Refreshed by

Living Water
Fruhauf
Living Water is interesting terminology within the scriptures. Essentially it is water that is not stagnant, which tends to breed bacteria, germs and disease. Living water is usually from a spring, fresh rain water, river, ocean or lake that has a ow in and out. It is where the ancient Jewish practice of MIKVAH comes from or as Christians know it, BAPTISM. It is done when anyone wanted to commit or recommit their ways to the LORD; when women were puried after cycles and childbirth. Anyone could enter the waters of a Mikvah and be Immersed showing delity to God and purication before Him or that delity and purity to a spouse.

www.GraciousVine.com written by Joanna

Revived Reinvigorated Replenished

What one element would you associate with being refreshed... WATER! We take showers in the morning to get going and wake us to the world, we drink water when weary, we jump in a pool when overheated. Water is a source for Life. As a kid and especially after the movie JAWS I feared water. Various camping trips gave opportunities for a variety of strange water experiences. I have been tossed and pummeled by waves, pinched by crabs, wrapped with seaweed, pulled off leaches, swam seeing sharks, in pools and ponds with alligators, water moccasins, eels, lampreys attacking canoes...muck between toes, all so refreshing right? Personally, my favorite type of swimming is with a vinyl or cement floor! In fact, before my husband and I started camping again, I hadnt been to a beach in 20 years. Fortunately I can now say, Ive gotten past all that trauma from my youth and cant stand a summer when we dont spend two weeks camping on the beach. Water really does Refresh us! The Bible talks a lot about water, and more specically LIVING water.

It was in the waters (mikvah) that the earth was cleansed by God during the ood of Noahs day. It was the waters of the mikvah that David saw Bathsheeba purifying herself for her husband. It was the waters of mikvah that John was calling people to be recommitted to the Lord in at the Jordan River. The Jordan River has an iconic association with purity and baptism. The Waters of Genesis 1:9 were gathered into one place, the term in Hebrew is the Mikvah. Living Water was prominent in the Garden of Eden where it came up from the ground like a fountain or spring in the center and broke off into 4 rivers meandering through the garden watering all of it as it exited. It brought life to every area of the garden. In similar fashion the River of Life in Revelation will be bringing life to every area it ows with in. Trees will line its banks bearing a several different fruit.

In Genesis 6:7-14 Hagar the pregnant mistress/concubine of Abraham flees and finds herself refreshed by a miraculous spring supplied by an angel of the Lord and encouraged to return and submit to her master. Then again in Genesis 21:9 She is sent away by Abraham and again is refreshed by a miraculous well, her and her son survive. In Genesis 32:22-30 Jacob wrestles The Angel of the LORD by brook of Jabbok, his name is then changed and an eternal blessing is given to Him. Moses nds himself with nearly 2 million people in Exodus 15:12-27 at the Waters of Marah which mean waters of bitterness. a Tree was commanded to be put in the waters and changed the waters miraculously from bitter to sweet. Living waters are what became of the Bitter waters at Marah where the children of Israel complained to God just three short days after their miraculous crossing of the Red Sea where their enemies were crushed and swept away by the Sea itself. Once again while the people are complaining in Exodus 17:6 In the middle of a harsh and brutal desert, Gods wonder and mercy explode on the scene as Moses Strikes a giant rock, The Rock of Horeb and massive amounts of water flow, enough to sustain 2 million people and their livestock. Elijah is provided for miraculously by God in 1 Kings 17: 2-6 as he proclaims a drought but is himself able to drink and be sustained at the Brook Cherith.

Naaman in 2 King 5:1-19 is a Leper miraculously cleansed and healed in the Jordan River. In the Gospels we hear John the Baptists cry to Repentance beside the banks of the Jordan River where people were compelled to change their lives, and return to God being made spiritually new. Act 3:19 Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.

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John 4:10 - A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give Me a drink." 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. 9 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, "How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?" For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. 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." 15 The woman said to Him, "Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw." That Renewal was offered to so many, This woman recognized that JESUS was the source of True LIVING WATER.

While standing in the Temple courts in John 7:38 On the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink."He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water." Each year on this day the PRIESTS took water from Pool Siloam on last day of the FEAST of Tabernacles & poured it out on the Altar to Commemorate the ROCK of Horebs Water!- Jesus was saying in essence - I AM the LIVING water. Water that is greater than the water of Horeb which sustained 2 million people for 40 years in a desert - I AM Spirit. I AM Life. www.GraciousVine.com

Jeremiah 2:13 For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, And hewn themselves cisternsbroken cisterns that can hold no water. Jeremiah 17:13 O LORD, the hope of Israel, All who forsake You shall be ashamed. Those who depart from Me Shall be written in the earth, Because they have forsaken the LORD, The fountain of living waters. Revelation 7:17 for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

Interestingly there are two major rivers in the Bible that ow into the Dead Sea. One is Physical and One is Spiritual. The Jordan River and River of Life!!! Both descend to the DEAD Sea! The Jordan River flows from the Prominence of the high lands and the Sea of Galilee to Dead Sea - and other is the River that flows from the Throne of God into the Dead Sea when He returns. Ezekiel 47 The Prophet is shown a vision of a Majestic River that is too deep for Him to swim in and cross on His own, and it flows from the Throne of God, "the water of life as proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." His throne was set up in the temple at Jerusalem (Ezekiel 43:7). The waters flow eastward, towards the Jordan, and so along the Gihor into the Dead Sea. A main point in the picture is the rapid change from a petty stream into a mighty river, not by the influx of side streams, but by its own self-supply from the sacred miraculous source in the temple. (Compare Psalms 36:8,9, 46:4, Isaiah 11:9, Habakkuk 2:14). Searching into the things of God, we find some easy to understand, as the water up to the ankles; others more difficult, which require a deeper search, as the waters up to the knees or loins; others beyond our reach, of which we can only adore the depth (Romans 11:33). What is amazing is that the healing of the waters of the Dead Sea here answers to "there shall be no more curse" (Revelation 22:3; compare Zechariah 14:11). We have got to seek out the water of the word which cleanses us, making us holy and acceptable in His sight.... That sustains us during droughts and desperate times... It is Jesus who can turn bitter waters, salt seas to living and flourishing with all kinds of food and healing and life...It is when HE Shakes up our world, and Radically alters the Landscape of Death that it is swallowed up by HIS LIFE, HIS LIVING WATERS and Healing and Refreshing Come!
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Death swallowed up by LIFE

The River of LIFE

www.GraciousVine.com WE NEED the Living Water, because we are DEAD without it. We have descended with no way of escape. There is no way for mankind to reassert himself and gain life on His own. Regardless that He was made in the image of God, His sin has brought him to a place of inescapable death short of Gods intervention and miracle. Much like the Dead Sea whose waters started in the High Plains of Israels Upper boundaries, Mt Hermons precious springs and melting snow eventually find their way to the Sea of Galilee and then down the Jordan River, winding and descending becoming muddy and eventually end in the Salt Sea/ Dead Sea without an escape. That which flows out of Mankind, out of ADAM winds up leading to death. Only Gods Intervention can change the course of that truth. Nothing lives in the Dead Sea. Nothing Survives. In Joshua 3:14-17 there is an interesting and significantly spiritual scenario that unfolds. Joshua is leading the people over the Jordan River to step into the promised land. The Ark of the Covenant is being brought forth first by the Priests of God and as they step into the furious waters of the River Jordan, they are stopped, as far back as the city ADAM. GOD intervenes! By HIS PRESENCE the River Flowing from ADAM is STOPPED and the PEOPLE are able to be set FREE and walk without being swept away by the torrents of a River that leads to the DEAD SEA. DO YOU HEAR what the SPIRIT is saying there?

* ADAM Jericho * Jerusalem * * Crossing of Priests w/ ARK