When it rains, it pours. Who knows what I’m talkin about?
Lately it’s felt like I’ve been stuck in a never ending rainy season. Cloudy. Dark. Gloomy. One thing after another falling down upon me like rain drops. Disappointments, betrayal, closed doors, health issues, more betrayal, loss. Did I mention betrayal?
Pitter patter… pitter patter… the rain falls.
Collectively these things have a way of dampening us - mind, body, and soul. You feel soaked and weighed down.
Then….. it happens. The sprinkling sky opens up, and it starts to dump buckets.
When it rains, it pours.
This happened to me quite literally yesterday. Because of a long “cloudy” season, I decided to get away and attend a spiritual event near Cleveland. (I was looking for revival on soooo many levels.)
Long story short, it ended abruptly with me in a downpour, far away from my car, no umbrella, possessions soaked.
It was not the “revival” I envisioned. I went to figuratively “get out of the rain” and ended up literally drenched.
As I walked head-down back to my car, my face dripped with a very poetic mixture of tears and rain. I don’t know if it was the “let down” from my high expectations, or if maybe yesterday was just the straw that broke the camel’s back… but, either way, I cracked.
“Uncle, Lord. Uncle,” I cried.
It was raining as hard as it could rain which made the drive home difficult. At that point, truth be told, I was sulking and whining like a baby in a wet, soggy diaper driving down I 480. I was a real sight to behold.
That’s when God started doing His thing. The spiritual event ended abruptly but my “retreat” had just begun.
The rain hitting my car was loud. The water on the road, whooshing underneath it, was louder. It was hard to hear the radio over all the chaos. But, faintly, I heard the song “Rattle” by Elevation Worship queue up on my playlist.
So I cranked it. And the Lord sang over me.
“This is the sound of dry bones rattling.
This is the praise make a dead man walk again.
Open the grave, I'm coming out.
I'm gonna live, gonna live again.
This is the sound of dry bones rattling.”
The irony still makes me chuckle. DRY bones. I was certainly no longer “dry,” that’s for sure.
Then it hit me.
I’ve been struggling with a few health ailments which actually made me nervous to even attend the event. I knew it would be physically difficult for me, given my limitations and size of the event. I honestly worried that I wouldn’t physically be able to do it.
But driving home it occurred to me: I did not experience one single ailment that day. Not one. And guys, given the severity of these, that’s a huge miracle!!
I was so focused on the emotional rain that I didn’t notice the physical sunshine.
The song continued…
“My God is able to save and deliver and heal
And restore anything that He wants to.”
Before the Lord sent the downpour upon me, He strengthened me physically so that I was able to handle it. Gosh, you guys, there’s sooo much to unpack in that.
“Dry bones hear the Word of the Lord
Live (live), live (live).”
I was praying for Him to stop the rain but He wanted to use it to heal dry bones. I wanted Him to prevent the downpour but He wanted to strengthen me to carry it in buckets. I wanted Him to restore everything around me but He wanted to restore everything IN me.
I guess you could say my retreat wasn’t a bust, after all. It wasn’t at all what I expected or envisioned. It was so much MORE than all that.
Friends, God’s ways really are above our ways. Thankfully. If I would have had it my way yesterday I would’ve come home spiritually revived, dry, but still physically struggling. (I didn’t go there praying for healing because I didn’t think it was possible.)
Instead the Lord soaked my dry bones in a downpour of living water, overflowed all my little finite expectations, and revived me physically, then through it, spiritually.
So today I’m walking with a new spring in my step, looking at the clouds and the forecast, praying “Let it rain, let it rain, let it rain.”
Pitter patter… pitter patter… pitter patter… it’s music to my ears.
“This is the sound of dry bones rattling…”