Welcome back! If you are just joining us, we are using the YouVersion Bible App to follow a devotional together. Read THIS POST to get all the information you need to join in and then you can read THIS MORNING’S POST to see the promises we are focusing on this week.

Did you get a chance to spend some time with this week’s promises? I read them over and over and had such a hard time deciding which one stood out to me the most. Each one is so fantastic but the promise I am claiming this week is….

Expect surprisingly good things to happen. Even during the worst situations. Isaiah 43:18-19

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now i springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” Isaiah 43:18-19, NIV

I love that we serve a God of restoration and life. There is nothing so far gone that he can’t bring back! When the trees and vines are overgrown he can make a way through. When the dessert is dried out and saps life from everything he can make streams that restore.

Are there too many things in your way right now? Perhaps you said, “yes” to one too many commitments. Maybe you are trying to take on too much in your season of life. These could even be good things – Bible studies, youth group, organizing your home, going back to school, writing a book – but you’ve added so much to your plate you’ve forgotten your way! All these good things have gotten in the way of the greatest thing – your relationship with Jesus.

He can make a pathway through the wilderness. He can help you see through the things that are getting in your way and show you the path you are supposed to be on.

And just as he makes a path in the wilderness he can make life in the wasteland. Instead of too much perhaps you are in a season of drought. A season of scarcity. Your finances look like a barren desert or your relationship is becoming as dry as the sand dunes. He can bring refreshing streams that restore life to these areas!

And not only can he do it, and not only will he do it, he has already started! The beginnings of something new have already started, even if you can’t see it quite yet! He asks you to see it, he asks you to believe.

Thank you, God, for being a God of restoration and life! Thank you that we don’t need to live in the wasteland or in the wilderness for good. I pray that you would bring us the pathways and rivers that we need in our lives and that we would see them as soon as you begin. In your precious name, Amen.