Snapshot
The Samaritan woman: The multiple-times married woman.
Jesus: Father of all, and mankind’s fellow sufferer.
Samaria: A part of Israel deemed occupied by proselyte Jews.
👀: Check here for part 1.
How we may drink?
Having discussed a little about how we may come to the brook of the living water, drinking per thirst can only connote a deepened dependence on the source. In this case, the next natural question that gets our focus is “How may we drink?” This section attempts to faintly answer the question.
More complicated shall the thought be, when one considers that in Isaiah 55:1, it was written that we should, without money, come and buy. This further limits our freedom of control on how to drink. However, the closest passage where a drink was without buckets and ropes, and the drinkers were expected only to drink according to thirst, is the story of Gideon. There, a test of fitness for enrolment into God’s army was conducted.
Judges 7:6:“And the number of those lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, was 300 men; but all the rest of the people got down on their knees to drink. Then the Lord said to Gideon, “By the 300 men who lapped, I will save you and deliver Midianites into your hand. Let all other people go, every man to his place.”
Judges 7:6: Only 300 of the men drank from their hands. All the others got down on their knees and drank with their mouths in the stream.
Judges 7:6: Now the number of those who lapped [the water], putting their hand to their mouth, was three hundred men, but all the rest of the people kneeled down to drink water.
Come as you are!
Granted, only the righteous shall ascend to the hills of God. That is but an expectation. The truth is that all men have sinned and fallen short of this expectation. Therefore, our lives are all fraught with this inequality. The psalmist further said when we regard this inequality in our hearts than confessing and forsaking them, not only does God pay deaf ears to us, but He is also committed to our lack of spiritual prosperity (see Ps 24:3; 66:18; Pro 28:13). The story of Gideon brings across two sets of drinkers. One set who lapped like dogs who we need not bother ourselves about, and the other who fetched water with one hand and drank by putting them to their mouths. Their drinking act means not so much to us as did what action preceded the fetching the water with their hand.
It is only logical that they purified their hands by rinsing them with the flowing water before they must have fetched it to drink with the same bare hand. The same water of Life that enervates is it that purifies. But the purification, like the army of Gideon, must precede drinking for any other reason.
Is your hand stained with as much as the blood of your blood brother? And your thirst is as sharp as the prickling might of guilt? Come, brother, the natural purification process for making fit for a drink will take its course. Has your mouth excellently run libels against others? With this same water, you may gaggle for the cleansing of your mouth. Come as you are! The only prerequisite is thirst. If you venture come without hunger, you may be sent away empty as Mary said about God (Luke 1:53) and Jesus confirmed by the story of the rich young ruler (Mark 10:17-27). Come as you are, the only perfect being that ascended before God in the name of perfection was demoted to the lowest abyss – Satan!
Are you sad, come and drink into freedom! In sorrow? come and drink into gladness! Underneath the dark clouds of time? Come and drink into the light! Sick? Come drink from the healing stream! In want? Come drink riches devoid of sorrows! Weighed down by sin? Come and drink into the personality of Jesus! Burdened by shameful failure and loss? Come drink into the gain of the cross! Overwhelmed by earth’s sorrows and storms? Come and drink of the balm-laden calm river of Life! Distressed by cares? Come drink into jubilating psalms! Come out of unrest and your arrogant pride and drink into abiding in His perfect will! Come out of yourself to dwell in His love – the flesh profits nothing! Come drink and be enraptured by the beauty of Life out of your constant despair! Scared by tombs dread? Come at once! Come and drink of the river whose course leads home! Are you wearied by ruins with depths untellable? Come and drink of the river of peace uminable! Come out of your habitual gloom, stoop down, and drink! And the first glance at the purity of the river shall dazzlingly refleflect the glory of Christ! Same river that satisifies also purifies to make the drinker fit for drinking. Come dear friend, eact time spent away is lost time of refreshing.
Time
Time is the current of Life. It is the quantity against which most values are staked and measured. The longer the lifespan of an antique, the more expensive it is. Things that do not last are naturally inexpensive. This may explain why Jesus is invaluable since His time of existence is immeasurable. He outspans all humanly known sense of worth because He lives in infinitive time, otherwise known as eternity. One who has no money can come to buy. He who has no purity can come. He shall be catered for by the same river. Sadly, one who has no time may never come. He who has time for all other things and pays no attention to the need of his Saviour in his soul will never come.
The time you do not have for Jesus now, shall you not have it to die when death comes knocking! All the activities that lie within the realms of our pursuit, if finally gotten, often never really satisfies. They share the same characteristics with the water from Jacob’s well – the drinker will thirst again. But, contrarily, if obtained from Jesus, a sprinkle carries the potential of preserving the drinker to eternity. Therefore, we brought nothing into this world. And we shall take nothing from it except the purity a fellowship with Jesus has achieved or corruption all other pursuits has accomplished in our souls.
Time for immorality; time for pleasure; time for football; like the Samaritan woman, time for men and wide learning; but no time for Jesus. Did we not hear in a later verse in the same chapter 4 of John that these drinkers are worshippers who will in turn worship God in Spirit and in truth? Shall you wait till eternity before you know that all that shall count in heaven is time dedicated to seeking God? Seeking God both in expressions of love to our neighbours and our private discussions in devotion to Him? Time ticks and ticks out every moment you spend on earth without God. It checks all the moments you use like a robber whom God lent time and never returned it with its interest accruals. Those who do not have time to seek Jesus on earth will have more than sufficient time to burn in hell! Be warned and repent!
Discipline
1 Corinthians 9:25 “And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.” A line in Pauls letter further buttresses this thought by adding that the athlete must compete according to the game’s rules (see 2 Timothy 2:5).
The other set of Gideon army made up of 7,700 volunteer soldiers did not scale through even if they passed the first test of fear. Coming to drink as goodly intended as it is must be according to laid down guidelines. Known or unknown little act of discipline, if inspired by the Holy Spirit and adhered to, will help solve the problem. The remnant 300 indeed drank with their assignment at heart. Riffle strapped to the shoulders and drinking with their hand to their mouth, they can unhesitantly dispose of the water and reach out for their ammunition to counter their attackers. But those who stoop to lap are in the slaughter-ready state - to be overrun by the Midianites' chariots.
John the beloved confirmed to us by his commentary given in Jn. 9:39 that Jesus spoke of the Holy Spirit when He said, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink…out of his heart shall flow the rivers of living water” in Jn. 9:37-38. This tells of the in-dwelling till filling up of the Holy Spirit, whose source to mankind is Jesus. How does discipline then apply?
Accordingly, it may be good to introduce an answer with the question: “What is your motive for seeking to be filled with the Holy Spirit?” To drink excessively and erode the purpose for which the Holy Spirit was given, like the sensual majority of the last 10000 of Gideon’s army? Or with God’s kingdom at heart? Are you drinking that you may outclass Jesus in popularity or that you may be His faithful servant, obscurity, bane, pain, shame regardless? Are you being filled for your personal gains or for God’s gain? Is your seeking for His Holy Spirit for “Thy or my will be done on earth”? Is it not unhealthy today that the drive for drinking from the living springs is to establish God’s kingdom on earth but instead our empire?
Where is the drive to run according to the competition’s rule? Or, like Moses and Noah, the passion for constructing according to pattern or spiritually hygienic convictions? Come with a disciplined appetite – drinking for the right reasons. No reason could be more correct than that for which this fountain is opened for the house of David. There exist no other purpose other than to cleanse people from the unhealthiness of sin (Zechariah 13:1). And where health is, there is Life, and a little more exercise of senses, an abundance of Life will be obtained.
Come as you are, come freely, come in time and drink disciplined!
