# “He gives rain on the earth” by John Piper

- Link: https://tollelege.net/2016/11/05/he-gives-rain-on-the-earth-by-john-piper/
- Published: 2016-11-05T20:30:04-05:00
- Author: tollelege

“‘God does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number. He gives rain 
on the earth.’ (Job 5:8-10) In Job’s mind rain really is one of the great, unsearchable
wonders that God does. So when I read this a few weeks ago, I resolved not to treat
it as meaningless pop musical lyrics. I decided to have a conversation with myself(
which is what I mean by meditation).

Is rain a great and unsearchable wonder wrought by God? Picture yourself as a farmer
in the Near East, far from any lake or stream. A few wells keep the family and animals
supplied with water. But if the crops are to grow and the family is to be fed from
month to month, water has to come from another source on the fields. From where?

Well, the sky. The sky? Water will come out of the clear blue sky? Well, not exactly.
Water will have to be carried in the sky from the Mediterranean Sea over several
hundred miles, and then be poured out on the fields from the sky. Carried? How much
does it weigh? Well, if one inch of rain falls on one square mile of farmland during
the night, that would be 2,323,200 cubic feet of water, which is 17,377,536 gallons,
which is 144,735,360 pounds of water.

That’s heavy. So how does it get up in the sky and stay up there if it’s so heavy?
Well, it gets up there by evaporation. Really? That’s a nice word. What’s it mean?
It means that the water stops being water for a while so it can go up and not down.
I see. Then how does it get down? Well, condensation happens. What’s that? The water
starts becoming water again by gathering around little dust particles between .00001
and .0001 centimeters wide. That’s small.

What about the salt? Salt? Yes, the Mediterranean Sea is saltwater. That would kill
the crops. What about the salt? Well, the salt has to be taken out. Oh. So the sky
picks up millions of pounds of water from the sea, takes out the salt, carries the
water (or whatever it is, when it is not water) for three hundred miles, and then
dumps it (now turned into water again) on the farm?

Well, it doesn’t dump it. If it dumped millions of pounds of water on the farm, 
the wheat would be crushed. So the sky dribbles the millions of pounds of water 
down in little drops. And they have to be big enough to fall for one mile or so 
without evaporating, and small enough to keep from crushing the wheat stalks.

How do all these microscopic specks of water that weigh millions of pounds get heavy
enough to fall (if that’s the way to ask the question)? Well, it’s called coalescence.
What’s that? It means the specks of water start bumping into each other and join
up and get bigger, and when they are big enough, they fall.

Just like that? Well, not exactly, because they would just bounce off each other
instead of joining up if there were no electric field present. What? Never mind.
Take my word for it.

I think, instead, I will just take Job’s word for it.”

–John Piper, [_Taste and See: Savoring the Supremacy of God in All of Life_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1590524497?tag=toletaupanre-20)(
Sisters, OR: Multnomah Publishers, 2005), 24–26.

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