The Bow in the Cloud

"I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between Me and the earth." -Genesis 9:13

It is the will of God that human beings should get into moral relationship with Him, and His covenants are for this purpose. ‘Why does not God save me?’ He has saved me, but I have not entered into relationship with Him. “Why does not God do this and that?’ He has done it, the point is—Will I step into covenant relationship? All the great blessings of God are finished and complete, but they are not mine until I enter into relationship with Him on the basis of His covenant.

Waiting for God is incarnate unbelief, it means that I have no faith in Him; I wait for Him to do something in me that I may trust in that. God will not do it, because that is not the basis of the God-and-man relationship. Man has to go out of himself in his covenant with God as God goes out of Himself in His covenant with man. It is a question of faith in God—the rarest thing; we have faith only in our feelings. I do not believe God unless He will give me something in my hand whereby I may know I have it, then I say—‘Now I believe.’ There is no faith there. “Look unto Me, and be ye saved.”

When I have really transacted business with God on His covenant and have let go entirely, there is no sense of merit, no human ingredient in it at all, but a complete overwhelming sense of being brought into union with God, and the whole thing is transfigured with peace and joy.

Chambers, O. (1993). My utmost for his highest : Selections for the year (NIV edition.). Westwood, NJ: Barbour and Co.