The Broken Bottle

"My people have committed two sins:
They have forsaken me,
the spring of living water,
and have dug their own cisterns,
broken cisterns that cannot hold water."
Jeremiah 2:13

My daughter used to have this plastic, pink cup that had a picture of Sleeping Beauty on it. It soon became her favorite glass and she would drink out of it at every meal. One day her brother dropped it as he was "helping" clear the table. That cup got a crack in the bottom and now the water would drip through it. It was not fixable and I finally had to throw it away.

In Jeremiah, God told the Israelites that the root of their sin came down to two things:
1. They had turned from God and
2. As a result, they were trying to find their own way.
God tells them their lives were like cisterns that were broken and could not hold water. What good is a water bottle if it can't hold water? Their lives had become empty and broken and no longer usable for the kingdom of God. The sad thing is, they weren't always like that.

Jeremiah 2:2, says "I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the desert, through a land not sown."
I remember when I was dating my now husband. He was in his last year of law school and lived an hour and a half away. We would stay up talking on the phone so long that many times I'd hear my dad waking up to go to work, before I realized midnight had come and gone and it was now 6 in the morning! There was nothing I wouldn't do for him, no mountain I wouldn't climb or request that was too great.

That is how the Israelites were with God. They crossed the desert and followed Him in faith and love to the land unknown. Do you remember when you first asked Jesus into your heart? If you were like me, you might have been ready to jump on the first plane to Africa to become a missionary or march across the street to tell a stranger how He saved you. All of those things were grand when they happened, but how is your life now?

Are you like the Israelites, going on your own, living your life how you want, without any regard to Him or His purposes for your life? It is so easy to slip, to begin to worry, to try and fix a situation to have the outcome you want, or to want things you cannot have. The enemy can easily tempt you to re prioritize and run out of time to read His word. It is so easy to "follow worthless idols and become worthless ourselves,"(my paraphrase, Jeremiah 2:5b) like the Israelites did. We look to politicians or our spouses or our best friend or the next big promotion or new "thing" to make us feel whole, and to complete us. Before we know it, those things control our thoughts and our actions and our lives become worthless to His kingdom.

Thankfully, He is also the God of forgiveness and mercy and He would love nothing more than to take your shattered life and put the pieces back together again. He fills us with Living water, covering over every hurt, every want and every need. John 4: 13-14 says, "Jesus answered, "...but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." When our lives are lived for Him, we no longer thirst for the things of this world because He completes us. We realize that He is all we really want or need.

God makes a promise to the Israelites, despite their sin. It is a set of well known verses that says, "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity." (Jeremiah 29:11-14a)

He promises to bring you back from whatever captivity sin has entrapped your life in. He has a plan for your life, filled with hope and a purpose. Rest in His love, trust in His plan and give Him the shatters of your life so that He can make you whole again.