when the well runs dry…

 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water?  Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”—John 4:10-15

This pandemic and all of its uncertainty has continually been bringing me back to the well, digging a little deeper, searching for a little more, striving to thirst no more.  I struggle with who I am if I’m not…  Who am I if not an Emergency Medicine provider?  Who am I if not a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner.  Who am I if I don’t have a job?  

Lance and I have gone through umpteen iterations of what life would be like if I had decreased hours, no hours, no job and for how long of each.  We have plans and rip-cords to pull in case the unthinkable happens.  But who am I if I’m not working?  Who am I if not an EM pediatric nurse practitioner.  Everyday I worry about losing my job.  The workplace is an incredibly volatile environment these days.  I worry that at any moment, I could be singled out for doing or saying the wrong thing, for not toeing the line, asking the wrong question, being too bold, for demanding better.  I worry about the security of our finances, our livelihood, our home, our children’s education, our life insurance, our retirement.  I worry about my relationships, my friendships, the connections that I’ve made while employed over the past 6.5 years.  Who will still be there for me, who will text to check in on me, stop in and say hello?  Who will still invite me to hang out, to get together, to catch up?  Who will have my back, stand up for me, be my voice if I no longer have one?  

Personal, local, known injustice eats at me.  It has always been in my nature to take on the pain and the suffering and the cause—even to my demise of those closest to me and those most vulnerable.  That most certainly is why pediatric nursing was my calling and on the flip side why I know, and even more so know now, that I could never be in management.  

My first long time job was as a nurse tech on a little chronic, long term rehab facility.  My patients were the definition of vulnerable—chronic, abused, high needs, and most, no parents.  I tried to leave to work in the NICU but my heart was with those sweet kids who so many didn’t have a voice or an advocate so I was drawn right back.  I also had grown close to the little old sweet man who had a depth of knowledge corporate CEOs only pretend to possess and the somehow simple yet still managing to be eclectic nurse who had spent her life in this role at this one facility in this one department.  And so as I transitioned to nurse and the department was seeing corporate cuts and corporate changes in the requirements and stipulations forced upon that doctor and all of the nurses I began to take on that pain.  I whole-heartedly felt the unfairness and the disregard for staff and experience.  I began to carry that load and even though I have been gone for 15 years, I still feel the weight and the depth of their suffering and struggle.  When I left that job, I had promised myself to never work for a hospital system again.  I wasn’t certain that ingenuity to figure out how to keep experience, quality of care and profits under one roof could exist.  On my facebook boards, there is a post of fellow nurse practitioners who have been furloughed, laid off, hours reduced, wages cut due to the unexpected, unprecedented turn of events.  The irony of losing your job in healthcare in the middle of a health pandemic is uncanny.  With Lance in law enforcement and I in healthcare, we have always joked that we would be employed until Jesus came back and now I’m just sitting back thinking I may have missed the coming of our Savior—not truly, of course.  One NP had words of wisdom, uplifting words.  She was trying to intentionally spend time with God daily.  She was searching for Jesus in all of this.  She was hunting, searching for what it was he had for her to learn through all of this.  She still was processing through all of the anger, the hurt, the fear, the unknowing and mourning, not just over lost wages but lost relationships.  But time and time again, she was choosing to take it back and lay it at his feet.  

At his feet, is the only place there is healing.  At his feet, is the only place your burden becomes light.  At his feet, is the only place the wrongs of this world can be overshadowed by the goodness of his love.  At his feet, there is comfort.  At his feet, there is love.  At his feet, there is water.  You find the water.  You. Find. The. Water. You find the everlasting water of a well that doesn’t run dry.  At his feet, you find that the views of the world of what they think you should be or what you think you should be die.  At his feet, you find who you are.  At his feet, you find who he is and you find who you are in him.  He is love and goodness and all knowing and all powerful.  And at his feet you find that power.  You find that power that comes through the water from a well that doesn’t run dry.   At his feet, you remember you are the child of the one true risen God.  You are the daughter of a King.  You are more than a label, more than a career, more than an address or a school system.  He is more and because you are his, you are more.    You. Are. More.  Find his feet.  Find the well.  Find the water.  Poor child, never thirst again.  I never want to thirst again.  His well does not run dry. 

9 years ago, God sent this little bundle to my friend Sara.  He arrived roughly one and a half months after our loss of Gideon.  I remember feeling the joy and the heartache.  I was fortunate to have them at that time. I was thankful for her sharing of this beautiful boy who is only 4 months younger than our son. I'm thankful God sent him and that through him I have been able to see what every age and what every stage of Gideon could have brought.  In loss, there can be joy but it's only found through Christ Jesus.  Seek him.  Lay it down.  If you pick it up, do it again.  Lay it down again.  Bring the shame, bring the hurt, bring the bitterness, bring the ego, bring your worry.  Bring the things that run your well dry and lay it down.  He will take it and he will give you water.  

...there’s a cross

…“Weren’t there three men that we tied up and threw into the fire?”

They replied, “Certainly, Your Majesty.”

He said, “Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods.” Daniel 3:24-25

Have you heard the song “Another in the Fire” yet?  Several months ago our worship leaders sang it at church and I was swept up in the words and the truth.  I had heard it before and loved it then but it was a completely different thing to be standing there in my time of worship, arms held high, ready to be moved, ready to feel the power of the Holy Spirit and to be swept away.  I’m standing there hands out, probably singing too loud and tears just streaming down my face.  I was overcome by the honesty and simplicity of the words and what they meant to me. I was overcome with love for Jesus but first by the love Jesus has for me.   And every time I’ve heard it since then, I probably sing too loud and get a little teary eyed and today was no different.  But today, I ruminated over the lyrics and I went back to Daniel to study the verses.    I thought of the three.  I thought of their honesty.  I thought of their steadfast belief in the one true God.  They stood up to the king and told him that they would not serve the king’s false gods.  And when threatened with the death in the fiery furnace, without hesitation they responded, “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand.  But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”—Daniel 3:17-18.  Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego knew that their God could deliver them from the fire but if he didn’t they would still worship their God.   There was either going to be a divine intervention and a miracle that would save their lives or they were going to die but either way they were still going to worship God and refused to give in.  When we were in the hospital, I wrestled with even the thought that Gideon may not live.  I prayed heavily that God would save him but even then, I knew if he died it didn’t change who my God was.  I’ve heard people say that you shouldn’t speak things into existence, you should only pray for supernatural healing, pray for life but right here, we see these three speak it plainly.  “I know God can deliver us through this but if he does not he is still God and we will still follow him.”  He is God and he can’t be manipulated.  We can’t trick him into getting our way. 

     

Being Good Friday, we had already talked a great deal about what today meant for Jesus and what today meant for us.  I was already feeling the anguish and the heaviness of what his beating may have looked like.  I always break down when I think of the scourging and after our Good Friday service where it was discussed in detail, it was all too heavy.  I had talked to Gabe a lot about it and about the tremendous amount of suffering Jesus had to endure before even being placed on the cross.   Yesterday, I used a charcoal mask again.  The kids were in the bath behind me as I began pulling it off.  It hurt.  My breathing became heavy, my heart rate increased.  I started to sweat as I became flushed.  I made little painful sounds as I would slowly peel it away.  They both asked me several times if I was okay.  In the best way I could, I compared that slow agony to the scourging of Jesus.  Except of course we talked about how much worse it was for him.  We talked about the whips lashing across the skin causing cuts across his body.  We talked about the hooks on the end of the whips that would grab onto the skin and pull at the skin and rip it away when the enforcer was going back for another swing.  He felt it.  He could have ended it.  But he stood there, feeling every ounce of pain.  Every stripe was felt in real agony.  My heart breaks knowing that my sin did that.  I can’t help but fall on my face when I think about that beating he took when he could have ended it all but instead he chose to save me, to save us.  

Today’s circumstances are no different than the times of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.  We still have struggles. We still have to make hard choices. Our sin is no different than what was going on at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion.  Our world is facing this pandemic together.  Some are experiencing sickness and death.   Some are hit with financial loss and wondering how they are going to pay the mortgage, put food on the table.  Some are struggling through home-schooling and some juggling this new homeschooling situation while still working full-time.  And many are just plain struggling with fear.  But guess what?  The same Jesus that was in the fiery furnace with the three is the same Jesus who suffered an excruciating death for our sin and he is the same Jesus who lives for us today.  He is alive.  He is risen.  Whatever tomorrow will look like, I will praise him and I will worship him.  As I look at the cross, I see the burden of my sin.  When I think of the empty tomb, I think of the hell that has no victory.  Thank God he first loved me.  

...he washed their feet

“…he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.”—John 13:5

on repeat.  This image playing over and over in my head.  I picture him there, essentially in his undergarments, on his hands and knees, washing and drying the feet of his closest friends.  As we started the day out with our morning scripture reading, we discussed the events of Maundy Thursday.  Gabe found it humorous how dirty the disciples feet would be.  “Like a day at the lake without any shoes.”  We talked about communion and the betrayal by Judas.  We talked about Jesus going to pray in the garden.  But mostly we talked about the feet washing.  Growing up, I always thought the washing of feet came at the end after Judas was already gone.  It probably was within the last decade that I learned Judas was still there and it actually happened before the meal was over.  And today, that really hit me and stuck with me.  There are many reasons for Jesus’ act of washing the disciples’ feet—being a servant, symbolizing the need for repentance, but today I really focused on Judas.  

Jesus knew that Judas was going to betray him.  Yet he still chose to wash his feet.  Why?  In all honesty friends, that’s a struggle for me. Of course, he’s Jesus.  He’s the ultimate forgiver.  That’s why he is God and we are not.  But hurt is real.  And when I feel betrayed, the last thing I want to to do is get on my hands and knees and do something so low for the ones I feel betrayed by.  But here it is.  Here he is doing just that.  He was God.  In mere hours, he was going to be handed over by his own.  Judas had walked along side Jesus for 3 years.  He had seen with his own eyes the miracles.  He had heard with his own ears the teachings of Jesus.  Yet, he still handed over Jesus for some extra money in his pocket.  But still, Jesus washed his feet.  Was it merely an act of servanthood that he was compelled to do for all 12?  Was it hypocritical because Judas was not “whole body clean”?  Was it an opportunity for Judas to repent and turn from the deceit?   I believe time and time again, Jesus was trying to reach out to Judas.  He loved Judas.   Nowhere do you read about contempt or rejection towards Judas.  Nowhere.    How could he do it?  I just couldn’t do it.  But then I thought about the other 11.  Why was it so easy for me to think of Jesus serving the 11 but not Judas?  These 11 would also deny him.  They too would sin against God.  These men were considered his best friends, the ones he loved and they too would give him up for fear of their own loss.  Even in knowing all of it, he still washed their feet.  The King was now the servant.  And as I’ve reflected throughout today—trying to figure out how to let go of resentment and contempt, I struggled.  How could I possibly get on my hands and knees and wash the feet of those who have hurt me?   Then  I realized God had answered my question with the very verse I had been pondering and picturing all day. Get down on your hands and knees and pray.  Seek God.  Pray.  Although Jesus was fully God, he also was full man.  He felt the same struggle and agitation but he was constantly looking to the father for his response, for his actions, for his guidance. Without that grace of Christ, I too could be Judas or Peter or…Without grace, I am any one of the 12.  

As we enter into Good Friday, I encourage you to think about that one who you feel abandoned you.  I encourage you to think about the one who didn’t call to check in on you or send a text to see how things were going.  I encourage you to think about the one who spread lies or who lied directly to your face.  Now pray.  Pray for them.  Don’t pray that “they will see the error in their ways” or that “God will give them theirs” but pray like Jesus would pray.  Pray for their health.  Pray for their wealth.  Pray for their happiness, their comfort, their freedom.  Pray they know Jesus.  In the most agonizing time of Jesus’ life on earth, he chooses to comfort the disciples when they should have been comforting him.  May we all have hearts like Jesus.  

Even on the night that Jesus was betrayed he still gave thanks (1Cor 11:23-24). Surely, in this time of suffering, in this time of being uncomfortable, we too can give thanks to the one who shed his blood, to the one who sacrificed his life for us. We thank you, Jesus. Continue to make us new. Continue to fix our eyes and our hearts on you. Thank you for the grace that covers us. Thank you for the grace that sets us free. Free us from our bondage. Free us from our bitterness. Free us from the things that are not of you.