RAIN- it changes things

As with most places across the country Missouri has been in desperate need for rain this entire summer. Or so everyone had been telling me. Of course, with me only just having moved here anything, everything looks greener than Las Vegas. They tell me that the landscape is dry but hey, they have TREES. Trees people! Not just one, but a ton of green leafy tress. I had almost forgotten what those looked like. And we have not one but TWO lakes here in Maryville. So, adjusting to that being "dry" took some time. 

Upon settling in a little more, and still not having seen a real rainfall I began to notice the dryness. The grass was a little too crunchy. In the trips that Zach and I had been making to the lake to fish every few days we began to notice that nothing was biting and the water was slowly dissipating with each passing day.  

Dry. 

In need of fresh rain to awaken the landscape.

And then it came. 

Last week it came. Rain poured out of the sky for hours upon hours. The dark clouds filled the sky. Sometimes it was just a steady drizzle, then a downpour followed by heavy, deep, soaking-into the earth rain. We kept our windows open. We laid up just listening to it all around us. For two days, the rain came. We rejoiced knowing the land was dry, this was what we needed. 

After it finally came to a stop and the skies cleared up we assessed what was left in the rain's wake. Everything smelled new, looked new. The air was crisp. The birds were literally singing, almost rejoicing in what had just occurred. My flower pot looked like it had been brought back to life from the downpour. In the moments of the torrential rain storm I saw the power held within the drops of water. 

Uncontrollable power that washed away the dirt and the uncleanliness. 

In those days I saw that water rejuvenates, brings life, makes things grow, clears the pollution and stagnant air from within the city, gives living things hope, causes them to rejoice. As it falls from the sky it replenishes the land, the lakes and the streams. This gave me just a new picture of why we sing worship songs about the Spirit raining down on us. It helped me to better understand how Jesus is the Living water 

"If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink." John 7:37b

He is Life! He gives Hope! 

He cleanses the dirt from within us and replaces it with newness! 

At times in my life I have not realized how dry I have been. How in lack of the living Water I have allowed myself to become. How I have removed myself from the rainfall I so desperately need because I try to become my own rain. I look to myself to provide something which can only be given by my Creator and Redeemer. 

"Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." John 4:13-14

When I don't recognize my dryness, my deficiencies, how DESPERATELY I am in need of rain, I sometimes view the rain, when it comes (because He WILL come, He WILL rain down on you) as a nuisance. Something that slows me down, that gets in the way, causing me to be late for MY plans. It creates mud, and messes up my hair, and is just plain annoying.  

This is where I have been. Not until recently recognizing that the Rain that has been pounding all around me it what I need. Sometimes, I don't understand. I don't see the big picture. But, I am learning to trust that the Giver of Life, the Creator all things recognizes and KNOWS and cares about my dryness. He brings the rain, despite the pain, questions and confusion it sometimes brings, to remove the dirt and uncleanliness in my life. To bring hope, and restoration and the newness I so desperately crave. 

"Faith must be tested, because it can only become your intimate possession through conflict." - Oswald Chambers 

Thankful for Jesus, The Living Water.