I recently read an article describing how parts of the western United States are currently experiencing historic levels of drought. If you’re interested, you can read the article here.
 
As a result, many lakes and other bodies of water are sitting at dangerously low levels. While these extreme water levels are mainly viewed through an understandably negative lens, there is at least one silver lining to these unprecedentedly low water levels:
 
What has long been submerged is now being revealed.
 
In the article mentioned above, the recent drought has dropped water levels to a point where researchers may have just solved the unsolved mystery of a plane crash that took place over 50 years ago.
 
For years, investigators searched the depths of the lake for the remains of the plane to no avail. However, with water levels as low as they currently are, lake surveyors recently discovered the remains of an airplane while testing some of their equipment.
 
If this is the plane that crashed way back in 1965, the answers that have eluded family, friends, and investigators all these years may finally be within reach.
 
Because of the drought, what was once submerged is now being revealed.
 
I wonder if God allows us to experience something similar to this? I wonder if God allows us to endure seasons of spiritual drought, so that what is submerged in our lives, the secret sin, the hidden pride, the unresolved wounds, and unsolved mysteries of the soul might also be brought to the surface.
 
Perhaps there are times in our lives
When God feels absent
When we don’t hear his voice
When we show up at church and experience nothing
When we read the scriptures and see nothing
When we pray and feel nothing
 
Because there are times in our lives when the only thing that can help us see what needs to be seen, feel what needs to be felt, hear what needs to be heard, and know what needs to be known is a spiritual drought so devastating that then, and only then, can the depths our souls can truly be explored.
 
It makes me think of Psalm 139. The psalm begins with the words, “You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.” The Psalmist continues on saying:
 
You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. ~ Psalm 139:2-4 (NIV)
 
We have a God who knows us intimately. Better still, we have a God who knows us better than we know ourselves. However, the often overlooked, unconsidered consequence of God knowing us in this way, is that God knows the true depths and content of our hearts, even when we do not.
 
That secret sin
Our hidden pride
Those unresolved wounds and unsolved mysteries
All the stuff in the muck and mire of our souls that we’ve repressed or long forgotten, God knows it, sees it, and wants to free us from it.
 
But how does God free us from the things we don’t even know we need to face?
 
He must either bring the bottom up or bring us to the bottom.
 
While there are some things that can be raised to the surface our lives, there are aspects of our lives that, like the plane sitting on the bottom of that lake in California, are so submerged that we must come to where they are.
 
And sometimes the only way to get to the depths is through drought. Through drought, what has been submerged can be revealed. Through drought, what has been lost can be found. Through drought, what has long been forgotten can be remembered once more.
 
In Luke 15, Jesus tells a story often called the Parable of the Prodigal Son.  While many a sermon and study has been spent focused on the story, the most overlooked aspect of the parable in the West is the catalyst that crystalized the son’s need: a famine.
 
The famine did for that young man what this drought has done for the plane on the bottom of the lake: it has revealed what was once concealed, exposed what was once submerged.
 
Sometimes we’ve got to experience the dryness of spiritual drought and the emptiness of spiritual famine to come face to face with the aspects of our lives we’ve been running from, ignoring, and missing all these years.
 
But as it is so often with God, there’s more good news. Droughts are sometimes followed up by super blooms.
 
In February of 2016, the dry, inhospitable land known as Death Valley experienced an identity crisis. The bland, arid soil was covered in brilliant colors – yellow, purple, and pink flowers covered the landscape. You can check out some images here.
 
For a time, Death Valley looked anything but dead.
 
As to the source of this explosion of color: heavy thunderstorms months and months and months before. That onslaught of storms came unexpectedly in October, the previous year, and as soon as they came, they were gone. Just like that, there was no more rain – no more water. Only dryness and drought. And all those rainless months seemed to be once again leading Death Valley to yet another spring filled with nothing but desolation. Only this year, 2016, would be different.
 
Drought was swallowed up by abundance.
Dust was swallowed up by wildflowers.
Death was swallowed up by life.
 
Sometimes the drought is just the prelude to the super bloom.
 
I don’t think any of us actually enjoy drought, regardless of whether it is physical or spiritual. The thing is, we don’t have to enjoy drought to be hopeful in it.
 
Through spiritual drought, the God who knows us better than we know ourselves drops the water level of our comforts in order for us to see the true, submerged condition of our souls.
 
Through spiritual drought, the God who knows us better than we know ourselves brings us face to face with our true need so that then like the son in Luke 15, we too might come running back to Him.
 
Through spiritual drought, the God who knows us better than we know ourselves prepares us for those rare moments of super bloom, when long forgotten rains and forsaken seeds burst into unexpected color and life.
 
So, if today feels like drought and there’s no rain in sight, may you join in the Psalmist’s prayer at the end of Psalm 139.
 
“Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.” ~ Psalm 139:23-24 (NIV)