The Lord has created another beautiful hot summer day, sapphire blue sky, bright yellow sun, white fluffy clouds. Ate a late breakfast of bagels and fruit perched in the swing this morning, watching the birds and squirrels enjoy their morning. I moved the iron bowl of squirrel food to a place where I could watch it and filled it up with fresh food. Seems all the birds and squirrels do is eat all day. They are bottomless pits. I’m watering my vegetables and flowers every morning and putting fresh water in the bird baths. This is the first year I’ve seen squirrels and chipmunks on the bird baths. The squirrels sit very erect and lean over to drink. The chipmunks are nervous drinkers. Got too hot around lunch so I retreated into the house to ponder in my reading chair.

Watched the sunset tonight, perched in the swing, and stayed on the porch till good dark. When I first sat down in the swing after supper the clouds look like a mountain range, dark purple mountain clouds on the bottom and snow capped white clouds on top of the dark clouds. I heard one clap of thunder and the dark clouds dispersed and took their rain filled bellies away from my neighborhood.

Soon as the dark clouds left Mother Nature dipped her watercolor brush in golden warm honey and painted the horizon. The pale gold light burst into a wildfire of watermelon pink as the sun rested on the top of the horizon and stepped into a bright red sequined gown to walk down the sunset stage. Father Sky walked on stage dressed in a jet black tuxedo complete with a silver topped walking cane and a tall top hat. He bowed to the sun and took her hand as they walked down the horizon drawing the daylight’s glow into a happy slumber with them. As twilight silently walked across the landscape the lightning bugs turned on their nightlights, the cardinals left the feeders, and the squirrels returned to their nests. The day was done and the night begun.

It’s dusky dark now and all my urn flowers have closed their blossoms and their stems are standing straight up like they are praying for rain to come and cool their roots. All of earth is so dependent on water. In 2023, two billion of people in the world did not have safe drinking water, that’s one fourth of the world’s population. I’m just thinking of all the water we use in one day and all the water that unnecessarily runs down our drains. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates the average home wastes up to 90 gallons of water a day which adds up to 10,000 gallons of water per household per year. Nationally that adds up to 1 trillion gallons. Think about that next time you turn on a faucet.

I’ve trained myself to not leave the faucet running while I brush my teeth. Maybe that helps in some way. I left the hose pipe on this morning after I watered everything. The water ran freely for about 15 minutes. Guess I could call that watering the grass but I hate when I forget to turn the faucet off. We all just take our clean water for granted. We don’t even think of water not pouring out when we turn on the faucet. And the wonders of ice…I’ve had crushed ice in my Mason jar of water all day long.

Water is used as a symbol of salvation in the Bible. It can be a symbol of a ceremonial cleansing or it can be a symbol of destruction. Jesus washed the feet of his disciples to teach them how to be humble and to serve other people. The chore of washing feet was given to the lowliest servant in the household. God sent the flood during Noah’s lifetime to bring goodness back to earth.

The living water of God allows life on Earth and offers us eternal life. John 4:10 reads, “Jesus answered her, ‘If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.’” Water quenches our bodies’ thirst. Jesus quenches our spiritual thirst.

Jesus offers us salvation and the living water is used as a metaphor, giving life-giving properties of water to Jesus and his teachings. Jesus cleanses us and nourishes our souls, filling us with the Holy Spirit. Our faith in the living water of God gives us ability to share his spiritual love with others. We become a source of God’s love and grace and his living waters flow from us.

“Always be like water. Float in the times of pain or dance like waves along the wind which touches its surface.” — Santosh Kalwar