1 Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. 2 The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands. 3 Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.4 “But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. 5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.6 “Whoever sheds human blood,     by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God     has God made mankind.7 As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you 10 and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”17 So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”REFLECTIONSWritten by Sam DarmoIn verse 1, after God saved Noah’s family through the ark, he blessed them with the same words he said to Adam and Eve in Genesis 1:28: “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.” Like Adam and Eve, God gave Noah’s family some simple rules to follow in the rebooted creation after the flood. He warned them not to commit murder like Cain did to Abel his own brother.And God made a covenant with all life on the earth not to destroy it again through a flood like He did with Noah’s generation. Every time we see a rainbow, we can remember that God set it in the sky as a sign to remind all people of His mercy in not destroying us as we deserve.This covenant did not depend on Noah’s descendants obeying his commands. It was a covenant that God made to preserve people until Jesus came and paid the price to reconcile us back to God and bring us into his family for all time (Col 1.22).QUESTIONKids, ask your parents or guardians: What does it mean for God to make a promise (covenant) with us? And what can we remember when we see a rainbow?ABOUT THE AUTHORSam Darmo is an Assistant Minister with our Assyrian and Arabic churches, as well as our Fairfield English Morning Church.