To forsake God for other things is wicked. We must always remember, “it is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all” (John 6:63). We must be aware that apart from Christ, we can do nothing (John 15:5). He alone is the fountain of living waters, and anything else is a counterfeit.

A few years ago, my wife and I installed a filtered water spout for our kitchen sink. It produces delicious, perfectly filtered water. It’s amazing. Anytime we want to fill our cups we can turn on the faucet and drink to our hearts desire. My children love to take an old plastic Tic-Tac box and use it as a water source. This thing holds about a thimble’s worth of water, yet they will actually fight over who gets to drink out of the Tic-Tac box. Let me make a confession: I can sometimes be like that.

Anyone reading that last paragraph would say, “Aren’t children so silly? They have access to an endless stream of pure water, but choose instead to quarrel over a plastic box.” And yes, it is silly, but can’t you see yourself at all? God through the prophet Jeremiah rebukes the people of Israel for something very similar; “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 2:13). Oh yes. Turning away from God to something else is just as foolish. No. It is exceedingly more foolish.

You might say, “Well I don’t worship idols. I’m a Christian!”

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