Considering The Source

• Our streams can get muddied by the passing of distance
  • The kids and Telestrations
  • Or finding a source of drinking water - by nature, things will come into a stream and pollute it
• So we need to locate the source
  • It's why we try to avoid triangulation - go directly to a person if there's an issue, and not try to employ a second person as a go between
  • If you're trying to live off the grid, it'd be ideal to find a local source of water, because otherwise you're spending a lot of time having to treat what you find.
  • When we do or find direct sourcing, we're going to tend to stay there: the more we don't triangulate, the better we are. People build communities over fresh, safe water sources.
  • So in our faith, which itself is a driving force, must have a space where there is a clean source of living water. And should we find that, wouldn't we want to build our lives around it?
• Might be one of those obvious Sunday School answers that it's God
  • Of course, no shock, but God is the source of our living water, and it would be nice to get as close to the source as possible.
  • And it's human nature then that once we've found the source, we'll build around it. We'll try to have it be usable and containable.
• But notice what happens in both our readings
  • GEN - when God speaks, God requires movement
    • It's not like Abram didn't have things going for him: he had a good life at the time. Stability, security
    • Yet God called. The source appeared to Abram.
    • And Abram got up and went.
  • MAT - when God speaks, God requires movement
    • It's not deja vu, you heard this text a couple weeks ago
    • But here's the same interesting issue: there's a moment where God speaks again - God's favor appears upon Jesus, a bright, flashing arrow for all concerned to see that Jesus is extension of God's source here on the earth. Jesus is living water.
    • And then as soon as it happens, it's gone. And then they're down the mountain
  • In both cases, the source moves, too.
    • God doesn't abandon Abram, and later Abraham. God is with him throughout, and the promise we hear today is brought to fruition.
    • Jesus goes down the mountain, tells the disciples to keep hushed, because it seems there's still work to do until the end.
  • So, if we want to stay close to the source, we need to go what it goes.
• Should we stay, we will eventually find ourselves further away from the source
  • So our call is to follow the source, which is strange all considered: usually the cleanest sources come from a single point.
  • When we stop going, then we have to employ all sorts of other tools to try to get back to the source.
  • But, just like setting up far downstream, it's just going to become expensive, far more focused on maintenance, and likely still potentially to fail.
    • Interestingly enough, it's not hard to think of the church in this example.
    • Let's say there's a winning formula a church has - it's so easy to consider that they happened upon the source. And maybe they do for a time
    • But what if the source moves? What if the church ignores God's call?
    • It may work for awhile, but it may start to look more like .
      • Operational maintenance - a wastewater treatment plant: The church spends more of its time just trying to manage itself and less and less time asking where to find the source has moved.
      • The endgame of Telestrations: confusion, misunderstanding, no sense of what the source is at all.
    • And if churches can be that way, so can individuals.
• Not so with God.