What is living water, how do we fill the emptiness inside? John 4:10, 13, 14

“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

“Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.

As we sit by the well with Jesus and the woman from Sychar, we have the opportunity to listen in on a puzzling and important conversation. The woman is clinging to his every word. She has been offered living water and He claims that if she drinks his water, she will never thirst again. This is good news to her. It is a tiresome chore trekking to the well every day. It reminds her of how alone she really is and that she doesn’t fit in with the other women. It sounds like a good deal, a way to make her life easier. But is this what He is really talking about? Or is he speaking about something different, something deeper?

Inside each one of us there is emptiness, a longing for something deeper. Some of us go on with our daily lives and never even recognize that something is missing. We are so busy with the ebb and flow of living that our need is barely a twinge on the edge of our conscience. For others, there is an awareness of it every waking moment. Whether we realize it or not, everyone tries to fill that hole in our lives with something. We pursue things like relationships, careers, success, hobbies, prestige, popularity, and more to meet our need. The list is endless. When that doesn’t work, some turn to drugs, alcohol and addictions to erase the longing. Even religion can’t satisfy this desire within us. Only the water that Jesus gives can quench this thirst.

So what is the water that Jesus gives us? Through him we have the opportunity to experience the unconditional love that our creator has for us. He made us, he knows everything about us, our best and our worst, and still he loves us. He desires a relationship with us. So why are we still empty inside?

It is because of our sin, all the bad choices that we make. God hates sin. Sin hurts people and destroys everything he made. It ruins all the good he wants for us. He is so pure and holy that the sins within us can’t even exist in his presence. So we can’t have a relationship with him. If we got close to him with all of our sins, we would be annihilated. In other words, the cost of our sins is death. This is a problem; God can’t have the closeness he wants with us, and we can’t experience the unconditional love we so deeply desire. But God had a solution. He loved us so much that Jesus came to earth and died on the cross for us. His death paid the price of our sin. He did it for us. All we have to do in return is to repent of our sins and accept that Jesus’ sacrifice was enough to pay for them and we are forgiven.

What does repent mean? It means to be sorry, to turn and go the other way. It is the desire to obey God instead of the sin within us. We decide that we want to live for God instead of for ourselves. We trust Him to have a better plan for us, a life of purpose. Now when God looks at us, he doesn’t see our sin. We are pure and holy in his eyes. We can still sin, but we are forgiven. Now we can see what it is like to be loved no matter what, just as we are. This love is the water that bubbles up inside of us and overflows into every part of our lives. It gives us peace when the world is falling apart around us. It gives us strength when life seems impossible. We no longer have to walk through life alone. God is with us every step of the way.

Now we can have the joy of getting to know God, just like we would get to know someone in any relationship. We can talk to him, learn about him, and start to see him do things in our lives to show us his love and make us better people. If you do not already have this kind of relationship with God, I hope that it is something that you will seriously consider. It truly is a wonderful gift, a well of water filling us up with eternal life.

Look at more of this conversation from the woman's point of view when she wants to know, Where do we worship God?