Water and Fire
John 4:10-14 ~10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? 12 Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?” 13 Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”
One of the characteristics of John's Gospel is that he records a number of personal conversations with Jesus. This is one. In it, we see the difficulty in attempting to fully explain the nature of God in the person of Christ. The "living water" here refers to the grace poured out in the person of the Holy Spirit. In various places the Scripture refers to the Spirit as either "water" or "fire." Both in conversation and in prophecy, we see both forms used.
What, then, do fire and water have in common which makes them so descriptive?
· As those who live in Southern California know, fire can spread with amazing speed—no matter what man proposes to do to stop it. If the season is dry enough, a brush fire is almost impossible to put out. Similarly, for those who live in a flood plain, there comes a point where the levees and dikes, the dams and basins are simply overwhelmed with water. When that happens, no pump made is of any real use. The water will go where the water will go. So it is with the Spirit—he will go where he pleases, and no one can say no.
· When such things as fire and flood happen to people, things change very quickly and very radically. The sensation of having all your possessions destroyed is not pleasant. But is this not what Christ told the rich young ruler? In essence, let the fire and water take away what is between you and God.
· We have seen the destruction; but we also know that fire and water, when properly harnessed, are of great benefit to mankind. That is the intent of the Spirit; he desires to live in us so that we may say, "Christ lives in me." The Spirit in one who is controlled is strong indeed.
· For the ancients, these two words would have had a different meaning. They believed that fire and water were two of the "elements" - meaning they could not be broken into anything else. For them, these metaphors would speak of the unity of God.
Christ, in talking to the woman, does not "put down" Jacob by comparison. Rather, he points this woman to himself as the source of living water. That river still runs today, for all who will believe.
Lord, sometimes we ask for finesse when we should ask for fire and flood. Let the Spirit grow strong in each of us, your children.
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