“I have set My rainbow in the clouds, and it will be a sign of My covenant with you and with all the earth. When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, and I will remember My covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” Genesis 9:13-16

Indigo

I learned to recite the colors of the rainbow when I was very young. They went “red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple.” But when I was a little bit older, I had a teacher who told me something I had never heard before. She said that even though the rainbow is commonly known to have six colors, it actually contains seven. Apparently, hidden between the blue and the purple is a color called indigo.  

I was immediately fascinated by this mysterious, often hidden color. Never would I look at the rainbow the same way again. As a grownup, indigo is one of my favorite colors, and not just because it is so pretty. To me, the color indigo is a promise. It’s not just the promise of the entire rainbow, hidden in plain sight for so many years, but it’s also the promise that God is still in control. This world at times gets dark. It can feel like evil is in charge. There are people who have tried to use the rainbow as a symbol of their own agenda. But they are using a six-color rainbow, not a seven-color rainbow, and therefore not a complete rainbow.

Often things that are evil are actually just very close to the truth, but off by a very little bit. The six-color rainbow is ALMOST correct. It doesn’t make sense, though. Only the seven-color rainbow makes sense, and here is why. Orange is located between the two colors that create it, which are red and yellow. Green is located between the two colors that create it, which are yellow and blue. So it doesn’t make sense to simply end that with purple. Wouldn’t the logical rule of the first two-thirds of the rainbow dictate the last third, as well? Wouldn’t there need to be a color in between the blue and the purple as well? The perfect mix of blue and purple is indigo. Including the color indigo in the rainbow leaves us with a seven-color rainbow.

Seven is often a number that symbolizes completion or perfection in the Bible. Isn’t that incredible? God did not do anything randomly. He has a purpose for everything.

“Dear heavenly Father, we praise You that You alone are in control. Thank You for creating rainbows. You alone define them and what they mean. Thank You for the way You have perfectly ordered everything in Your creation. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.”