Living Waters - July 19, 2004 Entry

July 19, 2004

Dear Sweet Lord,

My heart is filled with awe, admiration and gratitude towards You. As I come to know You better I become more engrained in the Father's love. His love becomes more real and His characteristics are revealed through You. Father, thank You for this ever giving love gift of Your Son, Jesus Christ. This extra special, extraordinary gift keeps on giving and is one gift everybody needs. How I pray ALL would receive this gift that You freely give and draw near to You, in Jesus' name. Amen.

Holy One, yesterday You showed me many things, the biggest being my need for You. Though I hesitate mentioning this, I am being led by the Holy Spirit to allow my life to be an open book, read by all men for Your glory. With that in mind and spirit, I share that I recently started a liquid fast (not just water but any liquids of my choosing). While praying yesterday morning there was such a desperate need to draw close to You and it wasn't felt just for me but for the congregation of the people who attend the church we go to - and for all people! We all need You so desperately but most of us don't even realize it. Oh Lord, how that breaks my heart. Daddy God has given us so much through You and too often we fail to receive that which He's given us because of ignorance or lost communication with You. Oh, Holy Spirit, stir in the hearts and minds of God's people that they might know the goodness of their God and the faithful love of their Savior, Jesus Christ!

Lord, what was revealed to yesterday is that, in the natural I can more easily give up food than I can water or liquids, that my life is sustained longer with water/liquids then it is with food. Then the Holy Spirit reminded me that You are the living waters, the river of life. It is You who refreshes me and "flows" through me continually and is not meant to be stagnant in my life for stagnant waters can easily become contaminated, polluted. While we also need food in the natural, food alone will not keep us alive without some form of liquid with it.

Lord, You are using this liquid fast as a parable to show our need for You, living waters, in the relational/revelatory activity in our spiritual walk. You are showing that the written Word, logos, is vital in our lives and it does give us life and nourishment. but You are also showing how You, the living word, rhema (revealed word), stands ahead of the logos word. To clarify, what this means is we can have the written Word memorized and know it from cover to cover and live our lives by it and it can be a good start, but it is not all God has available to us. He has given us His Son, living waters, to drink freely of Him and to have a continual flow (rhema) of God living in us. Jesus is the reason we have life and relationship with God our eternal Father. Through Jesus flows all issues of lift, and it is these waters (liquids) that are of extreme importance to our lives. God intended Jesus to be our first love and for us to maintain a constant, continual relationship with Him. Yes both are good (the written word and the revealed word) but one is better and that He Who is our living waters. The Holy Spirit was sent to guide us to our Lord Jesus Christ. As we are open to the Comforter, we will draw closer to our Lord and drink of that which flows through every page of Scripture and that which might appear "dry" will take on new life and depth and wonder and our "thirst" will be refreshed by the lover of our souls, our beloved Jesus. Thank You Lord!

The body of Christ has need of this Living Waters to flow up from within them; but they need to be filled! It is by coming unto Jesus and being filled with His Spirit and Word, for only then does Life come forth. This Word and Spirit are Life to the believer; but, that's the catch: we must believe!! And we must ask of Him to be filled! Do we thirst, and do we hunger? Yes, we do! But it seems to be for things!! But what about God and His righteousness?! Don't we hunger and thirst for Him? I don't think so; yet, there is a spiritual hunger and thirsting going on within the church, and they do not even see it nor feel it because they have lost their spiritual identity in Christ, and are 'in' church. We are not told to be in church, but to come together as believers being the body, but not just a body, but HIS Body!
Only by coming together as His Body will we truly be identified in Him; and by feeding upon His Word and receiving of His Spirit shall we not thirst, because God is the Living Waters that fills us, and to fill us to overflowing so that others may partake of.

May we, the church, come together in the unity of the faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; for man is not to lord over one another, but be humble before God for there is only One Lord and One God. amen.