Last Saturday was the annual fun day in our city park. Judith and I are part of the 'Friends' group of local residents that organise and run it. We arrived and met the rest of the group at 9.30am as planned to start setting up... but didn't as it was raining very heavily from a sky of unbroken dark grey. Nick from church turned up in the minibus. We climbed in and began to decide whether to call the day off or to move it indoors at the church.
I was for calling it off, and was still unsure when the rain slackened to heavy and one of the group - not a committed Christian - got out and said: "Looks like the rain is stopping. Let's get started." As we put up the first couple of gazebos the rain got a bit lighter, but I still wasn't convinced and was grumbling that we'd look like right idiots later, sheltering in one of the gazebos in a sodden and empty park. You see, I knew the weather forecast was for heavy showers all day...
Well, the rain stopped. We finished setting up, the jazz band, food, entertainers and face-painters arrived, the sun began to shine, and people started to come. Apart from a brief and not very heavy shower around 2pm, the next serious rain was about 5pm. By that time the event was over, several hundred people had come and had a great time, some community cohesing had occurred, and we'd done most of the clearing up.
Alannah told me later when she'd first noticed the gray skies she'd prayed that the rain would stop. Now, why didn't I think of that?
Photos: Top: 9.45am - view from the front of the minibus. Middle: 3pm - the Fun Day in full swing. Bottom: 5pm - the Friends group shelter under the trees, clearing up nearly done.
More photos of the Fun Day here.
I was for calling it off, and was still unsure when the rain slackened to heavy and one of the group - not a committed Christian - got out and said: "Looks like the rain is stopping. Let's get started." As we put up the first couple of gazebos the rain got a bit lighter, but I still wasn't convinced and was grumbling that we'd look like right idiots later, sheltering in one of the gazebos in a sodden and empty park. You see, I knew the weather forecast was for heavy showers all day...
Well, the rain stopped. We finished setting up, the jazz band, food, entertainers and face-painters arrived, the sun began to shine, and people started to come. Apart from a brief and not very heavy shower around 2pm, the next serious rain was about 5pm. By that time the event was over, several hundred people had come and had a great time, some community cohesing had occurred, and we'd done most of the clearing up.
Alannah told me later when she'd first noticed the gray skies she'd prayed that the rain would stop. Now, why didn't I think of that?
Photos: Top: 9.45am - view from the front of the minibus. Middle: 3pm - the Fun Day in full swing. Bottom: 5pm - the Friends group shelter under the trees, clearing up nearly done.
More photos of the Fun Day here.
