Isaiah 43:19 NIV: “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”
Many times in my life, I’ve felt stuck, either weighed down by external stressors, internally apathetic, or mired in cycles of repeated frustrations at where life has me. In those times, this verse has been one I’ve clung to and repeated to myself as a promise from the Lord.
The Hebrew word for new things means fresh, rebuild, or renew. When coupled with the phrase “now it will spring up,” I immediately visualize springtime. Out of the barren and depleted earth, fresh growth sprouts. This hopeful metaphor is powerful for times I feel physically, emotionally, or mentally dead.
The author gives more descriptions to encourage us. The Hebrew word for making a way is making a road or a trodden path for a journey. This opening place to walk forward is through a wilderness, midbar, which in Hebrew is a pasture or uninhabited open land. It brings to mind a vast, inhospitable landscape that can overwhelm us, and we may not know which way to go. God promises a way forward.
Not only is there a road ahead, but streams in the wasteland. The word used for streams is not a simple brook or creek but a word used for river or flood. Where this river begins to bubble up and refresh the earth is none other than a wasteland. A solitary and desolate place where life is usually absent.
I tried to capture a sense of barrenness and harshness in the landscape, with thorns and brambles impeding our path in juxtaposition with the lush, verdant new growth from the stream.
The key, however, to this verse is stuck in the middle. The writer asks, do you not perceive it? The word for perceive is yada, a very intimate word in Hebrew that means to know. It is a knowing that comes from deep personal experience and intentionality. This means that part of our responsibility is actively looking to see where God is at work. He is at this moment (it says NOW it springs up), making something new for you. Can you see it?
As you gaze at this image, I encourage you to mindfully try and perceive where God may be at work. Is there a spark of a new desire? A possibility of a new friendship? Maybe life seems extra cumbersome and tiring, but you note the smallest sense that something new will be there in the distance and in time. Hold on to that, my friend!
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