I recalled this morning an image of a fountain that came to mind one day last autumn when I’d obviously been thinking about coping with my responsibilities towards younger and older family members.
At the time, refusing to identify with a thought moments before, I journaled, “I’m not in the sandwich generation, hemmed in by both sides.” I chose a better phrase to partner with: “I’m in the cascade generation, flowing with heaven from God’s perspective onto those in older and younger generations who need love and power.”
It’s all too easy when under pressure to take on a false sense of identity that puts more emphasis on the burdens than on the answer that lightens the load, both for you and me and the generations around us.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman at the well, “whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”¹
This spring of water brings refreshment and restoration for ourselves, but also a flow of hope, healing and creative solutions for the individuals, families and communities whose lives we touch.
We’re told in the same story that the woman left behind her water jar at the well – on one level a symbol of the burdens she carried? – and went back to town to spread the news about Jesus, and drew people to him. Some would come to drink the supernatural living water of his Spirit for themselves, then pass it on to others in the region.
Immediately after writing these reflections this morning, the first song I heard as I turned on my car stereo was Matt Redman’s We Are The Free, in which the chorus ends with the line, “We are the free, the freedom generation.” Absolutely!
If you’re in need of refreshment this week amid competing pressures, just ask Jesus for a drink! It’s free, and we’re a generation that’s set free from the labels and identities that the voice of oppression would put on us.
¹ John 4:13
True Vine Time 