Like the water in your homes, salvation is being brought to your doors; it is gushing forth like a stream at your feet now, and it flows through the very aisles of this church, and filters into every pew. And like natural water, Christ's water of salvation possesses like qualities. To mention the particular He dwells upon in this text, Jesus answered and said to her, "Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again; but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." The soul has its desires, its yearnings, its appetites, as well as the body, and it is miserable until that thirst is satisfied. And how is this done? Certainly not by anything of man's provision. The various schools of man's wisdom, philosophy, have tried it, and we have their confession that they failed to find what they sought. The same may truly be said of this world's pleasures, possessions, and honors. These things, being earthly, leave the soul as thirsty as before, yea, even worse, like sailors in distress who drink the ocean's brine; it will but increase their thirst a hundredfold. "But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst." Christ's water, alone, is able to satisfy the thirst of the human soul.--The reason is very apparent. Man's happiness depends, first of all, upon a right relation to his God; as long as that is severed or strained, satisfaction and peace of heart are out of the question. And it is only He, that divine person, who sat upon Jacob's well, that has this supply of living water. We are made for God, and our hearts remain thirsty and restless until they find satisfaction and repose in Him.
But, you will note, it says: "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I give him." Christ gives it, but there is something, accordingly, for the thirsty soul to do. Water cannot quench the thirst unless it is taken; not all the water in the river at the foot of our city can save a man that does not partake of it. Nor can Christ's water of life assuage the thirst of a soul that declines it. There must be personal appropriation, or it fails of the blessed effects. Not as if there is anything meritorious in that, any more than it is a merit for one to drink a glass of water to allay his physical thirst. And yet, it is only thus that one becomes partaker of it; and the only reason why so many fail of its blessed effects is,--they do not drink it. It is told of a ship that its supply of fresh water was exhausted. The passengers and crew on board were at the point of perishing. For several days they had lacked water, and were almost frenzied. At last a vessel was sighted in the distance. They raised their cry: "Give us water, water; we are dying for water!" The reply came back, "Let down your buckets! You are in the mouth of the Amazon! You have fresh water all around you." They had been floating three days in fresh water and knew it not. It is so spiritually. Ignorance is what keeps many from salvation. The churches, like vast reservoirs and pumping stations, are seeking to supply the masses with the knowledge of Christ and His Gospel. They are actually floating like these perishing souls in the midst of religion, and yet they dip not their buckets to fill. With some it is because they are too indifferent, and with others, because of sheer stupidity they care not to give such matters concern. It is positively surprising to see how many otherwise intelligent and wide-awake men and women will be found altogether destitute of the first things, the A B C of Christian teaching and principles. Ask them to select the real things of man's life, to tell you the true purpose of existence, touch on matters of eternity, soul and God, and they are as ignorant of those things as children of the value of currency, who will tear to pieces a five-dollar bill and cling to their five-cent picture-book, or who will at any time take in exchange for a ten-dollar gold piece a large, glittering ball of Christmas tinsel. They know not, and so they value not, and allow the treasures of heaven, the gift of God, as our Savior called it, the blessed water of life, to flow by undrunk and unimproved.