Muddy streams and broken, leaky cisterns

(By John MacDuff)

"Come! Whoever is thirsty, let him come—and
 whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of
 the water of life!" Revelation 22:17

Thirsty? who is not thirsty? It is the cry of
universal humanity! Who does not feel that this
world is presenting us with muddy streams and
broken, leaky cisterns. Who does not feel, in
their moments of deep and calm reflection, when
we are brought face to face with the great enigma
of existence—that the world is serving up faded
flowers instead of those redolent with imperishable
fragrance, and glowing with unfading bloom.

Prodigal! Wanderer from God, exile from peace,
roaming the forest haunts of sin, plunging deeper
and deeper into their midnight of ruin and despair;
has an arrow wounded your heart? Are you, in your
agony, seeking rest and finding none—having the
gnawing feeling of dissatisfaction with all created
things, and an undefined longing for a solace they
cannot give? Yes! for your gaping, bleeding wound
there is "balm in Gilead, and a Physician there!"

"Yes, Lord! I come! Thirsty, faint, forlorn, wounded,
 weary! I come, just as I am, without one plea. You
 are all I need, all I require—in sickness and health,
 in joy and in sorrow, in life and in death, in time
 and through eternity!"