Cracks & Spiritual Water

 With little rainfall in the Texas region, we have seen vegetation dry up and die and the parched ground open up in starvation for water.  Just a few days ago we heard of a story about a little puppy and  one of these large cracks in the ground. A little boy was the caretaker of this puppy.  He went to check on the puppy and couldn't find him.  As they searched they could hear some little noises.  As they continued moving in the direction of these faint sounds, they found themselves kneeling down beside a crack in the ground.  After getting closer they could hear the little crying noises coming from the crack where the puppy had fallen. The boy and his mother could not rescue this pup, but had to call upon those that had to tools, means and know how to save this puppy from death. 

This story has lingered in my mind as I thought about the reason for the cracks in the ground and the danger it presented in the life of this puppy.  The correlation of this story to to our lives became very clear to me.

Water is the most valuable substance or commodity in the world.  It has greater worth than gold, oil or diamonds.  Thinking about that alone makes me understand how rich I am because I have water. Life could not exist without the availability of and access to adequate supplies of clean water.

As valuable as this water is to sustain life, we need "spiritual" water for our spirits. 

The Savior taught the women of Samaria about drinking the living water. “Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: “But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4)

Thinking back to the story of the puppy, I know of loved ones that have fallen into spiritual cracks. Not everyone has partaken of this living water or continues to partake as time goes on.  They live in a place where there are cracks and dangers.  Their soil of life has become hard and they have fallen into their spiritual cracks and need to be rescued.  While we do what we can to help lift them back to safety, sometimes it takes others as an instrument to help bring them back from the darkness.

Sometimes I feel like I have been in a crack of life.  Sometimes I have gotten there by accident, not seeing, hearing or maybe even doing what I should have been doing.  I feel like I cry out for help finding that I can't save myself.  I realized that it is important to cry out.  Perhaps the little puppy would not have been rescued safely if he had not been able to cry.

It doesn't take much to be dehydrated spiritually.  Ground that was once watered and healthy last month, or last week, or yesterday still needs water.  Sometimes it gets it's water from a stored supply, but it will eventually run out without water.  Leaves fall, grass turns brown with out that sustaining drink.  Likewise, we can only store so much water until we too become empty of that living water.  The service we have given, the scriptures we have studied in days past will not sustain us.  I have often thought about meeting with Jesus and how that interview would go.  I know I cannot say, "I was a good mother when my children were little" or "I served as RS president, YW Pres, nursery leader, scout leader, newsletter person, etc." and think that will cover me if I have not continued to serve well till my dying day.  I cannot say, how I have taken a meal to someone or cleaned their home, or help the sick and the weary if all those were past tense.  I need to continue to serve, continue to give, continue to love, continue to study and continue to grow.  I cannot expect the "living water" of my earlier years to sustain my spiritual in my later years.

And so, I think of this modern day puppy story and all it can teach.  There was a shepherd of the puppy.  The little boy loved and cared for the puppy.  He sought to find him when he was lost.  The puppy had been swallowed up by the ground because of the crack that had developed from the lack of water.

We all need shepherds in our lives.  We all need spiritual water and we all need to be rescued from time to time. Sometimes those who fall will cry for help, and hopefully, when we can't help those we love and care for, we will call on one that can.

I am grateful to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  Because of this I know, God is my Father,   I was created in his image.  Christ is his Son.  Through his atonement I can get back to live with my Father."  Those simple concepts are a few things that I know.