What the Water Said

Holiness:  What the Water Said.

A Testimony

I slipped down under the clear, morning waters of the community pool and pushed away from the side.  With eyes open I can see straight through, so I probe deeper, leveraging the cool drink with swimming arms and legs.  I'm pushing through waters to hear a word from You, God, to understand.  In the depths I know the holy hush.  I've felt it before.  And I hear "Holy" as the water touches all of me--while bubbles rise from my lungs.  Is this a glimpse of "Holy"?

Once I heard the hush of mother's womb.  Conceived in her earthen baptismal, her watery vessel of femininity where she carried me, held me as if there was nothing between her and I.  I was hers and she was mine.  The thrum of her flowing blood soothed me, the strength of her body grew me until through her sure hips and her busted waters I burst into light.  It was like a giddy foreshadowing of things yet to come.  (.....unless one is born of water and the Spirit.....John 3:5)

I dove down into the morning waters again and again encasing all of me.  And like mother's waters, I saw there was no impurity.  And I thought of those standing walls of salty sea, churning and cheering--Moses and the rescued walking free.  And I thought of you and thought of me.  Baptized in the cloud and baptized in the sea--a picture of what walking Holy could be--a perfect surrender to God filling me.

I thought of piled up waters by Jordan's banks, all fluid and foam and our people marching through, Joshua standing bare on Holy ground, receiving the word how Jericho would fall.

"Be Holy", it's like a saturated surrender.  It's like baring down soles to His path while holding all of Him and Him holding all of me.  It's kind of like mother and me.  All soaked in saturated surrender---just might lead us between our own seas.

So, under the waters I swam day after day and pondered sins and rules, commandments and alters and lambs -- and being "holy".  I thought of the Garden, the Promise and the King, and being "holy".  And as I stand overwhelmed by all that this means I can hear the Water speaking to me, and He says,

 "I will gush forth in your wilderness! (new birth) and I will flow like streams in your desert.  Your burning sand will become a pool and your thirsty ground bubbling springs!"  Isaiah 35:7-8 NIVRA

Isaiah 35:1-4 Imagine the wilderness whooping for joy, the desert's unbridled happiness with its spring flowers.  It will happen!  The deserts will come alive with new growth budding and blooming, singing and celebrating with sheer delight. (The Voice translation)

So, with confidence and hope in this message, strengthen those with feeble hands, shore up the weak-kneed and weary.  Tell those who worry, the anxious and fearful, "Take strength; have courage!  There's nothing to fear.  Look, here--your God!  Right hear is your God! The balance is shifting; God will right all wrongs.  None other than God will give you success.  He is coming to make you safe." (The Voice translation)

verse 8-10  A thoroughfare will be there-it will be called the WAY OF HOLINESS.  Those delivered from bondage will travel on it, those whom the Lord has ransomed will return that way. (New English translation)

They will enter Zion with a happy shout!  Unending joy will crown them.  Happiness and joy will overwhelm them; grief and suffering will disappear. (New English)

💗💗💗💗Be Holy.  (Leviticus 19:2)