C.S. Elston

Worshipper, Husband, Author, Screenwriter, Home Cook, Fan

Holy Water

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I love water. After my morning cup of coffee, water is my drink of choice all day long and leading up to bed. Unless, of course, it’s a night when my wife and I decide to have a glass of wine. Water is awesome. It’s not only thirst-quenching, it’s incredibly good for us.

Water helps us maintain healthy organs and muscles as well as aiding in both the digestive process and the regulation of body temperature. It also flushes us out, helping us remove harmful toxins from our bodies and fight off viruses like the flu and the common cold.

Bottom line: We were made to need water.

This is an indisputable fact when it comes to our bodies and we would be hard pressed to find a serious person who would claim otherwise. But, it is also true for our souls. Spiritually, we were made to need the invigorating streams of living water that only God can provide. The Psalmist knew this truth when he said in Psalm 42:1, “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.”

Jesus Christ knew it, too. He said as much when He told the Samarian woman at the well, in John 4:13-14, “’Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’”

We are all sinners. A quick read of Paul’s letters to the Romans makes that abundantly clear. And, anyone who takes, even a cursory but, honest look at themselves knows they are no exception. Therefore, we all need to flush out the sinful toxins from our souls. These toxins include things like unforgiveness, bitterness, jealousy, selfishness and rebellion. We need to be cleansed from the inside out. Physically, we can chug more water. Spiritually, we must go to Jesus. We must repent of our sins, bathe our lives in prayer, and devour the Holy Word of God.

Who’s thirsty?

  • Verses are quoted from the English Standard Version of the Holy Bible

Common Design?

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I thought, this week, instead of a typical blog post, I would post a small excerpt from the first novel I wrote and had published, “The Four Corners.” I’m currently writing the sequel, “The Four Corners of Darkness,” so my head is in that space right now. The following is approximately the first page of a chapter entitled “A World Aware” and it occurs almost half way through the book. My hope with this post is that it can spark some conversation. I’ll paste, below the excerpt, links to where you can find me on various social media platforms. I’d love to know what kind of thoughts this excerpt generates about both the scientific and spiritual implications.

Without further adieux:

Like a plant, every person begins as a seed. Each seed contains the genetic make-up, passed on through the generations of family members in the lineage of the father who produced that seed.

It is then placed in the mother’s womb where it adds the genetic make-up from her lineage. The mother of all plants is the earth itself and, therefore, that womb is the soil the earth provides. For people, the womb is inside the mother’s abdomen.

Both wombs provide protection from the outside environment so that the seed can grow and start the process of becoming what it was created to be. Inside both wombs, the seed is provided with the nourishment required to mature into the plant or person it needs to become before it is ready to enter the outside world.

However, once the plant or person has entered that world, it is not meant to be detached from its mother just yet. The plant still has its roots embedded in the womb it came from and the person, while not physically, still does as well.

Both continue receiving nourishment from their mother. The plant still gets it directly from its mother’s womb. The person, however, can then be fed by either parent. Or, even another person.

In the outside world, the protection of the mother’s womb has significantly decreased. Both plants and people are still growing into what they were created to be but that growth is determined by additional factors. Not the least of which, physically for the plant and spiritually for the person, is how much exposure they have to both the light and the dark.

 

 

Excerpt from “The Four Corners” used with permission from Electric Quill Press, LLC.

 

Find C.S. Elston on: Twitter – @cselston; Facebook – facebook.com/cselston; LinkedIn – linkedin.com/in/cselston