In the Chicagoland area the past few days, the clouds have been magnificent. It seems I look out my window, or go for a walk, and find myself staring at them, marveling. They have had such depth, such character, like a perfect landscape painted across the sky. And their colors have been varied and absolutely beautiful.

It made me think of the first clouds to cover the earth. As someone who believes in the Biblical account of the flood, I hold that it had never rained before that catastrophic event. I’ve heard that, without the rain, in the greenhouse effect that encased the earth before the flood, clouds would not have formed. That got me thinking. If it took the flood to get clouds, what does that say? mean? The majesty of clouds that we enjoy today would not have come without God’s judgment on the people in Noah’s day. Good comes out of bad. Restoration. Promise.

Sometimes we don’t understand our hard times, the difficulties, even the negative consequences that happen in our lives. Perhaps it’s more than understanding why those things happen, but looking to the God who restores people to himself, who seeks to reconcile the world to himself. Rain was a bad thing, now it is a good thing (in moderate quantities), but we have God’s promise that he will never flood the earth again. The rainbow is the sign of that promise. And the clouds, in all their glory, remind us that God brings good out of bad. He is in control and we can trust him because he is good.