Gulps

The four young men were only about two-thirds of the way up the trail to their destination in Guadalupe Mountains National Park in west Texas. But their supply of water – which was supposed to last them two days and a night – was more than half-way depleted. The hike with heavy packs up the steep, arduous trail had been much more difficult than they had anticipated. When they got to their camping spot, they were fortunate enough to find a snow bank. The guys used their backpacking stoves to melt enough snow to provide water for them to survive. For the remainder of their excursion, they sparingly sipped from their water supply.

In a different time, in a different part of the world, a man had spent the morning trekking through hot, arid, dusty country. He was tired and thirsty. His footsteps began to drag through the sandy soil. Finally, about lunchtime, he came to a well. Looking down over the rim, he saw his reflection in the water’s surface below. But he had no way to obtain a drink. A short time later, a woman arrived with both bucket and rope. But as it turned out, she had a thirst even greater than the man’s.

When my backpacking group came down from Guadalupe Mountain, we made a beeline to the water fountain at the Visitor Center. We consumed thirst-quenching quantities of cool H₂O. Similarly, the woman at the well’s thirst was slaked not with sips, but with great refreshing gulps of God-given forgiveness, love, and mercy.