You have made known to me the path of life. (Psalm 16:11)
Ezekiel had a vision of a river that flowed out from the Temple towards the east.
The river was ever-deepening, its waters eventually poured into the great sea, and wherever the river flows “everything will live” (Ezekiel 47:9). But what draws me to this vision this morning is that God didn’t simply cause Ezekiel to see this river, he caused him to walk through it; the river of life became for Ezekiel the path of life, and he knew exactly how deep it was at every point precisely because he was standing in it!
To walk the path of life means to walk in the ever-deepening flow of Holy Spirit life, and the flow of the life of the Spirit is experienced in various ways at various seasons.
At first, the river is merely a stream under your feet. You can run and play and laugh and frolic in it. It cools you in the time of heat, soothes you and provides refreshment for your dryness.
Then the river rises to your ankles, you feel God taking you deeper, and you revel in it. Although you walk in the heat of summer, the deep waters of the river keep your feet cool perpetually, and you begin to feel immune to things that once oppressed you.
Then the river rises to your knees, and now this river walk becomes uncomfortable. You thought that going deeper with God would make things easier, but suddenly you find that it is more difficult to walk than it was before. You can still feel the cool of the water around your legs, and it is refreshing, but now the struggle to push through the waters is nearly canceling out the sense of refreshment because you are perspiring.
Then the river rises to your waist, and this is the most difficult moment of all. Moving forward even one step takes great effort now. You look back and see people frolicking and dancing in the stream that you once walked in and you wonder if you haven’t lost your joy along the way and become religious.
But you soon discover that you are simply transitioning from walking to swimming. The halfway point is the hardest, but it soon gives way to a greater freedom than you could have ever experienced in the shallow waters. You discover that when you walked, you still had control over your life; you moved through the river at your own pace. But now that you are swimming, you have fully surrendered your life to the will of the river, and you are moving at the pace of the river. Now you no longer decide where you are going next, but you simply allow the river to take you wherever it desires to take you. And suddenly you see things coming to life all around you, for wherever the river goes everything lives!
Wherever you are in the river, you should simply rejoice that you are in the river! Those who play in the shallow waters should rejoice in the freedom to dance. Those who swim in the deep waters should rejoice in the freedom to swim. Those in between should rejoice in the progress that they have made and the shift that’s about to come. But one thing is for sure; all should rejoice because the path of life is a living path and it brings life to all who walk it!
Share your thoughts:
Can you locate yourself on this trajectory? Where are you, and what’s that like?
