Parched

Texas is hot in the summer by anybody’s standards. It just is.

Last night at the Dallas Cowboy’s football game against the San Francisco 49ers, the announcer said that the temperature was 120 degrees on the field at the start of the game. No doubt he was referring to the heat index, rather than the actual temperature, but hot is hot. He expressed his relief that an hour later it had dropped to a balmy 107 and added, “It’s really not that bad down here on the field.”

Julia Glick, in an article for Associated Press in Dallas, referred to “a searing Texas summer marked by drought and 100-degree days”.She went on to say that “the cities are sweating out their hottest year on record so far and the state as a whole is in the running for its most sweltering year on record.”

In addition to the heat, which we have come to expect in the summer, this drought is also serious business. We have been operating under water restrictions all summer. Basically, we are only allowed to water our lawns one day a week, depending on whether our address ends with an even or odd number. Check out: http://www.thepointhocc.blogspot.com for one congregation’s efforts to unite believers in prayer for rain. According to the National Weather Service, we have a 40% chance of rain today and a 90% chance tomorrow. Lord, open the sky and rain down on us!

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,

whose confidence is in him.

He will be like a tree planted by the water

that sends out its roots by the stream.

It does not fear when heat comes;

its leaves are always green.

It has no worries in a year of drought

and never fails to bear fruit.”

Jeremiah 17:7-8