Seriously, God...you send us rain and it's full of mud?
It's raining mud, our cars are dirty, but I have bigger questions I'm asking.
It was dusty in New Mexico, Texas, and through the middle of the United States, and as the winds moved east that dust kicked up into the upper atmosphere. Take a look at the trajectory in this nine second video.
Why do I care about dust from Texas? Because that very dust, when mixed with rain, poured down “dirty rain”—rain that was liquid brown and caked every car.
Rain is supposed to clean things, not make them more dirty. For the last week plus car washes have made bank in the Midwest.
Before I learned about the dirty rain, I didn’t think too deeply about the dirt, but I did notice that car looked dirtier than ever. In the winter, highway driving through the wintry mix of snow, dirt, and salt leaves any car needing a wash. The grimiest, primed for “wash me” graffiti which I get at least, not once, but twice a winter because I am that lazy. After weeks, it becomes a contest at some point of how long you can go without a wash. As cars begin to get washed and others hold out, the “haves” of clean cars begin to out number the “have nots” pretty rapidly. Only the most stubborn remain. What was unusual this time, was for days I continued to see a multitude of cars that looked like they had gone off-roading. At that point, I began to question if there wasn’t more to the situation than the winter mix. I wondered the following:
Could we be holding out because we were all so cheap and hoarding money because of the volatile financial markets?
Did it snow more than usual this year?
I do see more highway driving more than ever, could the workers mandate back to the office be creating more traffic and dirt?
I had lots of theories until I finally just googled, “why is my car extra dirty?” When I saw the word dirty rain I had to find what that meant and it explained everything. It wasn’t an answer I could have considered, but it made complete sense when I read it. We wouldn’t have this many cars that are this dirty without something else happening.
I recently read in the book, Strengthening the Soul for Your Leadership, by Ruth Haley Barton, and she talks about how ministry leaders discern God’s leading. She advised a great place to start is to ask if we are even asking the right question. Our original question or issue we feel we need to pray about or do something about may not end up being the relevant question at all. When God is doing something there are multiple levels of things happening for an individual, groups of people, future people, and beyond. I am sure I’ve asked God the wrong question more than half the time. That’s perfectly okay, but until we slow down, observe more of what’s going on around us and in us, and empty ourselves of our own ungodly patterns and acknowledge our motivators, then I’m pretty sure we will be asking God the “wrong” questions or ask those questions in the our order versus God’s order.
Even for me and my car I don’t think what the cause of my car being so dirty was the right question. Instead, the real question is why am I so reluctant to clean it off. Regardless of a rare meteorological event, typical winter driving, or increased traffic patterns, my car is going to get dirty during the winter, so what’s keeping me from just getting a car wash? Like this, there are likely so many questions I’m not asking but I should be. I just need to slow down and observe a little more to look past what I typically see, so I can see something God wants to show me.
What question are you not asking God?