"And lying at his door was a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who would gladly have eaten his fill of the scraps that fell from the rich man's table. Dogs even used to come and lick his sores. When the poor man died, he was carried away by angels to the bosom of Abraham." // Luke 16:20-21

We were visiting friends during a heat wave in the Carolinas. Too hot to do anything else, we had spent the past two days at the pool, sipping sparkling water, reapplying sunscreen to rosy cheeks, and jumping in after our kids when the heat became too much. When thunder began to rumble, the lifeguard whistle blew, and the kids reluctantly climbed out. Back at the house, we settled the kids in with a movie, and I slipped out to their porch to watch the storm roll in.

The thunderheads gathered, dark blue-grey against the sumptuous green sweet gum trees. The heat and humidity were oppressive. The wind played, then fought with a tall tree in the distance. A few cool drops sprinkled my bare arms and I sat, transfixed, bearing witness to a miracle. Suddenly a huge thunderclap rattled the panes of the window behind me and I jumped. Sheets of rain pelted the roof and with a crack, a large limb sheared away from a tree in the front yard.

Uncharacteristically, I hadn’t bothered to check the weather that week, so the storm came as a delicious surprise. Sometimes we are in the midst of a spiritual heat wave—suffering, grief, survival mode, illness—and we desperately want to look ahead at the forecast. When is this heat going to break? When will we get a respite?

But God doesn’t work like that. He asks us to praise Him where we are and promises to provide what we need to survive and grow closer to Him in each season, if we will only surrender each day, each wound, each trial to Him. We can control so few things in our life and are invited to give the rest over to God’s tender mercy and love as Lazarus did.

What about you, sister? How can you surrender to the heat wave in your life? Know that as you surrender, relief will come. The God Who allowed you to sit in the discomfort of that heat is the same God Who is sending the sweet relief of the summer storm to comfort and revive your weary soul.

[bctt tweet="Praise Him where we are. // Elizabeth Blanke" username="blessedisshe__"]

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