Job 14:7–9: “But there is hope for a tree if it is cut down. It will sprout again and its new shoots will not fail. Although its roots may grow old in the ground and its stump begins to die in the soil, at the scent of water it will flourish and put forth shoots like a new plant.”

This is, in my mind, the ultimate passage about hope. The worst has happened to the tree here. The tree is not only cut down; its root has grown old. So it has been a while. It is not something you can just switch off and on with the push of a button. Its stump begins to die in the ground. The death process has begun to manifest in this tree.

But “at the scent of water it will flourish.” This is the ultimate picture that all is not lost.

We see this with Jesus Christ, who died, who was buried—not for one day, not for two days, but for three days—and He rose again. And even before then, we see it with Jesus raising Lazarus from the grave. They told Him, “By this time there will be a smell, because he has been dead four days” (John 11:39). This is that kind of situation: “There is nothing you can do about it. It is gone. There is no hope. Nothing is going to happen.” But it says, “At the scent of water.” There was an intervention.

On its own, the tree that is cut down and dead cannot bring itself back to life. There has to be an intervention. There has to be something from outside that comes in.

Paul wrote in Ephesians 2 that we were “dead in…offenses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1). You can say this is a foregone conclusion. There is nothing you can do about it. These people are captured. These people are dead. But “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:6). That was the intervention. There has to be an intervention. God has to step in—and God has stepped in, God is stepping in, and God will step in, because that is who He is.

He has to make a distinction. You have to see the impact. You have to appreciate the work of God. It has to be seen and made obvious: this is the work of God.

“The scent of water” here means: whatever potential is in that tree, whatever it can express, will be expressed. You can ignore the cut‑down tree whose shoots have failed, which is dried up, whose roots have grown old in the ground, whose stump you walk past on the street and it does not even register in your memory because it has been like that forever. But there will be a transformation at the scent of water. Whatever is dead will come alive. Whatever seems to be hope lost, whatever seems to be potential dissolved, will respond.

“It has been a long time and we have not accomplished deliverance on the earth” (Isaiah 26:18 speaks this way). “This potential, these things You said, God, that would happen, have not happened. Rather than movement in that direction, there is actually regression. Things seem to be going from bad to worse.” That is exactly what we have here. Things were going from bad to worse.

Now look at Jesus. They were looking at Him. They said, “If You are the Son of God, come down from the cross” (Matthew 27:40). The disciples were there: What is going to happen? He died. Then He was buried. “Okay, what is going to happen now?” Day one. Day two. Day three. And He rose on the third day.

Glory be to God.

God bless you.