Though the fig tree fails
Joy without the harvest
The prophet Habakkuk arrives, at the end of his book, at one of the most stunning summits of faith in all of Scripture. He pictures total devastation — no blossom on the fig tree, no fruit on the vine, the olive crop failed, the fields barren, the flocks and herds gone. Everything that a person's security, livelihood, and joy depended on, stripped away at once. And then he says: yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will be joyful in the God of my salvation.
This is joy reduced to its irreducible core. Habakkuk does not rejoice because things are going well — they are catastrophically not. He rejoices in the Lord himself, in the God of his salvation, when every other reason for joy has been taken away. He has discovered the one source of joy that does not depend on circumstances, and the loss of everything else has only revealed it more clearly.
This is what the dark night and the empty valley are for: to bring us to the place where God himself, and not his gifts, becomes our joy. As long as the fig tree blossoms, we cannot always tell whether we love God or his blessings. But when the harvest fails and the stalls stand empty, and joy in God remains — then we know. The God who is your strength can make your feet like the deer's, sure-footed on the heights, even when everything below has been swept away.
“Though the fig tree doesn't flourish, nor fruit be in the vines, the labor of the olive fails and the fields yield no food, yet I will rejoice in the LORD.”
— The prophet Habakkuk — Habakkuk 3:17 (WEB)
Let the stripping away of your blessings reveal a joy that rests on God himself — able to say, with Habakkuk, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, even when the harvest fails.
“The Lord GOD is my strength. He makes my feet like deer's feet, and enables me to go on the heights.”
While the harvest holds, our love for God and our love for his gifts grow into each other so quietly that we cannot tell which one we are actually feeling. The interior work is to welcome the valley as the place that finally separates the two — and to reach, beneath every failing security, for the joy Habakkuk found, the one that rests on the God of our salvation himself and outlasts an empty field.
This week, examine where your joy actually rests: imagine (or face) the loss of a blessing you depend on, and deliberately practice rejoicing in God himself apart from it, cultivating a joy that would remain even if the fig tree failed.
A joy entangled with blessings is a joy on loan; let the fig tree fail and it fails with the fruit, and despair moves into the empty house. But the gladness that says yet I will rejoice in the LORD stands on God alone — and what stands on God cannot be carried off by stripping the branches bare.
As long as our blessings remain — the fig tree blossoming, the harvest coming in — we can rarely tell whether we love God himself or simply the good things he provides. The two are tangled together, and our joy could be resting on either. It is only when the gifts are stripped away that the truth comes out: whether any joy in God remains when everything else is gone.
This is part of what the dark valley is for. Habakkuk reached the summit where, with every earthly security removed, he could still say yet I will rejoice in the Lord — joy reduced to its irreducible core, resting on God alone. The loss did not create that joy; it revealed it, purifying his delight until it stood on God himself and nothing else. When your fig tree fails, the question the valley asks is searching and clarifying: is there a joy in God left in you when the harvest is gone?
- Does my joy rest on God himself, or on the blessings he provides?
- Would any joy in God remain in me if the harvest failed?
- What is the dark valley revealing about where my joy truly rests?
Lord, while my blessings remain I cannot tell whether I love you or your gifts. When the fig tree fails and the stalls stand empty, let joy in you remain. Be my strength, make my feet sure on the heights, and let me rejoice in the God of my salvation alone. Amen.