Here's what we're wondering about:
Genesis 9:8-13
Do you know the story of Noah's Ark? A very long time ago, God was displeased with people who had turned away from him, and who were making very bad choices.
There was a good man named Noah, who followed God. God told Noah to build a gigantic boat - an ark - and to fill it with pairs of every creature on earth. When the boat was finished and the creatures were loaded, Noah and his family also went on board. And then God made it rain - for 40 days and 40 nights.
It rained for so long and so hard that the water raised up and up, for months, and covered the earth. Everything and everyone under the water was washed away, forever.
At last the rain stopped. The flood waters lowered back to lakes, rivers, and seas. The land was dry again and a rainbow filled the sky. Noah, his family, and the ark full of creatures had survived. It was a time for new beginnings.
Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him,
‘As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark.
I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.’
God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations:
I have set my bow in the clouds,
and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.'
A covenant is a promise - an agreement; an everlasting, unbreakable alliance between two groups. (Sometimes one of the two groups is stronger than the other. Who is stronger here? God is.) God is making a promise that he will never again use a flood to destroy the whole earth.
