Second Week of Advent - Our Hope in the Fountain of Living Water

In our world it is difficult to understand the idea of thirst and the desire that one can have for water.  Water is such a basic human need that when it goes unfilled it is literally impossible to focus on anything else.  I don’t understand what it means to be thirsty, so thirsty that it consumes me.  So thirsty that I would give anything for a drink of water, that I can’t think of anything but water.  I feel so dry…dry…dry…  This consumes my thoughts and feelings and desires and everything that I am in this moment.  That is what it means to thirst.

The imagery of thirsting after Jesus as for a fountain of water has been lost on us.  Thirsting for water?  Why?  If I’m thirsty for water then I just go to the spigot and get a drink.  And so with Jesus, when he says that he is the fountain of living water, when he says that he who is thirsty should come and I will give to him to drink, we imagine him to be something like a spigot.

When we thirst we come and turn the spigot on, and when we don’t we leave it behind.  And if we turn the spigot and nothing comes out we just go to another source to fulfill our desires.  So we fill ourselves with the soda of this world and the milk of the earth, rather than waiting on the fountain of living water.

As we light this second advent candle and think of the hope that we have in Christ, let us be reminded of Him as the fountain of living water, the one who gives freely to all who thirst after him, and let us wait on the Lord in eager expectation of the salvation that is ours.  Let us echo with the prophet when he says “as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me.”

Let us be reminded of our hope, and wait expectantly for the one who will quench every thirst.  Let us not be so consumed with the now that we fill ourselves with the soda of this world that will not satisfy, but instead let us look forward to the blessed hope that has been revealed in the face of Jesus Christ, waiting to be filled with the fullness of Him who is that which we truly thirst after.  May we allow ourselves to be thirsty for the Way, and the Truth, and the Life rather than being so quickly satisfied with that which will only make our stomachs sick.