Let It Rain!

Let It Rain!
John R. Petrilli

“Let it rain, let it RAIN, open the flood gates of heaven! Let it RAIN, let it RAIN, open the flood gates of heaven, Let it RAIN!” So Michael W. Smith sings out his revival plea to God along with thousands of worshippers on his WOW! Worship live concert CD. This is an earnest prayer for the rains of spiritual revival and renewal to shower down upon the Church of Jesus Christ. For decades God’s Spirit has been burdening His people with a deep longing for a fresh visitation from Him. Will it happen in our day? Only God knows. In the meantime we, the Church, can do our part in positioning ourselves for such a heaven-sent blessing. The minor prophet Hosea points the way (Hosea 6:3).

“Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord.
As surely as the sun rises, He will appear;
He will come to us like the winter rains,
Like the spring rains that water the earth.”

For any passage of Scripture to be truly helpful, we must interpret it within its proper historical context. Hosea’s promise comes to a people who would soon be “going through the ringer”. They were guilty of cheating on God and consorting with pagan gods. Such disobedience wasn’t occasional but chronic in nature. The nation’s leadership couldn’t even be counted on to lead the people back to the Lord because they themselves were in on the whole corruption game (5:10). Only a trip to the woodshed would cure her of her sins. God had no choice but to personally and directly humble His erring people through economic ruin (9:2), invasion by foreign armies (8:14), and ultimate deportation into the pagan bondage of Assyrian and Babylonian captivity (5:14 ; 9:3). They sowed the wind and would, of consequence, reap the whirlwind (8:7). Verse one of chapter six informs us that God dealt severely with His people, mercilessly tearing them apart from limb to limb like a ravenous beast of prey. Such was the sad state of affairs in ancient Israel. But in the midst of such darkness and desolation, the Lord speaks of a future day when He’d favor them with spiritual renewal and glorious revival. Once the days of harsh discipline accomplished their purpose, the nation would return home to experience a wonderful season of rebirth and renewal that was as certain as the sunrise and as rejuvenating as the gentle spring rains.

The United States of America started out as a faithful wife to God. Her laws clearly reflected the precepts of His Word, and the vast majority of her people genuinely honored Him. Even when she slipped, God sent great and powerful revivals that swept over and reworked the entire cultural landscape. Conversions numbered in the tens of thousands. Bars shut down. Stores were shuttered on the Sabbath. Violent crime fell through the floor. Prayer and Bible study became an integral component of every child’s education. In the spiritual sense of the phrase, virtually no child was left behind when it came to being exposed to God’s Word, the gospel of Christ, and the joy of living for Him. So can it happen again in America? Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. The same God of mercy and grace surely longs to see our once Land of the Free return to Him in wholesale repentance. Nothing would make Him happier than for us to “press on to know the Lord”, to seek Him once again as a nation as we did two short centuries ago. To be sure, America has been spanked really hard in the past decade. Her sins are many, and she doesn’t seem to be willing or able to sustain any effort to forsake them and genuinely return to the Lord. Her laws increasingly fly in the face of God’s commands. Her culture is steeped in sins of a hundred different stripes. Like Israel of old, she appears to be spiritually debilitated, morally crippled and incapable of healing herself (5:4). She needs Divine rescue!

Like America, the nation of Israel needed a spiritual downpour that only God could engineer, and He did! The day finally came when her people had paid the price of their backslidings, learned their lessons about the cost of idolatry, and joyfully returned to their Lord and their homeland (14:4-9). God fell upon His people, not with a sword of judgment, but with the “dew” of divine mercy and grace (14:5a). This season of rebirth was festive and beautiful as Judah experienced growth like a pretty lily flower (14:5b), rooting as a strong Lebanese cedar tree (5:14c), and influence that permeated the international scene like a fruitful olive tree and a precious oriental fragrance (14:6). This happy reunion between God the Forgiving Husband and Israel the Rededicated Wife recurred at various time in Israel’s history. It began with her return to the land from foreign captivity and the rebuilding of the Temple under the capable leadership of Zerubbabel and Ezra (Ezra 1-4). A subsequent 2,000 year deportation followed with the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, followed by Israel’s return to statehood in 1948. Its ultimate fulfillment will be realized in the millennium when a restored Israel enjoys national resurrection and rebirth into a standing of permanent and perfect righteousness in a kingdom of perpetual peace (Hosea 6:2b ; Ezekiel 37:1-14 ; 39:21-29 ; Zechariah 12:10-13:1 ; Romans 11:15; Revelation 7:1-8).

So are renewal and revival a possibility for our beloved land of America? I believe they most certainly are … but ONLY if we meet the ageless requirement of true repentance (2 Chronicles 7:14 ;
1 Peter 4:17). Such an appropriate attitude will properly position us for the long-awaited spring rains of revival. “Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord!” And all God’s people said, “LET IT RAIN!”