Water on Thirsty Ground

In the summer of 2012 ninety percent of USA counties declared a state of emergency due to drought conditions. Corn crops shriveled and grain prices soared. 2013 doesn't look any more promising - at least in the West with low winter snowfall in the Rockies and projections that river-flows across the western states will be below average in 2013, as they have been for ten of the last 13 years.

Some ecologists today feel it is too late to talk about ‘sustainable’ strategies and focus instead on being ‘resilient’ as the earth's environment moves into deepening crisis.

Chronic drought can be debilitating, not just on the landscape, but in every area of life. Drought comes in many forms – when inspiration fails, when customers, job prospects or funding sources dry up … when marriage turns sour or brittle, or a daughter no longer calls home. Droughts like these cry out for relief just as desperately as farmers scan the sky for signs of rain.

That’s where some lines from the prophet Isaiah sing out to us with glistening hope:

I will pour water out on the thirsty land.
I will make streams flow on the dry ground.
I will pour out my Spirit on your children.
I will pour out my blessing on their children after them.
They will spring up like grass in a meadow.
They will grow like poplar trees near flowing streams.
Isaiah 44:3-4

Isaiah’s words came to the Jewish exiles in ancient Babylon as they wilted in ghetto communities and labor camps along the Euphrates. They were surrounded by physical water, but their souls were dry, their faith was parched, the future looked barren. Their children felt rootless with fading interest in the old traditions, culture and faith.

A 2012 study of church drop-out rates among young adults in Canada called Hemorrhaging Faith paints a similarly bleak picture. The landscape looks dry and unpromising and the status quo is surely unsustainable.

But barren landscapes don't tell the whole story. Isaiah invites us to embrace his song about rain and renewal, about God’s life-giving Spirit breaking into a new generation, about grass springing up in parched woodlots and poplars lining the riverbank – pictures of growth, vitality and a promising future.

This song – God’s song – counters the fear of the exiles – and the fears that paralyze us today. And parents, pastors and youth workers around the world can hear this song between the lines of Hemorrhaging Faith.

The larger context of Isaiah's song is about God as Creator and Redeemer, a God who calls us by name, who exposes the pipe-dream vanities, the contradictions and chaos that undermine our lives, a God who invites us instead into relationship and partnership in his mission to transform the dry and thirsty world.

That's a powerful song for today - the first day of Spring 2013. And Friday is World Water Day.  Until then, sing!

Image Credits:
Drought Map - Circle of Blue
Fresh Grass - Vanashree
Hemorrhaging Faith - James Penner & Asociates

Breakthrough!

In honor of Canada Water Week I’m posting some water-text observations from a song of hope and encouragement written for the Jewish community displaced in exile in ancient Babylon.

The year was 539 BCE and the long-cherished hopes of ever returning to Jerusalem were fading fast. Jewish children who had been born in exile were now grandparents. They were enslaved by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers that fueled the agricultural economy of famous Babylon, an empire that oppressed its captive peoples with apparent impunity.

But God challenged that Babylonian sense of omnipotence. In Isaiah 44:27 God said, "I am the Lord who says to the watery deep ‘Dry up!’... and I will dry up your steams."

Or as another translation has it “When I speak to the rivers and say, ‘Dry up!’ they will be dry.”

This promise seemed like wishful hyperbole to the Babylonian exiles, but in October 539, the Persian army captured Babylon without a fight and Cyrus, the king of Persia brought in a new policy of religious tolerance and national restoration. He issued a proclamation allowing the Jewish captives to return home and re-build their ruined city.

God broke through the impossible barrier. Just as the Red Sea had dried up centuries earlier as the Hebrews escaped from Egypt, now the surprised exiles walked out of Mesopotamia with full imperial funding and support.

I remember a childhood song my Dad used to sing:

Got any rivers you think are un-crossable?
Got any mountains you can’t tunnel thru?
God specializes in things thought impossible
He does the things others cannot do.

As a kid I assumed this was a guaranteed “Get out of jail free” card.

I’ve learned that life doesn’t always work that way, but I’ve also seen God dry up pathways through wide rivers and reverse ‘impossible’ situations and bring about unexpected break-throughs in my life.

What break-through are you desperately praying for? What rivers are you hoping will open up to allow you to live life to the full?  The God who opens up unexpected paths through uncrossable frontiers is still in the business of being God. Trust him.

If you’ve ever experienced God bringing about a break-through in your life, share it in the comment box below.

I’ll have some more observations from this song in future posts this week.

Photo Credits:
Water Graphic - bonfirehealth
Euphrates River - Ferrell Jenkins
Imprisoned - Jerry Reynolds Photography