IT TAKES MORE THAN WATER

DAY 170: I grew up on the saying, “you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink.”  This was often applied to us as children when in spite of all our parents noble attempts to get us to do what was right, we resisted. There is nothing shocking in that revelation I am sure.  What kid hasn’t defied the wiser counsel and even instruction of a parent simply because he or she could?  I was certainly on that list. 

You would think, having been the stalwart and stubborn horse (and that is putting it kindly) I would have understood this reality when I myself became a parent.  But nay, time and time again I forged ahead to the stream dragging my own little nags behind me only to discover that they would not partake of the sweet and healthy “water” I had to offer.  But did that stop me from trying?  Not as of yesterday.  Even now as a parent of adult children, I find myself dumbfounded when my very wise advice is spurned, regardless of what persuasive (or manipulative) path I lead my herd to the water of my wisdom.  The leading I can do, the drinking up of it I do not control.  ERRRGGGGGG!

So what am I to do? What are WE to do -when the leading is our responsibility but the compelling is beyond our capability?  It just so happens that we find the very example of that in today’s passages.  Picking up again in the unfolding story of the kings of Israel from the record of 2 Chronicles, we come to the story of Hezekiah.  Crowned king at the age of 25, he follows in the footsteps of a mixed bag of predecessors.  For the most part King Uzziah had been faithful to God. His son Jotham “became powerful because he was careful to live in obedience to the Lord his God” and did what was pleasing in His sight. Yet his son, Hezekiah’s father, Ahaz “took various articles from the Temple of God and broke them into pieces. He shut the doors of the Lord’s Temple so that no one could worship there and he set up alters to pagan gods…in this way he aroused the anger of the Lord.”  For 16 years he was unfaithful and led the people away from God. 

Then came his son, Hezekiah. 

29 Hezekiah was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-nine years. . . ² He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, just as his (fore) father David had done.³ In the first month of the first year of his reign, he opened the doors of the temple of the Lord and repaired them.

Hezekiah's first act of authority was to reopen the Temple of God so that the people could again worship. He had the example of David and he had the Law of God. To him, those were the streams of water from which he drank.  But he didn’t stop there.  Hezekiah called the priests back into service. He called the city officials to yield to God’s authority. He re-instituted sacrifices to the Lord, accompanied by songs of praise as the Law commanded. Then, after the Temple of the Lord was restored to service, he re-instituted the Passover celebration that had been neglected by the people.

30 Hezekiah sent word to all Israel and Judah and also wrote letters to Ephraim and Manasseh, inviting them to come to the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem and celebrate the Passover to the Lord, the God of Israel… ⁶ At the king’s command, couriers went throughout Israel and Judah with letters from the king and from his officials,

Hezekiah was leading the people to the Water and inviting them to drink.

He himself discovered it’s life giving refreshment through obedience to God’s perfect Law. There he personally found them to be waters of life and full of blessing. For that reason I am sure he was SHOCKED at the response of some of the people to the invitation to drink along with him.

¹⁰ The couriers went from town to town in Ephraim and Manasseh, as far as Zebulun, but people scorned and ridiculed them.

Most did not drink, but laughed at the very idea. Indeed, Hezekiah could lead them to the very best place, the Water of Life itself, but Hezekiah could not make them thirst for what was offered. And MANY did not.  

But some did – though it was not Hezekiah who made them. 

¹¹ Nevertheless, some. . . humbled themselves and went to Jerusalem. ¹² Also in Judah the hand of God was on the people giving them all one heart to obey what the king and his officials had ordered, following the word of the Lord.

Hezekiah was in a God-ordained position to lead.  Rising to that call, He did his best to lead others to the Living Water.  That is where his responsibility and his ability ended.  It is also where ours ends. Just as it took God’s intervening hand to get the people of Israel to drink what God had to offer, so we must turn over the responsibility of other people's obedience into God's hands.  He alone can give them “one heart to obey…following the word of the Lord.” 

The reality is that it takes more than water to get someone to drink - it takes THIRST.  And only God can create in any one a thirst for obedience in the heart of any soul.

 

It is inevitable that some we lead to "water" will drink and some will not; but that outcome lies in the hands of God himself.  What is in our hands is drinking of obedience ourselves and then making sure that when we do lead others, it is to right waters.  God will make them thirsty in His good time- just as He did for us. 

Today’s passages for reading the Bible in one year.

2 Chronicles 29, 30, 31

Romans 14-15:22

Psalm 24, 25

Proverbs 20:12-15