April showers bring May flowers...

So it’s April. I know this is obvious to all but as I sit and look out my front window the rain is falling. The showers have come and cancelled my first softball game of the year so I am resigned to sit on my couch and type while listening to The Avett Brothers. For some reason it struck me this morning with that small, simple rhyme, that if I endure the rain there is the good possibility of flowers. Much like in life we endure and go through difficult times, maybe not knowing what is on the other side, but that the difficult times have a tendency to refine us and make us stronger. Difficult doesn’t have to mean bad things or tragedies but may be as simple as differences of personality with people . It can be the small, uncomfortable feeling in the pit of your stomach when you know it’s time to pursue some new goals in life.

 For me personally it brings me to a deeper self-realization. Flowers need the rain for nourishment and growth and as much as I don’t like to admit it, I also need the rain. Isaiah 45:8 says, “Shower, O heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain down righteousness; let the earth open, that salvation and righteousness may bear fruit; let the earth cause them both to sprout; I the Lord have created it.” It becomes a cycle of renewal, one that I believe the Lord can use for great things such as such as salvation and evidence of God’s grace in our lives and the lives of others.