Rained On by Emily Owen

 Let me tell you about the cloakroom.

As an opening line, I’m not sure the above is up there with ‘It is a truth universally acknowledged’ (Pride and Prejudice) or ‘There was no possibility of taking a walk that day’ (Jane Eyre) or even ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt (um, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt), but this blog does indeed begin in a cloakroom.

When I was a child, Bibles were kept on a shelf in the cloakroom. Being by the front door, it was easy to grab a Bible during the few-minutes-late dash out of the house on a Sunday morning.

One day, however, it was decided for us that the Bibles should find a new home.

My dad, reaching for his Bible, realised it wasn’t on the shelf. Nor was it on the floor. Nor was it hiding among the coats. The Bible had managed to take a high dive from the shelf, straight into the toilet (clean water = unmitigated gratitude). I can still remember Dad holding up a Bible, the lower half of which was wet. I can remember the concern and sympathy the rest of the family showed him. I recall that none of us giggled. At all. Not once. Especially not my sisters and me.

The day Dad’s Bible got baptised is now written in our family history. It is not an anecdote we revisit particularly frequently, but I had reason to recall it this week.

I was in my study. It was a warm day, and the windows were open. As I worked on some editing, I was not facing the windows, and so did not see (or hear – I am deaf) the rain that soon began to pour down.

In fact, there was no possibility of taking a walk that day.

When I realised the deluge, of course I moved to shut the windows. As I did, I saw that my Bible – lying open on a table beneath the window – was rain spattered. It was wet. Baptisms of Bibles seem to run in the family.

Looking at the drops of water on words on the page, I was reminded of Psalm 68:9:

‘You sent abundant rain, O God, to refresh the weary land.’

Perhaps our writing, in whatever stage we are, can feel like a weary land sometimes. Old, tired, dehydrated, in need of life.

My editor is wonderful, so it is no reflection on my editor when I say that – within the parameters of knowing experientially that editing is essential - it is not my favourite part of the writing process.

Perhaps editing is, at times, my ‘weary land’.

I recently said to God, in a forlorn little voice, ‘I need to edit this manuscript.’

God replied, full of refreshing rain; ‘Let’s do it together.’

And we did.

Whatever our ‘weary land’ is at the moment, let’s remember we have a God who says, ‘Let’s do this together.’

A God who refreshes our weariness – word-weariness or otherwise - with His presence.

Raining Presence.

A God who says, ‘I’ll never leave you or forsake you’ (Joshua 1:5), and means it.

Let’s do this together.