He Is Everything He Says He is: #2 Jesus the Living Water

In John 4 we are introduced to the Samaritan woman at the well, where Jesus has come to sit down wearily after an exhausting journey. Jesus (as a Jew) astonishes the woman when He requests a drink from the well {Jews and Samaritans did not interact or unite in any way}, and she questions why He would ask her. Jesus then goes on to say in verse 10 -  “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” Jesus provides water that is alive, actively flowing and deserving of the true desire to be sought after.  The Samaritan women then carries on to question Jesus about how this ‘living water’ can be greater than the water Jacob has offered through the physical well, and Jesus explains that those who drink of the water that HE provides will never thirst again. ‘’It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.’’ Jesus assures us of the effects of this water and that ultimately receiving what He has to provide for us through Him supersedes the Old Testament and is more than enough as well as sufficient to bring forth what has been placed within us.

Later in John 7 from verse 37, where Jesus first addresses the fact that people are THIRSTY. He extends the gift of His everlasting Spirit and grace to ANYONE who chooses to believe. Jesus invites us to take initiative and to seek a drink (belief in Christ) which will result in us aligning ourselves with His Spirit, will and commandments. Jesus shouts to the crowds on the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles, using a key component of the tradition (water) to provoke revelation of who He is and what He has to offer, by proclaiming the power of this water that provides absolute life. Verse 38 – ‘’Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’”

Jesus ensures us that He is the source of life, the One in whom we depend on for refreshing of our spirits and restoring of our hearts. From Christ alone are we able to live in the Spirit (verse 39) that would be given through our belief in Him. Our yearnings for God’s presence, or quest for answers and our desire for complete wholeness, is available through the living water of the spirit of Jesus Christ. We no longer have to thirst for fulfilment, but are instructed to come to Jesus to drink, from a river in His heart that is never ending and will never run dry. Jesus, in offering the Spirit, is claiming to be able to satisfy people's thirst for God. The longing for God is met with God's invitation to be saved by believing in Jesus and receiving what will fundamentally fill us up spiritually in what the word describes as a ‘river’ – an overflow, a large capacity, a continuous as well as unbroken volume of living water that sustains our ability to stay alive in Him. In Jesus, God's own desire for man to be filled with and be led by His Spirit is expressed and the desire of man for a genuine relationship with God is met.