Water! (Featuring The Water Project)

Water in our 50 gallon fish tank
See A Really Fishy Tale

The theme of the P52 Photo Project this week is Water.  

Something so ordinary.  

Something we take for granted.  

Something we often waste every day without a thought.

In America, we drink it, wash our hands in it, take showers in it, water our gardens with it, wash our dishes and clothes and cars with it, fill our fish tanks with it, swim in it, boat on it, build water parks and play in it, create hydroelectric power with it...

And yet how many people in this world do not even have basic access to clean water for drinking and bathing?  How much productive education and work is prevented by dehydration and disease and drought, or by the fact that some people have to spend hours a day looking for water?  Why not, for about $5,000, build a well that gives clean water to a whole community?  Why not?

As I mentioned before, last week I started a new blog theme, A Worthy Cause, in which I highlight charitable organizations that are making a difference in their communities and/or globally.  Today, I'd like to feature The Water Project. The Water Project, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization bringing relief to communities around the world who suffer needlessly from a lack of access to clean water and proper sanitation. They currently have projects in Kenya, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Uganda, and Sudan.  Watch here:

From their web site:

Why We're Doing It

We're Christians and we believe Jesus makes a clear call to "provide a cup of cold water" and to answer the needs of those who say "I am thirsty" (Matt 25).

Our belief motivates our action. It doesn't limit our reach.

That said, it's important to note that we work with everyone, for everyone. Our belief motivates our action. It doesn't limit our reach. It forms the basis of our integrity and the assurance that lives can be truly changed.

We work hard to help you help others. Our goal is to make sure your generous gifts are put to the best possible use. We want to see lives changed through hope restored.

We believe that providing clean water restores hope by enabling our partners to make a "whole-life impact" in the communities they serve through their broader development activity. We desire to see access to clean water enable schools to thrive, people to get back to work, farming to provide enough food to earn a living, and suffering to be alleviated as health improves.

We believe the issues facing Africa, India and other under-developed parts of the world are not simply today's problems. We know that a lack of clean water stands in the way of tomorrow's hope. And we're sure that together we can change that.

~*~*~

More words from Virginia: 


While water is essential to our physical bodies, it is also a metaphor for spiritual sustenance.  In John 4, we read a story of what happened at a water well in Samaria.   


Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?”

The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

This morning at church we sang the old hymn, "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say."  The second verse echoes the Bible story...

I heard the voice of Jesus say,
"Behold, I freely give
the living water; thirsty one,
stoop down and drink, and live."
I came to Jesus, and I drank
of that life-giving stream;
my thirst was quenched, my soul revived,
and now I live in him.


Blessings,
Virginia Knowles
www.VirginiaKnowles.blogspot.com


This post will be linked Saturday morning (June 9) at:

P52 Photo Project 

You can see my other P52 photos here: P52 Photo Page