Job 14:7-9 (HCSB)
7 There is hope for a tree: If it is cut down, it will sprout again, and its shoots will not die.
8 If its roots grow old in the ground and its stump starts to die in the soil,
9 the smell of water makes it thrive and produce twigs like a sapling.
When a tree is cut down, it looks like it’s all over for that tree stump. What good could come of it now, right? Wrong, God can still revive it from just the scent of His living water.
Water denotes a divine cleansing from sin as recorded in Ezekiel 36:25, water is a consummate renewal of life, it symbolizes human wisdom as in Proverbs 18:4 and salvation as seen in Isaiah 12:3.
In Jeremiah 2:13 and 17:13, God is described as the “fountain of living waters,” the eternal water whose source and power can revive, restore and refill every other.
Every plant needs water to grow and flourish, if not properly watered, it shrivels and dies and even when it dies, yet through the scent of water it will bud again as soon as it smells water, it speedily, and easily buds either from rainwater that descends upon it, or river water by which it is planted, I believe this is particular of the willow tree, which by the benefit of water bud out again, even when its stock is seemingly dead.
Every dead thing can come back to life through the power of God’s breath and dew says Isaiah 26;19.
Water is synonymous with hope, hope that whatever the condition of life or heart, at the scent—inhalation of water, it causes that life or heart like a tree to regerminate. The efficacy of water is in both the scent and the vapour or actual liquid.
Life happens to harden our hearts, cover our glory and keep us on a slippery spot as snow would do when it falls to the ground but when the rains come, it not only washes the snow away and leaves the ground clean, it prepares it for seed planting-Isaiah 55:10-11 because the rain cannot return to the Lord as it came down, the ground absorbs it and the scent of the water travels miles especially in the deserts where there’s little or no rain- the scent is enough to revive and sustain the desert plants.
The fragrance or scent of freshly fallen rain gives hope for the harvest to come.
This sense of renewal is something we all wish to experience again and again throughout our lives, and it is one of the precious gifts we win by spiritual struggles with the enemy who is constantly wanting and working to keep us dry and dead as Ephesians 6:12 states.
The scent of water misting in the air through the atmosphere, trees and slicking the horizon with the promise of rain is always something to look forward to especially after a long period of dry weather spiritual draught. Some of us have situations that as far as the eye can tell is beyond hope but God showed a pile of “dry situations” to Ezekiel and asked him, “Can these bones live?” in Ezekiel 37:3. He was asking Ezekiel, in other words, God is asking you, “Can anything be done with your mess? Can this situation change?
Yeah! God has this message for you today as a means of bringing the scent of water to you, who desperately needs it. Don’t lose hope yet. By the scent of water, God’s life-giving water you can be revived.
Shalom