Psalm 107:35

Psalm 107:35, in plain English

But God can also do the opposite: He can transform a wasteland into fertile pools of water, turning dry ground into streams that flow with life-giving water.

Why it's here

Here's the reversal. The same God who brings drought can bring abundance. The same creative power that disciplines can restore. The psalmist isn't setting these as two different gods or two different aspects that contradict—He's showing that God's power flows in both directions, and which direction it flows depends on the response of the people.

Who's speaking

The psalmist, presenting God's power to restore and bless.

Where it sits in the story

The wilderness-to-garden motif runs through Scripture. God leads Israel through the desert but takes them to a land flowing with milk and honey. The Gospel describes spiritual rebirth in similar language—dry bones becoming alive, barren ground producing fruit. Transformation from death to life is God's specialty.

The scholarly reading

Conversely, God reverses the process—miraculously transforming arid wasteland into verdant, water-rich terrain through His direct intervention.

Language and setting

The parallel structure to verses 33-34 creates antithetical symmetry: what God devastates, God restores. The Hebrew 'מִדְבָּר לַאֲגַם מַיִם' (midbbar la-agam mayim—'wilderness into pools of water') employs stark contrast, emphasizing God's capacity for complete reversal. The transformation is presented not as gradual process but as direct metamorphosis.

Voice

The psalmist, demonstrating God's restorative capacity through mirror-image imagery

Significance

This prefigures Isaiah's restoration oracles (Is. 35, 41) and anticipates eschatological promises of creation's redemption—the wilderness blooming represents cosmic reconciliation and the fulfillment of covenant promises.

33He turns rivers into deserts, springs of water into thirsty ground,

34and fruitful land into fields of salt, because of the wickedness of its dwellers.

35He turns a desert into pools of water and a dry land into flowing springs.

36He causes the hungry to settle there, that they may establish a city in which to dwell.

37They sow fields and plant vineyards that yield a fruitful harvest.

Read all of Psalm 107 — Four stories of people in trouble — lost, imprisoned, sick, storm-tossed. Each time they cry out. Each time God delivers. Let the redeemed say so.