Spring has definitely sprung! There are wonderful, beautiful signs of it everywhere. Have you noticed?
It’s also a great reminder to us that God is in the business of renewing and refreshing His children!
The great thing about life is that it continually offers us a second chance. Just because we falter and fail at certain times in life doesn’t mean that we can’t try again and hope for a better result. It is easy to get down on ourselves when things don’t go our way, but what we must realize is that a new season is always dawning. A relationship may end, a job placement may not have worked out, a friend may betray us, something that we really wanted didn’t come to pass, etc., but we should have the attitude that all things will work together for our good.
The next time you are tempted to murmur and complain about an ending in your life, I would encourage you to turn it around and be thankful that you have learned the lessons and became better than you were before you had that experience. I am a firm believer that every experience in life serves a purpose.
We become better, wiser and stronger through the lessons of life and when we allow ourselves to apply those lessons, our future will become brighter because of it. I encourage you again to be thankful for every season in your life and do not become discouraged when one comes to an end. A new season with new opportunities, with new challenges, with new lessons is coming your way to make you even better than you are right now.
Spring is such a glorious time. It is a time of rebirth, new beginnings,and fresh starts. It is a time of growth, a time of beauty and most of all a time of life. Being outside and in the midst of the air has helped to stir the life and joy within me as well. It awakened my spirit, warmed my heart, enlightened my mind, energized my body and uplifted my soul. It made me aware of just how precious each day is and just how priceless each moment of our lives can be. It showed me again that life is for living and for loving not just for existing.
I hope that the spring of this year adds a spring to your own step as well. I hope that the new life bursting forth in nature awakens you to the endless life in your own soul. I hope that all the new growth and new beginnings around you help you to choose new growth in love and new beginnings in joy in your own life. I hope that all this wondrous glory of creation reminds you of the loving hand of God that created it.
I’d like to share another thought, about the wellspring of Living Water.
Moving water has a fascination of its own. Creeks gurgle, waterfalls plummet, springs bubble, and ocean tides crash. The bubbles, foam and noise draws us. The water sustains us. We need water for our physical life, but it also somehow soothes our spirit.
Desert animals travel many miles to find a water hole. City birds cluster in birdbaths or rain puddles. Grocery shoppers pay several dollars for plastic bottles of water. For thousands of years springs and wells provided the only access to clean water. City planners designed their locations around reliable water sources. Hauling water from long distances was hard, thirst-inducing work.
When Jesus compared life with Him to a never-ending, thirst-quenching spring, the image resonated with a hardworking Samaritan woman. Water got her attention, for she was thirsty.
Though she had come to the well to draw water, Jesus knew she needed more than physical water; she needed Him. She had tried to find satisfaction drinking from wells of the world, but no man had truly quenched her thirst. Then she met Jesus, who knew everything she ever did. This Man became a wellspring of life-giving truth that overflowed to her community.
What do you really thirst for? Do you long to know the meaning of your life? Are you longing for the kind of love that fills you up rather than drains you? Are you forever trying to find acceptance and respect? Or are those longings so deep and buried that you can’t even say what you want or need? Perhaps you can’t even get beyond just feeling…empty.
Only Jesus can identify those deep longings and fill your thirsty soul. Seek out the One who offers you living water. Come to Him. He won’t be surprised at how empty you are. He knows everything you ever did. He’s the wellspring who will fill you to overflowing with His goodness and love.
As writer Wendy Wright says, “In this dry desert season of the heart, we are watered by God’s promise of sustenance and fullness of life to come.”
Would you describe your relationship with Jesus as a life-giving stream or a parched desert? When and where do you feel closest to Jesus? How has Jesus satisfied your spiritual thirst?