Verse of the Day for December 15

The streams in the south were the dry riverbeds of the Negev. For most of the year they are dust and stones. Then rain falls in the hills, and in a few hours the empty channels are running with water.

That is the picture of hope here. Not a slow trickle but a sudden filling of something that looked dead. And while they wait for it, they keep sowing. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.

Look at the farmer in verse six. He goeth forth and weepeth. Both verbs at once. He walks and he cries, and what he scatters is precious seed, grain his family could have eaten. He plants it anyway, because waiting is not the same as doing nothing.

The harvest is not promised for next week. The verse says he shall come again with rejoicing, and the word doubtless is in there, but the season is God's to choose.

If you are in a waiting room today, at a clinic or an embassy or outside an exam hall, sow something while you wait. A prayer for the stranger beside you. A kind word to the receptionist. Tears and seeds can be carried in the same hand.

Waiting does not have to mean doing nothing.

You can weep and sow on the same morning.