The Truth About Rain

Where I live, the rain has been coming down for days. I don’t mind summer rain. In fact, I enjoy opening the blinds on the wall of windows in my family room, lying on the couch, and watching it fall. As I was doing so this morning, a thought occurred to me. Like many things in life, rain can be a welcome site or rain can be bad news. In California, rain would be indispensable as firefighters battle deadly blazes. In Thailand, rain helped create the terrifying entrapment of youth soccer players deep into a cave. This is nothing new. In biblical times, rain was both something to fear and something to pray for.

One of the most well-known instances is described in the book of Genesis. Before God sent the torrential rain that led to the massive flooding, He called Noah to build an arc and save himself, his family,  and two of each animal. This flood resulted in the deaths of “every living thing on the face of the earth”…except for Noah and those humans and animals he brought on the arc with him. Yet, rain that God sends is not always devastating. There are numerous verses that speak to the Lord providing rain in its season. Leviticus 26:4 clearly states, “I will send you rain in its season…” Deuteronomy 11:14 states virtually the same thing. Clearly, rain is necessary and Heaven sent.

Sadly, at times, the storms are so strong that people perish. Home destroyed. Businesses lost. Families displaced. Other times, the rain is cherished for how it nourishes the ground so that crops can grow and refills the lakes so boating and swimming can resume. It offers  chance to wear your kicking’ rain boots and splash in the puddles. Rain can even be seen as romantic – who can forget that scene in The Notebook?!?

Rain can be good. Rain can be awful. Some people don’t like rain because they prefer the sunshine. I had a co-worker once who much preferred wet days to dry ones! Everyone has their preferences, but no matter what we do, we cannot control the rain. Oh, to be sure, we can pray for rain. And we can pray for rain to stop. There are plenty of biblical examples of when God answers both kinds of prayers – James reminds us that Elijah prayed for it not to rain, and it didn’t, and then he prayed for rain, and it did! All I need to do for it to rain is to straighten my hair…

There are legitimate “pros and cons” to rain. The same can be said of different aspects of our lives. So often we look at what we call the storms of life as being negative when that’s not always the case. To be sure, they can be tough. Other times, the rain may be positive. Sometimes – may times?- an experience or season of life is both. Hard but rewarding. After all, aren’t so many things like that? College, careers, relationships, parenting… just to name a few. Sometimes rain is necessary for growth. Perhaps we can choose to allow the Lord to stretch and grow us during the rainy times, even if we or others cannot see them as positive in the moment. Perhaps we never will. Yet, James 1:2 tells us to count even our trials as joy. After all, God tells us in Isaiah 43:2 that when we pass through the waters, He will be with us. Because of this, we really can praise God through all the storms of life.