As we begin the Season of Creation, we are invited to reflect on water—a gift that sustains all life. Water can also be a source of renewal, healing, and connection with God. This week, take some time to notice your own relationship with water and the ways it may be inviting you to slow down, let go, and be renewed.
Reflection 1 — Living Water Music Video by VOUS Worship
Take a few minutes to enjoy this song that reminds us that God is always at work, even in times when we feel dry, tired, or uncertain. Sometimes we need to stop, wait, and trust that God’s living water will flow again.
click on the image or link to view and listen
Question for Reflections or Sharing:
Where am I being invited to wait, trust, and allow God’s living water to flow through me again?
Reflection 2 — Stirring Waters
Water has been part of our lives from the very beginning. We have memories connected to lakes, rivers, baptism, and so many other places and experiences. This reflection invites us to think about our own relationship with water. Below is an excerpt from “Stirring Waters: Feminist Liturgies for Justice” by Diann L Neu.
“Every day I go to the water. Presently my water is a pond with a fountain that sits on the deck at my home. Throughout my life the water has been a lake: Lake Manitou in northern Indiana, Lake LaSalle in Brown County, Indiana, and the lakes at St. Mary -of-the Woods, Indiana. In my childhood the water was a creek flowing beside my family home. During my graduate studies, the water was the San Franciso Bay. Now it is the Atlantic Ocean.
Water: rain, streams, lakes, rivers, oceans, ponds, creeks, pools, wells, waterfalls; and the fluids of most living organisms.
According to Cherokee traditions, going to water at the beginning and at the end of each day is good practice. On each visit one asks the water to take what is not needed or what does not belong (like anger, worry, blame, competition, conflict, anxiety) and to bring what one needs (like calm, inspiration, insight, compassion, patience, healing). The Cherokee understand that the waters of our lives and the waters of Earth are intertwined. Throughout my life I have known this too, perhaps beginning with living in the water of my mother’s womb.
Stirring: inspiring, moving, impassioned, exciting, moving briskly, electrifying, awakening, motivating, stimulating, provoking, affecting, disturbing, causing commotion, energizing”
Questions for Reflections or Sharing:
- What is your history with water? List, describe your experiences and memories of water in your life. In your imagination, go and sit beside your favorite water location. How does that feel? What happens to your spirit as you rest there? Who do you thank for that experience?
- Think about the experience of baptism. When did you last see or participate in a baptism? How does the water in nature flow into the water of ritual? Celebrate the life giving waters of life.
- Have you ever heard about the Cherokee tradition concerning water and its role in blessing the beginning and ending of each day? Might you choose to incorporate it in your daily practices? We invite you to sit with a bowl of water or dip your toes or fingers into a stream of water in nature or even from the faucet in the shower. Be grateful for the gift of water when so many are thirsty.
Resources thoughtfully compiled by the DSGR Promoter of Study Committee
