After the Locusts Came Rain

In 2004, a swarm of desert locusts descended on West Africa — the worst infestation in fifteen years. Farmers in Mali watched helplessly as clouds of insects stripped their millet and sorghum fields down to bare stalks. Moussa Traoré, a farmer outside Bamako, told relief workers he sat in his empty field and wept. Everything he had planted was gone. Years of careful terracing and soil building, consumed in days.

But Moussa did not abandon his land. With aid from agricultural workers, he replanted. And something unexpected happened. The locust carcasses, millions of them decomposing in the soil, became nitrogen-rich fertilizer. When the rains returned that October, Moussa's millet grew taller and thicker than any crop he had ever raised. His yield nearly doubled. The very thing that had destroyed his field became the substance that enriched it.

This is the astonishing arithmetic of God. Joel announces that the Almighty will "repay you for the years the locusts have eaten." Not just replace — repay. Not just enough — overflowing. The threshing floors will be full. The vats will brim over. And then, as if abundant grain were not enough, God promises to pour out His Spirit on all flesh — sons and daughters, old and young, every willing heart.

Whatever the locusts have taken from you, the Lord is not finished with your field.