Slaking the unseen thirst

But those who drink the water that I will give them will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give them will become in them a spring which will provide them with life-giving water and give them eternal life.

(John 4.14)

I mentioned at the first of the year that I would be revisiting this verse from time to time throughout the year. So, it's time for a visit.

The Great Teacher gave a great kernel of truth in this saying. Many say the life-giving water is his message. Some say it is the Comforter he said would stand beside us in life. But there might be something a little more. The "water" from the Teacher would become a spring providing a never-ending life. It seems implied to me that the spring is a never-ending source. It might be important, then, because the never-ending life comes from the never-ending source.

A sort of dilemma arises since there is nothing "never-ending" about us humans' lives on the earth. What would be never-ending in such a world in which everything ends? Something invisible, like the soul, is a usual answer here. That is something we cannot see. So is the never-ending source. The line of logic is that our soul, which is unseen, is fed by a never-ending source, also unseen, which gives a never-ending life, which no one has ever seen. Talk about a leap of faith!

This mysterious water is supposedly more than a symbol in this passage, but you wouldn't call it something tangible. It would, however, allow someone never to be thirsty again, that is, fully satisfied. I don't know if that is true or not by observation. Are followers of the Teacher fully satisfied people? Has their invisible thirst been slaked? I think I should see satisfied followers. His water is enough. The restlessness in the soul should come to an end. I still see a lot of searching by followers. I still see that they shift about for fulfillment on the earth.

I think that if people can handle being satisfied about the unseen, what they should be the most restless about, then I should very definitely see satisfied people handling the tangible matters of life. There is not a thirst.

Used

Going... going... go-o-o-ne!

The auctioneer loudly proclaimed.

Sold all right, but

The piece of furniture

was merely

a used piece of furniture.

And that's how it is.

Life as auctioneer

trades us around, and after

the first sale we

are only

a relic, a shape of what we've been used for.

by David Singleton

I can see the future from here

We're going somewhere. I'm trying hard to put my finger on it. It's about to come clear. I'm trying to figure out why I'm so tortured lately about the way religion is organized. Something is out of kelter. I see books with titles such as "Why Men Hate Church." I hear on the radio about "why youth are opting out [of church]." I go to a church service and see many, many people leave without uttering a word to anyone on the way out. I see new churches of all kinds experiementing with various ways to organize. Some try the stip center approach. Some try the mega church approach. Some try the satelllite campus approach. Some try the TV approach.

Here's the deal. If I had grown up in 1930, I would have lived in a much more rural, isolated setting than today. I would have probably not driven to a gathering place, but walked or ridden a wagon or horse. I would have wanted to stay 3 or 4 hours with other believers and eaten a meal with them before returning to the house and my daily chores. I would have had only limited contact with those believers except on days like Wednesday and Sunday to interact with them. If I had a phone I would have more than likely been on a party line. People wrote letters to each other that the other parties would have received in about a week. Televsion? What television. Radio, yes, but very limited on how many stations were in the area. Iceboxes were big. Flying was experimentally done by the military mainly. Music was not "in a can" but remembered in the mind. People sang tunes actually from their lips, not just in mental assent.



Here's the other deal. If had grown up in the year 2008, I would have lived in an urban area, other people around me all the time. I would go to gathering places in my own car, probably not with parents, but by myself or with a friend or two. I can be anywhere I want to go probably in a 30 minute radius, and I have people to see, places to go, things to do, all of which can be accomplished in a matter of 30 minutes or less. I can see anyone, anytime in 30 minutes or lessor virtually on My Space or Facebook. I have a cell phone that also doubles as a camera and computer. I can text message, leave voicemail, or talk directly to a person. I can email if I want right from my phone. Handwritten letters are what I study in history class because I have 4 email accounts and a My Space account. Letters are boring. Television? That's old hat. The generation before me was known as the television generation. I don't have time to sit and watch boring serials. If I watch at all, it's to watch America's Next Top Model, Survivor, Deal or No deal, American Idol, or some reality show. Who needs the pie in the sky stuff or hypothetical TV. Satellite radio is much more efficient than regular radio and has a menu of more than 100 stations for whatever my mood is or whatever the occasion calls for. All my music is professionally sung and recorded. I can listen around the clock. Mostly I walk or jog with earbuds wired to an MP3 or MP4 player. Why sing when you can hear any kind of music sung professionally anytime, anywhere? Oh, and if I want to go outside a radius of 150 miles, I can hop on a commercial flight for about $100 one-way to most places in a 10-state area or anywhere in the world for about $1000.

Here's my deal. I go to work and get more emails than phone calls. I meet with vendors who have flown in from Austin or Albuquerque. I go to conferences over a weekend like the one I attended in Maryland just 3 weeks ago. I sometimes listen to satellite radio at home through my satellite TV. I am on the board of an online high school. I like to blog and put pictures of anywhere in the world on my blog that I capture from the internet. I can call from my cell phone anywhere in the world to anyone, anytime. I often make out-of town phone calls at while driving on trips and nearly always at work. I listen to the radio or MP3 player while I drive 35 minnutes to work in another town from where I live. I many times call people related to work from my car going either to or from home. I can make You Tube videos and send them to people who can watch them on their computers or phone. And I watch Numbers on TV every Friday night.

So, what kind of organizational structure am I really looking for when it comes to other believers. At least once a week I get some kind of devotional email. I can read the Bible in any translation or in the original tongues from internet site like studylight.org. I can see the most inspirational power points with embedded video clips when people send me those in my email. I listen to Christian music any time I want it no matter where I am. I can go to any church's website and download the sermon in audio or video. I listened the other day to a sermon on CD driving back from a friend's house in a town 150 miles away, which is only 2 hours and 15 minutes of my precious time going 72 MPH on an interstate highway. This is why I am tortured. The organizational structure I seek is not in a building with others that I have no contact with outside of that building. It's not in a place in which very little stimulus takes place outside of visiting with individuals that I could make a phone call to and get the same amount of visiting done without driving somewhere.



I say check out the two virtual worlds of 2nd Life and Active Worlds and you will see the church of the future. If I'm in Maryland or in flight to Austin or on the road to see my mother or staying at the lake or at work, anytime, anywhere, I can tap into one of these worlds, carry on conversation and be out. The future from here is anywhere, anytime. I think that is very much in keeping with what the message of Jesus is trying to accomplish. It's also not bound by time or space, so when we do get to the stage of colonizing the moon or terraforming Mars for habitation, the church is there anytime, anywhere.

Language as a way of categorizing life

This "Celtic Knot" is a widespread symbol across northern Europe and in northern China. It doesn't have any particular meaning today. But, 1500 years ago, people had given it meaning of some kind. It appears in too many places. Too bad the meaning has dropped from usage. No one makes the sign these days, except for a few tatoo shops.

The Sapir/Whorf Hypothesis says that the language a person speaks determines the world view that person has. For example, if the language has a direct object in it, then there is the belief that a person, place, object, or idea can receive the action or be the result of the action. In a language in which no direct object exists, then nothing receives the brunt of any action. It's all in how life is categorized. Word particles would serve as another example. When using earlier English, one could translate a famous phrase from Paul's letter to --"O Death, where is thy sting." But, modern translations just say, "Death, where is your sting?" What happened to the "O?" Modern speakers don't look on personifications as terms of address any longer. The earlier English usage required "O" in order to desginate a term of address. Our outlook on life has gone more casual; we don't need the formality of a particle any more. By way of comparison, Latin had a vocative case built into its language because any noun could be used as a term of address. Not all ancient languages had a case built into its language like Latin did.

So when it gets down to each person's experience of the Creator, language categorization matters. Does it matter to anyone today that the name for the Creator is merely the Capitalization of the name for the generic deity–god vs. God. The Hebrews of 1300 BCE said the Creator had a name. Why hasn't that been kept through the ages? Another label that gets used in religious circles is the term "lord." Modern English doesn't use that term any more. It died. So why do people insist on using an archaic term to apply to the Creator? What does that say about a person? That religion doesn't really cater to the modern person? That religion doesn't have modern parallels? That most people think religion is not for everyday living, just a blast from the past in case modern lifestyles don't satisfy a person?

Have you ever been to a class in which a passage from an ancient text had to be illuminated by the history or customs of the times? That's usually nothing more than an attempt to show how the world view from another language shaped the idea being expressed. Language seems to affect one's world view. An example of this is that we don't have a native word for the ancient concept of prophet. We have transliterated the Greek term so we could halfway understand the concept. Hebrew had several words for prophet based on the particular activity of the prophet being emphasized. We moderns could very well do without the word because we don't have that category of person in our society. We prefer something like "visionary." But it seldom has spiritual applications.

I would like to bring all of the above discussion to bear on a New Testament event. Just using the gospel of Mark, Jesus tells a number of people not to say anything or not to tell others after he healed them. Why? I have contemplated the question for years. Perhaps, it can best be understood because of the prinicple of the Sapir/Whorf Hypothesis. I don't know what language the Creator speaks. But, for those who have non-verbal encounters with Him, such as a healing, it would seem that using language would automatically categorize the experience in some way or another. Perhaps, the Son of Man wanted people to experience a healing as a whole experience and not reduce it to any category by trying to speak about it. It would be easier to internalize the experience without using words. The healing experience would work itself out in our actions as a response to it.