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I. ITS SOURCE. It is produced by God, and it is directed by God. He brings it about, and he guides it.

1. It comes from God. Now, this is most certainly an integral part of nature. We have seen that the thunder belongs to nature. That was not always apparent to men; there seemed to be something so weird and awful about it that men attributed it to supernatural agencies. But the rain is manifestly in the order of natural phenomena. Yet this is as Divine as the thunder. God is in all nature, and as much in its quiet, normal occurrences as in what is startling and exceptional.

2. It is piloted by God. The clouds seem to pass over the heavens in wild confusion. We can see no reins to hold them in, nor any whip to drive them on. The science of meteorology is about the most backward of all the sciences, because it is so difficult to reduce the phenomena of the weather to their place in an orderly scheme, on account of their ceaseless variations and apparently boundless irregularities. But we are already seeing that there are laws behind the weather, and some of them are already known. Hence our weather prognostications in the newspapers. Now, the Scripture view of the weather, as much as that of the most orderly and changless phenomena, attributes all its movements to the will of God. God is in what looks to us most conflicting and purposeless. If he is steering it, we can trust to him to bring it to a happy end.

II. ITS PURPOSE.

1. This is determined by God. The march of the clouds is commanded by their great Captain. In nature as well as in human life God works with a purpose, and the end is with him.

2. It is obscure. We cannot tell whether the rain is for one particular purpose which we have in mind, or for another that has never occurred to us. In all life God works out many purposes quite beyond the reach of our thoughts.

3. It may be "for a scourge. God sends what we regard as untimely rain - rain in harvest; or too much rain - floods that devastate fields, drown crops, and invade houses. For God sometimes looks very stern in his actions, whatever his thoughts may be. In other ways God chastises his people by natural calamities. Let us not be amazed when these things happen to us. They are predicted, and therefore they should be expected.

4. It may be in mercy. For the good of his land." The dry soil needs rain. Thirsty crops are refreshed by the downpour that is distressing to the traveller. What looks like a calamity may be a blessing. Instead of complaining of the inconvenience of what happens to us, let us look round us and see if it is bringing good in some other direction.

5. In any case it is for a blessing. The scourge is a blessing in disguise. Though various results may issue from God's various actions, in so far as they are designed by God they all make for righteousness and the welfare of his children. Thunder and rain bless even by their calamities. Sorrow and loss, pain and tears, scourges and thorns, are instruments of discipline that bless when they hurt. - W.F.A.

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KJV: Also by watering he wearieth the thick cloud: he scattereth his bright cloud:

WEB: Yes, he loads the thick cloud with moisture. He spreads abroad the cloud of his lightning.