The story of Noah and the flood is well known – God observes humanity’s sin; God decides to destroy humanity, except for Noah; God instructs Noah to build the ark, etc. (See Genesis 6-9 for the full story.)

For the purposes of this post, I want to fast-forward to the end – Genesis 9. There, God covenants with Noah, his family, and all the creatures of the earth, saying, “Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood” (v.11, NIV). God then says, “This is the sign of the covenant… my rainbow in the clouds” (vv.12-13).

All of this is very familiar. And like so many familiar stories, it is easy to miss peculiarities like the fact that God says twice, “When I see the rainbow, I will remember my covenant” (my paraphrase, cf. vv.15-16).

God will remember? Well, that’s interesting, considering God is omniscient. Even more interesting that He twice frames the rainbow as for His remembrance and not ours. That is what struck me a couple of weeks ago as I prepared to lead a small group through this chapter.

God doesn’t need the reminder – we do! Over and over and over again. We need the reminders of who we are and who God is and how good He’s been to us when we don’t deserve it.

Not only that, but I think there’s another important lesson here to be taken to heart; namely, setting signs to remind us of truth – of who we are and who God is and how good He’s been to us when we don’t deserve it. Because those are the things we need to be reminded of, over and over and over again.