. . . hidden waters run to far green pastures.”

“For there is hope for a tree, 
   When it is cut down, that it will sprout again,
And its shoots will not fail.
   Though its roots grow old in the ground
And its stump dies in the dry soil,
   At the scent of water it will flourish
And put forth sprigs like a plant.
   But man dies and lies prostrate.
Man expires, and where is he?
   As water evaporates from the sea,
And a river becomes parched and dried up,
   So man lies down and does not rise.
Until the heavens are no longer,
   He will not awake nor be aroused out of his sleep.”
(Job 14:7-12)

I brought home two green willow branches from my grandmother’s after Thanksgiving, and kept them in a pot of water to see if they would grow. I have pretty good luck getting things to start growing, but they usually die shortly thereafter. They sprouted roots early on, and then I went away to a retreat, coming back late on Christmas Eve. 

“[The righteous man] will be like a tree planted by streams of water,
   Which yields its fruit in its season
And its leaf does not wither;
   And in whatever he does, he prospers.”
(Psalm 1:3)

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
   But desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”
Proverbs 13:12

“A garden enclosed is my sister, my bride— 
   A rock garden locked, a spring sealed up.”
(Song of Songs 4:12) 

   She thought of the hardness and the coldness she had cultivated over the years and wondered if they were the mask she wore or if the mask had become her self. If the longing inside her for kindness, for warmth, for compassion, was the last seed of hope for her, she didn’t know how to nurture it or if it could live.
   Unable to guess the answer, she asked, “Who am I, that you should love me?”
   “You are My Queen,” said Eugenides. She sat perfectly still, looking at him without moving as his words dropped like water into bare earth.
   “Do you believe me?” he asked.
   “Yes,” she answered.
   “Do you love me?”
   “Yes.”
   “I love you.”
   And she believed him.
(The Queen of Attolia, page 359)

“‘Behold, God is my salvation,
   I will trust and not be afraid;
For the LORD God is my strength and song,
   And He has become my salvation.’
Therefore you shall draw water joyfully
   From the springs of salvation.”
(Isaiah 12:2-3)

“The wilderness and the desert will be glad,
   And the Arabah will rejoice and blossom;
Like the crocus
   It will blossom profusely
And rejoice with rejoicing and shout of joy.
   The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
The majesty of Carmel and Sharon.
   They will see the glory of the LORD,
The majesty of our God.

   Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble.
Say to those with anxious heart,
   ‘Take courage, fear not.
Behold, your God will come with vengeance;
   The recompense of God will come,
But He will save you.’
   Then the eyes of the blind will be opened
And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.
   Then the lame will leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the mute will shout for joy,
   For waters will break forth in the wilderness
And streams in the Arabah.
   The scorched land will become a pool
And the thirsty ground springs of water;
   In the haunt of jackals, its resting place,
Grass becomes reeds and rushes. . . .
   And the ransomed of the LORD will return
And come with joyful shouting to Zion,
   With everlasting joy upon their heads.
They will find gladness and joy,
   And sorrow and sighing will flee away.
(Isaiah 35:1-7, 10)

“What is the scent of water?”
“Renewal. The goodness of God coming down like dew. . . .”
(The Scent of Water, Elizabeth Goudge, p. 326)

“Your dead will live; 
   Their corpses will rise. 
You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, 
   For your dew is as the dew of the dawn, 
And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits.”
(Isaiah 26:19)

“Arise, my darling, my beautiful one,
    And come along.
For behold, the winter is past,
    The rain is over and gone.
The flowers have already appeared in the land.”
(Song of Songs 2:10-12) 

“‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God. And behold, even your relative Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age; and she who was called barren is now in her sixth month. For nothing will be impossible with God.’ And Mary said, ‘Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word.’
. . . ‘And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what had been spoken to her by the Lord.’ And Mary said, ‘My soul exalts the Lord. . . .’”
(Luke 1:35-37, 45-46)

“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.”
(John 15:4-5)

“But when the kindness of God our Saviour and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneraton and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”
(Titus 3:4-7)

“The LORD will guide you continually
   And satisfy your desire in scorched places
   And make your bones strong,
And you shall be like a watered garden,
   Like a spring of water,
   Whose waters do not fail.”
(Isaiah 58: 11)

“Then he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” 
(Revelation 22:1-2)

C. S. Lewis, “What the Bird Said Early In the Year” 

I heard in Addison’s Walk a bird sing clear:
This year the summer will come true. This year. This year.

Winds will not strip the blossom from the apple trees
This year, nor want of rain destroy the peas.

This year time’s nature will no more defeat you,
Nor all the promised moments in their passing cheat you.

This time they will not lead you round and back
To Autumn, one year older, by the well-worn track.

This year, this year, as all these flowers foretell,
We shall escape the circle and undo the spell.

Often deceived, yet open once again your heart,
Quick, quick, quick, quick!—the gates are drawn apart.

When I went into the willows’ room to check on them, I saw that they had sprouted new leaves and some had catkins too. Leaves and catkins on a willow branch on Christmas Eve!