Kids love water.
Baths. Pools. Squirt guns. Water tables. Anything that holds water or makes it easy to pour water on others is pure fun.
Kolly and Thea were playing in the backyard with a water table that gave them easy access to enough water to soak them and me. Which they did, with gusto. Add heat and humidity, and it made it feel like a sauna.
The fun the girls had, however, was greater than any discomfort on my part.
They got creative and declared it to be everyone’s birthday. They filled containers with water, put mud on the bottom to hold the sticks that were candles, and we sang round after round of “Happy birthday to you!”
Leonardo da Vinci once said, “Water is the driving force of all nature.” We really can’t live without it. An average adult human is 55-60 percent water. 71 percent of the world’s surface is covered with water. Water isn’t something many people think about because they have easy access to clean water.
However, 25 percent of the world lacks access to clean water, about 2.1 billion people globally.
Jacques Cousteau, a famous ocean explorer and conservationist, once said, “We forget the water cycle and life cycle are one.” Life depends on the existence of water. People can last about three to seven days without water; we can go longer without food than water.
We need water to live. In Jesus’ day, the need to draw water daily from wells or pools was a reminder that life-giving water was a priority for every citizen. Unless one was wealthy, such as King Herod, who piped water into his palace and private pools, dipping jars in local wells was a daily need.
Jesus used this picture of daily life to help people understand what He came to offer them. He was in Samaria, waiting for His disciples to return with food. It was the middle of the day, when no one in their right mind would come and draw water. But a Samaritan woman came alone to collect the water for her daily needs. Jesus, breaking all cultural, ethnic, and religious traditions, asked the woman for water.
The Jews despised the Samaritans because they saw them as half-breeds, a mix of Jews and Gentiles, so there would be no conversation between them. And a Jewish man would never speak to a woman, asking her for help. The woman was confused; she couldn’t understand why He would speak to her. He understood what kind of woman she was; she’d been married five times and was living with a man who wasn’t her husband. Jesus didn’t condemn or shame her. Instead, He offered her a gift.
“Jesus replied, ‘Anyone who drinks this water will soon become thirsty again. But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.’” John 4:13-14.
The woman was astounded. Fetching water took a lot of time, and she heard this Man tell her He could provide her with water where she’ll never be thirsty. Where the woman was focused on physical water, Jesus was telling her of spiritual water that would satisfy her soul, that would never leave her thirsty for truth.
That’s the living water Jesus offers us. That which satisfies us in every way possible: hearts, souls, and minds. He offers gratifying truth that gives life to us in ways we often don’t think we need. Life-giving, life-building hope.
The girls had fun playing in the water. They never once thought about where it was from.
Jesus is like the hose connected to an unlimited source of love and forgiveness, showering us with the richness of all the blessings He enjoys giving us.
His type of water works wonders.
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