Drinking the Wrong Water...

Yesterday's sermon wasn't so encouraging for me, because honestly it made me face some of my past decisions.  It made me examine some truths in my life, that I would just rather push aside and forget that they exist.  You see I found myself sympathizing with the woman in the story...you know the one that has had "five husbands."  Now don't get me wrong I am not claiming to have lived the lifestyle that Jesus so clearly called her out on, and yet maybe I have.  

It brought me to a place of self-examination, a place where I had to look at myself and realize that I had been "drinking the wrong water, only to be thirsty again."  What is it that makes us keep going back to those people or places that are clearly not good for us?  What makes me continue to spiral downward, when I know that all I have to do is look up and take the cup that He is offering me?  Why don't I do it?  

I want the easy road.  The other road, the one with the good, thirst-quenching water it is a hard road.  It is a road full of heart-ache and pain.  A road that I have traveled down and continually found myself with people, and in situations that seem so much more difficult then the other.  At least that is what it seems like from my flawed human perspective. 

Yet I wonder, maybe I need to go down the so-called "easy road" first.  Maybe I need to look my sin straight in the eye, and see that it truly doesn't quench my thirst.  Over and over again I seem to be blasted with the things that I do so completely wrong.  I seem to be blasted with the people I have let come into my heart that were not pushing me toward God, in fact they pushed me farther away.  

If I want to truly have my thirst quenched, don't I first have to realize what is making me so thirsty?  Don't I first have to see that the "water" I think I am drinking isn't in fact water, but vinegar.  It looks so good from the outside, and perhaps will even go down, but in the end it does nothing for my thirst, but leave a sour taste.  

I know that I often substitute the real living water for something more immediate and tangible.  I know that my heart has been hurt and torn because I have allowed my life to continue in a cycle of "soul thirst." 

The thirst quenching road it isn't easy, but it is worth it.  To be the "kind of worshiper the Father seeks."  To be real and authentic in admitting when I don't want the living water, but want a substitute.  

My soul doesn't want to be thirsty.  My soul longs for the Living Water, to experience love and beauty.  To worship in spirit and truth.  Sometimes I just have to be reminded that the cup is there, but I might have to have everything stripped away in order to truly taste the goodness that is in the cup.  Sometimes we can only taste, when there is nothing left but our deepest, fears and regrets.