I’ve been pondering over this morning a verse which was in the intro video at the opening of Manifest Presence conference last night.

Has the rain a father?
Or who has begotten the drops of dew?
From whose womb has come the ice?
And the frost of heaven, who has given it birth?
-Job 38:28-29

Over the years I’ve found that God often speaks to me through some of the more unusual and less well-trodden parts of His Word. Some of the verses that I find myself fixated on can seem pretty weird on first glance – but I’ve learnt that for me this seems to be God’s  invitation to dig a bit deeper and discover something new about who He is and what He’s doing.

To put this passage in context, Job has just spent 35 chapters moaning at God after the opening 2 chapters of what could euphemistically be referred to as a bit of a rough patch in his life. After round upon round of little to no help or real understanding from his wife and mates, God Himself enters the scene in chapter 38, and gives Job quite the perspective lesson!

And these two verses that jumped out at me in the video are part of God’s masterclass in how much higher His ways are than ours and why He’s God and we’re not 🙂

But as I turned these two verses over in my mind, I was interested to note that all four lines contain a reference to water (rain, dew, ice, frost) – and a link to parental relationship (father, begotten, womb, birth). There’s something deeper going on here….

Here Comes The Rain

We’ve had a lot of rain here in Auckland in the last 24 hours, and it looks set to continue over the next few days. But until now I can’t say that I’ve ever looked outside at the downpour and considered it’s parentage!

Instead I usually tend to focus more on what that rain is doing in the here and now… making me wet, causing traffic congestion, reminding me that finer weather has yet to grace us with its presence….! #bringonsummer

Yet the rain comes from somewhere. The cloads bloat with evaporated moisture and reach a tipping point where they dump their load on the earth. Most people can explain the process. Nearly all of us would have drawn colourful pictures with crayons in primary school showing the seas, the clouds and the yellow sun radiating from the corner of the page to demonstrate our understanding of the water-cycle. Yes, the rain has an ORIGIN.

Origin-ality

As humans, we are naturally curious about the origins of things. We have scientists across the world putting large amounts of time and energy into understanding how everything began – and we’re especially interested in how the universe, the earth, and ultimately we as humans came into being.

But here’s the thing. When you try to understand creation but exclude a Creator, the best you can come up with is a PROCESS. A big bang, a galatic shattering that somehow birthed everything. A purposeless, personless process which somehow begat the beauty and unbelievable intricacy of the planet we live on, the bodies we dwell in, and the minds that we think with.

Setting aside the unfathomable leap of faith required to actually believe that this is what led to the billions of cells in my body functioning seamlessly together as I write this blog post (save that for another time) – the study of ORIGINS without reference to an ORIGINATOR can only ever at best tell us HOW things happened.

But they can’t answer the deepest and most pressing question that humanity has… WHY am I here?

The Rain Has A Father?

The rain falls from the sky. It has an ORIGIN and a PROCESS. Sure.

But God questions Job… “have you considered if the rain has a father?”

Why would God want Job to link the process of rain in with the person of a father? Could it be to get us to connect the dots that there’s another reality behind the reality that we see? (wow, that’s deep!).

Behind every PROCESS is an ORIGIN.
We see the process of water falling from the heavens, we wonder where it comes from. We study it and observe it. We come to a conclusion about it’s origin.

And this is where most of science stops. Here’s HOW it happens. Here’s where it comes from.

But God wants us to keep going and to look deeper and see…

Behind the ORIGIN is an INTENTION.
The rain isn’t there by accident. It’s there by design. Thought and intention was put into it’s construction and process. Which leads us to see that….

Behind the INTENTION is a PERSON.
It seems to me that our Heavenly Father has an underlying plan for us. He wants to fundamentally change how we see ourselves and the world that surrounds. He wants us to understand that our lives and existence aren’t just an accident, but part of a wonderfully good grand design. He wants to let us know that we’re not just vagrant sentient beings moving around in the time and space of interconnected processes. We’re here on purpose. There’s a reason.

Through something as simple as showers from the sky – God wants to answer once and for all the burning question of WHY we are here.

God wants us to see that not just the rain but everything, everything … EVERYTHING has been given to us not by accident or fate, but through the provision and hands of a loving Father. It all comes back to Him.

The sky has a Maker. The universe has a Creator. Humanity has an Author. The rain has a Father.

We’re not just connected physically to this world.  But we’re connected relationally to the One who made it.  We’re not accidents.  We’re not orphans.  We belong.  He is our Father, we are His children.  How awesome is that!

So today… it looks it’s going to rain!  But thanks to Job, I’m seeing more than just the heavens opening and the need for an umbrella. I’m looking beyond it, and seeing the wonder and glory of a good God, who graciously provides all that I need.