Grace Like Rain

Our family has been enjoying a wonderful week of vacation at Myrtle Beach. Linda has been doing exceptionally well - walking more freely (still with help) than she has at any time since the day we went into the hospital. It has been such a blessed week - we are conscious of all your prayers and good will.

I wanted to share a rather lengthy thought about grace - our need for grace, just like the earth (and its inhabitants!) need rain from heaven. You will be able to access this "article" on our church web site in the next few days, but I wanted to send it to you now. Again, the warning that it is rather long. Here goes:

Grace Like Rain

We could use some rain around these parts. Does it seem to you that we can have years of normal rain, and then with only a month or two of relatively dry weather you start hearing the weather forecasters say, “We are dry – we need some rain!”? All that good rain seems to mean so little when the sky refuses to produce moisture. Once the flow ceases, the hand-wringing begins.

I asked Mike Moneypenny, our resident meteorologist, about our need for rain these days. I had planned to summarize his comments, but it seemed to me that you would find this information helpful and interesting! It will certainly help you to know how to pray, when the weather calls for it. I asked specific questions about drought. Mike’s response reads well enough without including the questions here:

“We are 4-8 inches behind for the year thus far. We had a wet Fall and ended 2006 with a surplus. We are not in a drought in central NC...the mountains are in a moderate drought (classified D1) and the foothills (from Charlotte and Greensboro west to the mountains) are classified as D0, abnormally dry. Inflows are low, but the water supply reservoirs are 2 to 4 feet above normal due to conservation efforts over the winter in anticipation of a potentially dry Spring and Summer. We expected the dry weather due to a strengthening La Nina, which actually affects rainfall in NC very little except to increase the number of tropical systems, potentially providing us a soaker in the late Summer or Fall.

“There are two primary types of drought; 1) Agricultural drought, which has the earliest onset and most immediate consequences to crops and livestock, and 2) Hydrologic drought, which lowers the groundwater table, and reduces reservoir storage, thus limiting the amount of water available for consumption and power generation. Hydrologic drought takes longer to develop, but harbors potentially graver health and economic consequences. San Diego, for example, could weather a severe year-long drought due to water rights signed long ago to water from the Colorado River basin. Phoenix and Las Vegas, being newer and very fast-growing cities, have rights to less water, as those rights were acquired more recently. Their 'water buffer', therefore, is considerably shorter."

“The definition of a drought...50 percent or less of normal rainfall for a 6 month period. This is not a 'true' definition, as it does not take many months to clobber the agricultural community...2 months of little rain coupled with hot temperatures will do it. Rivers will dwindle to trickles in a similar time frame as the base flow (from the soil, not runoff) will slow and springs dry up. Again, it's not an easy call, since you can have near normal conditions at 50 percent of normal rainfall as long as it's well distributed both areally and temporally...on the other hand, 3 inches of rain from a thunderstorm provides almost no help as it is largely drained off and evaporates quickly.”

So, while we are not as dry as we have been in the past, you sure hear a lot of people calling for rain! It’s a perception thing. Our perceived need for rain reminds me of my need for God’s grace. My formative spiritual years were spent in quite legalistic settings. Though I had been saved by grace, I thought I should grow by an effort that would keep or regain God’s favor on my life, if I felt I had lost it. I constantly sought to live good enough to avoid God’s judgment. Even though I enjoyed periods of rest in God’s grace, the dry times of “earning His smile” would make the moisture of His grace a wistful memory.

Oh, how I need to swim in God’s grace! It is difficult to swim in a pond that has been wracked by drought, though. What is one to do who lives life in fear of God’s judgment (it’s either that or smug Pharisaical self-righteousness) because of persistent failure? How to experience the refreshing, life-giving rain of God’s grace?

My tendency is to write a list because that’s how I learned both to cope and to teach. But, it is a matter of perception, isn’t it? It is an understanding of Who God is, who I am, and how God expects me to live. Oh, He expects me to obey Him, no doubt – it’s all through Scripture. But, I obey Him out of gratitude for His work in my life, not so that He will accept me.

Brennan Manning speaks eloquently (in books like, The Ragamuffin Gospel, and Abba’s Child) about the need to receive God’s love and grace, anticipating His smile rather than His frown. Manning emphasizes God’s love almost to the exclusion of God’s wrath, which is a theological mistake. One cannot deny God’s wrath, and it is most important that His wrath against us be placated by repentance and acceptance of Jesus’ death being the payment for our sins. Nonetheless, I am so grateful that Brennan (hey – when you read his books you will be on a first name basis, also!) writes to assist recovering legalists like myself.

Before I include an excerpt from Manning's book, Ruthless Trust – some of the most important reading I have done – I want to encourage you to purchase this helpful book before your summer vacation. You can easily read it in a week. Perhaps a small sampling will entice you:

“Rather than being surprised that we have done anything good – as certainly we have – we are shocked and horrified that we have failed. We would never judge any of God’s other children with the savage condemnation with which we crush ourselves. Indeed, self-hatred becomes bigger than life itself, growing until it seems as the beginning and the end. The image of the childhood story of Chicken Little comes to mind. In our self-hatred, we feel that the sky is falling.

“Understandably, then, we hide our true selves from God in prayer. We simply do not trust that He can handle all that goes on in our minds and hearts. Can He accept our hateful thoughts, our cruel fantasies, and our bizarre dreams? we wonder. Can He cope with our primitive images, our inflated illusions, and our exotic mental castles? We conclude that He cannot and thus withhold from Jesus what is most in need of His healing touch.

“In order to grow in trust, we must allow God to see us and love us precisely as we are. The best way to do that is through prayer (and I, Brad, might add, prayer that is based on the truth of Scripture). As we pray, the unrestricted love of God gradually transforms us. The Spirit opens our eyes to see what really is, to pierce through illusions so that we can discover we are seen by God with a gaze of love.”

When was the last time you perceived a “gaze of love” coming from God? Is your spiritual life in a bit of a drought? Allow the rain of God’s grace to refresh your spirit and experience the joy, once again, of singing praises to God in the rain!

If you want to meditate on God’s love toward you and His grace in your life, consider these verses: 2 Peter 3:18; Romans 5:6-8; 8:31-39; Psalm 103; Psalm 130; Psalm 139. OK, I know, I know – you are already familiar with these verses! The question is, do you believe these verses? Happy swimming in the pool of God’s love and grace!