The only times it hasn't rained today are times that I've been indoors. The sky has been gray all day, the grass green, the pavement wet. The rain has come and gone, sometimes drizzling, sometimes pouring down, and the worst of the downpours have all been perfectly timed to drench me, despite my raincoat, as I have walked to and from my car: in the daycare parking lot, at the clinic for my toddler's 18-month checkup, in the church parking lot as I've come and gone between appointments and lunch and errands.
It has been one of those days where you never quite seem to get un-soggy.
Elsewhere in the country, heavy rains and dry earth have conjured up floods and standing water. Water not as mere soggy inconvenience, but water as power and strength and terror and danger.
Sunday, I will preach on Jesus telling Nicodemus that he needs to be born of water and Spirit. And I would be lying if I didn't say that both of these elements are pretty dangerous. They are both powerful and unpredictable and will knock you right off your feet when they come rushing past. And not always in a good way.
After spending this past weekend sick - sick enough that I couldn't fully enjoy my precious family members who were all gathered together for the first time in months - I feel a little washed out. Wrung out. Bowled over by my own fledgling spirit, which has a lot of power to make me equally grateful for my loved ones and lonely and regretful for not being able to be fully present among them.
Do I really think that loneliness is a work of the Holy Spirit? I can't really say. Maybe not.
But I know that I have a body and a spirit that feel tired today, and a body and spirit that are working hard to recover from being sick and sad. And I know that it just keeps raining out there. And if the rain and a stomach bug and some weepy emotions can knock us down, then the Spirit has that much power and more to bowl us over. And once we're drenched and disarmed, there are things to be learned about ourselves, God, the world, that we might not have learned otherwise.
Water and Spirit. Not for the faint of heart. But especially for the faint of heart.
It has been one of those days where you never quite seem to get un-soggy.
Elsewhere in the country, heavy rains and dry earth have conjured up floods and standing water. Water not as mere soggy inconvenience, but water as power and strength and terror and danger.
Sunday, I will preach on Jesus telling Nicodemus that he needs to be born of water and Spirit. And I would be lying if I didn't say that both of these elements are pretty dangerous. They are both powerful and unpredictable and will knock you right off your feet when they come rushing past. And not always in a good way.
After spending this past weekend sick - sick enough that I couldn't fully enjoy my precious family members who were all gathered together for the first time in months - I feel a little washed out. Wrung out. Bowled over by my own fledgling spirit, which has a lot of power to make me equally grateful for my loved ones and lonely and regretful for not being able to be fully present among them.
Do I really think that loneliness is a work of the Holy Spirit? I can't really say. Maybe not.
But I know that I have a body and a spirit that feel tired today, and a body and spirit that are working hard to recover from being sick and sad. And I know that it just keeps raining out there. And if the rain and a stomach bug and some weepy emotions can knock us down, then the Spirit has that much power and more to bowl us over. And once we're drenched and disarmed, there are things to be learned about ourselves, God, the world, that we might not have learned otherwise.
Water and Spirit. Not for the faint of heart. But especially for the faint of heart.