The other day I came out of Liverpool Street station and some cheerful-looking guy stuck a bottle of water into my hand shouting “O2 water!”
It was a sweltering hot summer’s day in the City so a little light refreshment was more than welcome. Besides, if someone is offering you a free bottle of water, why wouldn’t you take it?
This contrasts with another experience I had at Liverpool Street only days before. I had just come off the Central Line tube after experiencing heats levels of around 50C and thought I must have some water. The first shop I came to had row upon row of bottled water in their chilled cabinet. I made an impulse purchase and left the shop £1.20 poorer for it.
The commercial rise of the commodity technically known by scientists as H20, or as laypeople like myself might describe it – water, is phenomenal. However for the consumer it has to be “mineral water” to taste any good. And what’s more, you’d expect to pay for it.
This year will see our consumption for mineral water break another record. And although we do need a lot of water to stay healthy, the question still remains: does it need to come from a bottle?
When I was growing up it was quite common to see water fountains in parks. We had them at my school. Interestingly, the Westminster Borough Council today provides only seven drinking water fountains.
The history of the water fountain started in the Victorian era with the rise of the Temperance Movement, a time when the religiously misguided, but well-meaning establishment banned anything that mildly challenged social conformity. Water fountains sprung up everywhere from outside factories to public places in order to stop people drinking just anything, and especially too much beer. But it was conceded that men in factories who drank beer suffered less with diarrhoea than women.
Victorians were particularly concerned with providing water to the under classes such as the flower girls, dockworkers and street-sweepers. In the Edwardian era, life became for better for everyone as a water tap in the home became the norm. Also water-related diseases started to disappear for good.
Ann Hardy, professor of the history of modern medicine at University College London has studied the social effects of water at length. She commented, ”People have taught themselves to need water”. Nowadays it seem we are forever thirsty. She adds, “The bottle of water is now a visible symbol of ‘I care about my health’.”
No one would question the value of water. In fact it never has been questioned. When Jesus said, “Anyone who is thirsty, come to me and drink” (John 7:37) he obviously used water as a metaphor for spiritual health. It was a well-chosen and poignant expression to describe what the gift of the Holy Spirit would mean for people, present and future, if they just believe in him.
Up to that point in history, the Spirit was given only to God’s chosen spokesperson, i.e. a great prophet like Isaiah or Jeremiah, But through the experience of the cross and resurrection all that was about to change. It was the equivalent of getting a water tap in your own house for the very first time!
GK Chesterton said, “When people stop believing in God they believe in anything.” How true.
Somehow we have stopped believing that tapped water is good for us and believed someone else’s message that bottled water is better, even though it often sits on palettes on large warehouse floors overseas for months on end.
How true also of people’s view of Christianity. Somehow new age spiritualities and philosophies are heralded as being more spiritually healthy than a belief in Jesus.
A new life in Christ is as free as water should be. We don’t have to pay for it - the cost has already been met. Our job as the church is like the cheerful guy at Liverpool Street, we just need to be there to give the stuff out for free.
Simple isn’t it?
ASD
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