WATER

“And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” (Revelation 22:1-2)

Water is something we tend to take for granted. In many of Boston’s suburbs, including Framingham, our water comes from the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority system (formerly known as the “Metropolitan District Commission” water supply). The MWRA water and sewer rates are among the highest in the country, but frankly, the MWRA system provides some of the highest quality drinking water in the country. On last night’s “Greater Boston” public affairs television program, a local physician was featured who spends up to eight months a year in RURAL Haiti. He tried to describe conditions in rural Haiti. I’ve been there and I knew exactly what he was talking about, but unless you HAVE been to rural Haiti, you just can’t appreciate how blessed we are! In rural Haiti, the people get their drinking water from the rainwater. The have a whole drainpipe/cistern setup for collecting the water. (We brought in bottled water each time we went to rural Haiti!)

Yesterday afternoon I was running the cold water from the tap in our bathroom I noticed it seemed dirty...brownish. I know that when they flush the hydrants in Framingham the water will look like that for awhile. One time I did a load of my permanent press laundry, NOT realizing they were flushing the hydrants. No joke, I ruined a bunch of my dress clothes! I was surprised the water looked brown because they normally don’t flush hydrants in the winter. More commonly such a problem can come from a water main break. I ran glass after glass of water. On a 0-10 scale, if 0 is perfectly clean and clear water and 10 is the color of brown paint, the water was around a “4”. I picked up the phone and called the Framingham Water Department. “Al” answered the phone. He was a nice guy and told me he’d just started his shift and did not know of any work going on in my part of Town or of any water problems in my part of Town. Al told me to keep running the cold water and that it SHOULD clear up in a few minutes. He also told me that if it doesn’t clear up to please call him and he’d send a crew out. I ran the water for several minutes. After about 5 minutes the color was a “2” on that scale, and after a couple more, it was a”1”. Obviously, it was clearing up. I called Al back and he was grateful for the call. He told me sometimes something will agitate the water in a pipe and dislodge dirt from the bottom of the pipe. For some reason, that had probably happened and it was clearing up. I do thank Al and the Framingham Water Department for their concern.

There’s a LOT about water in the Bible, both literal material about water and symbolic material about water. “Water” is a big theme in the Gospel of John, as well as the theme of “Light and Darkness”. After my dirty water experience, I got to thinking. Our lives are to be PURE before God...pure as crystal clear water. In reality, many times our lives are anything BUT pure! If we’re going to be honest, sometimes our souls are “pretty dirty”. When I had dirty water in the bathroom, I called Al. I followed his directions and eventually things cleared up. When my LIFE is impure, I need to call on the Lord (see I John 1:9). I need to “do what He says”...to follow His instructions (see James 1:22). If I WILL do that, I will be cleansed and once again pure in His sight.

Anytime I have a water purity problem, I need to call Al, or whoever the person is on duty at the Framingham Water Department. Anytime I have a life purity problem, I need to call on the Lord, and receive His forgiveness and cleansing.