AMONG all the material blessings of earth, air possibly excepted, the greatest is water. It forms the vast restless, rolling, roving body of the sea, and the mighty mass of overhanging clouds. It roars in Niagara, and soothes to sleep in the soft music of the rain. In fancier, filmier lace than skilful fingers ever made it crests the mighty wave, and sparkles like a diamond in the tiny dewdrop. The luscious, fragrant fruits of all lands and climes are filled from its fountain. The wide-stretching lake, the rushing river, the babbling brook, and the crystal spring are all alike fed from its flowing fulness. Tree and moss, blade and root, bird and fish, man and beast, drink daily life from its flowing streams; and leaf and plant, and flower and fruit spring up in response to its magic touch. It scintillates in the frost pictures, builds fairy forms in crystal white in the snowflake, and with the pencil of light limns on the heavens God's covenant bow. O beautiful, blessed water, the liquid of life, what wonder that Inspiration used thee as a symbol of the all-pervading, all-beneficent Spirit of God!
AN ARAB WATER-CARRIER IN JERUSALEM.
THAT bodily sensation which longs for water we call thirst. Hunger does not compare with it. Men suffer and pine and die from lack of food; but they become insane, when deprived of water. So suffering men will open veins in their own arm, drink the warm life-blood from slain beasts, and even take the lives of their fellow-companions, driven mad by thirst, or by both hunger and thirst.
AND every one thirsts. Every one must have drink to preserve the health, from the tiny, helpless infant to the aged, tottering grandsire; water must be had to quench the thirst, to cleanse the tissues. Some persons, for their physical needs, substitute for water various decoctions, mixtures, and distillations, more or less harmful. One must have his tea, another his coffee, another his beer, another his wine, another his brandy, or gin, or whisky, or champagne. Men sometimes boast that they never drink water. But they do; they all do; for the good of every one of these substitutes, mild or strong, moderately injurious or vile, is found in the water base. The more water there is in them, the less harm they do. Tea and coffee poison the water a little. Alcohol in its various forms poisons it much more. Poisons set on fire the tissues, and thirst is nature's demand for water to quench the fire and wash out the intruder. Water, pure water, satisfies. Alcohol—whether in wine, beer, whisky, etc., can never satisfy thirst; for the poisoned tissues call for more and more to quench their burning fire, eliminate the poisons, and soothe the sick and irritated organs.
JESUS CHRIST calls to the physical man, If any man thirst, let him drink of water, pure water. Even the brackish waters of the slime-covered pools are not so potent in death-dealing potions as the wretched intoxicating substitutes that millions are daily pouring down their throats. Better the warm, insipid water from the Arabian's goat-skin bottle than the champagne in the costly cut glasses of the millionaire. There is more life in the heeded cry, “In 'the name of the prophet, water,” than in the accepted invitation of the highest and fairest of earth to drink of the beverage which intoxicates, blunts the sensibilities, and destroys both soul and body.
WATER, blessed water, there is no drink like it. No shattered constitutions, ruined fortunes, wrecked characters, blasted reputations,2blighted homes, weeping, hopeless, worse than widowed wives, shame-faced, ragged, worse than orphaned children, drunkard's graves, and lost souls are charged to thy account, blessed water, free gift of God. All the fearful category, too long for mention, are chargeable to thy substitutes, the devilish delusions by which Satan and his agents would deceive and destroy the thirsty of the world. Heed them not. Drink water, pure water.
Water is the symbol of God's blessed Spirit which He is more willing to give to them that ask Him than earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children. Luke 11:9–13. He is saying now as of old, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink.”John 7:37. By every device of words and figure of speech He appeals to the thirsty to drink of life's water. “And the Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is ‘athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life ‘freely.’” Rev. 22:17. It is as free as the air.
But here, as with the physical man, Satan brings his substitutes, his counterfeits, his perversions, of the water of life. He asks men to drink from the ancient poisoned brewings of Babylon, preserved through ages of paganism, to quaff the sense-destroying, septic infusions of Buddhism, to sip from the more refined champagne cups of higher criticism and evolution; to take any mixture, any substitute, rather than the pure Spirit of God, direct from the great Father.
Jesus calls to you, thirsty soul, “Come unto Me.” Why not come and drink? The Fountain flows free. It will not only quench your thirst, but it will make you a fountain, and forth from you streams of living water will flow, blessing the thirsty. You are thirsty; leave the substitutes that poison; drink of the life-giving Spirit, and live forevermore. Jesus says to you, whoever you are, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink.”
