of God. Do not misunderstand. There will be hell for those who refuse His grace. But God’s dealings with His people have changed from a position of “wipe them off the face of the earth” to mercy. Mercy.
God is pledged that no matter how rebellious His people become, He will not send another flood on the earth. He is going to remain faithful to His new position. He is going to deal with His people—you and me—in grace. Why? The sacrifice. The Lord Jesus.
The second sign is the far greater sign, according to me, and it is the rainbow covenant. So let us read Genesis 9:8-17. Get ready, because this is amazing.
Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying, “Now behold, I Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your descendants after you; and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.
I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood, neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth.”
God said, “This is the sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all successive generations; I set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth.
It shall come about, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud, and I will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and never again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh.
When the bow is in the cloud, I will look upon it, to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”
And God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant which I have established between Me and all flesh that is on the earth.”
Thank you. So now God says, “I have a new direction. I am not going to look at My people outside of Christ. I am going to keep My eyes on the sacrifice. I am going to look at Jesus and be at rest.”
“To give you a sign of this new direction, I am putting My bow in the clouds.”
To really enter into this, we need to try to put ourselves in the shoes of Noah and see the rainbow from his point of view. We are so familiar with the rainbow that it is easy for us to miss the spiritual truth it illustrates.
When we read this, we automatically think, rainbow. But notice in Genesis 9:13, God does not say rainbow. He says, “I set My bow in the clouds.” To us, this registers rainbow, but to Noah, on that day, it only meant one thing: a bow was a weapon.
The Hebrew word for bow here is the same word used throughout the Bible for bow and arrow. The bow was a weapon of war.
It is amazing what God is saying here. He says, “I am changing My attitude toward My people, and to show them this, I am hanging My weapon of judgment—My bow—in the sky.”
Notice, God’s weapon is empty. There are no arrows in God’s bow because all the arrows have been spent. You know Who got them? The Lord Jesus on the cross. He took our arrows.
God is saying, “My people, I am not mad at you anymore. The war is over. I am going to hang My weapon in the clouds and turn it into one of the most beautiful things you can ever see.”
Brothers, this is what the rainbow covenant is all about. Because of the sacrifice of Jesus, God is not angry with you anymore. God is not angry with me anymore. The instrument of His judgment is at rest.
After the flood, when a cloud came into view, I can imagine it would not have brought happy memories for Noah. At the sight of a cloud, he may have thought to himself, “Oh no. Is God angry? Is it all going to happen again? This time, will I find grace in His eyes?”
A cloud could have been a very scary thing for Noah. But no more, because there was an empty bow in that cloud.
Now, when a cloud came into view, Noah could gather his grandchildren and say, “Children, see that cloud? Let me tell you what happened one day. Let me tell you about the bow, about Who our God is, how He loves each one of you unconditionally.
“Children, the bow shows us that God is our friend, not our enemy. If you sin, you have an Advocate. We have a Redeemer. All of our sins have fallen upon Him, and He brings pleasure to God’s heart.”
What does it mean, then, to live under the rainbow covenant? It means to live with a God Who is happy with you. Exactly.
It means to live with a God Who has declared that His faithfulness to you will never end—a God Who has promised to look at you from now on only through the blood of His Son.
In Genesis 9:16, God says:
When the bow is in the cloud, I will look upon it, to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature that is on the earth.
Notice, it does not say God has put His bow in the clouds that we might see it and remember the covenant. It is not that we might see it. Of course, we do see it, and in seeing it we worship Him.
But the bow in the clouds is not for us to remember. God says, “When I see it, I will remember.” It is not for our memory; it is for God’s memory. Not that God could forget—He is saying this just to emphasize, for our sakes, the truth.
Usually, when we see a rainbow, we say, “Remember God’s promise. It is a sign for us.” But that is not what God says. It is not a sign for us; it is a sign for Him.
The point is that this everlasting covenant of grace does not depend upon our remembering it. It depends on God’s will never to forget it.
Sometimes, when life gets hard, you and I may forget that God loves us. But God will never forget that He loves us.
Sometimes, when unpleasant things happen to us, we forget that God’s will is perfect, and perfect for us. But God will not forget that His will is perfect, and perfect for us.
Sometimes, because of our sin and our wickedness, we may despair and wonder, “How can God forgive me time and time and time again? I am so sinful. It never ends.” But God will never wonder how He can forgive you time and time and time again.
He has hung His bow in the sky. He has promised to deal with us in Christ, and He will never forget that. He loves His Son, and because He loves His Son, He loves you. Because He will never stop loving His Son, He will never stop loving you.
Brothers, in those times when we forget that He cares for us with all of His heart, He will not forget. He will never forget. This is the covenant of the rainbow: that God always remembers His grace toward us in the person of His Son.
What does it mean to live under the rainbow covenant? It means that throughout life we may constantly offer up to Him the sacrifice, hold up to the Father the Lord Jesus, and not have to say, “Oh, God, please look at what I have done. Look at my faith. Look at my surrender. Look at my service to You. Oh, please be satisfied with me. Look at my holiness. I am trying really hard.”
No, we never have to rely on what comes from us to secure God’s acceptance, God’s approval, and God’s blessing. In all things we can say, “Lord, look to the sacrifice. Look to the Lord Jesus.
“Thank You that Your acceptance of me is not based on what I do or how faithful I am, but on what Jesus has done and how faithful He is. That will never change, and therefore Your love for me will never change. Thank You.”
Believe this. Ask God to settle your heart in this. To live under the rainbow covenant means liberty. It means freedom with God, your Creator.
Noah and his family were now out of that crowded ark. They were living under God’s grace. They had room to live and room to enjoy life with their God, Who loved them with all of His heart.
They were not thinking that every time they messed up, God was going to hurt them, give them cancer, or put them in a car accident. They were free to live knowing that God is their absolute best friend.
This is what it means to live under the rainbow: to know that all of your dealings with God, and all of His dealings with you, are based upon the finished work of Jesus Christ, and that there is therefore now no condemnation. Never, never, no condemnation.
It has become quite popular among believers in our day to dig up their past and try to deal with their past so they can live a fruitful life. But all we ever need to know about our past is that God has dealt with it, and it is under the blood of Jesus.
Just like Noah, God wants us to put a period there and move on, for heaven’s sake—to come out and live in a brand-new creation, to live comfortable before God with your past, no matter how ugly your past has been.
Live before God comfortable with your present, even though you are not perfect and you will always be a sinner until heaven. God is calling us away from the life of condemnation.
It is over. It is forgiven. It is done with. It is over. It has been buried in the flood, buried in the cross. God is now your friend, and all He allows in your life, He allows as your friend, not as your judge.
This is the rainbow covenant. God has promised to love you, to protect you, to forgive you always, no matter what. One day, you are going to wake up just like Jesus. Just like Jesus.
Jesus took God’s anger for us so we can live in God’s love and faithfulness.
It is amazing how, when we see a rainbow, it always instills wonder in us, does it not? We never seem to tire of seeing rainbows. Boy, if you see a double rainbow—whew—that is like the cherry on top.
When we see a rainbow, we want everyone to see it with us, right? We immediately call to people and say, “Come on out. Look at the rainbow. You have got to see this. It is beautiful, beautiful.”
Ed and I want everyone to see the rainbow—not the illustration, but the truth. The rainbow covenant is all about Jesus, our Substitute. Not only our Substitute in His death, praise God for that, but also our Substitute in His perfect life.
Jesus died so I do not have to die. Now Jesus lives so I do not have to live. Right? In my place, He did the dying. In my place, He will do the living.
So I do not have to try to die, and I do not have to try to live the Christian life. The Father counts His death as my death, and He counts His life as my life. Is that heaven or what?
I do not live. I live, yet not I; Christ lives in me. We should just say, “Lord, live. Live, Lord Jesus, live. Live in me, live through me, live for me.”
Life under the rainbow is all about living free in God’s grace through the person of Christ, raised above all that displeases the Lord, under a rainbow where we find acceptance in Him, where we find life in Him—a life that pleases God.
Our life does not please God. His life does. You have His life. You please God.
One more thing, and I will close with it. I cannot end without mentioning the last time we see a rainbow in the Bible: Revelation 4:3.
The apostle John had a vision of our Lord Jesus on the throne, and we read that:
He that sat was to look upon like a jasper stone and a sardius in appearance;
And there was a rainbow round about the throne, like an emerald in appearance.
In the book of Revelation, when all things have been summed up in the person of Christ, look at what happens to the rainbow. It is now a circle around the throne. In the center of the circle is the Lord Jesus, and He is on the throne at the very center of the rainbow.
When I was a little boy, they told me there was a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Well, they were right. They were right. I found the pot of gold, but it is not at the end of the rainbow. It is at the center of the rainbow. It is our dear Lord Jesus.
We all own a pot of gold in Christ.
It is our prayer that the Lord may take us all forward this weekend in our union with Him through these precious truths that we have considered in this amazing story of Noah and the ark.
Heavenly Father, how thankful we are. As ages roll upon the ages, our hearts will not tire. Our mouths will not cease to sing of the love that we have for our Savior because He first loved us.
We praise Him, and of our own accord, with no one forcing us, with no force from You in our hearts, we offer You praise and adoration. You are worthy. In Jesus’ name, amen.