Water, Water, Water

Before I started this process, I had always heard how important water was, but just kind of brushed it aside.  I liked my Dr Pepper too much.  The real Dr Pepper by the way...not the "I'm calling myself the real thing but I'm not so don't even bother picking me up" or the " I have diet in the title so I taste similar but still not good enough".  Okay.  Do you understand.  I wanted the real stuff.  You know at 160 cal a piece.  And I went through several a day.  Let's just say that I drank  A LOT of my calories!!  But, once I started this process and got really serious and actually took the time to learn the effects of it, especially in the dietary process...I was very surprised.  See, I didn't know how much of it I actually needed.  Just the average body needs 64oz per day.  But, for those of us trying to loose weight, we need more.  How much more?  Eight ounces more for every 25lbs you are overweight.  That's right.  You heard me.  However, you should never drink more than 96oz in a day.  Too much is just as bad for you as too little.  If you don't drink enough water your fat cells swell up to hold onto whatever water they have.  And, if you drink too much, they swell with the excess water.  So, it's important that you drink the right amount.

When they first told me how much water I was going to have to drink, I thought to myself "I will never be able to do that.  I won't have time to do anything else!!" (I started out at the 96oz level, by the way)  And I had to work my way up to it, that's for sure.  But when they told me that all the peeing it would make me do was one of the main ways that my body would get rid of the fat, you better believe I started downing that water like there was no tomorrow!!  The good news is, the more you loose, the less you have to drink :)  Actually, it's not so bad.  And I do have time to do other things.  And I don't ONLY drink water either.

What's been interesting has been all of the thinking this has lead me to about Jesus referring to Himself as the living water.  I mean, do you think it's an accident that He compares himself to what is essentially the most important thing to our bodies?  Water is what our bodies are primarily composed of, not bone or muscle.  And  water is the only real thirst quenching drink there is.  The others just make you more thirsty!

Here are some verses where Jesus talks about living water.  Drink and Enjoy!

JOHN 4:14(NIV)

but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst.  Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life. 

JOHN 7:37-39(NIV)

On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.  Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him."  By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.  Up tot hat time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.

REVELATION 21:6(NIV)

He said to me: "It is done.  I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End.  To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life.

REVELATION 22:17(NIV)

The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" And let him who hears say, "Come!" Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.