From J. C. Philpot's Daily Portions
September 11 "For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams
on the dry ground. I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring, and my
blessing on your descendants." Isaiah 44:3 In pouring out his Spirit upon Zion's offspring, God
pours out therewith every spiritual blessing that there is in his heart or
hands to bestow. Whatever earthly good you may enjoy, without the blessing
of God it will but prove a curse; whatever afflictions fall to your earthly
lot, if God blesses them, they must all eventually be made a blessing. Nor
is this blessing niggardly given, for the Lord has here promised that he
will POUR it out! It shall be given as profusely and as abundantly as the
Spirit himself. Nor shall Zion doubt either the blessing itself or the
source whence it comes, for it carries its own evidence, shines in the light
of its own testimony, and manifests itself by its own effects. And does not the contrast between the dry ground and the
promised showers of blessing enhance it all the more? Your very barrenness
and sterility make the promise all the more suitable, and therefore all the
more sweet. If you look into yourself, a barren wilderness meets your view.
If you look up, you see the clouds of blessing floating in the pure sky. You
see that the Lord has promised to "pour water upon him that is thirsty, and
floods upon the dry ground." You beg of him to fulfill that promise to your
soul. You have no other plea but his own word of promise, no other
recommendation but your own miserable barrenness. He enables you to cry to
him. He listens to that cry, and in his own time pours water upon your
thirsty soul, and floods upon your dry and parched heart. O may a sense of
our poverty and destitution be ever a means, in his sacred hand, of leading
us to seek that blessing which he alone can bestow!