Tap Water

"I'd like a glass of water, no ice please." Terrifically perfect the moment I drink it, water satisfies my thirst. Outside, water turned snow and ice give the dim noonday sun a blinding sparkle. I squint to see the road as I drive, the ski tracks as I glide, the traffic light on our way to the store. Water, blinding water. Inside water comes with the opening of a valve -- safe to wash clothes, prepare meals, and to drink. Somewhere under the foot of ice now creeping across the lakes of the Midwest water continues to move and fish are swimming in it. We need it and it doesn't take watching Lawrence of Arabia to know how much we appreciate it.

This fall Elliott's interest in plumbing directed us toward the streets and sanitation section of the children's library. Our first epic description of what happens to water when we send it out of our house was Flush. We read a chapter at a time. The image of the Chattooga River on fire -- in the 1970's -- changed my assumptions about water. It was in my lifetime that rivers were so polluted they could be lit with a match! Dietrich's favorite picture was of the toys and other objects caught by the screen as waste water enters the treatment plant. Elliott's? The first water closet and its tall neck and long, chain handle. It hasn't convinced us to set up a gray water system in our house (buckets hanging around in the bathrooms? Not a good idea with two four year olds) or take timed 3 minute showers. But reading books like Flush and nearly gagging while walking near Lake Mendota in July (Elliott almost threw up) has steered us toward taking care of water -- and not treating it as "ours" but as a borrowed gift. I trust that there is enough for what we need, but I am humbly aware that my sense of need and my love of comfort can be grossly distorted.

Today's sermon was filled with water imagery. Pastor Wilson drew our attention to how ordinary water is. It is a basic requirement for human survival. And even baptism in water is not described in the Bible as all that special -- Luke tells us that everyone was getting baptized. The extraordinary piece of Jesus' baptism is not in the water or the act of whoever was doing the baptizing but that the Holy came into the ordinary. In Jesus' baptism we witness the Creator of all entering into one of the most basic needs for all that is created -- water. We are told in the baptism story that God is interested in us and all the things of earth that keep us living: water, friendship, asking and receiving forgiveness.

Then the pastor turned our attention to what follows Jesus' baptism: prayer. As sure as we are about water coming out of a tap when we release the valve, the act to follow baptism is prayer. Jesus prays. "Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying...". It is right there. Water, baptism, prayer. Prayer admits that we are not alone in the day to day of our humanness. Prayer acknowledges we were created in and for communion with God and each other. For Jesus, what follows his prayer is the affirmation of who he is: "You are my Son". For us it is no different. When we pray, we are affirmed in who we are. We belong.

In the Tomie dePaola drawing in the Bible I'm referring to at my side, the people witnessing Jesus' baptism are standing far off, faceless, and looking toward the river. But I imagine the scene anything but serene. I imagine God's voice among a chaotic gathering of people -- maybe some have been there before, for others their first time at the river. There are kids voices pitched high, laughter and chatter among women, low conversations between aged men. Yet God's voice is among the people, over the water as it is in Genesis. Who knows who even heard it, but it was there and it is still here. God's word is among us as we make tea and cook noodles, shovel snow and scrape windshields.