One more long one (don't hold me to that;) but, I can’t stop thinking about the sink… if you missed my post on May 15, it tells the story of the sink. You can scroll back and read it, if you’re interested, but in summary, it’s where God met me in such a practical place, and has overwhelmed my heart.

There’s a backstory, from 2021, but that first day of our walk, in Tuscany, was starting to feel like another really bad day a few years before. And I was afraid and trying not to be angry that we hadn’t prepared better for this trip. I should change that ‘we’ to an I… Scott was fine, he doesn’t need water, in the copious amounts, that I do. I knew better. So when I prayed that prayer, at the end of the driveway, it was a scared, desperate prayer because I wasn’t feeling well. I had no expectation of how God might show up, I just knew He could somehow help me finish the walk, even without water.

I had seen the sink as we walked up towards the house. I had even thought, “What if I just go over there and fill my bottle?” But I didn’t know the source of the water. Was it clean? Would it make me sick? Could I get us in trouble because it was private property? I needed an invitation and some reassurance.

This past Sunday, one of our pastors preached about Ebenzer stones, or a stone of help. Here’s a short explanation from biblestudytools.com, “Whenever God performed a miraculous act or proved his faithfulness, people in the Old Testament would often stack stones to create a memorial for what God had done.”

Somehow Scott and I had missed them, but they had handed out stones before church and we were invited to write a word or two on them, that signified how God has shown His faithfulness to us. Even though I didn’t have a stone, I couldn’t stop thinking about what I would write… ‘sink’. What about water? Nope, just sink.

As I’ve thought about that more and more, it hit me. What I needed that day in Tuscany was a source that I could trust and an invitation. Yes, I needed water, but that water had to come from a pure, clean source that could be trusted. And I didn’t know the sink could be trusted, or that we were welcome, until the lady invited us to the sink and assured us that it was cool and clean. She wasn't the source of the water, she just knew where to find it.

But what a beautiful picture of Jesus. He promises us Living Water (John 4), water that will never leave us thirsty, in a spiritual sense, water that will lead us to abundant, eternal life. I can tell you, I know what spiritual thirst is. I lived thirsty for a lot of years, trying untrusted source after untrusted source to quench that deep longing in my heart, and all of it left me sick and even more thirsty. And just like the sink, that was there waiting for us to drink from it, Jesus is too. And in case you need an invitation, a reassurance that He can be trusted, I’m like the lady who lady crossed the driveway and came back. “Cool, clean water?”

You might be tempted, like I was that day, to say, “No, I’m fine.” But are you really? It’s ok to be skeptical, doubtful, even a little afraid, but just don’t decline the invitation without exploring the possibility.