Embrace the rain

Last night I attended the outdoor U2 concert in Minneapolis. After about three songs, it started pouring rain. Instead of ending the show, Bono and crew relished the moment. The downpour added a certain excitement to the concert, and the rain looked amazing on the video screens.

There's something that can be learned from these talented Irishmen and applied to our lives:  embrace the rain. I have been feeling the rain during these last 11 months of being unemployed, and it's really challenging to embrace it.

But you know what? God shines through broken people -- not perfect ones.

Husbands: listen to your wives

Every marriage encounters challenges. My wife and I were talking recently about the issues affecting our marriage when I decided to pray.

Heavenly Father, please come into this situation, solve our differences and heal our wounds. Show me what I need to do to make this marriage successful.

His response:  Listen.

When I mentioned to my wife my prayer and God's response, she was deeply touched. I'm listening to her and it is making all the difference.

Bring clean water to Africa

The following devotional is reprinted with permission from Lutheran World Relief.

Isaiah 41:17-20 -- When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue is parched with thirst, I the Lord will answer them; I the God of Israel will not forsake them. I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains in the midst of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane and the pine together, that they may see and know, may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it.

Prayer

God of overflowing promise,
You call for justice to run over like living streams,
And made water a sign of your ultimate righteousness.

Reborn through the bath of your grace,
We hear with new ears the cries of our neighbors;
Parched hearts and arid earth plead for reprieve.

Move us in our response to all who thirst,
That we and they might receive your water,
Poured out for all, that none would be forsaken.

Amen.