Wn our culture, cisterns are not used. At least in the Southeast. I think probably out West where water is not plentiful, there are ways people collect rain water and save it. But in the areas we serve in Central America, drinking water is precious. There is lots of rain but clean drinking water is a precious commodity. So they have cisterns to collect rain water.

These cisterns are very important. Of course if one is damaged and begins to leak, it is of no use. I think of Jeremiah 2:13. “For my people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, to hew for temselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water.” NASB

Maybe I can make it more relevant. For my gardening buddies, don’t you have a “dishpan”? Those large pans grandmothers washed dishes in, shelled beans in, and snapped green beans in? I have several. One was my Mom’s. She passed away in 1987 and had this pan since I was small. So it is old.

It has several small “pin-holes” in it. I have to remember each time I’m washing vegetables to get my pan because if I get Mama’s, water is going everywhere. Now why do I keep a pan witjh holes in it? A pan that won’t hold water? It was Mama’s. But that pan that should hold water is broken. What in the world?

The cisterns I first spoke about in Central America are crucial to them. If the cistern won’t hold water, their existence is threatened.

So the question I keep asking myself is, “Why do I/we want something that is broken? Why do we choose the broken when He has something so much better for us? Why would we choose a vessel that won’t hold water when there is a fountain with living water we can drink freely from?

That silly pan that I keep for sentimental reasons, is a reminder for me. Choose well. Choose Him. Don’t settle for the counterfeit. He has so many blessings for us.