Drink More Water

 Sometimes it’s easy to take things for granted --like running water for example. When my mom was growing up, they had to use the hand pump on the back porch to get their water. They kept a bucket inside on a little table with a ladle in it. Family and even guests would all drink from that same ladle. Water leftover from the drink would get poured into a basin next to the bucket that would later become a place to wash their hands. Mom shared a story about their uncle John Balli who stayed and helped with farm work for a time. As was common he used the ladle and basin method to wash his hair. Mom and her sister Hilda would run up behind him and tip the ladle so water would run down his back and get his shirt all wet. While they thought it was hilarious, he did not. They didn’t heed his multiple warnings and they eventually got spanked, after which Mom said they didn’t do that trick anymore.
     One of the most interesting elements of that story is that everybody drank from the same ladle. On this side of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s unimaginable to share a drinking vessel. Besides the possibility of saliva residue causing a plethora of sicknesses like the cold, hepatitis, strep throat, mumps, mono, cold sores, and meningitis, there is always the probability of dreaded backwash. I still get backwash shivers from when my kids were little. They ate a lot of crackers which made them thirsty, and they always asked to share my water!  After their first swig, the water would be polluted with bits and pieces of half-chewed crackers. And one time when I took a water break from being a nurse to my daughter who had the flu, I suddenly realized I was drinking from her germ-laden water glass. You can imagine the depth of my despair and sensitivity about sharing drinking vessels.
     It seems like as I get older I’m thirstier than I used to be. Most studies agree that older people do need to drink more water to help regulate changes in body temperature. (Can I get an amen from anybody on that one?)  Staying well hydrated also helps keep you regular, helps with various medicines, and prevents muscle pain, tiredness and heat exhaustion. When I was growing up, we only drank when we were thirsty. But in today’s world, health institutions recommend we drink eight glasses or up to a gallon every day! Carrying around a water bottle, even though it’s inconvenient, is now so commonplace some people call them their “emotional support water bottles”.
     The most important water we need a good daily dose of is the living water Jesus offered the Samaritan woman in John 4.  It was in the heat of the day when the shunned woman had to go get water alone. By all cultural norms Jesus should never have been talking to her let alone ask her for a drink –she was a female and worse yet a Samaritan. Not only did he lift her up out of her shame like her bucket of water coming out of Jacob’s Well, but He chose her as the first person to whom He actually revealed his identity as Messiah! And much like sharing the back porch water bucket, He showed He loved her enough to drink from the same ladle. She then went and told the townspeople about Him and many of them believed. Imagine a personal encounter with the Messiah and being excited about your faith like a wellspring inside you bubbling up and refreshing others. John 4:14 “but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” Let’s all drink more Water…

---