Back to the Future

I recently went back to my past. Places I hadn’t been in years. People I hadn’t seen in years. It was surreal as somehow my mind kept jumping back to the last time I’d been in that “space”.
While most of it was comfortable and familiar, other parts made it perfectly clear that a paradoxical "split" between time and space occurred at the moment I’d left there so many years ago. I felt myself wanting to reacquaint with what I liked most about those past experiences, only to come to the realization that the best thing about the whole thing - isn’t what it is now, but what was, then.

As I muddled through the ins and outs of this mental struggle, it made me think: It reminded me of a story in the Bible. It’s the story typically known as “The woman at the well” found in John 4. It’s a lengthy exchange, so I’ll just pull some highlights to help explain where I'm coming from.

Here’s The Word:

John 4: 5 -6(a) Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there.

7 There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.

12 (The woman speaking speaking to Christ) Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?

13 Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: 14 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.

20 (The woman speaking again) Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. 21 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.

23 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. 24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

There’s so much richness in this biblical account, and it’s not uncommon for focus to be placed on living water in reference to Who Christ is, or His unlikely interaction with a Samaritan (being a Jew), or Him telling her about her past as evidence of His Godly omniscience. However, in light of my recent experience, here’s what I saw:

Jesus shows up to the well and starts having a conversation. Her point of view is based in the past. His was based in the future. Her’s was based in the significance of the location because of its history. His was in the significance of the life He was bringing, the hour that was coming (and now is). In His conversation, He was trying to make it clear to her that there’s a future that you can choose to walk in right now, if you can be ready to get out of your past.

So, in that moment, in that mind, in my past, I realized something. With all of the significance of my history in the places I was once so fond of, I’ve now tasted of The Living Water and my past, while good for nostalgia purposes, is no longer my mountain. I’m now familiar with having His Spirit and truth in me wherever I go and the warm comfortable feelings of belonging are never far from me. I now know that as much fun as it can be to visit my past, I don’t fit in there like I used to and I’m always looking at my watch, anxious about getting back to the future.


In Him,
Cros