Nourishing Rain

"Be patient, then, brothers and sisters, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop, patiently waiting for the autumn and spring rains. You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near."

-James 5:7-8

It has been a while since they've danced white.  The dancer's journey, now, takes many of them deep, down into the ground where they quench the thirst of the lush green life sprouting with the spring.  Others rage high and strong through the stream's passage to faraway places where, they will water plants of a different forest.

  With each new rain, more dancers join but in the spring’s warmth their dance is of a different sort.  Translucent droplets cascade down from the billowing clouds above. 

 Sometimes they fall soft and slow, almost but a mist, which makes the world glow and shine in the midst of the gray skies.  Others come hard and heavy like a tribal drum with beats and taps of music all their own.  At rare and special times lights and base join in.  In this trio, the dancer's might renews as the joiners clear the air.  

Today the rain is slow, lulling me to rest in its hushing fall. I consider the past year and the certainty I've found a midst the abundant "rains."  But, when I think about the truth of it, my rains only felt like storms to me.  For, my uncertainty and trials would seem minuscule compared to other's.  And I am overwhelmingly blessed and annoyingly ashamed at my inability to feel the gratitude the Lord deserves.  But there, there I see the truth.  I am not ever going to be “good” enough, but Jesus was, and is, so that I would not have to.  Now, the sorrow I would normally find in my inability to be perfect is replaced in the certainty of Christ's saving grace.  He called and sent me to nourish, not to save.  He did not call me to be all the light, nourishment, protection, and life.  Because he is all the light, nourishment, protection, and life.  No he just said to love him and in doing so share his love with others. 

" If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.  If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

-1 Corinthians 13:1-3

Oh, but what is love?  For when it pierces and hurts us in order to reshape and refine how do we remember it is for our good?  What about the times when love says what we want and feel is wrong? 

 "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.  For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."

-1 Corinthians 13:4-13

Often times we do not like the rain, we grimace at its coming as it hides the sun's view behind its white darkening clouds.  Forgetting that the sun needs the rain to strengthen and not dry up the land with its bright light. 

 We need the storms to wash away the waste we have allowed in and around us.  By letting the waters cleanse, purify, render full and rejuvenate us, when the sun shines, we can turn our faces toward its light...

  Then, all can see the long hard wait and the nourishing rain were just a part of the process to make us shine brighter, stand stronger, and rise higher while remaining humbly His. 

"Seek the Lord while he may be found;

    call on him while he is near.

 Let the wicked forsake their ways

    and the unrighteous their thoughts.

Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them,

    and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

 'For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

    neither are your ways my ways,'

declares the Lord.

As the heavens are higher than the earth,

    so are my ways higher than your ways

    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

 As the rain and the snow

    come down from heaven,

and do not return to it

    without watering the earth

and making it bud and flourish,

    so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

 so is my word that goes out from my mouth:

    It will not return to me empty,

but will accomplish what I desire

    and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

You will go out in joy

    and be led forth in peace;

the mountains and hills

    will burst into song before you,

and all the trees of the field

    will clap their hands.

 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,

    and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.

This will be for the Lord’s renown,

    for an everlasting sign,

    that will endure forever.”"

-Isaiah 55:6-13

 “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock.  The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock.  But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.  The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”

-Matthew 7:24-27