If the locusts have stripped your fields, and you have born a loss never to be regained.

If your threshing floor is not full of grain, and your vats are not overflowing with new wine and oil.

If what is precious has been ravaged or cut down, and the locusts still gnaw at the shamed remains.

Is there any reason to give thanks today? Is there any reason to praise?

This is what the Lord your God says to you and all his people:

“Then I will make up to you for the years that the swarming locust have eaten, the creeping locust, the stripping locust and the gnawing locust…”

Swarming suffering.
Creeping dread.
Stripping shame.

God intends to remove it all from you.

Years defaced.
Years destroyed.
Years of dismay.

God intends to restore them all back to you.

God is able to make up to you for all that the swarming, creeping, and stripping locusts have cut down. He is able to remove the sorrow and shame of his people and replace it with thanksgiving and even joy.

Beauty for ashes.
Laughter for mourning.
Feasting for fear.

“You will have plenty to eat and be satisfied, and you will praise the name of the LORD your God who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people will never again be put to shame.”

Peace to you this Thanksgiving season, even as you may mourn all that has been lost.

For the Lord our God is able to do all that he says he will do.

Darkness to light.
Sickness to health.
Death to life.

Our God will restore to whole  all the holy and precious things that the locusts have eaten.

And we, the people of God, will be forever satisfied and amazed with the way he has dealt so wondrously with us.

In this hope we can give thanks today.

Kim