Our Daily Journey

Daily Devotional, January 18, 2011

Waiting For Rain

read›
Joel 2:18-32
Rejoice, you people of Jerusalem! Rejoice
in the Lord your God! For the rain He sends
demonstrates His faithfulness. Once more
the autumn rains will come, as well as the
rains of spring (v.23).

Competing against the thwap-thwap sound of
the windshield wipers, the rain beat a rhythmic
pattern against the car. Driving out of town for
a retreat with our youth leaders, I was thankful for the
chance to spend time with them.

The rain outside, however, fell in contrast to the desert
condition inside my heart. His presence real, I felt that
Jesus was near, but I wrestled with feelings of significant
disappointment in ministry. Soil that had seemed to
promise such beauty now seemed hardened by relentless
heat and wind. Nettles of discouragement readily
flourished in the dry, wounded places of my heart.
Jeremiah 17:7-8 says, “Blessed are those who
trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope
and confidence. They are like trees planted along a
riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water.
Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by
long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and
they never stop producing fruit.” In the moment of
adversity, however, we sometimes believe that something
has gone dreadfully awry. Wanting God to rescue us,
we cry out in our pain. We wonder at His timing, at His
seeming silence. All the while, in that place of confusion
and uncertainty, our spirit presses through the hardened
clay of surface living, pushes aside the gravel of selffocus,
and—in a refusal to give up—finds living water at
the point of desperation (John 7:38).

He is real, and so are His promises.

Jesus—who came and lived among us—“grew up in the Lord’s presence like
a tender green shoot, like a root in dry ground” (Isaiah 53:2). In the certainty of
His grace and the steadfastness of His hand, He can be trusted. The refreshing,
restoring rains will come again. —Regina Franklin

more›
Read Psalm 52:8-9
to see where we should
be planted and what
the attitude of our
heart should be in all
seasons—especially in
those where rain
is scarce.

next›
What circumstances in
your life have caused
you to give up hope for
change? How have your
circumstances shaded
what you believe God
wants to do in you?