It’s raining again. The rain is always welcome here in the South because we too often are in dire need of rain. So when the rain comes I try not to complain and I make sure I praise God for the rain.
Sometimes life brings rain in the form of trials and tribulations and there are days where it seems as though it will never let up. You get to the point that you believe you’ve reached flood stage.
What do you do when the rain comes? Do you forget to praise God or does it seem impossible to praise His holy name? How do you react with the storms in life come? Do you praise the rain or curse the darkness wishing for just a little sunshine.
Karen and I were driving around last weekend and a song came on the radio that reminded me of this subject. It’s by a group called MercyMe and their music touches the very depths of our souls. I completely relate to the first verse of “Bring the Rainâ€:
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I can count a million times
People asking me how I
Can praise You with all that I’ve gone through
The question just amazes me
Can circumstances possibly
Change who I forever am in You
Maybe since my life was changed
Long before these rainy days
It’s never really ever crossed my mind
To turn my back on you, oh Lord
My only shelter from the storm
But instead I draw closer through these times
So I pray…
The first Sunday after Eddie was killed Karen and I attended church because I thought it was important to worship our Savior who was and is holding our only son in His arms. At the beginning of the service we began singing a worship song and I was overcome with awe, joy, and praise for God and I raised my arms in song, tears streaming down so glad to be in church and thankful that Jesus had saved Eddie.
A man commented later on how it amazed him that my faith could allow me to do that. I smiled and told him that it wasn’t my faith but a faithful God that allows us to worship Him in the times we are suffering. What else could I do? It’s like the song says, it never really crossed my mind to turn my back on you, oh Lord.
If I had done that, where would that lead? Where would I go? To whom would I turn? When you find you have nothing else you learn that Jesus is all that you need. It is when we are afflicted that we must turn to God.
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“Hear my prayer, O LORD, and let my cry come to You. Do not hide Your face from me in the day of my trouble; incline Your ear to me; in the day that I call, answer me speedily.†(Psalm 102:1-2)
Monday was Eddie’s birthday and we were traveling back from Southern California and we saw many a military member in the airports and it was a painful reminder of our loss and yet the chorus of MercyMe’s song kept coming to mind:
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…Bring me joy, bring me peace
Bring the chance to be free
Bring me anything that brings You glory
And I know there’ll be days
When this life brings me pain
But if that’s what it takes to praise You
Jesus, bring the rain.
Can you ask Jesus to bring you anything that brings Him glory? That’s a big prayer! A scary one too! But oh you should pray such a prayer!! The freedom in Christ that comes with the willingness to give Jesus free reign in your life is incomparable to anything life on earth has to offer.
Beloved the rain is going to come and sometimes it seems as though it will never end. And it makes you weary, but you are in good company. Many before you have suffered greatly for the cause of Christ:
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“How long, O LORD? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? How long will my enemy be exalted over me? Consider and hear me, O LORD my God; enlighten my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death; lest my enemy say, ‘I have prevailed against him’; lest those who trouble me rejoice when I am moved. But I have trusted in Your mercy; my heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, because He has dealt bountifully with me.†(Psalm 13)
Many of you are going through hard times right now rather it be loss of income, finances, illness, marital problems, wayward children, whatever. My encouragement to you is in the form of a question. Can you rejoice in the fact that Jesus has saved you? Can you sing to the LORD because He has dealt bountifully with you? Maybe your bounty table is bare right now, but has He not dealt in such a way with you?
Can you pray the words Paul wrote to the Corinthian church?
“For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us.†(2 Corinthians 1:8-10)
Life brings rain and in the rain is life.
Sometimes it seems too much as though the floodwaters will overtake us, and yet we never drown.
We have a Heavenly Father who is completely trustworthy; we just have to convince ourselves that it is true.
When you get to that point you can say to Jesus…
…yes Lord, bring the rain.
In Christ
Dave
Ps. 37:4
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Copyright © 2010 David Jeffers