How do you prepare for HEAT?

In Middle Tennessee over the past few days, we've been under a heat advisory.  As temperatures have peaked close to 100, people are clamoring for a cool place, and others are on the lookout for people who are in need of shelter and water.  For me, I have two choices: either be in a pool, which is like bath water, or be inside.  Even walks to get in and out of the car make me break out in a sweat.  

I don't have much luck with ferns, because by July, they are half dead because I've gotten tired of watering them.  This year has been different as I made a pact with myself that they live and look good!    I have impatiens that colorfully decorate the front of my house, but they NEED water.


So, during these 100 degree days, I tell myself, "I need to water my flowers every day, or the heat will kill 'em".  I've even changed my timer on my backyard flowers to water twice a day.


As I watered I began to think of my walk with Christ.  When I'm in a season of "heat", and things are coming at me from all sides, is my tendency to intensify my dose of "Living Water" so that the heat won't consume me, or do I whine and complain and neglect the very One who will sustain me through the heat?  If I'm honest, there are times where I live in that place where I try to rely on myself instead of my Jesus, who I know will give me all that I need to get me through the heat.


Something I've also seen from my flowers and also my own life is that when I am giving them extra drinks during heated times, they actually flourish and grow instead of wilt and fade!  The past 6 months for me has been an intense time of "heat", but also probably some of the greatest growth in Him that I can remember.  The heat can be very damaging, but it can also, if you allow it to, be the greatest drink of "Living Water".  


Don't resist the heat.  Embrace it.  But always make sure you prepare for it with extra drinks of Living Water.  He will never leave you thirsty.


John 7:38
Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.”


John 4:10
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.”


Revelation 7:17
For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; ‘he will lead them to springs of living water.’ ‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’ ”