H2O

When I was a kid, we went to the Catholic church, and I remember walking in the door and dipping my hand in the "holy water". Funny how some memories come rushing back when you least expect them. It was a sprinkling. The water, not the memory. I think the sound of the rain on our roof today brought it to mind. 

We don't think much about water in America. It comes out of the tap abundantly, and without effort. Not so in other places in the world where the only water has to be sought out, and then carried a distance. That's why, in John 4, we find a woman at a well, and Jesus using that moment of daily life to introduce Himself. There she was with her bucket, working hard at mid day, maybe wondering how many trips it would take to care for her household, when along came Jesus offering a different kind of water. Living water. The kind that washes you from your head to your toes and takes all the filth and sin away. The kind that quenches that thirst to understand who you are, and Whose you are. It was water that rushed into all the empty spaces in her heart, and filled them. Do you think she was still thinking about her laundry, or the dishes to be washed, or even physical thirst after that?

I've found, as the years have gone by, that I am no longer satisfied with dipping my hands in holy water, I want a drowning. I daily ask for God to immerse me in Himself, so much so that I can feel water up my nose, and on my skin, and in my wet hair. I pray that for my kids, for my family, and my friends, and my enemies. Especially for the ones standing in the heat on the sandy shore, inches from the waves, parched and longing. Step in. Step. In. You will thirst no more. John 4