Water Main Break

If a spring has not been opened in a soul, a spring of living water from God's own Son, no waters can flow and there is no life in you.  G.V. Wigram

Today I woke up a little earlier than I normally do, around 4:15, and I went into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee.  I had the coffee ready and went in to take a shower.  I had freely flowing water when I was making my coffee and by the time I turned on the water in the shower it was down to a trickle.
 
So I turn the water off and on again somehow thinking that by doing so the water would miraculously start running faster.  It didn’t happen.  So after turning it off and on several times I started thinking about how things have been going around Texas lately and it dawned on me that there was probably a water main break in our neighborhood.  I took the fastest shower on record.  I think Guinness Book of World Records should be calling me about now.
 
I decided to call the city to make sure they knew about my water issue.  There was another person up as early as I was because when I called at 4:30am, someone else in my neighborhood had already called them.  They even knew the water main break was on my street. I walked out the front door and there was a foot of water running down the street into the storm drain. 
 
This whole incident started me thinking.  We are dependent on water to survive.  I did several things once I realized what was going on.  I started thinking about the things that I do every morning that require water.  Washing my face, brushing my teeth, filling the dog’s water bowl, to name a few.  I immediately filled the dogs water dish, filled a cup with water to be able to brush my teeth because I knew it was only a matter of time before the city turned our water off to repair the break.  I even woke my husband up to see if he wanted to take a trickle shower and he proceeded to remind me that today was his day off so he wasn’t going to be getting up anytime soon to take a shower.  I even asked him if he wanted to get up and go see where the water break was and can you imagine he told me “no”.   I mean just because it was 4:30am, I can’t imagine why he wouldn’t want to have the opportunity to get up and see a water main break.  This is an event in my neighborhood. 
 
I then thought about how God blessed me this morning by waking me up a little earlier than I normally get up which allowed me to get coffee made, my shower and to get dressed before the city turned off the water.  My next thought was when I went out to the street and could see and hear the water rushing down the street and draining into the storm drain, how Jesus provides us with living water literally.  This water never runs dry, is never shut off and there is an unlimited supply available to any of us who choose to drink from it.  If we are filled with “Living Water” we will never go thirsty.

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I praise you for providing Living Water.  An unlimited supply that never ends.  Thank you for providing this life giving water so that when I believe in you and thirst I can come to You and be filled with Living Water.  I need Your help so that the same Living Water You provide, will flow out of my heart to others.        

Scripture: On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:37-39

Shark Infested Waters

A Christian is not a person who believes in his head the teachings of the Bible. Satan believes in his head the teachings of the Bible! A Christian is a person who has died with Christ, whose stiff neck has been broken, whose brazen forehead has been shattered, whose stony heart has been crushed, whose pride has been slain, and whose life is now mastered by Jesus Christ.  John Piper

Many years ago my husband was in sales and he received an all-expense paid trip to the Bahamas.  We stayed at a place called Atlantis.  This was probably the largest hotel I have ever stayed in.  This is a 141 acre property with several hotel towers, multiple pools, a shopping mall, casino, a lazy river and an underground tunnel system that contains 20,000 varieties of tropical fish and aquatic wildlife. 
 
This place was like nothing I had ever seen before.  The underground tunnels were filled with fish tanks that were created to look like undersea life.  There were sharks and lionfish, stingrays and grouper.  One of my favorite photos from that trip was me sitting on a rock next to a shallow water pool and in the water was a large hammerhead shark. I could literally reach back and trail my fingers through the water where this shark rested.  That is how close you could get to the wildlife.  In the morning we would get up and sit on our balcony and watch the divers feed the stingrays in the shallow pools that covered the grounds.
 
When I thought of this long ago vacation it made me think of the sharks that I saw on that trip.  The sea creatures on the grounds of the hotel were fed daily by divers.  I am thinking they did that so if you accidently fell in they wouldn’t make you their next meal. But we also took a photo of a sign next to a lagoon that read “No Swimming, Shark Infested Waters”.  This reminded me of Satan and the way he works in our lives.  If we don’t cling to God with everything we have in us, Satan is there waiting to get us into shark infested waters.  We become easy prey, bait fish for a bigger predator.  Maybe the sign should read “No Sinning, Satan Infested Waters”.    

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I praise You daily for your protection from Satan.  He is literally prowling the earth looking for someone to devour and I for one don’t want to be his next meal.  Help me to navigate the dangerous waters where he waits to prey on me if I let my guard down and become complacent.  You are my Savior and King.      

Scripture:  And the Lord said, “Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat.  But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.”  But he said to Him, “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death.”  Then He said, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know Me.”  Luke 22:31-34

The Ability to Choose

Many people hear the Word of God, but to some of them it is only words; they do not accept it as the Word of God. What a paradox it is that all creation obeys His Word except we who are made in the image of God and have the ability to choose.  Theodore Epp

I always find nature fascinating, maybe because all of nature follows God better than we humans do in everyday life. 

My dove is back.  Gladys came back again this year.  I like to think that she was a young mother last time when she built her nest in one of our trees.  The tree she chose last year didn’t have many leaves so she wasn’t hard to spot and her nest eventually fell apart. 

This year she chose a tree with tons of leaves and I almost didn’t see her nest it was so camouflaged by leaves and branches.  In reality she probably didn’t want me to see her nest because of the fear I would try to help her rebuild it if it came apart like the last one. That didn’t go so well the last time. 

I started thinking about the above quote in relation to every living thing on earth and humans.  Every other creature and plant on earth obeys the Lord.  Plants grow and produce fruit and animals have young and raise them without any help from us.  We are the greatest life form that God ever created in His own image and we are given great freedom to choose God above everything else in our lives, yet we often miss out on His Greatness because of that “freedom to choose.”

God didn’t create any of us exactly like another.  We are all uniquely made where no other person on earth will be exactly like us.  That alone should make us worship Him in awe. 

If God took such great care in creating us why do we have such a hard time obeying or believing in Him?  I think it goes back to self.  If it is all about us and not all about God then we will never come to understand God’s Majesty and what He created in each of us.       

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I stand in awe of You.  When I look at your amazing creation and observe how plants grow and produce fruit, or animals care for their young, I know the power You have over all of creation.  Help me to remove self from everything I do so that I will always be able to see You.  Thank You for giving me the ability and the good sense to choose You.

Scripture:   For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.  Ephesians 3:14-21

 

Unpredictable

God shows us Himself by being unpredictable.  How much more can we accomplish in His Name by being unpredictable too. 

When I think about the word unpredictable, it often brings to mind many of the stories in the Bible about how God worked.  God doesn’t do things the way we would.  He often used the most unorthodox methods to get his point across or to show us His majesty.

One of the best examples of this was in John 4.  This is the story of the Samaritan woman at the well.  She went to draw water from the well and Jesus was sitting at the well and asked her to draw water for Him.  The irony of this is that Jews were not allowed to have dealings with Samaritans.  So you have Jesus the Son of God actually having a conversation with a Samaritan woman in a public place in the middle of town.

In another unpredictable move, God spoke through a donkey to Balaam.  If we realize who God really is we will understand that he was and is unpredictable.  When we understand this we can then begin to understand that God wants us to be unpredictable too. 

It means that we must learn to do the unexpected.  We are God’s tool to show others Him.  To be the best we can be for His Kingdom we must do the unpredictable.  If someone hurts us the most unpredictable thing we can do is to forgive the person.  What does that show the other person?  It show them a small glimpse of our Heavenly Father. 

There are small things that each of us can do to be unpredictable for Christ.  Recently I was standing in line at the grocery store and there were two young teenagers that came up behind me in line.  I had twenty or thirty items already on the checkout counter.  The teenagers had two items.  I asked them if they would like to go ahead of me.  They both looked totally shocked that I would even offer to let them ahead of me in line.   Have you ever had someone do that for you in the grocery store line?  It makes you feel differently about the person doesn’t it?  It turns your impatience of waiting in line immediately to kind thoughts about the person and gratitude for letting you be first ahead of them.

It is not an accident that God wants us to put ourselves last.  The action of putting yourself last and allowing another to be first is the very basis of what God wants each of us to show others.  The unpredictability of that action can draw others to God and that is the ultimate blessing.  Are you unpredictable?     

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I praise You for giving us so many examples of how You were unpredictable with others.  That very unpredictability changed lives.  Help me to be unpredictable so that others can see You.  If it means I must be last, I thank you for that opportunity to be at the end of the line.     

Scripture: A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”  For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.  Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”  The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”  Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”  John 4:7-14

Heaven's Gates

Scripture repeatedly makes clear that heaven is a realm of unsurpassed joy, unfading glory, undiminished bliss, unlimited delights, and unending pleasures. Nothing about it can possibly be boring or humdrum. It will be a perfect existence. We will have unbroken fellowship with all heaven's inhabitants. Life there will be devoid of any sorrows, cares, tear, fears, or pain.  John MacArthur

I was reading about Heaven’s gates and why they are there.  In the earth’s current state, a fallen world, when you see gates to a city, the majority of the time these gates are intended to keep out those who would plunder and steal.  When the Bible describes Heaven’s gates, they are open and will never be shut (Revelation 21:25) “Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there).”

If we compare today’s world with what is to come, there is no likeness to what we experience today.  It is described as not needing the moon or the sun for light because God’s glory will illuminate it and the Lamb is its light. If our name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life we can come and go through those gates freely.  Because of Christ’s blood on the cross, we will be able to approach His throne. 

Can you imagine being in a place where there is no deceit? (Revelation 21:8).  You won’t have to wonder if someone is telling the truth or not because there is no deceit allowed there. 

It will not make a difference if you are rich or poor in your current worldly circumstances because all who have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior will be welcomed into this amazing place.  There will be Living Water, and food in abundance and we will lack for nothing.     

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, when I read of the place you have prepared for us it makes me long for my eternal home.  When I start longing for things of this earth, remind me of this special place called “Heaven” with its streets of gold and angels guarding the gates protecting whoever enters. 

Scripture: “And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his work.   I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.”  Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.  But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and  idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie. “I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of  David, the Bright and Morning Star.” And the Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let him who hears say, “Come!” And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely.

The Merry-Go-Round

God's first great design in all our trouble is that we might let go of self-confidence. When we do that, there is a temporary sense of falling. But by faith in God's mercy, we land, infinitely more secure, in the arms of our Father, who is utterly in control at the brink of life and death.  John Piper

We have a tendency to help Satan along in our downfall.  When we are broken is when God can do the most through us but we fight it every step of the way.  Why does it work that way?  Why does it take our downfall for us to be better for His Kingdom?

I think the main reason is because we have to get to the end of the road for us to realize we have reached a dead end.  The irony is that when we reach that dead end that is the place where we meet God face to face and realize there is hope in our brokenness.  This is the very place where He pours out his mercy on us. 

If you think about it, our lives are a lot like being on a merry-go-round.  You hop on the horse and the merry-go-round takes off.  Then you have great things that happen in your life and the horse goes up.  Then tragedy strikes and the horse goes down.  Our lives resemble this up and down ride.  The problem is we get stuck in the ups and downs and never get off.  So we go in circles over and over again wondering when the ride will end.  It ends when we decide that we will wait for the Father in everything we do and place our trust in Him. 

Do you remember those merry-go-rounds at the park when you were a kid?  They were the ones that were powered by a couple of kids running alongside it to make it go faster and faster.  Finally the last kid jumped on and everyone on it spun endlessly until it stopped.  Do you remember the feeling you had when you stepped off? You had spun around so fast for so long that all of a sudden when you stepped off you couldn’t walk straight.  So every kid walked sideways or fell over onto the ground because you were so dizzy. Merry-go-rounds were never meant to get you anywhere.  They just go in one endless circle.  If you want to get where God can take you, step off and be amazed. 

When we decide to step off the merry-go-round of life and wait on God, amazing things will happen.  He meets us in the very place where we are the most broken.                   

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I have often fought through this life as if I am on an endless merry-go-round.  Remind me that You are where my peace lies.  If I place my trust in You, I know You will take me places I never dreamed of going.  Help me to step off.

Scripture:  My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.  James 1:2-8

Whom Will We See

Heaven is not here, it's There. If we were given all we wanted here, our hearts would settle for this world rather than the next. God is forever luring us up and away from this one, wooing us to Himself and His still invisible Kingdom, where we will certainly find what we so keenly long for.  Elisabeth Elliot

Have you ever thought about the people you will see in heaven and those you will get to spend time with when you get there?  Then there is the time itself where you will have unlimited time where it doesn’t end. 

I remember many summers spent with my grandparents.  My sister and I would go for a week every summer to spend with my grandparents outside of Austin.  Sometimes if we were lucky we might get to stay an extra week. 

My grandmother was a great cook so when you went to Granny’s house she always had homemade cookies.  I don’t remember ever going to her house when there weren’t cookies in the cookie jar.  Sometimes it would be chocolate chip, oatmeal and sugar cookies and the next time there would be peanut butter and potato chip cookies.

My Grandpa was a fisherman so we always had the opportunity to go fishing or tubing in the creek that ran behind their house.  Grandpa had all the fishing equipment.  He had cane poles, hooks, corks and we would go down to the nearest bait store for minnows, worms and crickets.  Grandpa also taught us how to bait our own hook.  We were girly girls but we could bait our hook and remove a fish from the line. 

Granny and Grandpa also had a swing on their front porch and there were always times where you would just sit on the swing and talk about nothing in particular. 

Granny and Grandpa were always the ones who let us get away with stuff that your parents would never allow.  You always knew no matter what we did, Granny and Grandpa never told Mom and Dad.  You might get in trouble while you were there, but they never told on you.  It was the unwritten “Granny Grandpa Rule”.

When I think about heaven and the people I will see there I think about my grandparents. Can you imagine having no schedule and all the time in the world to just visit or maybe just go fishing with your Grandpa or cookies and milk with your Grandma? 

How about getting the opportunity to sit and talk to Jesus with no meetings to get to and having unlimited time with the One who saved us?  What about getting to talk to David about a sling-shot and a rock or Noah and a boatload of animals?  Then you might be able hear Moses talk about parting the Red Sea?  I look forward to Heaven with great longing.

                    
Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I am forever thankful for your many blessings, the most important one being Christ’s death on the cross for my sin.  Thank you for giving us a way back to You.  I look forward to seeing and worshiping You in Heaven.   

Scripture:  And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.  Matthew 8:11

Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.  And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.  And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.” Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.” And He said to me, “It is done!  I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son.  Revelation 21:1-7