Psalms 107:33 Commentary: God Turns Rivers to Desert

Psalm 107 is a liturgical thanksgiving hymn, likely post-exilic, composed for public worship in the restored community. Its structure is unique: an opening call to praise (vv.1-3), four strophes describing deliverance from specific crises (wandering in the desert, imprisonment, illness, storm at sea, each followed by a refrain), and a concluding section (vv.33-43) without refrains that reflects on God’s sovereign reversals of fortune in nature and society. Verses 33-34 and 35-38 form a matching pair: judgment (fruitful to barren) and mercy (barren to fruitful). The language draws heavily on Isaiah: verse 33a echoes Isaiah 50:2 (“I dry up the sea”), and verse 33b resembles Isaiah 35:7 (“the parched ground shall become a pool”). Verse 35 quotes Isaiah 41:18 (“I will open rivers on the bare heights”). These allusions root the psalm in the prophetic tradition where natural fertility and drought signal covenant blessing or curse (Deuteronomy 28).

In the ancient Near East, water was the single most critical resource. Rivers and springs determined whether land was habitable and productive. To “turn rivers into a desert” was to reverse the very basis of life, an act only the sovereign God could perform. The Targum specifically refers this verse to the drought in Joel’s time (Joel 1:18-20), showing that early Jewish interpretation saw it as a historical judgment. The psalm’s juxtaposition of this verse with “a fruitful land into a salt waste, for the wickedness of those who dwell in it” (v.34) makes explicit the moral cause: human sin provokes divine action. This is not impersonal fate but a personal God responding to covenant violation. The context of the psalm, gathering the redeemed from captivity (v.3), suggests that the community singing this hymn had themselves experienced both judgment (the exile) and restoration, and could look back on God’s hand in both.

The supplied commentaries and lexical data note no significant textual variants for Psalm 107:33. The Hebrew text is stable across manuscripts. The differences among English translations, “desert” (WEB), “wilderness” (KJV, ASV), “dry land” (YLT), reflect lexical choices in rendering מִדְבָּ֑ר and צִמָּאֽוֹן, not textual disagreement. The Cambridge Bible suggests the verbs should be read as past tense (“he hath turned”) rather than a general present, but this is an interpretive judgment on the Hebrew form, not a textual variant.

Jewish tradition, as reflected in the Targum, linked Psalm 107:33 directly to the drought in Joel’s time (Joel 1:18-20), reading the verse as a historical record of judgment. Early Christian interpreters, following the psalm’s liturgical use, saw it as showing God’s power over creation and his moral governance of history. In the Reformation, Calvin stressed the didactic purpose: believers should see God’s hand in every change of fortune, not attribute events to luck. Matthew Henry and Gill both used the verse to warn against national sin and to call for repentance, with Gill citing Sodom as the classic example. The verse has also been sung in hymns that celebrate God’s sovereignty over nature, for instance, Isaac Watts’ paraphrase “He turns the desert into lakes” reflects the balanced picture of verses 33 and 35. Modern preachers often use this text to address questions about natural disasters and moral causality, careful to avoid suggesting that every drought is direct punishment while still affirming that God’s justice and mercy are at work in the world.

Three-point outline

1. God’s sovereignty over nature is absolute. Rivers and springs, the most dependable sources of water, are completely under his authority. He can dry them up or restore them at will. This is not magic or chance; it is the Creator exercising his lordship over creation.
2. Natural calamity can be a moral warning. The verse does not say that every drought is punishment, but it does assert that a fruitful land can become barren “for the wickedness of them that dwell therein” (v.34). Judgment has a purpose: to call people to account and to humble the proud.
3. God’s power is equally present in mercy. The very next verse (35) shows the reverse: desert turned into pools. The same hand that brings drought also brings rain. This double movement invites praise from those who have experienced deliverance.

Five-point outline

1. The setting: Psalm 107 is a song for the redeemed, gathering four pictures of rescue followed by a meditation on God’s governance of history.
2. The act: “He turns rivers into a desert”, an active, present-tense verb in English but likely referring to past acts in Hebrew (so Cambridge Bible). God has done this; it is not hypothetical.
3. The cause: The land’s fertility is lost because of the inhabitant’s wickedness (v.34). Human sin has consequences that affect the land itself (cf. Hosea 4:3).
4. The sovereignty: This is not impersonal fate or random disaster. It is the purposeful work of the God who rules the waters (Psalm 74:15).
5. The response: The psalm calls the wise to observe and understand the Lord’s lovingkindness (v.43). Events that seem like mere misfortune are meant to lead to repentance and praise.

Illustration hooks

• A farmer in a drought-dependent region watches a river shrink year after year. He knows that water is a gift, not a guarantee. When the rains finally come, his gratitude is worship.
• A community built on a now-dried-up lake (like the Aral Sea) lives with the consequences of decisions made decades earlier. The slow death of a water source is a parable of how sin can poison a whole landscape.
• Tourists visiting the ruins of once-fertile cities, Petra, Babylon, Sodom’s assumed site, see how even great civilizations can become barren. The stones whisper a warning about pride and injustice.

Questions your congregation is asking

• If God controls the weather, why do droughts happen? Is every disaster punishment?
• How do we know when hardship is a consequence of sin and when it is simply life in a fallen world?
• Can a nation or community repent in a way that restores its land? Does this promise still apply?

Psalm 107:33 stands in the middle of a section that contrasts judgment and mercy. God turns rivers to desert (v.33) and desert to pools (v.35). The key to understanding the difference is the moral condition of the people involved. This passage invites us to consider how we view natural events and what they might teach us about God’s character.

Discussion questions

1. Read Psalm 107:33-35. What do you notice about the way God acts in these verses? Is he arbitrary or purposeful?
2. The surrounding context (vv.34, 36-38) links the land’s fertility to the behavior of its inhabitants. How does this challenge modern assumptions about the separation of spiritual and physical realities?
3. Verse 33 uses the image of springs turning into thirsty ground. In what ways have you experienced a kind of spiritual or emotional “drought” in your own life? Could that be a call to examine something?
4. Compare verse 35: “He turns a desert into a pool of water.” How does this balance the picture? What does it say about God’s ultimate intentions?
5. The psalm is sung by people who had been redeemed from captivity. How might their experience of exile (judgment) and return (mercy) shape the way they sang this verse?
6. Some Christians read natural disasters as direct divine punishment; others see them as neutral events in a fallen world. Where do you land, and what Bible passages shape your view?
7. What would it look like for a group of believers to “observe these things” (v.43) and “understand the lovingkindness of the Lord” in the middle of a drought or hardship?