1 C. H. Spurgeon. 2 J. H. Jowett.
236 NO MORE THIRST
(3) It is a springing fountain. — "The water that I shall give him shalll)ecome in him a springing fountain"; it shall not lie there stagnant, but shall leap like a living thing, up into the sunshine, and flash there, turned into diamonds when the bright rays smile upon it. Here is the promise of activity. There seems small blessing, in this" overworked world, in a promise oi more active exertion ; but what an immense part of our nature lies dormant and torpid if we are not Christians ! How much ol the work that is done is dreary, wearisome, collar-work, against the grain. Do not the wheels of life often go slowly ? Are we not often weary of the inexpressible monotony and fatigue? And do we not go to our work sometimes, though with a fierce feeling of '' need-to-do-it," yet also with inward repugnance ? And are there not great parts of our nature that have never wakened into activity at all, and are ill at ease, because there is no field of action provided for them ? The mind is like mill- stones ; if we do not put the wheat into them to grind, they will grind each, other's faces. So some of us are fretting ourselves to pieces, or are sick of a vague disease, and are morbid and miserable because the highest and noblest parts of our nature have never been brought into exercise./ Surely this promise of Christ's should come as a true gospel to such, offering, as it does, if we will trust ourselves to Him, a springing fountain of activity in our hearts that shall fill our whole being with joyous energy, and make it a delight to live and to work. It will bring to us new powers, new motives ; it will set all the wheels of life going at double speed. We shall be quickened by the presence of that mighty power, even as a dim taper is brightened and flames up when plunged into a jar of oxygen. And life will be delight- some in its hardest toil, when it is toil for the sake of, and by the indwelling strength of, that great Lord and Master of our work.
^ The indwelling power of the Holy Spirit rises superior to all disadvantages, like a spring which cannot be kept under, do what we may. Our engineers and buikleis know how hard it is to bind up the earth-floods from overflowing, and the spiritual floods are yet more unconquerable. It is wonderful how springs will bubble up in places where we least expect them. The great desert of Sahara will no doubt be made a very easy county to traverse, and, perhaps, may even become a fertile plain, from the fact that there is water everywhere at no very great depth below
ST. JOHN IV. 13, 14 237
the surface, and where it is reached an oasis is formed. The government of Algeria has sent engineers into parts of the Sahara bordering on the French possession, and these men have bored the rock by Artesian wells, and greatly astonished the natives ; for in the wilderness have waters leaped out and streams in the desert. At the magic touch of the living water, palm trees have sprung up and an undergrowth of vegetation, so that the solitary places have been made to sing together. When the Lord gives our souls to drink from the fountains of the great deep of His own eternal love, and to have a vital principle of grace within us, our wilderness rejoices and blossoms as the rose, and the Sahara around us cannot whither our verdure; our soul is as an oasis, though all around is barrenness.^
In the mid garden doth a fountain stand;
From font to font its waters fall alway.
Freshening the leaves by their continual play: —
Such often have I seen in southern land,
While every leaf, as though by light winds fanned,
Has quivered underneath the dazzling spray,
Keeping its greenness all the sultry day,
While others pine aloof, a parched band.
And in the mystic garden of the soul
A fountain, nourished from the upper springs.
Sends ever its clear waters up on high.
Which while a dewy freshness round it flings.
All plants which there acknowledge its control
Show fair and green, else drooping, pale, and dry.^
(4) It is an eternal fountain. — The water of a fountain rises by its own impulse, but however its silver column may climb it always falls back into its marble basin. But this fountain rises higher, and at each successive jet higher, tending towards, and finally touching, its goal, which is at the same time its source. The water seeks its own level, and the fountain climbs until it reaches Him from whom it comes, and the eternal life in which He lives. The Christian character is identical in both worlds, and however the forms and details of pursuit may vary, the essential principle remains one. So that the life of a Christian man on earth and his life in heaven are but one stream, as it were, which may, indeed, Hke some of those American rivers, run for a time through a deep, dark canon, or in an underground
1 C. H. Spurgeon. 2 Trench, Foems, 144.