Life from Barren Places
“Sing, O barren woman, you who never bore a child, because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband,” says the LORD (Isaiah 54:1).
Scripture insists that God is capable of bringing life out of barrenness. When God came to human history Abraham, he told him that all human history would be different because of Abraham’s life, that out of Abraham’s descendants would come a lineage that would lead to the redemption of the world. I can imagine Abraham and God’s conversation after God told him that. I can hear Abraham saying, “You obviously aren’t from around here.”
“Oh, really, what do you mean?” God asks.
“If you were from around here, then you would know that when a man is seventy-five and his wife is sixty-five, there is no chance for them to produce a child.”
“That is right; I am not from around here. In the place from which I come, there is One who makes the impossible possible.”
I am sure God has a sense of humor. He made Abraham wait twenty-four years before he started the fulfillment of that promise. How could one get a better illustration of the fact that God is the kind of God who can bring life out of barrenness? God is saying that he is the One who can bring water from a rock, fruit from sterility, life from death. Note the accounts in Judges 13, Samuel I, and Luke I. Samson, Samuel, John the Baptist, and Jesus are all witnesses to what God can do.
God can bring something out of your barren and sterile heart too. If you open your life to him, you will find the unexpected. Out of you will flow living water that will reach a world for his glory. What could be a higher privilege?
—Dennis Kinlaw,
This Day with the Master
God delights in doing the impossible—not to impress us, but to remind us who He is. Today’s reflection draws us into the surprising, often uncomfortable truth that God brings life out of the very places we’ve written off as hopeless. Whether it’s a barren womb, a bruised heart, a shattered past, or a weary mind, the God who spoke life to Abraham and Sarah still speaks to us today. For those battling mental illness, addiction, or deep emotional pain, the promise isn’t just about miracles that change circumstances—it’s about the miracle of God changing us. The places in your life that feel lifeless or sterile are not beyond His reach. Open your heart—even the dry, quiet corners—and let the God who brings water from rocks cause something unexpected to grow. Living water still flows. And it can flow through you. —DH
—David Hoskins, Founder & Care Guide, Sanctuary Clinics