Rain and Rainbows

Into everyone's life a little rain must fall. In recent years it seems that it is little rain, indeed. We are in the grip of a fairly substantial drought and have been for a while. When no rain falls we all complain and feel the effects of the drought. When we get rain we complain because we can't do the things we want to do. It really is interesting to watch people's response to this rain or lack of rain thing. I'm a preacher who believes that the weather patterns are still controlled by God and that the actions of his people often times precipitates a climatic response from God. If you would read in II Chronicles 7:14 the great revival passage and then back up several verses into chapter six you would find that Solomon prayed to God and said to him, "If your people do all of these bad things (Helms translation) and you send drought and pestilence and famine and etc..... and your people lift up their hands toward this place and repent and call on your name, then hear from heaven and heal your people." [This is a very condensed version of the prayer. If you would like to read it you can find it in its entirety in II Chronicles 6: 12 - 7:22] It is in the 14th verse of chapter 7 that God gives the great revival promise. If his people will repent and call on him, he'll forgive and heal the land. Have you ever thought that maybe the reason we have the unusual weather patterns is because of the unusual sinfulness of our churches. Yes! Our churches! Read I Peter 4:17 and you'll see that judgment begins with the house of God. Christians are the ones held to the standard of Christian living - NOT LOST PEOPLE! So, have you ever wondered if the reason why we have such unusual weather patterns is because we have such unusually sinfulness in God's house? I have.

I'm reminded of another story from the Old Testament and it concerns Noah and the rainbow. Do you remember why God sent the flood? It is becasue mankind had been exceedingly wicked and God was sorry that he made us [Read Genesis 6:5-8 and following for the whole story]. God struck down sinfulness and only Noah and his family survived. Then comes the rainbow. The rainbow is a sign of the promise made by God to Noah to never destroy the earth by flood again. So...the rainbow is a sign of a good thing, the promise, and a reminder of a bad thing, judgment. Maybe we need to pray for rain and rainbows to help us navigate life with a greater sense of purpose and direction.....