20.10 | Niagara Waters
John 7:25-52
‘On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”’
John 7:37-38
At its peak flow, over six thousand cubic metres of water pours over Niagara Falls.
Every second.
I visited Niagara Falls in 2007. The horseshoe falls are a full 790m wide, and the deep, fast-flowing river cascades over the falls in extraordinary quantities, giving it the most powerful flow rate of any waterfall in North America. At over fifty metres, it is a big drop, and yet what mesmerised me as I stood watching it, wasn’t so much the height of the drop: it was the sheer amount of water. The speed of it. The depth of it. The weight of it. Crystal blue and endless, rushing past and down in its thunderous display of the raw power of abundance. As I stood in the rising spray, I was captivated by this colossal flow.
The Feast of Tabernacles held together multiple ideas. It remembered the forty years in the wilderness, as the people in Jerusalem lived in temporary booths. It followed the Day of Atonement, and had multiple sacrifices as an emblem of being purified and reconciled to their God.
And yet, a key image throughout the festival, was water.
Every day of the festival, the priests would descend through the streets of the city to the Pool of Siloam, and fill a large pitcher with water. They would then carry this pitcher back through the streets, with songs and celebration and prayers, back to the top of the mountain, where the temple was. They would circle the altar, and then pour out the water into a special basin beside it. The basin drained to the ground beneath it, meaning the water of the offering would then flow out from the temple and into the streets of the city.
This ceremony (called Simchat Beit HaShoevah) reached its climax on the final day of the festival: Hoshanah Rabbah. On this day, the priests would celebrate with greater intensity through the streets, and as they reached the altar in the courts of the temple, they would circle it seven times, before pouring out the water.
The imagery was powerful and it was clear. It was a prayer for God to save (hoshanah, or hosanna) them by the sending of rain and a harvest. It was the yearning for God to open the heavens above them, that life would flow from His temple to their city and their whole land.1
And it was on this day, that Jesus stood up, and cried out those famous words:
If anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, …‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’
Rivers of living water.
It is an extraordinary claim.
Jesus is taking the specific imagery from Hoshanah Rabbah, and focusing it purely upon Himself. He is proclaiming in the city that He is the place (temple) from which the heavenly life of God will flow. He is telling them that He is the source of all vitality that leads to a harvest. He is declaring to them all that He is the intersection of the life of the heavens and the life of the world.
It is an extraordinary claim.
And it focuses our discipleship. For truly our lives our thirsty, and truly our world is parched for the life of God.
And Jesus stands among us today, with the same declaration — that there is one solution to our dry lives and one solution to the cracked and hardened soil of the world around us:
Him.
For from those who believe in Him — trust in Him, choose Him, walk with Him — rivers of living waters will surely flow. Refreshing waters, cooling waters, Niagara waters.
Come to Him. That, in the midst of a dry and hurting world, the living waters of heavenly life may flow.
Reflect:
Where am I dry? Invite His Spirit.
Where do I see dryness in the world around? Ask His Spirit to pour living waters from you into these places today.
Pray:
Spirit of God,
Flow from me.
I’ve sought refreshment
In a thousand places
And yet, have found none of them to give
Life.
And so, I simplify my gaze
To Jesus—
Asking that,
As I set my eyes upon Him,
You, Spirit of God,
Would fulfil His word in this life,
And flow—
In me and through me and from me—
That the Niagara waters of heaven
Would saturate this soul
And cascade life
With rising spray
And thunderous impact
Into this hurting world.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Ezra 9-10 | Psalm 119:81-96
This image is taken from the Old Testament, in Ezekiel’s description of the coming temple of God, where the waters flow from the temple to the wastelands of the Dead Sea itself, far east of Jerusalem, bringing those dead waters back to life. See Ezekiel 47:1-12.