Water, Word And God's Spirit

We continue our meditation upon Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus in John 3:1-21.

Water, water, every where,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, every where,
Nor any drop to drink.

The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.

So goes the famous words from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The mariner and all onboard waited in vain for a wind to blow that would take them to land where they might find drinking water. Without water to drink only death awaited them.

And every tongue, through utter drought,

Was withered at the root;

We could not speak, no more than if

We had been choked with soot.

Through water God's Spirit brings new birth, new life, new hope, said Jesus in His nighttime conversation with Jewish Sanhedrin member Nicodemus. 

Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. - Jhn 3:5-6 ESV

Nicodemus knew of the importance of water in the history and in the rituals of Israel. By water the LORD had rescued them from slavery in Egypt as Pharaoh's armies were drowned in the Red Sea (Exodus 15:4). When nothing but desert threatened the LORD twice gave them water from a rock Moses struck with his rod at the LORD's command (Exod. 17:6; Num. 20:8-11). Water was used to clean clothes, to wash feet, to sprinkle on dwellings, to pour on unclean people, on altars, etc. (e.g. Lev. 8:6, 21; 11:32-38; 14:6-9, etc.). The waters of the Jordan river parted when Israel finally marched into the Promised Land (Joshua 3:15-17), "and all Israel was passing over on dry ground until all the nation finished passing over the Jordan."

Every year the people celebrated their Exodus journey from slavery to freedom during the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles in the seventh month in the Jewish calendar (Sept.-Oct.), the time of the year when the fall harvest was gathered (Deut. 16:13-16). For an entire week they lived in booths (sekhakh) as they praised their LORD for bringing them safely through the wilderness to their prosperous land and for giving them another year of His blessings. On the eighth and final day of the feast, the high priest, in a great processional made up of priests and thousands of worshipers, descended from the Temple Mount to pause briefly at the Pool of Siloam. A pitcher was filled with water, and the procession continued via a different route back to the Temple Mount. Once back in the Temple, with great ceremony the high priest poured the water out of the pitcher onto the altar.

In this way the people were reminded of God's continued blessings and deliverance from slavery and death. This ceremony was also intended to invoke God's blessing on the nation by providing life-giving water for the coming year. In Israel rains normally stop in March and there is little or no rain for almost seven months! If God did not provide the "early" rains in October and November, there would be no spring crop, and famine would again be at the doorstep. On the last day of that feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out,

"If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, 'Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.'" Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. - Jhn 7:37-39 ESV

As God provides water to quench thirst and grow crops, so He gives His Spirit to bring new life to all His children. In this way water and the Spirit are intimately tied together. This is the new birth that Jesus speaks about in His conversation with Nicodemus. Or course, it is not the water itself that gives new birth.  By itself water cannot work such a wonder. It is the Spirit of the Living God at work in the water, the Spirit speaking God's life-giving Word, the Word that glorifies Jesus. And how does the Spirit glorify Jesus in the hearts of those upon whom water is poured? The Spirit tells those so washed (baptizein in Greek) that Jesus has taken them with Him into death and from death to life eternal. He has gathered them together and brought them safely out of bondage and slavery. Now He is leading them through the wilderness of this world to the security of the promised land.

We have adopted the Greek word baptism to speak about this wondrous creative activity of God's Spirit. More about this next time.