Day 18
Spring is almost here and that means that many snowcapped mountains in the Rockies will begin the melting process, the seasonal hydrological cycle known as snowmelt runoff, where accumulated winter snowpack turns into liquid water due to rising temperatures and solar radiation. Throughout the cold season, snow builds up on high-altitude peaks, forming thick, compressed, and hardened snowpacks. As temperatures rise, the snowpack begins to melt. The liquid water, or “meltwater,” begins to trickle down, forming small rivulets and streams which flow downhill, merging into larger streams and eventually rushing rivers.
A couple of years ago, while visiting our daughter in Colorado in early June, I witnessed the snowmelt runoff first-hand. While driving across a mountain pass, snow was packed 5 feet high on each side of the road. By the time we reached the bottom of the mountain we were greeted by rivers, once reduced to trickling streams rushing, even overflowing their banks! We even went paddle boarding on a glacial, or alpine lake and the colors in the water were spectacular!
Today’s reading from John’s gospel takes us back to the Festival of Shelters in Jerusalem and Jesus making yet another significant claim regarding living water. The crowd of listeners won’t have to wait for the end of winter and the snow to melt. The Source was right there and ready to refresh and satisfy them.
Read John 7:37-52
All Israel had gathered in Jerusalem for Sukkot, the Jewish festival that commemorated the 40 years their ancestors spent in the dry, thirsty wilderness after their exodus from Egypt. There, on the last and most important day of the festival, as the crowd called on God to bless the world with water, “Jesus stood up and cried out, ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. The one who believes in me, as the Scripture has said, will have streams of living water flow from deep within him.’” (v 38)
“…As the Scripture has said…” Which specific scripture is Jesus talking about? Running water, or living water as it was called in the Bible, is a theme that runs throughout the entire biblical text and is often a picture of God’s dynamic Spirit at work in the world. Jesus’ invitation refers back to Old Testament prophetic passages such as Isaiah 55:1 in which Israel is invited to, “Come, everyone who is thirsty, come to the water; and you without silver, come, buy, and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without silver and without cost!” and just a few chapters later Isaiah again references the people’s unquenchable thirst, “The Lord will always lead you, satisfy you in a parched land, and strengthen your bones. You will be like a watered garden and like a spring whose water never runs dry.” (Is 58:11)
One of the most beautiful examples of this living water comes from a vision Ezekiel experiences in Ezekiel 47:1-12. The prophet is shown a small drip…drip…drip of water coming out from under the temple in Jerusalem. Further down the mountain the small drip becomes a trickle, which then becomes a steam, which becomes a river, until finally the rush of water is so strong and wide that it couldn’t be crossed. Ezekiel measures the depth of the water and witnesses it rise from his ankles to his knees to his waist, until finally, he can’t cross safely. Over the roar of the rapids, God asks Ezekiel, “Do you see this, son of man?” (Ez 47:6) Ezekiel looks and sees that lush trees are bursting up along both banks of the river. Amazed, the prophet exclaims: “Since the water will become fresh, there will be life everywhere the river goes.” (Ez 47:9)
At this point in the vision Ezekiel starts wondering where this River of Life is headed. Will it fill a valley somewhere calm and quiet, creating a peaceful lake for people to enjoy? Will it circle back to the temple to avoid becoming contaminated by anything less than the freshest water? No, the river cascades directly to the unlikeliest of places: the Dead Sea. And when the flow crashes into this body of water notorious for lifelessness (due to its extremely high salt content), the Dead Sea actually bursts into life! Fish, frogs, fruit trees, you name it. This place that was once barren and lifeless is now a perfect example of God’s transforming power, further evidence that God brings dead things to life.
When Jesus invites the festival celebrants to come to Him and drink, He is offering more than a one-time drink of water. If they came to Jesus for refreshment, they would have to believe in him and enter into a trusting, ongoing personal relationship with him, but the invitation doesn’t stop there. Jesus is offering them the opportunity to actually join God in His work of transformation! Shalom to chaos, light to darkness, life to the dead places of the world…or in the case of Ezekiel’s vision, freshwater to saltwater. But there is one very important detail about this life-giving water: the trickle that becomes a stream that becomes a life-giving river does not find its source in the people Jesus is speaking to, nor you or me.
But honestly, that’s the very best part. The trickle that becomes a stream and eventually a life-giving river does not find its source in God’s people, past, present or future. If we walk with Ezekiel back to the beginning of his vision, we find the source is the very wellspring of God’s presence, specifically, the altar on which the lamb is sacrificed. Fast forward to Jesus’ offer, and knowing that He has come as the Lamb of God, to take away the sins of the world, that trickle of living water was already beginning to flow into all who believed and trusted in Jesus as Messiah. Those streams of living water were beginning to flow from within some of them, changing how they related to God, to their families, to their neighbors. But He was offering Himself to all who would come and believe.
Of course this continued to be a problem for the religious leaders. When the temple police returned to the Sanhedrin without Jesus, perhaps with their eyes a bit glazed over, the priests asked them, “‘Why didn’t you bring him?’ The servants answered, ‘No man ever spoke like this!’” (v 45-46) Their answer was more profoundly true than these officers could have realized, for no other man in history has been fully God as well and thus able to speak with the infinite knowledge and authority of God Himself.
My son, pay attention to my words; listen closely to my sayings. Don’t lose sight of them; keep them within your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and health to one’s whole body. Guard your heart above all else, for it is the source of life. Proverbs 4:20-23
Big Picture Questions for Today:
* Do you struggle, like the crowds in Jerusalem that spring, to trust that Jesus is Who He says He is? Do you get stuck in needing everything to make sense to your finite mind, asking the wrong questions, like, “Isn’t the Messiah supposed to be from Bethlehem?” And “Surely the Messiah wouldn’t come from Galilee, would He?”
Pray for faith to come to Jesus alone to quench our thirst, to cling desperately to Him so that His sacrificial love flows not only into us, but overflows out of us.
