A Good Umbrella

It has begun to rain here in Nicaragua. We have 6 months of rain and 6 months of no rain so we're glad that the rain is back. Unfortunately though, with the rain come surprises. One of my favorite songs in "Bring the Rain" by Mercy Me and it talks about the effect rain should have on my christian life..."rain" being trials. I was reminded of how important it is to be prepared for "rain" when it started raining Saturday night. I had rained once in March and we realized that our roof leaked, badly, so we called our landlady and she sent some guys over to fix it. We weren't home when they came to fix the exterior of it so we didn't really know what they had done. When they came to fix the ceiling inside the house I asked them if they had fixed all the leaks and they said yes and proceeded to fix several rooms that had been damaged by the rain. I told them it would be awful to have the roof still leak after they fixed the ceiling because their work would have been in vain but they assured me that the roof was fixed. Guess what? Saturday night as it began to pour I was walking around the house with pans finding all the spots that it still leaked!!! They had only fixed one of the leaks. All the other places were still leaking and, once again, ruining the ceiling. I was reminded of how important it is to make sure our spiritual umbrella (or roof as the case may be) is prepared for the rain that WILL come. It's not good enough to just cover up the bad, ugly spots on the ceiling by painting or putting new plywood or whatever if the hole on the outside is not fixed!! Sometimes the rain is what shows me where the holes are in my roof but if I don't fix those holes I will keep having to deal with the same leaks!! James says that we should not be surprised when we have trials but that we should count it as joy because it produces patience. I pray that God doesn't have to keep using those trials to show me the same old holes but that I would be strong in Him and that as He continues to show me where the holes are from time to time, that I would repair the holes, not just try to cover them up so they look good.