Living Water Part 3

The other night I was sitting on my swing. The sun had already set, but the sky still had color in it. There is a pasture across the road from me. I could see only the silhouette of the tree line on the other side of it. It was so quiet. Peaceful. Suddenly, in the distance, I heard the sound of a tree falling and crashing on the ground. It was kinda one of those oddly, majestic moments. You know that question, if a tree falls in the woods and no one hears it, does it really make a sound? That was my first thought.

I must confess to you. When the Lord first started talking to me about living water, I never thought it would turn into a three part blog. But here we are.

As a little review:

In Living Water Part 1, we talked about shame— trying to collect the living water in a bucket, making it no longer living water. And also a bunch of other rabbit trails that I’m sure you don’t want me to get back into.

In Living Water Part 2, we talked about trust— or rather our lack of trust and how trust takes time. And again, chased some rabbit trails.

If you haven’t read both of those, I would highly encourage you to do so. All of these go together.

“Live like a River, not like a Lake” Kristi McLelland will say this over and over in her teachings. Why? Because lakes are stagnant. They don’t flow. They don’t move. But a river, flows and is continuously moving. Her point when saying this, is to encourage people to take what they have learned, to take what the Living God has shown them, and share it with others. We need each other.

In John 7, we read last week, about Jesus standing up in the water ceremony, of the Feast of Tabernacles, and saying “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 the rivers of living water.”

The phrasing is interesting here, isn’t it? Notice it says “Whoever believes in Me… ‘out of his heart will flow the rivers of living water.” There’s that heart again that we talked about in Fake Rest. But now what’s coming out of it? Living Water! The Holy Spirit!

So let me break this down a little bit:

• “If anyone thirsts…” Are you thirsty? He sees you. He knows of your lack. He knows your shame.
• “Let him come to Me and drink…” Do you trust Him to give you what you need even if it’s not what you expect? Do you trust His ways and timing?
• “Whoever believes in Me…” Do you believe Him? Do you believe that the gift He has to give you, (His Spirit) is exactly what you need?
• “Out of his heart will flow the rivers of living water…” Do you trust Him with your heart? Do to trust that His Spirit will flow through you to others?

My point is simple today. We cannot love others with a love that comes from ourselves. It wouldn’t be real love. And if we have not experienced the Love of God, through Jesus Christ, we cannot love others. If we have not gone to Him with our thirsts, if we have not given Him our shame, if we have not fully trusted Him and received the gift of His Spirit, we have no living water flowing from our heart.

Going back to Jeremiah 2:13 that we read last week…

“My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken Me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”

We are a busy and burned-out people. And the world and our culture is encouraging us to dig our own cisterns, to collect our own water, instead of leaning in and trusting in the God who gives us Himself to satisfy us. We are trying to satisfy our own thirsts and then trying to pour out to others from our own cisterns, not realizing they are broken and can’t even hold water. Hence the burn-out.

I’ve been vague, but you’ve probably picked up on the fact I’ve been struggling lately. I’ve been weary. Dry. It’s been hard to connect to the Lord. Hard to read His Word. Hard to pray. Yet, I’ve had an odd amount of moments that I’ve found myself speaking, encouraging, witnessing, not on my own. I think I’m learning that in my driest, darkest seasons—the seasons when I’m just not hitting all the marks, when the checklist isn’t even close to being completed— if I’m still being honest with Him, if I’m still trusting Him, He will flow through me whether I know it or not. Why? Because it’s not mine. It’s not coming from me. It’s coming through me! He is coming through me!

Maybe it doesn’t actually have anything to do with me at all— where I’m at, what season of life I’m in, my mental state, if I got up early and got in the Word that morning or spent time in prayer. And please hear me, those things are most definitely important. But sometimes it’s just harder. My prayers have looked a lot like “Lord, please help me, sustain me. I’m exhausted. I don’t know what to do. Please come and move. I can tell I’m not ok. But I don’t know what is really wrong, and I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t know what to do to change what’s happening.”

But still, in moments with people, He’s coming through. I don’t feel Him, yet I know He’s with me. I don’t hear any kind of direction, yet I know He’s still got me. I don’t see any changes, yet I trust and believe He’s working. And the crazy thing is, in these moments when I’ve needed words— the moments when I’ve needed to minister, He suddenly starts talking… and I see the tears forming in the eyes of a waiter at a Mexican restaurant. I see understanding and awe falling into a room of college students. I see faith beginning to rise in a friend’s heart. I see Him doing things He wants to do, saying things He wants to say. Loving the person in front of me the way He wants to love them.

It’s a humbling thing. That He might allow me, in these moments, to be the one who gets to say what He wants to say. It’s a humbling thing, to be allowed permission to experience His heart at all for another person. It’s a humbling thing, that He might want to partner with someone like me, who is struggling in my own ways, to be able to experience such a holy moment as this. When He comes and encourages with His love, it’s truly a humbling thing.

It’s like experiencing heaven touching earth, hearing the sounds of His voice coming out of your own mouth— like getting to hear the sound of the tree falling in the woods, when no one else is around. It’s an oddly, majestic moment.

Only He knows what others need. We can form our opinions. Oh yes, we love our opinions, but only He sees what truly is. Only He knows the best way. So unless we trust Him and drink from the Living Water ourselves, we cannot truly know His heart and we have nothing at all to offer others. We can have the most eloquent words, a beautifully scripted, formulaic gospel written out, ready to read, but unless we have drank of this Water ourselves, we have no water to give others. Unless we believe Him, unless we trust Him, unless we open our mouths wide for Him to fill (Psalm 81:10), we have nothing. He is the overflow.

I don’t have a lot for you this week. Just simply this:

Instead of trying to figure out ways to love people more, and evangelize better or more effectively, instead of beating yourself up for struggling with whatever it is your struggling with—lean into Him. Be honest with Him. Trust Him. Believe Him and rest in knowing that when you do, out of your heart, He Himself will flow, the rivers of Living Water.