Lessons From A Pond

What a difference a day makes!  There's a song there somewhere.  I took a picture of this same pond on Monday and there was a white crane standing in the middle of it - on dry ground.  It had really dried up much more than the pictures I posted last month.  It was down to a small pool off to the right and we expected every day to see dead fish floating on the surface - like so many other ponds in our area.  But then came the rain on Wednesday night.  When we got up yesterday morning, the pond was back to having water from shore to shore.  It's hard to tell it because of all the weeds that grew up on the dry soil of the pond.  It's nice to see it looking like it's supposed to look.  Since it's scheduled to be re-dug next year, I still think they missed a great opportunity to do it while it was mostly dry.
Being the preacher that I am, when I saw the water back over the pond it made me think of that passage in Titus that says, "He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having hope of eternal life." (3:5-7)
On Thursday morning I felt like I could hear a collective "AAAAAAH!" from all the frogs, turtles, fish, and other critters that inhabit our pond.  That's how our spirits feel when we think about the cleansing we have in Christ, and the constant refreshing of his Spirit being "poured out on us generously."
Oddly enough, our pond became another illustration to me that wasn't so refreshing.  We had suspected that it had become really shallow - especially as we watched cranes walk around in the water and it being only knee deep for them - but once it became dry, we could clearly see how shallow it was at our end of the pond.  Just a couple inches of water made it look like a deep and health pond, but in truth, it's in terrible need of dredging and re-shaping.  Wow - if that's not a lesson, I don't know lessons!  How many times in the Bible does the Holy Spirit warn us about having a surface faith?  Jesus called it having a righteousness to be seen of men.  Maybe some of us need spiritual dredging to deepen our faith, and strengthen our walk with God.  Our pond started out deep, but gradually became shallow.  That's an even scarier lesson to comprehend, but whatever the lesson, the washing of rebirth and renewal can only come through Jesus.