Divining Rods

Where is the water? Where should I start digging to find my well?

Way back in the olden days when I was a very small boy, my family purchased twenty acres of forest land in Eastern Washington and began the process of creating a home. Our first step was to find a subterranean water supply so we could dig and access a viable well. To help us, a neighbor lady, a beautiful, ancient widow named Katie, used a divining rod and “dowsed” the well for us.

Of course, there are many natural theories behind the phenomenon of “water dowsing” rather than the supernatural ideas that the term “dowsing” or “witching” implies, but it was still quite impressive. I clearly remember the moment when she used a divining rod to tell us where the water was. She pointed at a random spot on the ground, told us to commence digging, and sure enough that was exactly where we eventually struck water and built a well that sustained our family’s needs for many years.

On a spiritual front, our world today is in desperate need of human divining rods. We have endless commentators, thought leaders, critics, and influencers, but not enough divining rods who can tell us where to locate a safe water supply.

Jesus was both diving rod and well. He was simultaneously the path to life as well as its source, and we, His followers, are supposed to follow in His steps. Beloved minister to India, Dr. E. Stanley Jones, said it this way, “I am a diving rod. My job is to show where the water is.”

Where is the water? Have you found it? And can you articulate to others how to find it as well? People are thirsty, and in a world of empty promises, not every drink can satisfy. Let’s embrace the imagery and approach our lives as living signposts, human diving rods for soul-reviving, thirst-quenching water.