Spirit-power is “living water” to satisfy our thirst

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See Spirit-Baptism – BT12 for an excellent study on this!  The Holy Spirit is the “living water of zoe genuine-life” that was meant to “continually gush, spring, or well up (a) from our innermost being” (b).  In context, Jesus is addressing people who are entrenched in man’s outward religious service to God instead of God living within them by His Spirit.  Jeremiah 2:13 says the Jews had committed “two evils: 1) they have forsaken Me – the fountain of living waters (c) and instead hewn out cisterns for themselves – cisterns that are in fact, broken so they can hold no water.” Instead of looking to Yahweh as a “garden fountain, a well of living water, and flowing streams” (d), they had “dug out cisterns (e) for themselves,” and Yahweh says: “they are broken, holding no water.” Trying to store the physical rain water to live off of is smart water-harvesting, but not when that “rain water” is Yahweh. We weren’t meant to try to sustain ourselves off what God once said or did, but on what God is NOW saying and doing!  This is exactly what the prophecy of Zechariah 4:6 of the New Covenant is alluding to – God’s doesn’t want our “might and power” (f) but wants to do it ALL and take all the credit, “by My Spirit, says Yahweh.” <Notes> a) descriptions of an artesian or spring-fed well, b) John 4:11, 14, 7:38, c) cf. Jeremiah 17:13, d) Song of Solomon 4:15, e) storage pits or wells, f) chayil and koach:  man’s external resources: skills, talents, plans, programs, schedules, buildings, money, etc., and man’s internal abilities: IQ, imagination, knowledge, desires, emotions, will-power, etc.

The Holy Spirit isn’t sitting in a bible “well” for thousands of years to “drink” when we open our bibles, yet this is what I’ve heard churches preach. Some people even keep “an open bible” laying in their house, hoping this will act as some kind of charm or be invitation for miracles.  1 Corinthians 12:13 says Christians “have already been made to drink towards/at One Spirit just as by One Spirit we were all water-baptized into One Body just as the Jews in the wilderness “drank from the Spirit-kind-of (a) [massive] Bedrock” (b). This was a flowing stream through the desert that stretched for miles so that over 600,000 Jews could drink for days and weeks!  However, the “the water that I will give him [that] shall be in him a well of water” and will “routinely be springing up towards/at everlasting, zoe genuine-life” (c). That’s a lifestyle of drinking – that’s how to “never be thirsty again!”  The “eating and drinking” of Christ’s “flesh and blood” (d) for “everlasting, zoe genuine-life” are also present participles, thus a lifestyle or routine habit (e). “If anyone presently thirsts, let him presently/ongoingly come to Me and/coupled presently/ongoingly drink” (f).  Now we can see where the problem lies with many of us:  we don’t do the ongoingly part! <Notes> a) pneuma as possessive adjective, b) Christ, 1 Corinthians 10:4, c) John 4:11, d) symbols of Himself, e) John 6:54-56, f) John 7:37.

The Jews had the directly-spoken/heard “rain water” of God written down as scripture, which sat for hundreds of years, and they were STILL trying to zoe genuinely-live off of it. By definition, “living water” had to be “fresh and running from a spring or artesian well,” for the “fountain of Wisdom is a bubbling brook” (a), freshly supplied by “rains from the heavens for fruitful seasons” (b), freshly granted from God (c), even as “early and late rains” (d). But these “rains” are also symbolic of “showers of righteousness” (e), the arrival of God Himself (f), and especially the “directly-spoken/heard prophetic rhema words of God’s mouth, My teaching (g) dropping as rain, My directly-spoken/heard prophetic rhema words as dew, like gentle rain, like showers, proclaiming the name/authority of Yahweh” (h). There is no reference here to second-hand bible gnosis info-knowledge, taught from person-to-person!  <Notes> a) Proverbs 18:4, b) Acts 14:17; Isaiah 55:10, c) 1 Kings 8:36; 2 Chronicles 6:26-27; Jeremiah 14:22; Zechariah 10:1, d) Deuteronomy 11:14; James 5:7; Jeremiah 5:24; Hosea 6:3; Joel 2:23, , e) Isaiah 45:8; Hosea 10:12, f) Hosea 6:3, g) received mental instruction, h) Deuteronomy 32:1-3.

The “luo bathing/washing (a) of the rhema-word” that “sanctifies/consecrates/sets apart or makes holy, ‘clean’ or pure” the Church in Ephesians 5:26 isn’t referring to even the preached logos gospel message about the Living Logos as Jesus, and certainly not referring to OT graphe scripture of the sacred gramma letters of God.  That’s because the Greek word for “word” is rhema, which is the “directly-spoken/heard prophetic words of God’s mouth” that “mentally instruct” us, that “proclaim the authority of Yahweh.”  This is what will “bath/wash” us to “make us holy” – not any logos messages that were ever written down in gramma letters or logos communicated second-hand, passed down from person-to-person.  It must be first-hand, direct communication to be rhema words.  Jesus hasn’t guided us to more scripture as written logos communication content to be read or analyzed, “for the Lamb . . . will be their shepherd, and/coupled He will guide them to springs of living water.” Jesus guides us to the “One Teacher” of the Holy Spirit!

Yes, this is what Moses and the prophets enjoyed with God LONG ago and had even written down as the “gramma letters of graphe scripture,” but the people were STILL trying to zoe genuinely-live from this second-hand, sitting “water.”  They were STILL trying to live from very old, even paleo ancient, stale water of the old covenant and OT.  However, man wasn’t meant to drink a few sips from a glass and then let the glass sit for days or weeks, trying to live off of such little water, and certainly not by the time they get back to the glass to find the water is full of dust, algae, and bacteria from the world around them, finding it has gone stale, just like in ponds/pools of sitting water (a) or “hewn-out cisterns for themselves, even broken” (b). This is actually quite dangerous! And we certainly can’t live much on water that’s frozen solid through so many winters – unless you are an Emperor Penguin in the Antarctic! <Notes> a) Psalms 84:6, b) Jeremiah 2:13.

What is this “thirst for righteousness” for which “we shall actually by satisfied” (a) – “to never be thirsty again, because this water I will give him will become in him a spring of water, welling up [like an artesian well] towards/at eternal, zoe genuine-life” (b)?  Jesus said, “Whoever has trusting-relying-faith in Me shall absolutely not in possibility or in fact thirst at-any-time/ever” (c) and “If anyone thirsts, let him Come To Me and drink.  Whoever has trusting-relying-faith in Me, . . . Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water” (d).  Jesus says in Revelation 21:6, “I AM . . . the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of zoe genuine-life as a free grace-gift [given by a sovereign].” Aren’t you thirsty to drink this living water?  I sure am! <Notes> a) Matthew 5:6, b) John 4:14, c) John 6:35, d) John 7:3-38.

As Christian musicians, are we satisfied playing what once was anointed, prophetic, and spontaneous – our hoping it was once?  But now the music feels lifeless and worse, we are having to play it without the “living water” bubbling up within us?  All because there is a schedule to follow and we are expected to play our part for the church?  Isn’t this exactly what the Jews did year after year?  Do you think this is any more pleasing to God now?  Are we also living in a desert?  Are we trying to cross it without drinking from the stream of “living water?”  Or did we once “drink” long ago, or reading about others doing so in an ancient book, and are just living off personal or impersonal memories of it, like running on gas fumes?  Are we still confused by the radical difference between direct, prophetic, rhema communication and second-hand logos communication?  Per John 6:61, only Jesus, the living Logos directly-speaking to us His rhema words that are Spirit and zoe genuine-life, will be washed and made holy!  Only ongoingly drinking from this “river of living water” will our thirst ongoingly be met.  Only ongoingly eating this bread of life will our hunger be ongoingly met.

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