Unity #
26: Living Water
Dear Father,
Your glory is coming and Your Voice is like the sound of many waters.
Yes, the earth shines with Your glory. (Ez 43:2) There is a river whose streams
make glad the city of God, the holy dwelling places of the Most High (Ps 46:4).
Our bodies are Your tabernacles. You break open springs and torrents, bring
forth streams from the Rock of Christ, and cause waters to run down like rivers
(Ps 74:15, 78:16). You make us to lie down in green pastures and lead us
besides quiet waters. Please give us Living Water to cleanse and revive us.
In Jesus Christ’s Name,
Amen
Dear
Beloved,
This week’s letter is about the Living
Water of Christ. According to the New Covenant prophesied through Ezekiel, God
would sprinkle clean water on us, and we would be clean. He would cleanse
us from all our filthiness and from all our idols. (Ez 36:25) Jesus told the
Samaritan woman at the well that if she knew the gift of God, and who it is who
asked her for a drink she would have asked Him and He would have given her Living
Water. He said that everyone who drinks of physical water will thirst again,
but whoever drinks of the water that He will give him shall never thirst, but
the water that He will give him will become in him a well of water springing up
to eternal Life. (John 4:10-14) In the same way on the last great day of a
Jewish feast, Jesus stood and cried out saying, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and
drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scriptures said, ‘From his innermost being
will flow rivers of Living Water’”. By this,
Jesus spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for
the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. (John
7:37-39)
The power of the Living Water starts with
the washing of the regeneration. When the kindness of God our Savior and
His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we
have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of
regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly
through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would
be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Tit 3:4-7) The washing of
regeneration is our Spiritual baptism. For having been buried with
Christ through baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the
dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life
(Rom 6:4). Having been buried with Him in baptism, we were also raised with Him
through faith in the working of God, who raised Christ from the dead (Col
2:12). Think of Noah and his family who were saved as they were brought safely
through the water by staying in the boat, just as we remain in Christ.
Corresponding to that, baptism now saves us—not the removal of dirt from the
flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience—through the resurrection of Jesus
Christ, who is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels
and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him. (1 Pet 3:20-22). Christ’s
Feet are like burnished bronze, when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and
His Voice is like the sound of many waters (Rev 1:15). In John’s revelation of
heaven he said, “Then I heard something like the voice of a great multitude
and like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder
saying ‘Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns’” (Rev 19:6)
The Living Water involves the Spirit
and the Word of Christ. For when Jesus spoke of the Living Water that flows
from within the true Christian, He spoke of the Holy Spirit (John
7:37-39). God prophesied through Isaiah that He would pour out water on the
thirsty land and streams on the dry ground; He would pour out His Spirit and
blessing on His people (Is 44:3). The Living Water also involves the Word
of Christ. Jesus told His disciples that they were already clean
because of the Word which He had spoken to them (John 15:3). For Christ loved
the church, His bride, and gave Himself up for her so that He might sanctify
her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the Word (Eph 5:25-26)
Jesus is the Word (John 1:1)! So how do
the Word and Spirit interact as the Living Water? Jesus told us that when
the Spirit of Truth comes, He will guide us into all Truth; for He will not
speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will
disclose to us what is to come. He will glorify Christ, for He will take of His
and will disclose it to us. All things that the Father has belong to Christ;
therefore He said that the Holy Spirit takes from what is His and discloses it
to us. (John 16:13-14) The Holy Spirit takes the Word and cleanses,
regenerates, and renews us; He discloses the Word of Christ in the Scriptures
to us.
Dear saints, we must never forsake the Living
Water and seek to be satisfied with what does not satisfy. God told Jeremiah
that His people had committed two evils: They had forsaken Him, the fountain of
Living Waters, to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that could hold
no water (Jer 2:13). God tells everyone who thirsts to come to the waters; and
those who have no money to come, buy, and eat freely. Why should we spend money for what is not bread and our wages for what
does not satisfy? God tells us to listen carefully to Him, and eat what is
good, and delight ourselves in abundance, and to incline our ear and come to
Him, and to listen that we may live. For He has made an everlasting Covenant
with us, according to the faithful mercies shown to David. (Is 55:1-3). For His
justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream
(Amos 5:24).
There is great satisfaction and
contentment for those who drink of the Living Water. How blessed is the man who
does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners,
not sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the Law of the Lord, and
in His Law he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by
streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and its leaf does not
wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers. (Ps 1:1-3) The Lord will continually guide him, and
satisfy his desire in scorched places, and give strength to his bones; and he
will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters do not
fail (Is 58:11). The lame will leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute
will shout for joy. For waters and streams will break forth in the wilderness.
(Is 35:6) Those who bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there
may be food in His house, test God in this, for He will open for them the
windows of heaven and pour out for them a blessing until it overflows. (Mal
3:10). The blessing of our Living Water extends to others, for we must be
eager to share the Word of Christ with all in hope that the Spirit will bring
about regeneration and renewal. How blessed we will be, when we sow beside
all waters (Is 32:20). The generous man will be prosperous, and he who waters
himself will be watered (Prov 11:25).
The Living Water is an important part of
our initial and ongoing repentance. With weeping we have come, and with
supplication God leads us; He makes us walk by streams of water, on a straight
path in which we will not stumble; For He is a father to His people. To have
part with Christ, we must allow Him to clean our feet from the filth of our
daily wanderings, that is, we must live a life of ongoing repentance and
conformance to the Image of Christ. (John 13)
We share in the Spirit’s grief over the
unrepentance of others (Eph 4:30). May our eyes shed streams of water, because
many do not keep His Law and because of the destruction of God’s people until
He brings restoration (Ps 119:136, Lam 3:48). Jeremiah said, “Oh that my head were waters
and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain
of the daughter of my people!” (Jer 9:1)
Ezekiel describes the water which flows
from the Temple of God. Water was flowing from under the threshold of the house
toward the east. Water was flowing down from under, from the right side of the
house, from south of the altar. Water was trickling down from the south side
also. The water was deep enough to swim in, a river that could not be forded
surrounded by a large number of trees. The water went towards the sea, being
made to flow into the sea and the waters of the sea become fresh. Every living
creature that swarms in every place where the river goes will live. Fishermen
stand beside the river and it is a place for spreading nets for the many kinds
of fish. By the river on its bank, on one side and the other, will grow all
kind of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither and their fruit will not
fail. They will bear every month because their water flows from the
sanctuary, and their fruit will be for food and their leaves for healing. (Ez
47:1-12). At the time of the end, in that day, there will be no light; the
luminaries will dwindle. For it will be a unique day which is known to the
Lord, neither day nor night, but it will come about that at evening time there
will be light. And in that day Living Waters will flow out from Jerusalem, half
of them toward the eastern sea and the other half toward the western sea; it
will be in summer as well as in winter. And the Lord will be King over all the
earth; in that Day the Lord will be the only One, and His Name the only One.
(Zech 14:6-9)
Love
in Christ,
Preethi
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