A Fish out of Water

“God also sealed us and gave the Spirit as a down payment in our hearts.” 2 Corinthians 1:22 (CEB)

One afternoon while Brooks and I were outside he watched a bass chasing a much smaller bream in the shallow water of the pond. That little bream was swimming like his life depended on it! Wait! It did depend on his outrunning that big ole’ bass! The bream swam himself right up on the muddy part of the pond’s edge, slap out of the water! He flipped and flopped his little body around and inch by inch worked his way back to the water to live another day.

As Brooks was telling me about watching this spectacle, I was thinking about how we who are Christians sometimes get caught up by something in the world and finding ourselves outside of the Spirit that is within us. Without being in the water, the little fish would have perished – being outside the Spirit we too, will perish. Our fish must be in the water to live and breathe, our water is the Living Water God provided in Jesus Christ.

Fish know by instinct that they must return to the water to live, likewise, we know that if we do not have the Holy Spirit we will surely die, for life without Jesus leads to eternal death – separated from the source of life. Knowing that we will die without the Living Water, the Holy Spirit, we can never have true peace or comfort. Many will not realize the reason for their hopelessness, discontent, and lack of peace. Perhaps the cause is the instinctive and subconscious realization that we are “out of the water” – void of the Holy Spirit?

It is the Holy Spirit within us that helps us to not feel like a fish out of water. It is by staying in God’s word and the daily consumption of the Living Water that keeps us alive and breathing! “but whoever drinks from the water that I will give will never be thirsty again. The water that I give will become in those who drink it a spring of water that bubbles up into eternal life.” John 4:14 (CEB)

We do not have to spend our lives flipping and flopping aimlessly about. Accept that “drink” that Christ offers and let the Spirit be your guide.