Holy Spirit Rain on Me

David Timms message in his IN HOPE newsletter on August 8, 2003.

Some of us couldn’t sustain a cactus in the crusty conditions we call our lives.  Here’s a prayer for any of us who know this experience.  Perhaps you’d like to take 3-5 minutes and pray this – not just read it.

Holy Spirit, rain on me.  The soil of my life is dry and thirsty.  I need the refreshing and nourishing touch that only you can bring.  But please, go easy.  Be gentle.

Do not come as a sprinkling shower.  The light mist fails to penetrate.  It tantalizes and promises but barely penetrates the surface.  My heart is far too dry for that.  A light shower will not close the cracks that have opened up.  My self-reliance has produced fissures that need more than a few passing droplets.

Do not come as a deluge.  I want so much of you, but my heart resists you like a baked tile.  To be overwhelmed by your flooding Presence simply leaves me … well, overwhelmed for a moment.  Then I find that little has changed.  The hard crust has formed with time and may take time to loosen.

Do not come as seasonal condensation.  I need you as much in the chilly winters of non-productivity, the breezy autumns of change, and the scorching summers of conflict, as in the pleasant spring seasons when all seems well.  The soil of my heart, the garden of my soul, needs your steady Presence.  Come again, and again … and abide.

Come as a soaking Presence.  Let me drink of you not in gulps but sips.  Let my barrenness and dryness be transformed so that roses flower in this desert.  Soak steadily.  Soak deeply.  And as the top layers rejuvenate, continue to course deeper and deeper within me, softening the clay, infiltrating the buried layers that I hide, seeping into the deepest aquifers.

Spirit of God, come.  Come beside me.  Come upon me.  Come within me.  But come.  Come gently.  Come surely.  Bring your replenishing Presence into my life.