La tranble

Life-giving Water

"La tranble" — a Creole term for "the shaking" – is the term Haitians use to refer to what claimed
230,000 lives and left 1.5 million people homeless on this impoverished island in the Caribbean.
After "la tranble," Healing Hands International, a humanitarian-based aid organization associated
with Churches of Christ, bought a drilling rig and shipped it to Haiti. Healing Hands has drilled
350 wells on the island to help provide clean water for the Haitians.

Janice Fuller — a 67-year-old grandmother of four — coordinates the annual Walk4Water fundraiser
sponsored by the Brentwood Oaks Church of Christ in Austin, Texas to help Healing Hands. She
recently joined a group that traveled to Haiti to drill another well. "I just think how incredible
this is," Fuller said. "These people were drinking dirty water for so long, and now they have a
place to come get clear, clean water because people cared enough to contribute."

Phenix Port-Louis, a Haitian preacher who works with Healing Hands, recalled: "Back in the day,
there were a lot of cases of cholera," referring to an epidemic that killed 10,000 Haitians and
sickened 800,000. "But now we do not have cholera because HHI put a lot of wells in our community,
in our country, so that the Haitians can have water to drink."

One of the wells dug by HHI is in Akdesé, Haiti. Matthew Perry, a 37-year-old father of two who
coordinates the Detroit area Lincoln Park church's Walk4Water, was present for the well's
dedication. He was amazed at what had transpired. "If we dig far enough in the ground, there's
this perfect, clean water right there," Perry said, reflecting. "It's free, provided by God, and
it's drinkable. It's amazing." *

In John 4, we read of a Samaritan woman who went out to Jacob's well in the middle of the day to
draw some water. Jesus sat at that same well and asked the woman to get him some water. She was
amazed because a Jewish man was asking a Samaritan woman for a drink of water.

A dialogue proceeded between Jesus and the woman. Jesus knew that the woman had a thirst that the
water in Jacob's well could not quench. Hers was a spiritual thirst that she had tried to satisfy
in many (failed) relationships.

Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water [the water in Jacob's well] will thirst again;
but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will
give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life." – John 4:13-14

The woman said to Him, "Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw." –
John 4:15

Jesus was speaking of the relationship with God that saves us and brings eternal life. Because of
His great love for us, God gave His Son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins (John 3:16). He died
for us so that we might drink of the Living Water which connects us with God and provides salvation
and eternal life.

Jesus will provide "living water" to those who: place their faith and trust in Him (Acts 16:30-31),
turn from their sin in repentance (Acts 17:30-31), confess Him before men (Romans 10:9-10), and are
baptized (immersed) into Christ for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38). He will continue to quench
the spiritual thirst and keep clean by His cleansing blood, those who continue to follow Him as a
way of life (1 John 1:7).

When it comes to quenching our deep spiritual thirst, all that the world has to offer is polluted.
It will never satisfy. It will kill you! ONLY Jesus offers the Living Water that will quench our
thirst and give us eternal life.

It is freely provided by God. It is truly amazing. Won't YOU drink of that Living Water today?

-- David A. Sargent

* Information gleaned from "1,000 wells around the world" by Bobby Ross, Jr., in The Christian
Chronicle (Vol. 75, No. 6; June 2018) and posted at www.christianchronice.org