Thursday 29th January - A River Runs Through It

DAILY BYTE

In Ezekiel 47 we read about this remarkable vision of a river flowing from the Temple. It starts off as just a trickle, but as the river flows further and further from the Temple, so it grows wider and deeper. Eventually it is a great river that cannot be crossed. On its banks are many kinds of trees that produce fruit for eating, and leaves for healing. In the vision, as the river pours into the Dead Sea it makes its waters fresh, enabling fish to thrive where before there were none. In fact we read that wherever the river flows, swarms of living creatures are found and there is life in profusion.

It is one of the most graphic and beautiful images in the entire Bible of the life of God that flows through the world. Today I’d ask you to notice just one thing about this vision.

This river of life has its origins in the Temple, but then flows outward into the world. What a challenging picture for us as the people of faith, for it reminds us both of the source and the purpose of our life.

For the Temple represents the place where the worship of God happens. It is only as we worship that we can connect with the sustaining source of our life. Apart from the worship of God there is nothing that we have to offer the world. Apart from the worship of God there will be a dryness that will characterize our lives. And so the ‘temple’ is a place to which we need to return again and again, that we might give ourselves in worship to the Living God.

But notice that what begins in the Temple doesn’t end there. The transformation that begins in worship is intended to be expressed in the world. And as we ‘live out’ our worship, in the ordinary situations of our everyday lives, so we discover that we are in fact part of God’s loving purpose to bring life, healing and transformation to all.

Without experiencing the renewal of worship, our ministry to the world will quickly become dry, and we will grow tired and cynical. Without moving out into the world, our worship will quickly become superficial and irrelevant. Both are needed.

It is in this flow – from the Temple to the world – that our life’s truest purpose is found as the overflowing abundance of God is both experienced and shared.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Loving Lord God, renew and revive me today in this time of devotion and prayer, that I may be strengthened to face the needs of the world and to be a channel of your healing and transforming power within it. Amen.

SCRIPTURE READING

Ezekiel 47:1, 3-9

The man brought me back to the entrance of the temple, and I saw water coming out from under the threshold of the temple toward the east…. As the man went eastward with a measuring line in his hand, he measured off a thousand cubits and then led me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist. He measured off another thousand, but now it was a river that I could not cross, because the water had risen and was deep enough to swim in—a river that no one could cross. He asked me, "Son of man, do you see this?"

Then he led me back to the bank of the river. When I arrived there, I saw a great number of trees on each side of the river. He said to me, "This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah, where it enters the Sea. When it empties into the Sea, the water there becomes fresh. Swarms of living creatures will live wherever the river flows. There will be large numbers of fish, because this water flows there and makes the salt water fresh; so where the river flows everything will live.