Is It Raining?

God, who created it all, is very much in charge of the elements. Always has, always will be. He has revealed and declared that truth with authority, and with clarity:

Ps 104 (NKJ)
1 Bless the LORD, O my soul! O LORD my God, You are very great: you are clothed with honor and majesty,
2 Who cover Yourself with light as with a garment, who stretch out the heavens like a curtain.
3 He lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters, who makes the clouds His chariot, who walks on the wings of the wind,
4 Who makes His angels spirits, his ministers a flame of fire.
5 You who laid the foundations of the earth, so that it should not be moved forever,
6 You covered it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains.
7 At Your rebuke they fled; at the voice of Your thunder they hastened away.
8 They went up over the mountains; they went down into the valleys, to the place which You founded for them.
9 You have set a boundary that they may not pass over, that they may not return to cover the earth.
10 He sends the springs into the valleys, they flow among the hills.
11 They give drink to every beast of the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst.
12 By them the birds of the heavens have their home; they sing among the branches.
13 He waters the hills from His upper chambers; the earth is satisfied with the fruit of Your works.
14 He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the service of man, that he may bring forth food from the earth,
15 And wine that makes glad the heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread which strengthens man’s heart.
16 The trees of the LORD are full of sap, the cedars of Lebanon which He planted,
17 Where the birds make their nests; the stork has her home in the fir trees.
18 The high hills are for the wild goats; the cliffs are a refuge for the rock badgers.
19 He appointed the moon for seasons; the sun knows its going down.
20 You make darkness, and it is night, in which all the beasts of the forest creep about.
21 The young lions roar after their prey, and seek their food from God.
22 When the sun arises, they gather together and lie down in their dens.
23 Man goes out to his work and to his labor until the evening.
24 O LORD, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all. The earth is full of Your possessions–
25 This great and wide sea, in which are innumerable teeming things, living things both small and great.
26 There the ships sail about; there is that Leviathan which You have made to play there.
27 These all wait for You, that You may give them their food in due season.
28 What You give them they gather in; you open Your hand, they are filled with good.
29 You hide Your face, they are troubled; you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust.
30 You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; and You renew the face of the earth.
31 May the glory of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD rejoice in His works.
32 He looks on the earth, and it trembles; he touches the hills, and they smoke.
33 I will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.
34 May my meditation be sweet to Him; I will be glad in the LORD.
35 May sinners be consumed from the earth, and the wicked be no more. Bless the LORD, O my soul! Praise the LORD!

Our great God uses the natural elements to both bless people, as well as to correct them.
Amos 4:4-13
4 “Come to Bethel and transgress, at Gilgal multiply transgression; bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days.
(Stay religious, if you like, a religious place won’t matter if you’re living in sin. Location is never a justification, even Bethel)
5 Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, proclaim and announce the freewill offerings; for this you love, you children of Israel!” Says the Lord GOD.
6 “Also I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities. And lack of bread in all your places; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
(God meanwhile, was dealing with their unrepentant nature by bringing famine to them)
7 “I also withheld rain from you, when there were still three months to the harvest. I made it rain on one city, I withheld rain from another city. One part was rained upon, and where it did not rain the part withered.
(Oops, here we go. God is doing the rain-thing, trying to get the agricultural nation’s attention. Rain or no rain meant life and death)
8 So two or three cities wandered to another city to drink water, but they were not satisfied; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
9 “I blasted you with blight and mildew. When your gardens increased, your vineyards, your fig trees, and your olive trees, the locust devoured them; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
(They likely sat in front of their TV’s, while newscasters explained things in terms of “high pressure fronts, and low pressure fronts”. No sense offending anyone by mentioning God)
10 “I sent among you a plague after the manner of Egypt; your young men I killed with a sword, along with your captive horses; I made the stench of your camps come up into your nostrils; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
11 “I overthrew some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were like a firebrand plucked from the burning; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
(So God escalated things, and the people continued to ignore Him)
12 “Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel; because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!”
13 For behold, he who forms mountains, and creates the wind, who declares to man what his thought is, and makes the morning darkness, who treads the high places of the earth– the LORD God of hosts is His name.

Amos was not alone in his prophetic revelation of God trying to deal with the people, by way of natural occurrence. In Deuteronomy, way earlier, the Lord Himself proclaimed that He could/would utilize waters to bless. In Kings, Solomon rightly dialogued with God about His corrective hand (duplicated in 2 Chron 7, of course):

Deut 11:13-15 (NKJ)
13 ‘And it shall be that if you earnestly obey My commandments which I command you today, to love the LORD your God and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul,
14 ‘then I will give you the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the latter rain, that you may gather in your grain, your new wine, and your oil.
15 ‘And I will send grass in your fields for your livestock, that you may eat and be filled.’

IKing 8:33-36 (NKJ)
33 “When Your people Israel are defeated before an enemy because they have sinned against You, and when they turn back to You and confess Your name, and pray and make supplication to You in this temple,
34 “then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of Your people Israel, and bring them back to the land which You gave to their fathers.
35 “When the heavens are shut up and there is no rain because they have sinned against You, when they pray toward this place and confess Your name, and turn from their sin because You afflict them,
36 “then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of Your servants, Your people Israel, that You may teach them the good way in which they should walk; and send rain on Your land which You have given to Your people as an inheritance.

You can research the brief book of Haggai to see God Himself tell His people that He was working nature against them in their sinful doings, and as soon as they repented, He (figuratively), holds up a calendar, mentions that the time of year was too late to plant but too early to harvest, and yet that did not restrict Him from pouring out an immediate blessing.

And let’s not forget the Flood, please. There is an ark. It will be revealed. It is true. He brought a flood on the ungodly.

God does not respond to nature. Nature responds to God. God, in His loving mercy, chooses to respond to us, when we, in humility, choose to come to Him and to acknowledge Him as God, as the One worthy to be praised, feared, reverenced, adored, sort after, and loved.

It is a good time to recognize the fullness of the personality of God, who told us Himself that He does not change (Malachi 3:6). Jesus’ death and propitiation work was for us to be able to come into His presence, not to calm down a wild and crazy OT God Who would now behave Himself during the NT era.

Isa 45:5-9 (NKJ)
5 I am the LORD, and there is no other; there is no God besides Me. I will gird you, though you have not known Me,
6 That they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting that there is none besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other;
7 I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the LORD, do all these things.’
8 “Rain down, you heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness; let the earth open, let them bring forth salvation, and let righteousness spring up together. I, the LORD, have created it.
9 “Woe to him who strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth! Shall the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’ Or shall your handiwork say, ‘He has no hands’?

On a high note, God speaks through young Zechariah, and equates the unfailing promise of outpouring of His Spirit, in the last days, as a Latter Rain – so needful for a harvest, this time, of souls and not crops:
Zech 10:1 (NKJ)
1 Ask the LORD for rain in the time of the latter rain. The LORD will make flashing clouds; he will give them showers of rain, grass in the field for everyone.

We’re told to ask for that outpouring, when we see, in our spirits, that it is the right time for that outpouring. Pour out Your Spirit on Your people, Lord.

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About ez3728

I am a believer in Jesus - that He is the One and Only Messiah of the world. I believe the Bible is the perfect and complete Word of God, and that God is absolutely competent and capable of keeping His Word perfect, undefiled, and uncorrupted. Jesus was born Jewish. So was I. He lived a perfect life, and is worshiped. I live an imperfect life, and I worship Him.
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