Oh, to drown...

'We want a map, but instead God weaves us a mystery.' ~L. Bevere

I have spent the last 5 months sitting on the sidelines & watching some of the most amazing events unfold before my very eyes. Stories of passion & calling. Missionaries sent out. Incredible moments watching people awaken to the life and the story that God has called them into--His story. I've watched drug addictions die. I've watched lives be transformed. Night turn to day. Life to death and death to life. I've watched people fall deeply in love with Jesus & so many wander back to Him. This burst of resurrection stories, where the only thing you can do is buckle up, hold on for the ride, and get yourself out of the way as this burst of floodwater, living water, rushes in drenching everything.

But these moments were years, lifetimes in the making. Detail upon detail upon detail. Wandering in the desert, waiting, searching and hoping for more. And even now, conversation upon conversation about which way is up and how life would be so much easier if God just sent a list of directions. Instead He weaves a tapestry.

Ezekiel chapter 40 begins:

'In the twenty-fifth year of our exile, athe the beginning of the year, on the tenth of the month, in the fourteenth year after the fall of the city--on that very day the hand of the LORD was upon me and he took me there. In visions of God he took me to the land of Israel and set me on a very high mountain, on whose south side were some buildings that looked like a city. He took me there, and I saw a man whose appearance was like bronze; he was standing in the gateway with a linen cord and measuring rod in his hand. The man said to me, "Son of man, look with your eyes and hear with your ears and pay attention to everything I am going to show you, for that is why you have been brought here. Tell the house of Israel everything you see...'

The next six chapters list in excruciating detail every measurement and detail possible. Because nothing should be left out and no detail escapes our God. The story ends in chapter 47:

The man brought me back to the entrance to the temple, and I saw water coming out from under the threshold of the temple toward the east (for the temple faced east). The water was coming down from under the south side of the temple, south of the altar. He then brought me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the outer gate facing east, and the water was trickling from the south side. As the man went eastward with a measuring line in his hand, he measured off a thousand cubits and then led me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist. He measured off another thousand, but now it was a river that I could not cross, because the water had risen and was deep enough to swim in—a river that no one could cross. He asked me, “Son of man, do you see this?" Then he led me back to the bank of the river. When I arrived there, I saw a great number of trees on each side of the river. He said to me, “This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah, where it enters the Dead Sea. When it empties into the sea, the salty water there becomes fresh. Swarms of living creatures will live wherever the river flows. There will be large numbers of fish, because this water flows there and makes the salt water fresh; so where the river flows everything will live. Fishermen will stand along the shore; from En Gedi to En Eglaim there will be places for spreading nets. The fish will be of many kinds—like the fish of the Mediterranean Sea. But the swamps and marshes will not become fresh; they will be left for salt. Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing.”

Asking Ezekiel if he sees the story that God is weaving? Through every last incredibly meticulous detail that has led to the very point where Ezekiel is led from the very shallow water to the deep end. That all this has been leading up to this crossroads, this moment where the water that is flowing from the temple will fill the valley and bring life to the Dead Sea. Water that will make dead things alive. A river flowing from the very heart of God--from the altar--to a place that was dead now and now flows with the very Water of Life.

But we can't misunderstand. This is no tame water. It is wild with a crazy undertow. Because when we drink this Living Water. When we are made new. When we are given life. It's not the kind of life that we know or imagine. It doesn't fit in a box or nicely on a bumper sticker. It's not that you come on a Sunday morning or evening to refill you water bottle. When you drink this water, you drown in it.

No longer is it compartmentalized in your life, it takes over your life. And as David Bauser writes: 'What joy....drowning in the Word of God and relying on Jesus to give you breath.' Now, you are all in. And so on days like today, I confess the ways that I am not all in, the ways I fight the undertow, the struggle to catch my breath instead of letting death come and this life that Christ breathes into me. Being patient with the tapestry that God is weaving, what He is teaching me today that is preparing for tomorrow, 10, 20, and 50 years from now. And the great story that He is telling. His story. Creation. Death. Redemption. Restoration.