Running Water Leviticus 15:1-13 (KJV)
The essence of Leviticus is God teaching His people how to live again. They had lived in bondage for most of the 430 years they were in Egypt and, as you can appreciate, they had lost all sense of perspective as to who they were as human beings, generally, and as God’s people, specifically. Getting His people out of Egypt was relatively easy for God. But getting Egypt out of His people was an entirely different matter.
In our text this evening, we have one example in a hundred of God giving practical instruction to His people for the purpose of protecting and prospering them. Some mistakenly view these laws as restricting, but imagine the immense benefit of possessing the Creator’s insight into matters of personal health and hygiene. Especially in a day when the cause of most sicknesses was a mystery; a day when the world of bacteria, and viruses, and microorganisms was unheard of.
If you read chapter 14, for example, people are instructed to shave off their body hair, eyebrows included, and remain outside the camp for a given period of time before being allowed to reenter. But there’s a lesson for us in 2006 as well. Medical science may be light years ahead of where it was 4,000 years ago, but if there’s one thing science has taught us it’s that: the more we discover, the more know we don’t know. But God does! And it is no less necessary for you and me to trust Him today with what we don’t know, as well as with what we think we know, than it was for those who lived so long ago.
These instructions were given by a heavenly Father who had wonderful plans for His children. Children who didn’t have a clue about life -- just like our own children when they were young. So, He established laws/rules for their own protection. And this particular passage had to do with protecting them from infection and disease -- protecting themselves and preventing its spread to others.
Now, I suppose I could be accused of taking a bit of license with this evening’s text, but the lesson I feel to share is contained in chapter 15:13 – “And when he that hath an issue is cleansed of his issue; then he shall number to himself seven days for his cleansing, and wash his clothes, and bathe his flesh in running water, and shall be clean.” He shall bathe his flesh in running water, and shall be clean.
The Hebrew word for “running” water is chay [Khah-ee]. It’s a word that translates a variety of ways: living, alive; green (vegetation); flowing, fresh (water); lively, active (of man); reviving, renewing (springtime).
What caught my attention in this passage is the phrase “running water,” and the question: Is there is flow in you this evening; a flow of life? Is there greenery; evidence of that flow? Can you be described as alive/active, spiritually? Do you sense a regular renewing and reviving in your soul?
Illustration: It seems hard to believer, but it’s only been about 100 years since surgeons started washing their hands in running water prior to/ between surgical procedures. Before then, it was common practice to simply wash one’s hands in a basin. Though the water would be discarded and the basin refilled with clean water, the germs would still be floating around in that bowl -- and then transferred from the one patient to the next. Children and mothers, for example, would later die of disease after a safe delivery, having contracted germs from whomever the surgeon had been operating on previously.
What changed? Surgeons discovered the need to wash their hands under running water, where the germs would not only be washed off, but flushed away altogether.
This year marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Pentecostal movement in that old mission on Azusa Street. It was there that the Church of Jesus Christ came into the knowledge of “Running Water” -- the need of the Running Stream of the Holy Spirit in our lives. The need for a continuous flow of cleansing in our lives that washes off those spiritual microorganisms and carries them away so that we might know the wholeness and the health that the Lord intends. Pastor Penney mentioned last week that the one thing that should characterize a Pentecostal believer is a NOW theology. Everything that was promised in God’s Word is for us TODAY – for here and now. Why? Because just as the same blood that flowed down the cross for man’s forgiveness is available today, so is the same River that flowed on the day of Pentecost.
The only question is: Am I dipping in a bowl, or am I flowing in the Stream? [Repeat]
Illustration: a bath is not necessarily a bad thing. But a bath is not intended as much for cleansing as it is for relaxing. A bath can be soothing and comforting, but if you’re dirty, the water you’re bathing in will leave a film of dirt on you. A shower on the other hand (running water) washes away the dirt and leaves you not only clean, but feeling revived and ready to go for the day (after a bath you’re ready to go to bed).
Notice God didn’t promise that when you got saved He would pour you a bath. No! He said, “I will pour out My Spirit!” And what would happen? You would come alive. You would flow in the Spirit. And everywhere you go there would be evidence of Spring (witness to new life).
You see, the Holy Spirit is constantly moving and flowing. So my question to you is: When was the last time He moved you? When the last time you flowed with Him? Has the Holy Spirit nudged you lately? “Living, alive, green, flowing, fresh, active, reviving, revival, renewal.” Do these qualities/ adjectives describe your life/spirit?
Illustration: When I was at District Conference the week before last, the pastors were divided into a number of small groups and given various topics to discuss and report back on lat in the day. Our group was given the topic: The Role of the Holy Spirit in our ministry today. During our discussions, one person brought up the question of whether or not speaking in other tongues was in fact the initial physical evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. Not that this pastor didn’t believe that it was, but one of their children is in one of our larger Bible colleges out West and said, “Dad there’s a debate on the subject here among the students and about half don’t believe that tongues is the initial physical evidence.”
So the topic got thrashed out for a couple of minutes and then I, like a good Baptist, said, “Brethren, debating whether or not speaking in other tongues is the initial physical evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is just a red herring.” The students aren’t debating the subject because they’re searching for truth. They’re debating it because they haven’t experienced it. And though it may not always be true, generally speaking, the person with the experience is never at the mercy of the person with the argument. Rather than sitting around the student lounge debating the truth all night, I would suggest they get on their knees and hunger for truth until the Holy Spirit shows up with power. Problem solved! Paul said, “I didn’t come to you with man’s wisdom, but in a demonstration of power . . . so that you faith would not stand in arguments and debates, but in clear manifestation of God’s power.”
You see, you can debate spiritual matters until the cows come home; and you’ll be no further ahead. Or you can get to heart of the matter and say, “Lord, there’s been a stop in the flow somewhere. Show me where the problem is, and keep it coming.” The Hebrew word Khah-ee is found throughout the Old Testament. Let me give you a couple of examples:
Genesis 2:7 – “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of [khah•ee] life; and man became a [khah•ee] living soul.” Jeremiah 2:13 - “My people have done two evils: They have turned away from me, the spring of living [khah•ee] water. And they have dug their own wells, which are broken wells that cannot hold water.”
And what gets even more exciting is when you cross-reference that word and follow it into the New Testament. There you find that the Greek counterpart to khah•ee, is: zao [dzah•o].
Zao [dzah•o] translates in the New Testament as: live, alive, be alive; breathe, be among the living (not lifeless or dead). To enjoy real life; active, blessed. Living water, having vital power, to be in full vigor. To be fresh, strong, efficient. Active, powerful, efficacious. In John 4:10 Jesus said to the woman at the well, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who I am, you would ask me, and I would give you living water.”
John 7:38 – “If you believe in me, come and drink! For the Scriptures declare that rivers of living water will flow out from within.”
Is there a flowing in your spirit this evening? In Mark 12:27, Jesus reminds us that “God is the God of the living, not the dead.”
You see, when we gather together in a setting such as this each week (Sunday morning or evening), there’s a flowing of the Holy Spirit that is life-giving; reviving and refreshing. But if we’re counting on Sunday to “get us through the week,” then we’re just filling up our Basin. And a basin’s not a bad thing, but it’s not the best. If you only leave with a basin full of clean water, how long do you suppose that water will be of use to you? How many times will you be able to dip into it before its cleansing/refreshing qualities are gone? Once? Maybe twice? We’ve all been there, haven’t we? We receive a touch from the Lord on Sunday, but on Monday, we’re by ourselves again. There’s no music, no organ playing softly in the background. Yet, we have a choice: Do you head into the week in the strength of Sunday’s ministry, or do you have your own supply/ your own “Shower” at home?
Illustration: Someone has taken the time to figure out that the average person only retains about 20% of what they hear (which they probably worked on during the sermon). That’s why I intentionally preached longer; so you’ll retain more. But, if that’s true, then even though that 20% can be very beneficial, it’s not going to sustain you for another seven days. You need a fresh Word, a fresh anointing, a fresh flowing of the Holy Spirit every day.
You see, the real beauty of having the Holy Spirit residing in you is that -- unlike the man lying beside the Pool of Bethesda who had been sick for 38 years, waiting for an angel to stir up the water, hoping to be the first one in and be healed – there is a River within you. You don’t have to wait for someone else to come along and stimulate you/ stir you up: “you have received the Holy Spirit, and He lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true” (1 Jn.2:27). “If you believe in Me,” Jesus promised (Jn.7:38), “Rivers of living water will flow out from within.”
Smith Wigglesworth used to say that, “If the Holy Spirit doesn’t move me, I move the Holy Spirit.” That may sound sacrilegious, but he understood that the Holy Spirit lives in Him and that same Holy Spirit is always moving. The question is never, “Is the Holy Spirit wanting to move?” The question is: “Do I have the tap turned on?” Why does the other person seem to receive and not me? Because you can either look to external stimuli to excite and to inspire you, or you can “stir up the gift that is already within you.” “I will enter His gates with thanksgiving (where) in my heart (within). I will enter His courts with praise. I will declare, ‘this is the day that the Lord has made . . .”
In 1 Samuel 30, David and his band of men discover that their town has been burned to the ground and their wives and children taken captive by the enemy. Verse 6 says that, “David was now in serious trouble because his men were very bitter about losing their wives and children, and they began to talk of stoning him.” What did David do? “David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.”
What is David saying? “I don’t need to sit around waiting for somebody else to pick me up or stir me up! There is a River that flows from deep within.”
Saints, Jesus has made you alive. And if we’re are alive, then there ought to be a flowing quality about us. As that old timer said at the Women’s Ministry banquet last Tuesday night: “There’s one thing I want people to say about me when they see me lying in the casket . . . . I just saw him move.”
Where there’s movement, there’s life! And where there’s life, God’s Spirit is at work. When people look at me, I want them to say, “I see Jesus moving.”
Song – There is a River
Flow Through Me, Holy Spirit
