Keep Moving
As I sat in my quiet time this time last year I asked the lord “what is it that you want to me to say” for today’s thought of the day. “Moving” came straight to mind. I had been in the process of packing up the house in preparation to begin the next part of my life, and had been truly blessed with having an opportunity to live next to a river, and a vision of a flowing river came into my mind, flowing water.
God is referred to as “Living Water” and we are called to be baptised in water just as Jesus was baptised. When Jesus came up out of the water the heavens opened and his father’s spirit came down upon him.
John 7 v 38 Jesus Said “If anyone believes in me, rivers of living water will flow out from that persons heart as the scripture said “.
Rivers can flow down mountains, through valleys (depressions) or along plains, and can create canyons or gorges. They have the capacity to form new terrain and they can move debris and materials that lay in their path. The term upriver (or upstream) refers to the direction towards the source of the river, i.e. against the direction of flow. I can look at periods in my life when I was swimming against the flow. I was two steps forward three steps back. My journey was always a struggle because my movement was against my father who always knows what’s best for me. I wasn’t going with the flow.
God, like a river is constantly moving, if a river stops the water becomes stagnant, if the water is confined so as to be practically motionless it becomes rotten, it becomes unsustainable and creatures cannot live in it. Water is at its best when it has movement.
When we are thirsty we drink. In John 7 v 32 it is written “On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.
Jesus was saying that those who came to him would be filled with his spirit. I love that he stood and in a loud voice. It was like he was saying …Hey everybody …listen to this…I’ve got something to say … you never have to die, I will quench your thirst. You don’t have to ‘dry up’.
The living water will be flowing from us. God literally keeps us ‘alive’. When god created us he made our bodies consist of approximately 60 % water, We cannot survive without it. With God flowing through us we are a never ending source of God’s life flowing through us. How wonderful that is.
So don’t allow ourselves to go stagnant, keep drinking, don’t wait until you’re on your last legs to get that cup of water, keep moving, and keep flowing. Everything we need is in that movement, the act of keeping up with the flow, allowing the river of life to find the valleys and depressions, to move the debris out of the way. In world history there are pockets of time that celebrated ‘Gold Rush’, people found nuggets of gold in the fallen debris and silt resting on the river beds, some gold could often be found in the rock too.