It’s raining today.  It’s been raining off and on for the last few days.  You ever notice how everything looks brighter after rain?  Like the grass looks greener.  The dirt looks darker. All the colors are more vivid after rain.

I have a little container garden on my back patio.  It’s not much.  A few tomato plants, cucumber, squash, lettuce and a grape vine.  Honestly, I haven’t done a whole lot to it.  I picked the suckers out of the tomato plant as it grew, but I’m no super gardener.  Yet, somehow I’ve managed to grow actually tomatoes, a couple of cucumbers, and a couple of squash.  (Still waiting on the grapes to show up, but the vine’s going crazy.)

I water my little garden everyday, but one thing I noticed is that it seems to look better after a little rain than after I’ve watered it.  I don’t know why that is.  Maybe it’s in my mind because it takes less effort for the rain to water the garden than it is for me to lug a gallon water jug back and forth from the kitchen sink a bunch of times.  You know, like kinda how dinner always seems better when you eat out and somebody else cooks it?

But either way, it’s got to be watered.  Whether it falls out of the sky or pours out of an old milk jug, in order to grow and produce fruit, the garden has to have water.

There’s been times over the years that I’ve felt God’s presence so powerful in my life.  Like I can feel him with me, leading me, speaking to me.  And then there have been times when it feels like he is silent.  Like I can’t feel him, can’t see him, can’t find him.

And I’ve realized that in the silent times, which I’ve had a lot of over the last couple of years, if I let myself get lazy and stop watering my soul, I stop producing fruit.  And if I’m honest, I’ve gotten pretty lazy.  Since we’ve been “between churches,” I’ve let myself get lax about being in the Word and spending time with Jesus daily.  And I can tell it….my soul feels dry.

But when in those times when I’ve been constant, I feel myself bubbling over with him.  God’s Word brings revelation about who he is and about who I am.  And when I’m spending time with Jesus, he sends revelation, sometimes in the most unexpected places and they surprise me and delight me.

So as the rain falls outside this morning, I’m reminded of how much my soul needs water and I’m encouraged when I feel my heart being drawn towards him.

He covers the heavens with clouds; he prepares rain for the earth; he makes grass grow on the hills. – Psalm 147:8

 

Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”- John 4:13-14