Put a Bow on It

February 21, 2021; The First Sunday of Lent: Genesis 9:8–17

Put a bow on it.

That’s a phrase with a few different implications, depending on how we use it. It makes me think of the first US war I remember, the Gulf War. And there were these yellow ribbons and bows that had started popping up all around the neighborhood, on mailboxes and draped around tree trunks and slapped on bumper stickers. You probably know the phrase that accompanied it: Support the Troops.

As a kid, the yellow ribbons and bows were as unfamiliar as going to war at all. But we…