Rivers of Living Water

There are huge rivers in the world, but none of them can be compared to the enormous Amazon —the greatest of all rivers.

With many Indigenous tribes already living along its banks, the Amazon was “discovered” in February 1542 by the Spanish explorer and conquistador Don Francisco de Orellana. Swept downriver by the current, his expedition arrived at the Atlantic Ocean on August 26, 1542. Since then, the Amazon has captivated the interest of many explorers, including Theodore Roosevelt and Jacques Cousteau.

With a basin of approximately eleven hundred tributaries, the Amazon discharges approximately 1,581 cubic miles (6,590 cubic kilometers) of water per year into the Atlantic Ocean. That’s more than the seven next largest independent rivers combined! It represents close to 20 percent of the global riverine discharge.

But that’s not all. On August 17, 2011, at the International Congress of the Brazilian Society of Geophysics in Rio de Janeiro, Valiya Hamza and Elizabeth Tavares Pimentel detailed the discovery of an underground river flowing miles beneath the mighty Amazon River. Scientific data suggests that this river is almost as long as the Amazon River but up to hundreds of times wider and much slower and that it discharges into the lower depths of the Atlantic Ocean. The Amazon Basin is only part of the much larger water cycle of the world. In that cycle, “lake and ocean, river and water spring —each takes to give.” As gigantic as it may be, the Amazon River is what it is only because of the smaller rivers and even the tiny creeks that feed it.

And it must empty its water into the ocean.

But even the waters of the ocean do not remain there.

A significant percentage evaporates and then returns to the earth in the form of rain, thus feeding the endless water cycle.

Whether you are a huge river or a little creek does not matter.

What really matters is whether you are fulfilling your task in God’s overall plan. You and I must share God’s Word, being “the recipients and the channels of its life-giving energy.” What blessings would flow forth to the world if each of us were a recipient and channel of God’s saving message!