Water
“This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood…and there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one” (I John 5:6-8).
What is the meaning of this puzzling verse? The reference to the Holy Spirit, and to the blood of Christ to atone for sins is clear. But is the reference to water merely a shadowy type of baptism? Why is water used so frequently in the Bible as a type of God’s spirit?
Just now, you are surrounded by a certain quantity of something you cannot see, feel, or smell. Water. That’s right, water, but water in the form of vapor, suspended in the air in such tiny amounts as to be invisible, and measurable only as “humidity” by meteorologists. Next to the air you breathe, (which contains at least some water in suspension), water is the most important substance for the sustaining of your life.
You are composed, mostly, of water. Our planet is the watery planet, the continents appearing from outer space as if merely islands in a vast, blue sea which covers the earth.
What is “water?” Eau, agua, vasser, it is called by the French, Spanish, and Germans. But what, really, is it? Where did it come from? How is it “made”?
Water is a strange substance, bound by inexorable laws which we take for granted. It exists in three distinct forms: liquid, solid, and vapor. In its lowest form, it seeks the lowest possible level, as pulled toward the center of the earth by gravity. Thus, rivulets, creeks, streams flow down the mountains from rains and melting snows, form rivers, which flow toward the seas.
Water is the primary means of erosion, carving out vast riverbeds, canyons, depositing huge deltas of fertile, alluvial soil. Water is a vital requirement for life; a normal person can only survive a week to 10 days without it, and the longest recorded survival time on a life raft at sea without fresh water to drink is 11 days. As a solid, water forms in cracks in rocks, exerting such force as it expands that it breaks them into smaller pieces, contributing to erosion. As a liquid, water exerts a surface tension, the molecules of water clinging together tightly in an attempt to pull the mass of water into the smallest space possible. As vapor, it forms clouds; then tiny portions of vapor form larger bodies, called rain, and it drops to earth, bringing life-giving sustenance to plants, animals, and man. Water acts according to inexorable laws.
Drop water from your hands toward the ground. Immediately, the droplets begin spinning, bending, forming, shaping, until, if sufficient space is allowed, the molecules cling so tightly together they form a perfect sphere.
The molecules of water form a surface tension, whether on a lake or pond, or in a glass. What boy is not familiar with “water skippers” and “water bugs” that seem to walk on water? Actually, there are hundreds of species of insects capable of performing such acts. Ever see a needle float? If you carefully place a needle on its side, lower it onto the surface of water in a glass, the needle will float, even though steel is much denser than water. The molecules at the surface of the water crowd together, denying entry to the needle. Many a lad has painfully experienced this tendency of water in a lake or swimming pool. A belly flop can bring a reddened patch of skin, and a stinging sensation.
Water is one of the most common of all substances, yet contains strange properties, defying seemingly established laws. For example, all liquids are capable of being compressed a little; water up to 20 percent. But when water is compressed, seven distinct forms of ice will form, depending upon the degree of compression.
Science tells us the hydrogen atom is the basic “building block” of the universe. Hydrogen mixed with oxygen at the ratio of two to one produces water. When hydrogen and oxygen are mixed together, and then ignited (by some source of heat, like a spark, match, bolt of lightning), they explode violently –– and water is the result! In a spectacular disaster on May 6, 1937, the German zeppelin Hindenburg, while being anchored to its tower at Lakehurst, New Jersey, was struck by lightning. Filled with hydrogen gas (to make the huge transoceanic blimp lighter than air), Hindenburg exploded, and the resultant fire melted the huge metal girders and frame. And water cascaded from the flames –– the result of the mixture of hydrogen with oxygen, and ignition.
Why does water form seven kinds of ice crystals when under pressure? Why not six, or five, or nine? And why does water defy other conventional “laws” when it is frozen?
Ice is merely water whose molecules have stopped moving as a result of a drop in temperature below 32 degrees Fahrenheit. Other liquids become more and more dense as they are frozen. Water does just the opposite! And how “fortunate”! For if water became more dense as it froze, it would freeze and then sink, so that lakes would freeze from the bottom up. Bodies of water would freeze solid, and no plant life, fish, or microorganisms could survive. There would be no life on earth if water became more dense when it freezes.
Instead, it becomes less dense than the water from which it was formed, and thus floats on water! Water expands when subjected to temperatures in either direction away from 32 degrees. When 212 degrees Fahrenheit is reached at sea level –– or when the vapor pressure of the liquid equals the pressure of the atmosphere above the liquid, water “boils,” or appears to be roiling, bubbling, moving about very rapidly; emitting “steam,” or thick vapor which can temporarily be seen before it disperses into the air.
Mankind has benefited immensely from harnessing the pressure caused by steam escaping from boiling water. Huge steamships, locomotives, donkey engines, pumps, dynamos to produce electricity –– hundreds of applications of the power of steam from merely boiling water have helped produce the industrial revolution, and are being used prodigiously, today. Huge coal-burning plants, some consuming as many as 200 coal cars of coal each day, boil water to produce steam to turn turbines which produce electricity.
But in order to convert water to vapor (steam), the water must absorb an enormous amount of heat. To evaporate only one pound of water, it must absorb the same amount of heat it would require to raise five and one half pounds of water from the freezing point to the boiling point. This ability to absorb heat is what gives your body its fantastically engineered cooling system. Since over two thirds of your body is composed of water, and your bloodstream is ninety percent water, your body is constantly taking in and giving off water. When each tiny droplet of perspiration, visible or invisible, leaves your body – as occurs each day and night – it does several things. First, it carries with it heat so that the body is cooled. It also carries various poisons, salts, pollutants, thus cleansing the body’s cells.
You take in about a ton of water each year. You give off the same amount. The tiny cells that make up your body are continually ingesting nutrients brought by water; carrying away wastes by water, as is true of every living thing on earth whether plant, animal, bird, or fish! The inside of plants, from huge trees to delicate African violets, is made up of thousands of little waterways which carry nutrients, and carry away wastes.
Perhaps, by understanding how much of our earth is water (three quarters of the globe), that you are more than two thirds water, you can come to understand the biblical usage of water as a type of God’s Holy Spirit; as a type of life, a type of cleanliness, a type of baptism, and a type of good works.
Think about the natural cycle of water on earth. Each year, about SEVEN BILLION TONS of water comes down on the United States from rainfall. Each tiny droplet of this massive amount of moisture comes from oceans, lakes, rivers; from evaporation. No “new” water is being created. Each drop of water is as ancient as the stones in the Great Pyramid. The laws of the conservation of matter decree that water on our good, green earth is merely changed from one form to another. In the depths of the sea, there may still exist specific molecules of water which have been there from creation, from before Adam, from the time of Abraham, Moses, Christ – right down through history! Though water tends to cycle from the bottom of lakes to the top, and ocean currents exist, the water at the bottom of the deepest parts of the ocean, like the famed Mariannas Trench, are relatively undisturbed. Yet, if that water could be brought to the surface, it would evaporate into vapor, form clouds, come down as rain, and you could drink it. A part of you, therefore, is composed of matter which has always been.
Water is not being created. It is merely changed from one form to another. Nothing is lost –– it is merely recycled from the oceans to the land, to plants, animals and man; back into streams, rivers, or ground water; eventually to the oceans, and the cycle begins anew.
The Bible says a great deal about water. In Genesis 1:1, God says, “In the beginning God created [Hebrew: Bara] the heaven and the earth. And the earth was [became] without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep [oceans covered all the continents]. And the Spirit of God moved upon [was pondering over, brooding upon] the face of the waters…
And God said, Let there be a firmament [a space, or expanse] in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so” (Genesis 1:1-7).
Throughout the first chapter of the Bible, we read of the massive oceans, of how the continents appeared from beneath them; how God called them “seas,” and how God filled the seas and the waters with life. “And God created great whales [behemoths of the seas, or sea monsters], and every living creature that moveth [creeps, or crawls], which the waters brought forth abundantly…and God blessed them, saying, be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters of the seas…” (Genesis 1:20-22).
God was determining all future history when He brought forth the land masses just as they are; when He caused Islands, continents, isthmuses, peninsulas, bays and estuaries to be formed, surrounded by water.
The oceans have currents, affected by the pull of the moon, and by the rotation of the earth. Among the most famous: the Japanese Current, the Gulf Stream, the Humboldt, and others. Few realize that London, England, lies north of Gander, Newfoundland; that if it were not for the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, which flows from near the equator past the West Indies, the coast of Florida, and across the Atlantic, England and Northwestern Europe would be virtually uninhabitable, a wasteland of pack ice and snow.
Ponder the development of civilization. In every country, on every continent, water is the primary concern. Cities developed at the confluences of rivers, on bays and estuaries, where adequate water supplies are found. More than 90 percent of the population of Egypt lives within about 25 miles of the Nile, for example – the rest is arid desert, with a few scattered oases.
Pollution: The Destruction of Water Supplies
Today, man is polluting our global water supplies at an alarming rate. Global water pollution literally threatens the future of civilization itself. Each day, billions of gallons of raw sewage, industrial wastes, oil and gasoline, harmful chemicals and toxic wastes flow into the seas of the world. Most major river systems, especially in the third world countries, have become like open sewers.
Not only is man polluting the oceans and rivers, he is also destroying his underground water supplies. Huge reservoirs of water lie beneath the soil and rocks. Scientists refer to this ground water as an “aquifer.” As water rains down upon the earth, having evaporated, mostly, from the seas, not all runs down creeks and rivers and returns to the sea. Much is absorbed in the soil and finds its way deep underground, where it can be pumped to the surface by deep water wells. But major aquifers are rapidly being depleted. As lakes and river systems shrink, salinity increases. Some species of fish have been completely eradicated from some lakes and rivers due to rising salt content.
Prodigious use of “monoculture,” the growing of single crops over large areas by irrigation, has contributed to the pollution of our aquifers. Farmers use powerful chemicals to control pests, stem rust, root rot; dump chemical fertilizers onto the fields. Runoff from such use of toxic chemicals has been proven to cause huge fish and wildlife kills.
Instead of farming as God intended –– living on the land with one’s family, raising a variety of crops for one’s own food, plus enough with which to barter and trade –– the family farm is rapidly disappearing as gigantic commercial agriculture takes over millions of acres, plants them to single crops, like soy beans, wheat, rice, barley, corn, sorghum, milo, sugar beets, potatoes and a host of others. Monoculture means a lack of natural variety, and, along with it, the disappearance of hedgerows, border areas which are uncultivated; tree lines and shrubs which are haven for a myriad of species of wildlife, including game birds and deer. It also means that when a particular pest attacks a crop, it can spread like wildfire. The result? Man dumps larger and larger amounts of pesticides on the crops to protect them. The final result is pollution, not only of ground water and the soil; not only of creeks, rivers, and eventually the sea; but of man himself – from his daily ingestion of a host of chemicals.
Since water is a great natural solvent, it carries many elements in solution. Sediments and sands, clay, vegetable material, bacteria; microorganisms and tiny, freshwater shrimp might be carried along in a stream. Before the water is fit for human use, it must be cleansed of impurities. To cleanse it, it is usually filtered through sand, or charcoal, or both. Centuries ago, civilization suffered from massive disease epidemics. Many were waterborne, such as cholera, and typhoid. The reason? Man did not understand that human wastes were polluting his water supplies, that he was building his sanitary facilities over his supply of ground water, or where wastes eventually leached out into the rivers and lakes. Explosive growth of bacteria caused disease.
Today, many of our city water supplies have an unpleasant odor. That is because water is not only filtered, but treated with chlorine gas in small quantities. Allegedly, the amounts of chlorine are not harmful to man; are merely sufficient to kill any bacteria present. Still, many city water supplies are polluted to a greater or lesser degree. Some city dwellers would be amazed to see the accumulation of sediments and strange-colored wastes which can be filtered from their tap water.
Water: Symbol of Cleanliness
Every day, we all use a great deal of water. We bathe or shower in it, drink it, make coffee or tea with it, brush our teeth with it, cook our food with it, or water our lawns and gardens with it.
As a cleansing agent, water is the universal substance. Speaking of the church, Paul wrote, “…That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word. That He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:26-27).
God insisted that ancient Israel be clean! He said, “Depart ye, depart ye, go ye out from thence, touch no unclean thing; go ye out of the midst of her; be ye clean, ye that bear the vessels of the Eternal” (Isaiah 52:11). Paul wrote, “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified [set apart as “holy” and “cleansed”] but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God” (I Corinthians 6:9-11).
It is no accident that God uses water and the cleansing action of water in washing our clothing and our bodies as a type of being clean, spiritually! As these and other scriptures show, the study of God’s Word; hearing His Word expounded by the ministry; pondering it, meditating over it, drinking in of its meaning results in spiritual cleansing just as surely as your morning shower results in cleansing your body! David prayed, “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin” (Psalm 51:1-2).
Notice Paul’s analogy: “Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled [reference to the “sprinkling” of all nations by the blood of Christ: see Hebrews 9:19-20] from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22). This is obvious reference to both physical and spiritual cleanliness! When Paul said the church was cleansed by the “washing of water by the Word” he was speaking spiritually, showing that the ingestion of the Word of God cleanses, purifies, carries off spiritual pollutants, as surely as pure water washes away physical impurities!
It is this double function of water that we tend to overlook. Not only must we use prodigious quantities of water, on a daily basis, to remain clean, to eat and drink, but we also are continually using water to carry poisons from our bodies, and carry bodily wastes away from our kitchens and bathrooms. So water is working in two ways. It is disposing of impurities, and it is sustaining, giving life!
Did you know that it requires 1,000 pounds of water to produce only one pound of food? That from 10 to 20 tons of water must pass through corn stalks to produce just one bushel of corn? If you consider the amount of water the grass and grain uses which cows eat, it is safe to say that it requires 15 tons of water to produce one pound of beef.
Look at the scripture first quoted again. Then turn to, and read slowly the sixth chapter of Romans. The word baptizo means “to plunge into water.” It means to submerge, immerse! In the rite of baptism we are not merely standing under a shower, or sitting in a tub, or using a cloth and a basin –– we are buried, completely covered with this substance we call water. As Christ said, a great fish swallowed Jonah, and he was three days and three nights in the deep, covered by the ocean. Christ said He would be buried “in the heart of the earth” for the same exact period of time. Thus, the analogy of burial in water is used to symbolize our death and burial –– the disappearance of the old self; and along with it, the washing away of all our sins!
Now look at the original scripture quoted again. “And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.” Of course! For they are like one. After broken-hearted repentance, and humble acceptance of the blood of Christ to atone for sins, we then become baptized, buried in a watery grave, which symbolizes not only burial and resurrection, but complete washing. We then rise to live in “newness of life” drinking in (an apt analogy) of the written word of God, which continues the washing, cleansing process; not only giving life, refreshing, rejuvenating, sustaining, but also carrying away impurities!
Once, a lady came to me to ask help. She was having problems with contrary thoughts, temptations, even the temptation to curse the name of God. I explained that many humans experience this, that it is more prevalent than many realize, that demons would like to implant such thoughts in our minds. I told her to read more of the Bible; to think on what she read; to open the Psalms, get on her knees, and pray David’s prayers out loud to God. For I knew that the answer to getting contrary thoughts out is to put positive thoughts in.
Turn to and read the account of Jesus’ encounter with the Gentile woman by the well (John 4:1-26). After Jesus asked her for a drink, and she replied in astonishment that a Jew should ask a Samaritan woman for a drink, He said, “If thou knewest the gift of God, and Who it is that said to thee, ‘Give me to drink,’ thou wouldest have asked of Him, and He would have given you living water.
“The woman said unto Him, ‘Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: from whence then hast thou that living water?’…Jesus…said unto 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!’” (Verses 10-14).
Later, on the Last Great Day of the feast, Jesus said, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink! He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water!” (John 7:37-39).
Do you understand? He was saying that those of us who can truly drink in of Christ, allowing Him to live His life within us –– those who are daily drinking in of God’s Word through prayer, study, meditation, yes, and sometimes fasting and prayer –– then “oceans” of goodness; of meekness, gentleness, faith; of good deeds toward others, productive work, the shining light of a really inspiring example will be the result! An outpouring of spiritual goodness will flow from those who are “drinking in” of God’s Spirit!
Water should not be taken for granted. It is a symbol of life, of cleanliness, of baptism, and burial of the old self; it is the symbol of God’s Holy Spirit! No wonder Jesus cried out, “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled!” (Matthew 5:6).
Wherever you are right now, you are composed of about three quarters of your body weight in water. You are surrounded by air, which contains a certain amount of vapor –– merely water, in minute amounts, unseen. Now, think on Paul’s statement to the Areopagites: “God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though He needeth any thing, seeing He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood [which is mostly water] all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us: for IN HIM WE LIVE, AND MOVE, AND HAVE OUR BEING…”
As you are surrounded by air, which contains water; as you are composed, to about three quarters of your body weight by water, so you need to realize the closeness of God; the power of His Spirit to heal, and cleanse, and carry away our sins and impurities; the power of His Spirit to give us life, not only now, but for ALL ETERNITY!
