Christian Pure

Prayers of Thanks for Rain and for God’s Creation

Christian Pure Team

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Summary

  • The 1928 Book of Common Prayer has a one-sentence thanksgiving for rain (p. 51) and a prayer asking for rain in a dry season (p. 40).
  • Short prayers give thanks for rain after drought, on a garden and a farm, for drinking water, on a rainy day, and for people harmed by floods.
  • The Benedicite, sung at Morning Prayer, calls on showers, dew, winds and wells to praise God; Catholics read it in Daniel 3, and Protestant Bibles print it in the Apocrypha.
  • The Catholic Manual of Prayers (1888) asks for “seasonable rain,” and the Orthodox Liturgy of St. Basil prays, “Give gentle showers upon the earth, unto fruitfulness.”
  • Israel relied on the former rain of late autumn and the latter rain of March and April; Elijah’s prayer on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18; James 5:17–18) is the Bible’s best-known prayer for rain.

Thanks for rain after a dry spell needs only a few plain words: “Lord, thank you for the rain. You have watered the ground and filled the streams again. Make the fields grow, and keep us thankful for the food and water you give. Amen.” The Episcopal Church’s 1928 Book of Common Prayer has a set thanksgiving for rain, one sentence long: O God, our heavenly Father, by whose gracious providence the former and the latter rain descend upon the…

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Bibliography (Click to show)
  • Scripture quotations are from the King James Version (1611), text of Project Gutenberg eBook no. 10 (Genesis 1:31; 2:15; 8:22; Deuteronomy 11:14; 1 Kings 18:42–44; Job 5:10; Psalm 104:13–14; 147:7–8; Isaiah 55:11; Zechariah 10:1; Matthew 5:45; 6:33; Acts 14:17; 17:28; James 5:17–18). https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10
  • The Book of Common Prayer (Protestant Episcopal Church in the U.S.A.), Standard Book of 1928. Morning Prayer, Benedicite, omnia opera Domini, pp. 11–13; Prayers, “For Fruitful Seasons” and “For Rain,” pp. 39–40; Thanksgivings, “For Rain” and “For Fair Weather,” p. 51. PDF facsimile: https://www.artisticdailyprayers.org/uploads/3/0/1/6/30164961/bcp1928std.pdf
  • A Manual of Prayers for the Use of the Catholic Laity, prepared and published by order of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore. New York: Catholic Publication Society, 1888. Occasional Prayers, “For Rain,” p. 167. https://archive.org/details/AManualOfPrayers1888
  • Hapgood, Isabel Florence, trans. Service Book of the Holy Orthodox-Catholic Apostolic (Greco-Russian) Church. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin, 1906. The Divine Liturgy, p. 110. https://www.ponomar.net/data/hapgood.pdf
  • The Holy Bible, Douay-Rheims Version, Daniel 3:57–88 (the canticle of the three young men). Project Gutenberg eBook no. 1581. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1581
  • Easton, M. G. “Rain.” Easton’s Bible Dictionary, 1897. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. https://www.ccel.org/e/easton/ebd/ebd/T0003000.html
  • Mershman, Francis. “Rogation Days.” The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 13. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13110b.htm

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