Have you ever been in a difficult place and unable to resolve the issue? Sometimes all of us find ourselves in a place like that. We try and try and can't seem to overcome some besetting problem. I've been in places like that and I'll bet you have, too. Sometimes the reason we can't seem to get control over our problem is that God wants to use it to help us. A number of years ago, I heard my friend Jim Newsom speak on today's brief passage and it can help you and me if we will just let it. Let's listen to the passage about what God says He will do:

He turns a wilderness into pools of water, and dry land into water springs. (Psalm 107:35)

Jim Newsom is a pastor and teacher who has spent much of his life in prison ministry. Interestingly, he got into prison ministry because he was a prisoner himself. As a young man, Jim was arrested in Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, for various drug offenses. In 1972, Jim killed his best friend in a drug deal gone bad. When he attended the wake, a woman he knew led him to give his life to Christ. Feeling the weight of his sin, he turned himself in to the police the same day and was convicted of second degree murder. But while in prison, he discovered that he was drawn to share the gospel with dangerous prisoners. Even so, Jim started a church in prison, a church that is still operating today. He served eight years and was paroled. Jim learned the power of today's passage, that God "turns a wilderness into pools of water, and dry land into water springs." Please note that it doesn't say that God puts pools of water into the wilderness, it says that God takes the wilderness and turns it into pools. In other words, Jim found out that what he thought would harm him is what refreshed him. For more than forty years, he has been sharing Jesus with prisoners all over the country and has led thousands of them to find new life in Jesus. How about you today? Are you finding yourself mired down in some situation that you can't seem to escape? Maybe that problem is your wilderness. I encourage you to look for God's Presence in it. Ask Him to show you how He wants to turn your situation into a pool, a pool that refreshes and sustains you.

Always remember, God wants you to find abundant life in unexpected places...and that's very Good News!