Rainbows

Last night we had a sweet surprise. My husband called while he was on the road home from work and warned us that if it wasn’t raining where we were, it soon would be, so we all hustled to pick up things in the yard and feed the animals before the rain hit. My middle son was out feeding the dogs when I felt the first drop of rain and I hollered at him to hurry in before he got soaked. He started running immediately and it seemed he was actually running just in front of the rain. I have never seen him run so fast! We laughingly ran up on the deck and through the sliding door into the kitchen just as the heavens broke loose. The three little ones joined us and we all stood at the door watching the rain pound the deck boards, glad that we had managed to get everything done and could now just enjoy the rainstorm. With dinner smelling so delicious in the crockpot, the prospect of a rainy evening was not half bad. The kids always love to use rain as an excuse to make a fort, or play a board game, or both.

However, the rain did not last very long. Only about ten minutes, maybe. There was still plenty of light outside once it was over. In the spring, summer, and fall, any shred of daylight means that my kids will want to be outside, and the prospect of fresh puddles of water to splash in certainly makes that sound even more appealing! Don’t you just love (generic) crocs and galoshes? They are so easy to clean up that you can feel free to let the kids just be kids without worrying about the mess you have to clean up later on! Anyway, as we gathered their shoes back up to put them on, my oldest daughter noticed that there was a rainbow forming over the neighbor’s cornfield, stretching over our house and pastures and ending in the woods beyond. My goodness, it was BIG and beautiful. Absolutely brilliant.

What is even neater is that just last week, after I was put on orders by my OB to "limit your activities, etc.," I decided to use my extended hours sitting in my bedroom at the computer to start working on our dream of writing children’s books. We started by writing one for the littlest child, then the next oldest, and so on. We had worked our way up to the third youngest and you can guess what her story is about from the title of this post…a rainbow! And not just any rainbow, but a rainbow specifically over our house, Blessing Farm! How much fun is that!? It was like a little present from God. Just a reminder that like that quote, "Yesterday’s history, tomorrow’s a mystery, but today is a gift…that’s why we call it the present" so eloquently, yet simply states…we need to appreciate each day for what it is. A gift from God.

In any case, the kids did not hesitate to jump into the moment and start appreciating things. All three little ones immediately ran outside in their bare feet to jump in the tiny puddles on the deck, oohing and ahhing over the rainbow. My middle one, ever helpful, ran in search of my elusive camera so we could capture the moment with a photo for the book. While he was looking in the car for the camera, a second, not as bountiful, rainbow formed right under the first and we were awestruck. We stood there, reveling in the impressive display. After a few moments, and quite a few snapshots, we noticed that the second rainbow had faded, and that a small section of the larger one had begun to disappear. It was the oddest thing to see bold and clear colors arcing over the forest, and another leg of colors arcing from the farmland, then this crystal clear gap in the center. Within another minute or so, the whole thing was gone and we decided to go back inside since it had started to lightly rain again.

What the whole thing made me think of this morning was how God used the rainbow to promise Noah that he would never destroy the earth and its creatures again using a flood of waters. The rainbow is a symbol of God’s promises. Then it crossed my mind that like the rainbow over our house, the rainbows, or the blessings in our lives, sometimes come in bountiful spleandor, with clear, vivid colors. Sometimes you even get more than one at a time…What a miracle that is! Other times you get one with a few holes in it, and that is harder for us to deal with, but still worth appreciating. Even more often, you see nothing at all, and that is when we falter. But what we need to remember is that even when we don’t have visible evidence through a beautiful rainbow, the colors are still there. They don’t go away just because we don’t see them in that way. God’s promises to us are always there, too, even when the way seems hard. He loves us and is with us and wants us to be with Him for eternity, so we need to rejoice in those things He gives us, even when times are tough and the rainbows, or blessings, are unclear.

The funny thing about the way God works is that He often uses those rainstorms to bring out the rainbows in our lives. I think that is what I need to remember for today. Instead of focusing on the storm, focus on the rainbows ahead, and enjoy the gift of the day. Enjoy your day…it’s time I went to enjoy mine!