Spiritual Rain

We have had a very dry summer. A little while after I woke up this morning it began to rain. After it had rained lightly for about an hour I decided to go out in the rain and weed the flower beds. Weeds are easier to pull when the ground is moist (not drenching as you pull a big glob of mud up with the weed). Even though it had been raining for an hour and still was, when I pulled the first weed only the top 1/8th of an inch was wet, below that the soil and roots were dry.

I was rather surprised that the soil was so dry as I had watered the beds for about an hour last night and we had about an hour of light rain the night before. This was actually a moment of epiphany for me. Even though the beds had been getting some water on a regular basis they were still essentially dry.

How much is this like most our spiritual lives? We (maybe) go to church for an hour once a week. Some of us may even go to Sunday School and the occasional short term mid-week class. This is like expecting an hour of watering to be enough for our flowers. We wonder why we don't feel spiritually fulfilled yet we do not "water" our spirituality very much.

I occasionally get into the regimen of reading the Upper Room on a daily basis but it is so easy to get out of the habit and just jump up and run. I say grace before most meals and usually pray before going to sleep. These occasional acts of worship and reflection are great and help sustain me but I all too easily forget them.

My plants either need water daily for more than a little while or they need a good heavy rain once a week to thrive. I too need to have greater spiritual rain to thrive.