Tag: living water

Come and See: Who Do You Think You Are?

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The Jews answered him, “Aren’t we right in saying that you are a Samaritan and demon-possessed?”

“I am not possessed by a demon,” said Jesus, “but I honor my Father and you dishonor me. I am not seeking glory for myself; but there is one who seeks it, and he is the judge. Very truly I tell you, whoever obeys my word will never see death.”

At this they exclaimed, “Now we know that you are demon-possessed! Abraham died and so did the prophets, yet you say that whoever obeys your word will never taste death. Are you greater than our father Abraham? He died, and so did the prophets.

Who do you think you are?”

Jesus replied, “If I glorify myself, my glory means nothing. My Father, whom you claim as your God, is the one who glorifies me. Though you do not know him, I know him. If I said I did not, I would be a liar like you, but I do know him and obey his word. Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.”

“You are not yet fifty years old,” they said to him, “and you have seen Abraham!”

 “Very truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds.
John 8: 48-59

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God.

That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell.

You must make your choice.

Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher.

He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. …

Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God.
~C.S. Lewis from Mere Christianity

I am all at once what Christ is,
since he was what I am, and
This Jack, joke, poor potsherd,
patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,
Is immortal diamond.
~Gerard Manley Hopkins from “That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the comfort of the Resurrection“

He says emphatically: Before Abraham, I am.

He is the Lord,
not liar nor lunatic.

He rains upon our thirsting earth
with shining drops of living water.

We are saved from the drought
of unbelief and skepticism.

Who do we think He is?
He is the immortal I AM.

I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year alongside my church family. Once a week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.

Come and See: Rivers of Living Water

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On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.  Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” 

Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

When they heard these words, some of the people said, “This really is the Prophet.” Others said, “This is the Christ.” But some said, “Is the Christ to come from Galilee? Has not the Scripture said that the Christ comes from the offspring of David, and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was?” 

So there was a division among the people over him. Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

The officers then came to the chief priests and Pharisees, who said to them, “Why did you not bring him?” The officers answered, “No one ever spoke like this man!”  The Pharisees answered them, “Have you also been deceived?  Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd that does not know the law is accursed.” 

Nicodemus, who had gone to him before, and who was one of them, said to them,  “Does our law judge a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he does?”  They replied, “Are you from Galilee too? Search and see that no prophet arises from Galilee.”
John 7: 37-52

This darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock highroad roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.

A windpuff-bonnet of fawn-froth
Turns and twindles over the broth
Of a pool so pitchblack, fell-frowning,
It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning.

Degged with dew, dappled with dew,
Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through,
Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern,
And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn.

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.
~Gerard Manley Hopkins “Inversnaid”

The One who gives the calm of lakes and pools, the freshness of brooks and streams, the majestic depths of seas and oceans, the glory of pounding surf, the might of Niagara and the tinkle of the garden fountain, the One from whose being flows the gift of the water of eternal life — this is the One who is dying of a terrible thirst on the Cross for the love of his lost sheep…
~Fleming Rutledge from “The Seven Last Words of the Cross”

…see the intricate connection between actual water—pure mountain streams, great lakes and seas, vast oceans, all of it created by God, all of it endangered by the carelessness and greed of humankind—and the living water of eternal life in Jesus Christ.

The water from <the crucified> Jesus’ side, together with the life-giving blood of the Lamb, is the metaphor for the eternal life that God gives to our human race, our race that seems more than ever to be bent on destroying itself and its beautiful planet. The interplay here between symbolism and factual reality is endlessly rich.

Human beings cannot live without water. In the age to come, in the city of God that will come down from heaven, there is a river of unquenchable love, bought for us by the agony and thirst of the only begotten Son of God.

Come to his water. Come to his cross. Come to his blood, shed for you . . . and find for yourselves the gift of the love that will never fail.
~Fleming Rutledge from The Christian Century

God has not abandoned us as we deserve due to sin and lack of belief.

He gifts Himself to His Created yet again, coming as Spirit to wash us clean in a river of living light and water. He invites us again to walk beside Him, die with Him, live with Him.

What we are asked for in return is simple faith – by acknowledging a God who is greater than anything or anyone, admitting we are thirsty and filthy, in dire need of cleansing.

He is our river of Light and Life, glorious and ever-flowing.

I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year alongside my church family. Once a week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.

Lyrics:
Are you thirsty
Are you empty
Come and drink these Living Waters
Time unbroken
Peace unspoken
Rest beside these Living Waters
Christ is calling
Find refreshing
At the cross of Living Waters
Lay your life down
On Thee, all come
Rise up in these Living Waters

There’s a river that flows
With mercy and love
Bringing joy to the city of our God
There our hope is secure
Do not fear anymore
Praise the Lord of Living Waters

Spirit moving
Mercy washing
Healing in these living waters
Lead your children to the shore line
Life is in these Living Waters

There’s a river that flows
With mercy and love
Bringing joy to the city of our God
There our hope is secure
Do not fear anymore
Praise the Lord of Living Waters

A Bright Sadness: Merciful Dew

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He hath abolished the old drought
and rivers run where all was dry,
The field is sopp’d with merciful dew
He hath put a new song in my mouth
the words are old, the purport new,
And taught my lips to quote this word
That I shall live, I shall not die,
But I shall when the shocks are stored
See the salvation of the Lord.
~Gerard Manley Hopkins




When I have no voice left,
He gives me a song I can still sing.
When I run dry, He replenishes.
When I wither, His merciful dew
restores and readies me for a new day.

I am stopped astonished,
sopped and mopping up,
spilling over in His grace.

Are you thirsty
Are you empty
Come and drink these Living Waters
Time unbroken
Peace unspoken
Rest beside these Living Waters
Christ is calling
Find refreshing
At the cross of Living Waters
Lay your life down
On Thee, all come
Rise up in these Living Waters

There’s a river that flows
With mercy and love
Bringing joy to the city of our God
There our hope is secure
Do not fear anymore
Praise the Lord of Living Waters

Spirit moving
Mercy washing
Healing in these living waters
Lead your children to the shore line
Life is in these Living Waters

There’s a river that flows
With mercy and love
Bringing joy to the city of our God
There our hope is secure
Do not fear anymore
Praise the Lord of Living Waters

God Was Here: Reclaiming His Own

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sunrise1214172

Now burn, new born to the world,
Doubled-naturéd name,
The heaven-flung, heart-fleshed, maiden-furled
Miracle-in-Mary-of-flame,
Mid-numbered He in three of the thunder-throne!
Not a dooms-day dazzle in his coming nor dark
as he came;
Kind, but royally reclaiming his own;
A released shower, let flash to the shire, not
a lightning of fire hard-hurled.
~Gerard Manley Hopkins, from “The Wreck of the Deutschland.”
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God came to us because he wanted to join us on the road, to listen to our story, and to help us realize that we are not walking in circles but moving towards the house of peace and joy.  This is the great mystery of Christmas that continues to give us comfort and consolation: we are not alone on our journey.  The God of love who gave us life sent his only Son to be with us at all times and in all places, so that we never have to feel lost in our struggles but always can trust that he walks with us.

The challenge is to let God be who he wants to be.  A part of us clings to our aloneness and does not allow God to touch us where we are most in pain.  Often we hide from him precisely those places in ourselves where we feel guilty, ashamed, confused, and lost.  Thus we do not give him a chance to be with us where we feel most alone.

Christmas is the renewed invitation not to be afraid and to let him-whose love is greater than our own hearts and minds can comprehend-be our companion.
— Henri Nouwen from Gracias: A Latin American Journal

 

lookingnorth3

 

Like so many, I tend to walk through life blinded to what is really important, essential and necessary.  I am self-absorbed,  immersed in my own troubles and concerns, staring at my own feet as I walk each step, rather than looking forward at the road ahead, listening to the companion who has always walked beside me.

We were joined by this living breathing walking God as He feeds us from His word. I hunger for even more, my heart burning within me.   Jesus makes plain how He Himself addresses my most basic needs:

He is the bread of life so I am fed.

He is the living water so I no longer thirst.

He is the light so I am never left in darkness.

He shares my yoke so my burden is easier.

He clothes me with righteousness so I am never naked.

He cleanses me when I am at my most soiled and repugnant.

He is the open door–always welcoming, with a room prepared for me.

So when I encounter Him along the road of my life,  I need to be ready to recognize him, listen, invite Him in to stay, share whatever I have with Him.    When He breaks bread and hands me my piece, I want to accept it with open eyes of gratitude, knowing the gift He hands me is nothing less than Himself, the Companion we were blessed with Christmas morning.

centralroadoct6

 

 

I wonder as I wander out under the sky
How Jesus the Saviour did come for to die
For poor on’ry people like you and like I;
I wonder as I wander out under the sky.

When Mary birthed Jesus ’twas in a cow’s stall
With wise men and farmers and shepherds and all
But high from God’s heaven, a star’s light did fall
And the promise of ages it then did recall.

If Jesus had wanted for any wee thing
A star in the sky or a bird on the wing
Or all of God’s Angels in heaven to sing
He surely could have it, ’cause he was the King

I wonder as I wander out under the sky
How Jesus the Saviour did come for to die
For poor on’ry people like you and like I;
I wonder as I wander out under the sky
~Appalachian Carol

 

sunrise1214171

The Universe in a Droplet

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kaledrops

And when the Sun comes out,
After this Rain shall stop,
A wondrous Light will fill
Each dark, round drop…
~William Henry Davies from “The Rain”

kaledrops3

I wouldn’t mind mud in August, just once, to see what is brown become lush and green overnight.

How sweet it would be to see copious tears spilling unchecked from a shrouded heaven.

Instead I must settle for one morning of northwest drizzle. An emerging sun illuminates these perfect round spheres with wondrous light as they roll off leaves and petals to huddle puddled together in community on the ground, only to evaporate by mid-day.

However, the wait for rain is never too long in this land of mush and mud ten months out of the year.

Rain will come sooner than I can imagine; soon again I will see a glistening crystalline reflection of the universe in a droplet.

The Living Water is always undimmed, its taste ambrosial.

kaledrop

Lenten Grace — The Dry Stone

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photo by Josh Scholten
photo by Josh Scholten

What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water.
~T.S. Eliot from “Burial of the Dead” in The Wasteland

We are created from perfection yet born broken, like a new toy flawed right out of the box already destined for the rubbish heap.  Out of our detritus there rises a thirst quenched only by hope and promise, coursing through roots that reach deep, surging into branches that rise higher despite a drought of faith.

This promise becomes glue for the brokenhearted, a sticky grace that can’t be shaken off, clinging to us though we are dry and undeserving as a stone.

Broken no more, silent no more, parched no more.  The living water now flows through us, a river of relief and shelter.

Advent Sings: Spring Up, O Well

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photo by Josh Scholten
photo by Josh Scholten

16 From there they continued on to Beer, the well where the Lord said to Moses, “Gather the people together and I will give them water.”
17 Then Israel sang this song:
“Spring up, O well!
    Sing about it,
18 about the well that the princes dug,
    that the nobles of the people sank—
    the nobles with scepters and staffs.”
Numbers 21: 16-18

Like the homeless Israelites of the wilderness years, we are prone to grumble as we wander through life.  Despite our many struggles, we are provided with what is needed when it is needed, day to day, to live.  In Numbers, ancient Israel sang of the wellspring of water that seemed to appear in the desert, no matter where they were,  in answer to their desperate pleading.    The wells of the ancients provided for their bodily needs, through God’s provision of water to the parched.

So too we are surrounded in the desert of modern society, desperately thirsty and needy for something, anything that will sustain us.  Our groanings and grumblings are answered, overflowing:

“The poor and needy search for water,
    but there is none;
    their tongues are parched with thirst.
But I the Lord will answer them;
    I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.
18 I will make rivers flow on barren heights,
    and springs within the valleys.
I will turn the desert into pools of water,
    and the parched ground into springs.
Isaiah 41: 17-18

The deepest well of all was born that night in Bethlehem, producing an endless stream of life flowing through the dry and dying landscape of human suffering and sin.   It was as if he had sprung up from the desert, miraculously appearing when desperately needed by the people.

10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
John 4: 10-15

Jesus asked the Samaritan woman for a drink at the well although he was the deep wellspring himself.    He dwells with us and like us,  needing the basics of water that can never truly satisfy.  He knows our body’s thirst as he feels just as we do.  Yet in responding to his bodily thirst,  we are engaged as never before, finding in him the quenching of our spiritual thirst.

Though Jesus needed nurturing and provision while on earth–as a helpless and hungry infant dependent on his parents, as a wandering teacher in the desert thirsty from the long hot miles, and hanging from the cross suffering from thirst and asking from relief–he is the deepest well from which we can possibly draw.

Let us sing of it this Advent.