Steep Into The Living Water

Matthew 6:33 (Message Translation)

"If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never seen—don't you think He'll attend to you, take pride in you, and do His best for you? What I'm trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God's giving. People who don't know God and the way He works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how He works. STEEP your life in God-reality, God-initiative, and God-provisions. Don't worry about missing out. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met."

Steep—to soak or saturate in a liquid so as to extract flavor or to soften; to surround or fill with a quality or influence

Let's break it down!

Jesus is referenced as the source of living water. This means that He is the place of spiritual refreshment, satisfaction for spiritual thirst, and spiritual revitalization. When we saturate ourselves in this living water, in Christ, we are meant to soak up so much of Him that we can't soak up anymore. We are supposed to be so full of Him that He overflows from us onto others. This isn't achieved when we only say a short prayer just telling God what we need and being like, "Okay God, until next time!" or doing a quick devotional and just going about your day like normal, not giving what you read a second thought. Those are 5-minute refills, and they are not going to sustain us for long. When we truly and sincerely meet with Jesus and get into His presence to sit, wait, converse, and worship Him for who He is, that is when we are being saturated in living water. When we are here, we can stop focusing on what WE can do to get something and begin to focus on what God has prepared to give us. That is when we become so full of Him that we are sustained throughout our day instead of constantly needing those 5-minute refills. I get it; sometimes that is hard to do; sometimes life just happens. Life challenges us on our list of priorities. As Christians, we are married to Christ and should treat that relationship with the same reverence (if not more) that we treat our marriages to our spouses. In your physical marriage, you prioritize time with your spouse because you know how important it is and the impact it has on that relationship. It is the same in your spiritual marriage with Christ. If we don't prioritize our relationship with Christ, then it will impact it in negative ways. When we steep ourselves in God, it will also extract the flavor we should have, and it will soften our hearts. We are meant to be the salt of the Earth, so spending time with God will dictate the level of saltiness that comes from us. Some of us may be too salty, and some of us may not have enough salt, and the Holy Spirit will adjust those levels when we allow Him to do so. The same goes for our other flavors that we possess. This will be a result from allowing the Holy Spirit to fill us up. When we allow our lives to be steeped in Christ, we become more like Him, and God will live up to His name Jehovah Jireh and provide our everyday needs. Keep this in mind: The longer something is steeped, the stronger the flavor. How long are you allowing yourself to steep in the living water?

--Jessica Schneider