God winking at you

Some years ago, after my husband had died, I was driving the 50kms to work.  I had with me the three teenage children of our workman who I took to the High School in Naracoorte.  It was a showery, winter’s morning with the sun shining intermittently.  Things were not going well for us at that time.  Interest rates on our loans were still climbing and the price of wool had fallen so that you could hardly give it away. I was having trouble paying the bills and wages.

I noticed a partial rainbow in the sky away across a paddock to my right.  As I turned to look at it, the thought crossed my mind that this was God winking at me.  I was horrified at the thought and quickly turned back to look at the road.  This was totally ridiculous.  God doesn’t wink at people!  Where on earth did such a thought come from.  I tried to block it out. The thought persisted, though, and I could not resist turning back to look again at the rainbow.  I realized that I was smiling and wondered if the three teenagers had noticed.  I tried to keep a straight face so that they wouldn’t.

As we drove on, we saw many partial rainbows.  At every bend in the road there seemed to be a new one.  I had never seen anything like it.  At last we came up over a hill to go down into Naracoorte and there was a complete double rainbow over the town.  It was spectacular.  As I worked with people during the day, I asked them if they had noticed the rainbows. Several said that they had seen the one over the town.  I was careful NOT to mention the idea of God winking.

After work it was my custom to go to the home of a friend for a cup of coffee before heading home.  I started to tell her about the rainbows and a strange look came on her face so I asked her what the matter was.  She replied, “Yesterday, when you were here, you were so down that I asked God to give you a rainbow to remind you of how much God loves you”.

Rev Julianne Parker

(for full sermon see sermons page)