Sometimes it's both...

It's been raining. A lot. 

It seems that this year has been feast or famine. When it rains, it rains a lot. Then we get a nice longer period of drying out. Then it repeats. this past week it has rained a fair amount. (That might be an understatement.)

Farmers know about ground moisture. Having the right amount of rain at the right time is critical. And while it is good to keep the ground moisture up, the rain right now is coming at the wrong time from a farmer's perspective. Harvest is right around the corner, and this much rain makes harvest just a bit challenging. 

I grew up farm-adjacent. My grandfather was a farmer, and my father-in-law is a farmer. So while I've never made my living from the land, I've spent enough time around farming to know that weather isn't just weather. It matters. Rain can be a blessing. Rain can be a problem. Sometimes it can be both. 

And all of that got me thinking about a hymn. "Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest..." We sing those words in Great Is Thy Faithfulness without giving them much thought. They are part of the familiar rhythm of the hymn. Of course there is summer and winter. Springtime and harvest. That's just how things work. Except sometimes they don't. 

Sometimes a line that I have sung dozens of times suddenly sounds different. "Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest..." The words aren't wrong. The seasons still come. Harvest will still come. But the hymn makes it sound so certain. So orderly. As if one naturally follows the other. 

And most of the time, that's probably how we experience it. But farmers know better. They know that there is a lot between planting and harvest that is outside of their control. Too little rain. Too much rain. Too much heat. Not enough heat. The right conditions at the wrong time. The harvest is never quite as predictable as the hymn makes it sound. 

Maybe that is where the hymn becomes interesting. We can easily confuse faithfulness with predictability. We like things we can count on. The rain comes when it is needed, the crops grow, the harvest comes, and the seasons follow one another just as they should. And when they don't it can be easy to wonder what happened. 

We do this with more than just the weather. We make plans. We set expectations. We imagine how things are supposed to go. And when life doesn't follow the pattern, it can be easy to wonder where God is in all of it. But the hymn doesn't actually say that everything will go according to plan. It says something different: "Great is Thy Faithfulness."

Faithfulness doesn't mean that every season will be easy, or that every harvest will turn out the way we hoped. It doesn't mean there will always be the right amount of rain at the right time. It means that whatever the season brings, God is still God. That's a harder promise, perhaps, but a deeper one. We don't need God to make everything predictable. We need God to be faithful when it isn't. 

Maybe that's what makes the hymn worth singing again and again. We know the words. We know the melody. We think we know what they mean. And then life gives us a little too much rain, or not enough, and suddenly those familiar words have something new to say. 

Great is Thy Faithfulness.

Peace, 
Travis Segar
Pastor for Care and Community