John 7:38 “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him or her” (NIV).
I now focus on a pinnacle message which is embedded in the passage I pondered in my last piece. Jesus said the way to receive all that He promised is to believe.
The beautiful simple truth is that believing in Jesus is the sole way to gain salvation from sin. The result is eternal life. Literally, you need only believe in Jesus.
To truly believe in Jesus is to receive Jesus. It is an eternal relationship of true love, made possible by Jesus who is Love, along with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
I have been unemployed a long time. Frustration only mounted this summer as fitting job postings were few, and my intense search resulted in nothing. Also, most everything about this job search process has seemed dehumanizing to me, including my application attempts with Christian organizations. In the midst of that frustration, I saw a job posting for a position at Colorado Christian University. I had applied for that same job in previous years with incredible enthusiasm, but to no avail. Once again, I wanted that job. A few days after applying, I got an email with an offer for a preliminary recorded interview. With no live person involved, it was simply a video recording where I had to answer four questions. I thought it was the best “interview” I had ever done. Sometimes it is a challenge for me to think quickly, yet there under a time pressure of from one to two minutes per question, my answers flowed right out. Afterwards, I was elated. But then two weeks went by with no contact from anyone at CCU.
Come the evening of the 24th of August, I entered a large chain store to buy a box to mail a birthday gift. At the entrance, I saw four young women walking closely together, and I quickly thought those ladies could be incoming CCU students. I had the strong urge to meet them and then to encourage them that very evening before the start of the semester. But since not one of the women was wearing a CCU shirt or cap, I could not be certain if they were students. I reluctantly but decisively refrained from talking with them.
About ten minutes later, all four were in the school and office supply section, where I had been earlier and where I returned to get a journal notebook. Sighting just a small bit of a blue lanyard in the hand of the one woman, I stooped down behind her back to look at that lanyard. Though too small to fully see, I saw what seemed to be the CCU shield.
Smiling, I slowly straightened up and said in a confident voice, “You all look like a group of CCU students.”
One of the four looked me right in the eyes and said with a bit of astonishment, “We are CCU students.”
Not trying to impersonate a prophet, I told them I saw the key chain in the hand of the one woman, yet that I figured they might be CCU students.
Then I said, “I graduated from CCU. In fact, you can pray for me!”
I briefly said I had an interview for a job at CCU which went great. Then I expressed my discouragement that I had heard nothing for two weeks.
Immediately, one of the women stated, "Let’s pray for you right now!"
"Great," I responded.
The woman prayed.
As she prayed, I was overwhelmed with the beauty of her prayer. The words of her prayer were straight forward. And there was something in the sincerity of her voice which was utterly caring.
Her final sentence was a request that the will of God would be done.
I was overwhelmed.
With emotions rising, a quick thought of how great her prayer was enabled me to say one sentence, “You made me want the position more.”
Then standing there for a moment, I knew I could say no more. I turned around and walked away as tears welled up in my eyes.
Normally I talked too long with CCU students, telling them a number of stories. Yet at that moment, I was unable to say even one more word to those four women without crying.
On the surface, this story does not have a good ending. Two days later I got a standard generic rejection email from CCU. One of my best “interviews” ever ended up in emptiness.
Yet deep down, this story has a glorious ending. I cherish the prayer of that CCU student.
She gave me hope when my job search seemed hopeless.
She gave me hope when I was losing hope.
Right now, I realize “living water” was pouring from her at a time when I was in need.
She believes in Jesus.
There is only one thing you need to do to be saved from the result of sins and to be spiritually united with God for all eternity: believe in Jesus.
Hunter
