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Daily Radio Bible Podcast
LIVING WATER
Today’s readings are II Kings 23, II Chronicles 35, and John 7. We are reading from the New Living Translation.
During the Festival of Shelters, each day the priest would carry water up from the pool of Siloam. There are steps that go from the pool all the way up to the gate of the temple and the bronze altar. Each day the priest would carry the water up and pour it on the altar and it would flow down the steps. This was a huge part of the celebration. The 7th and final day of the celebration marked the climax of the whole festival. John wants to make sure that we understand that this is the climax of it all. This act of pouring out the water was a symbol of the Messianic age when the Messiah would come and would pour out his Spirit upon all his people. This is what Isa 44:3 says.:
For I will pour out water to quench your thirst and to irrigate your parched fields. And I will pour out my Spirit on your descendants, and my blessing on your children.
This act of the priest pouring out the water on the steps, each day, for seven successive days, was a picture of the promise of Scripture, that the Messiah would come and pour out his Spirit upon God’s children. Jesus uses this moment, at the climax of the festival, to stand there on the steps, at that moment, and shout out to the crowd. John makes sure that we know that everyone hears him, as he declares this amazing thing about himself. He is telling the people who are present that he is the Messiah. He is the one that this whole ceremony is about. It’s all picturing him and what He will do – what He offers the world.
He says, in effect, if you come to me you’re going to have rivers of water, living water, pouring out of you – not just one little jar that a priest carries up each day and pours out over the steps. Instead – rivers of living water will be pouring forth, into you and from you, out into the world. These living waters give life and purpose, bearing fruit in your life, and giving hope.
Jesus had no interest in being famous, like his brothers who were goading him toward that end. His interest was in what his Father had asked him to do: to go, to be the Messiah, to fulfill the Scriptures, to let the world know that he alone is the source of living water, the source of salvation.
He is the source of our life in the Holy Spirit, By coming to him we can have this life, and rivers of water can flow from us into the world. Determine to respond to His invitation. Come to him, the source of life that is abundant and free, the source of the Holy Spirit. You don’t have to stand on those steps to determine that for yourself today. Receive the Living Water, wherever you are at; on a train, making your way into the city, commuting in your car, or turning the day down and getting ready for bed. Find your life and joy and hope in him, and him alone. Determine to receive it, walk in it, and be free in it.
You are loved!
