“Ask rain from the Lord in the season of the spring rain, from the Lord who makes the storm clouds, and He will give them showers of rain, to everyone the vegetation in the field.”
– Zechariah 10:1
What a great verse. What a great command. Ask for rain from the Lord. It’s interesting, it says in the season of the spring rain. Don’t just assume it’s because it’s this season that this will happen.
Zechariah 10:1 Reminds Us Good Things Come from God Alone
I know good gifts come from God alone. Every single good thing comes from God. God is inviting, calling, commanding his people here to ask him for good things, and he will give good things. He’ll bring the rain. He’s the one who makes the storm clouds. They don’t just come out of nowhere. They’re not just meteorological natural occurrences. They’re the work, the handy work of the Lord. When we ask, He will give showers of rain, to everyone the vegetation in the field.
What a simple picture that leads us to pray for so many things, so much rain, so to speak, in our lives and in the world around us. God, we want to ask you for the rain, for showers of rain, for clouds that bring rain for vegetation in the field, for fruitfulness and blessing. God, we look to you right now as the only source, the exclusive source of everything good. Every good gift comes from you. Everything that’s good. You’re the author of it all. We want good. Lord, we want good in our lives. We want good in our families. God, we want good in our churches. We want good in our cities. Lord, we want good among the nations. We want to see good.
God teach us to pray. God, please deliver us. Save us from prayerlessness, from just assuming that this good or that good will come when you are the only one who can bring the good and you’ve invited us to ask you for good. God, I think especially even with this imagery in Zechariah chapter 10 of seasons of dryness, in my life and others’ lives, God, there are so many of us with specific things on our hearts and minds right now. We need you to bring the rain. God, we need refreshment and we need help, and we need strength, and we need joy, and we need peace. We need wisdom.
Zechariah 10:1 Reminds We Desperately Need the Goodness of God
God, we need all the good gifts that come from you. We ask God, please bring the rain, shower these things down on us in abundance. Even if the dryness remains and circumstances don’t change, we pray that you would rain down hope. You would reign down hope in our hearts, that we would hold fast to you and your promises not to do this or that exactly in the present, in our present circumstances, but your promises to hold us and to lead us, and to guide us, and to sustain us, and strengthen us, and even satisfy us with your rain in the middle of the valley. With the hope that you rain down, it makes us confident that you’re working all these things together for our good and for other’s good and for your glory.
We pray, please bring the rain and even this imagery, as we pray for unreached people around the world. God, bring the rain to them, rain down the gospel, rain down the power of your Holy Spirit. Send out laborers into the harvest field among the unreached in the world.
Praying for Papua New Guinea
We pray for all kinds of people groups across Papua New Guinea, remote tribe, where there are languages that don’t have your word, and people who’ve never heard of the goodness of Jesus. We pray for revelation to rain down there, for people to go and learn the language and translate the scriptures. Bless those who are doing it now. Send out more workers for the spread of gospel rain, for showers to fall across Papua New Guinea.
God, we pray for that also, right where we are, wherever we are right now, we want to see showers of salvation falling. God, give us boldness in your Spirit to proclaim the Gospel and bring the rain as we do. Shower down salvation, we pray. All of this, we pray according to your word, this beautiful picture of you, as the one who brings the rain when we ask, so we ask according to your Word, in Jesus’ name, amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
