I need MORE WATER PLEASE...
Some thoughts from Tony...
My beautiful wife and my amazing kids all say that I say this one thing! When they don’t feel well, or have a headache, or are just tired, I give them the remedy by asking this question;
Have you been drinking enough water?
They usually just stare at me and roll their eyes like Dad, really? You can’t be serious, Dad, you think that drinking water or drinking more water is the answer to my not feeling well~?
Have you been drinking enough water?
This morning, I read John 4:1-26, and I received a text from a good friend who said he was praying for me and my preaching today. As usual, I started texting him back because he would be preaching. I found myself thinking about two things in my prayer...
Had my friend been drinking enough water?
I encouraged him to let the people come and drink deeply from the well inside him.
I love the way the Message translation puts it...
‘The water I give will be an artesian spring within GUSHING fountains of endless life...’
GUSHING fountains of eternal life! So first and foremost, Jesus says that the water he gives will become in us this GUSHING fountain of eternal life. What an amazing picture! Because of Jesus doing what he did and what the Holy Spirit continues to do, you and I can become a GUSHING fountain of eternal life! Why?
So whoever we come in contact with can get a drink and not just a drink but unlimited access to water that quenches their thirst but then makes them into one of those gushing fountains!
We know and have learned how amazing the water is, right?
There are so many water images used in scripture to show how full Jesus makes us and wants us to be and how we then get to take that water to others who are thirsty and quite literally dying from spiritual thirst!
Here are some of my favorite teachings from scripture using the water image. I encourage you to get a glass and fill it up, drink, then fill it up again, and drink too! When you’re done drinking, take one last big gulp, fill your glass up again, and share the drink with someone you know who is thirsty!
John 7:37-39
On the day of the feast, the most incredible day, Jesus stood up and shouted out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. Just as the scriptures says, ‘From within him will flow rivers of living water.” (Now he said this about the Spirit, who believed in him were going to receive, for the Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus was not yet glorified.)
Isaiah 55:1
Hey, all who are thirsty, come to the water!
Jeremiah 2:13
Do so because my people have committed a double wrong: they have rejected me, the fountain of life-giving water, they have dug cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns which cannot even hold water.
Ephesians 5:26-27
...to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious, not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless.
Here is one of my favorite ones because it tells me how to drink the water and what can happen when I drink the water!
Jeremiah 12:3-6
Joyfully you will draw water from the springs of deliverance. At that time, you will say:
Praise the Lord!
Ask him for help!
Publicize his mighty acts among the nations!
Make it known that he is unique!
Sing to the Lord, for he has done magnificent things, let it be known throughout the earth!
Cry out and shout for joy, O citizens of Zion, for the holy one of Israel acts mightily among you!
I love the thought about joyfully drawing the water, that is the how! Then it is like the GUSHING starts! Praise, ask, publicize, make it known, sing, cry out with joy! There is
something so much bigger than us when we start drinking from the springs of deliverance!
I believe there are many christ followers who are downright spiritually dehydrated and need badly to be filled up or, better yet, rehydrated with the water that Jesus offers. They have been without water for a way to long, and they are dried up, unfruitful, and are in desperate need of a massive drink of water! Can you imagine being a stream of living water to dry and thirsty land, as it calls us in Isaiah 32:1-2 when you are nothing more than a dried-up creek bed? Yes, life can get hard and is hard, and the sun can get hot, scorching hot almost to the point of burning us up. We all have been there. However, there is a tremendous promise in Psalms 1:1-6 that we need to claim and hold on to!
Instead, he finds pleasure in obeying the Lord’s commandments; he meditates on his commands day and night. He is like a tree planted by flowing streams; it yields its fruit at the proper time, and it’s leaves never fall off...
So maybe it’s time that we ask some honest questions... Have you been drinking enough water?
Maybe the source of many of your problems and anxieties and discouragements are because you need to get back to drinking water from Jesus! This leads us to ask another fundamental question.
Have you been drinking water from the right source of water?
Sometimes we think we are drinking, but maybe we are not drinking from the one true source of living water. There are so many voices that we can listen to today, and often even good voices can take away from listening to the one true voice that we need to hear and obey. Maybe that is why we get too busy, too distracted, too gobbled up. These things keep us from staying connected to the most important person in our life: being Jesus, and then staying connected to those important people that God has blessed us with here on earth, people like our spouses, families, and communities where we fellowship and worship.
Have you been drinking enough water?
If right now, you know that you haven’t been, then open up your bible and read John 4:1-26. You will read a story about an extremely thirsty lady, and she had been looking in a lot of wrong places for the water for a long time. Then it happened she met the true living water, and it changed her, and in fact, it changed a lot of people around her!
Go ahead! Pick up your glass and let God fill it up. Once you do, you will find that he never stops, and you can come alongside others and help them discover what you have found about the living water!
Have you been drinking enough water? Did you just roll your eyes at me?
Always Giving Thanks
Tony
My beautiful wife and my amazing kids all say that I say this one thing! When they don’t feel well, or have a headache, or are just tired, I give them the remedy by asking this question;
Have you been drinking enough water?
They usually just stare at me and roll their eyes like Dad, really? You can’t be serious, Dad, you think that drinking water or drinking more water is the answer to my not feeling well~?
Have you been drinking enough water?
This morning, I read John 4:1-26, and I received a text from a good friend who said he was praying for me and my preaching today. As usual, I started texting him back because he would be preaching. I found myself thinking about two things in my prayer...
Had my friend been drinking enough water?
I encouraged him to let the people come and drink deeply from the well inside him.
I love the way the Message translation puts it...
‘The water I give will be an artesian spring within GUSHING fountains of endless life...’
GUSHING fountains of eternal life! So first and foremost, Jesus says that the water he gives will become in us this GUSHING fountain of eternal life. What an amazing picture! Because of Jesus doing what he did and what the Holy Spirit continues to do, you and I can become a GUSHING fountain of eternal life! Why?
So whoever we come in contact with can get a drink and not just a drink but unlimited access to water that quenches their thirst but then makes them into one of those gushing fountains!
We know and have learned how amazing the water is, right?
There are so many water images used in scripture to show how full Jesus makes us and wants us to be and how we then get to take that water to others who are thirsty and quite literally dying from spiritual thirst!
Here are some of my favorite teachings from scripture using the water image. I encourage you to get a glass and fill it up, drink, then fill it up again, and drink too! When you’re done drinking, take one last big gulp, fill your glass up again, and share the drink with someone you know who is thirsty!
John 7:37-39
On the day of the feast, the most incredible day, Jesus stood up and shouted out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. Just as the scriptures says, ‘From within him will flow rivers of living water.” (Now he said this about the Spirit, who believed in him were going to receive, for the Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus was not yet glorified.)
Isaiah 55:1
Hey, all who are thirsty, come to the water!
Jeremiah 2:13
Do so because my people have committed a double wrong: they have rejected me, the fountain of life-giving water, they have dug cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns which cannot even hold water.
Ephesians 5:26-27
...to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious, not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless.
Here is one of my favorite ones because it tells me how to drink the water and what can happen when I drink the water!
Jeremiah 12:3-6
Joyfully you will draw water from the springs of deliverance. At that time, you will say:
Praise the Lord!
Ask him for help!
Publicize his mighty acts among the nations!
Make it known that he is unique!
Sing to the Lord, for he has done magnificent things, let it be known throughout the earth!
Cry out and shout for joy, O citizens of Zion, for the holy one of Israel acts mightily among you!
I love the thought about joyfully drawing the water, that is the how! Then it is like the GUSHING starts! Praise, ask, publicize, make it known, sing, cry out with joy! There is
something so much bigger than us when we start drinking from the springs of deliverance!
I believe there are many christ followers who are downright spiritually dehydrated and need badly to be filled up or, better yet, rehydrated with the water that Jesus offers. They have been without water for a way to long, and they are dried up, unfruitful, and are in desperate need of a massive drink of water! Can you imagine being a stream of living water to dry and thirsty land, as it calls us in Isaiah 32:1-2 when you are nothing more than a dried-up creek bed? Yes, life can get hard and is hard, and the sun can get hot, scorching hot almost to the point of burning us up. We all have been there. However, there is a tremendous promise in Psalms 1:1-6 that we need to claim and hold on to!
Instead, he finds pleasure in obeying the Lord’s commandments; he meditates on his commands day and night. He is like a tree planted by flowing streams; it yields its fruit at the proper time, and it’s leaves never fall off...
So maybe it’s time that we ask some honest questions... Have you been drinking enough water?
Maybe the source of many of your problems and anxieties and discouragements are because you need to get back to drinking water from Jesus! This leads us to ask another fundamental question.
Have you been drinking water from the right source of water?
Sometimes we think we are drinking, but maybe we are not drinking from the one true source of living water. There are so many voices that we can listen to today, and often even good voices can take away from listening to the one true voice that we need to hear and obey. Maybe that is why we get too busy, too distracted, too gobbled up. These things keep us from staying connected to the most important person in our life: being Jesus, and then staying connected to those important people that God has blessed us with here on earth, people like our spouses, families, and communities where we fellowship and worship.
Have you been drinking enough water?
If right now, you know that you haven’t been, then open up your bible and read John 4:1-26. You will read a story about an extremely thirsty lady, and she had been looking in a lot of wrong places for the water for a long time. Then it happened she met the true living water, and it changed her, and in fact, it changed a lot of people around her!
Go ahead! Pick up your glass and let God fill it up. Once you do, you will find that he never stops, and you can come alongside others and help them discover what you have found about the living water!
Have you been drinking enough water? Did you just roll your eyes at me?
Always Giving Thanks
Tony
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