Effective christian witness springs from Spirit-filled wells, not from broken cisterns; from a divinely given revelation accepted by faith and acted on in obedience, not simply from accumulated human wisdom or erudite reasoning.
Israel had forsaken God, and the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah saying that they “went after worthlessness, and became worthless … for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns, that can hold no water” (Jer. 2:5, 13). Let us beware today lest what should be a stream of living water proceeding from a Spirit-filled life prove instead to be the parched ground surrounding a broken cistern!
In his infinite wisdom God has placed Christians in the world to witness to his saving power. Neither the Christian nor the Church is the agent of redemption; rather, both are witnesses to God’s redemptive act in Christ.
Therefore the Christian and the Church are the channels of the Gospel, the instruments of witness, the repositories of truth to be passed on to others. They are likened in the Scriptures to wells of living water and streams of blessing.
What then can transform a cistern of spiritual life and witness into a broken repository of nothingness? Certainly three things: unbelief, neglect, and disobedience.
Unbelief stretches back into the dim shadows of antiquity. “Yea, hath God said?” was the root of man’s downfall in the Garden and continues to blight classrooms and pulpits today.
“Thus says the LORD of hosts: … To whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are closed, they cannot listen; behold, the word of the LORD is to them an object of scorn, they take no pleasure in it” (Jer. 6:9, 10). These words spoken through Jeremiah can be applied today!
Jeremiah speaks to us again: “The wise men shall be put to shame, they shall be dismayed and taken; lo, they have rejected the word of the LORD, and what wisdom is in them?” (Jer. 8:9).
Do we not need to hear and heed these words of that prophet: “Thus says the LORD of hosts: Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you, filling you with vain hopes; they speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD. They say continually to those who despise the word of the LORD, ‘It shall be well with you’; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart, they say, ‘No evil shall come upon you’ ” (Jer. 23:16).
God’s word is not to be trifled with: “Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? says the LORD.… Let him who has my word speak my word faithfully” (Jer. 23:24, 28).
Do we long for power as we live and as we witness? Then let us pray to be delivered from unbelief, accepting the Holy Scriptures at face value: “Is not my word like fire, says the LORD, like a hammer which breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jer. 23:29).
The sin of unbelief empties the cistern through the crack it has created. Following the cunning devices of men who deny the Bible may feed our ego and titillate our pride, but it means that the cistern of power is broken, and only the dregs of a sandy futility remain.
Neglect. The first cousin of unbelief is spiritual indifference, a state in which a person pays scant heed to God’s truth and blithely goes his own disinterested way.
The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews tells of God’s revelation of his truth through the prophets and then through his Son. He depicts the Son as the One who “reflects the glory of God and bears the very stamp of his nature, upholding the universe by his word of power” (Heb. 1:3). Then he exclaims, “Therefore we must pay the closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. For if the message declared by angels was valid and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?” (Heb. 2:1–3).
Neglect and indifference are just as deadly in their effect as open unbelief. We who know the truth—what are we doing about it for ourselves? For others? God holds us responsible for the truth he has imparted, and neglect in no way invalidates that responsibility.
Disobedience also takes its deadly toll. The cistern of spiritual power is broken by disobedience, a turning aside from the divine command in favor of one’s own preferences. Strange that we acknowledge the validity of a military command and the necessity of obeying it while we regard lightly the divine command and make its execution optional! I know gifted men who once appeared destined to become mighty channels of blessing, only to have the cistern of spiritual power cracked to its very bottom by the sin of disobedience.
Christianity is, thank God. a positive religion; one can mar its witness by emphasizing the negative. But Christianity is also a religion of “Thou shalt nots,” and woe to him who disregards these warning signs on life’s road!
The zealous Paul had great advantages of learning, citizenship, and social standing. But the risen Christ on the Damascus road gave him a commission that ultimately involved giving up all he had counted dear. To Agrippa Paul rightly said: “I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision” (Acts 26:19).
Suppose Paul had been disobedient. Suppose he had counted the cost of discipleship and found it too great to pay. What a tragedy for his age and for succeeding generations! The cistern of his spiritual power would have been broken from top to bottom by disobedience.
Have we been disobedient to the heavenly vision? Has disobedience marred God’s plan for our lives? Are we living right now with no more spiritual power than a broken cistern has water?
Unbelief, neglect, and disobedience shatter the cistern of life, but the cracks often begin with such supposedly “minor” sins as pride, selfishness, temper, jealousy, impurity.
Let any Christian, any minister of the Gospel, ask himself about his greatest need. An honest answer for many will be “spiritual power.” The cistern has been broken, but we hate to admit it. The water of spiritual power has drained away, and we try to get along with the sands of futile human endeavor.
“He who believes in me, as the scripture has said. ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’ ” (John 7:38).
