Thirsty: What is it that you THIRST for?

By Caprice Candace

"You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink."

What is it that you THIRST for? A woman at a well

Do you feel that you are living your life to the fullest? Or is empty a word that better describes your life. Come with me as we visit a woman at a well and dive into her situation and a life- changing visitor t

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Apr 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685560942

Caprice Candace

Caprice lives with her husband on a ranch in Northern California. She was a co-leader for 4-H horsemanship and attended 2 semesters of Equine Breeding and management at college. She is a retired RN, Disaster relief Chaplain with NAMB, taught Sunday school, served as Youth Director, Priority Team Leader for Missions and Women's at the church that she and her family helped plant.She states that she wants to help others on the road of discovery, that they might open their eyes to see, their ears to hear, their minds to understand and hearts to receive the living water of eternal life for themselves, so they will begin to understand and thirst no more.

Book preview

978-1-68556-093-5_Cover.jpg

Thirsty

"You can lead a horse to water,

but you can’t make him drink."

What is it that you thirst for?

A woman at a well

By Caprice Candace

photogrphy by Jennifer Freeman

Thirsty

Trilogy Christian Publishers A Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Trinity Broadcasting Network

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Copyright © 2021 by Caprice Candice Egloff

Scripture quotations marked AMP are taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMP), Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.Lockman.org. Scripture quotations marked CEV are taken from the Contemporary English Version®. Copyright © 1995 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked ESV are taken from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible® (NASB), Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.Lockman.org. Scripture quotations marked NCV are taken from the New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.TM Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.TM Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James Version of the Bible. Public domain.

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Photography by: Jennifer Freeman

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Manufactured in the United States of America

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ISBN: 978-1-68556-093-5

E-ISBN: 978-1-68556-094-2

Dedication

First, in memory of my sweet friend Peggy Latham, who, in the early dawn hours before she went to work, would talk me through some of my ideas. She would help me to complete my thoughts and encourage me to put them to ink. She and I rode many trails together; she just got to the final destination before I did. Thank you, Peggy, for being such a very dear friend.

My husband, best friend, and my number one fan! Thank you for your never-ending support. I love you forever and ever. A big thank you to all our amazing adult children for their encouragement when mom felt weak in the knees!

A special thanks to Jennifer Freeman for her time and energy in putting together the great photographs for this study. She has been blessed with a special gift. I hope these images capture your heart as much as they did mine!

That all said, how can I ever thank the One who met me at the well of forgiveness? Who gave me the all satisfying living water. Who took me gently by the hand and filled my empty jar with His love. Thank You, Lord, for taking this woman at the well, teaching me to trust You through the storms of life, helping me to shake loose of the acorns of this world, and coming into my life!

Lastly, to those of you who are on the trail: keep going, don’t look back, moving always closer towards the prize… the wonderful gift of salvation!

Table of Contents

Week One

What Is It That You Thirst For?

Heart for the Master: Day One

Are You Connected? Day Two

Bucket by Bucket: Day Three

If the Truth Be Known: Day Four

Do You See the Whole Picture? Day Five

Week Two

The Empty Trough

Created: Day One

The Acorns of this World: Day Two

Are You Empty? Day Three

The Manure Pile: Day Four

Upward, Inward, and Outward: Day Five

Week Three

How Do You Know That… You Know God?

What Do You Know? Day One

Imprinted with His Love: Day Two

little g… BIG G…: Day Three

Simply Worship: Day Four

Situational Awareness: Day Five

Week Four

The Light, Life, and Love of the Lord

The Mission: Day One

Contrasts: Day Two

Shine Your Light: Day Three

Working Together in Love: Day Four

Knock, Knock: Day Five

Week Five

Head to Toe, Inside, and Out

The Treasure Hunt: Day One

Distracted: Day Two

Stepping Out: Day Three

Disappointment: Day Four

Hard Pressed: Day Five

Week Six

The Horse and the Rider

My Heart Is Smiling: Day One

Hand in Hand: Day Two

Side by Side: Day Three

Riding the Trail with Wisdom and Insight: Day Four

Joy at the End of the Trail: Day Five

I Want Jesus in My Heart… So Now What?

About the Author

Week One

What Is It That You Thirst For?

Do you feel that you are living your life to the fullest? Or is empty a word that better describes your life? Come with me as we visit a woman at a well and dive into her situation and a life-changing visitor that left these words on her lips: Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?

We are going to investigate the dynamic words of God spoken to us through the Bible. We shall explore who the woman at the well was and the impact that Jesus had on her life. In addition, we will be using the illustration of a horse and rider and what it means to connect with the Master. Here are some of the questions I hope you will discover the answers to in this six-week study: Do you have a heart for the Master? Are you empty? What do you need to fill you up? Have you been imprinted with His love? How do you know that you know God?

Too many people, as they look for the answers to a life full of the living water that satisfies, forget to stay connected to the source. As a small group, you will learn what the trail ahead of you holds for the believer.

Whether you have been a Christian for years or you are just starting to discover what a follower of Jesus looks like, you will have some concepts that need refining. I want you to come away from this study with a better understanding of what it means to walk the walk that Jesus intended. This study will help to develop a strong trifold relationship, you to the Lord and also to those in your life.

Every church desires to have its members acquire a situational awareness of their purpose. The correlation of this purpose is to serve others that are on the outside looking in. If the individual does not fully grasp what their role is in this mission of follower, things can get rather disjointed. Every so often, it is important to do a head-to-toe assessment of who you are in relation to the Lord. Once we discover what it is that needs adjusting and fine-tuning, we will be able to ride the trail marked out for us with wisdom and insight, encouraging others to take a closer look at who is offering the living water that satisfies Jesus, our Lord

and Savior.

Week One

Heart for the Master

Day One

What are some of your favorite animals? Have you ever owned any unusual pets? How about farm or ranch animals? When we were first starting out as parents, we made the decision to home educate our five children. Looking for a better place to raise them, my husband and I made the decision to move from a valley in Southern California with a population in 1990 of over three million people to a rural ranch community in Northern California. We settled in a coastal valley with a whopping population of twenty-five. Did she say twenty-five? Yes, and I was indicating the number of people, not chickens. There are more animals than there are people in our little town! We dove in quickly to the ranch lifestyle, which included having up to twenty-eight horses at one time on our ranch of over 280 acres. From city dweller to country girl, I had some incredible lessons

to learn.

Horses are amazing animals created by our Lord for our service. They are swift, capable of not only carrying a rider for long distances but also considered a beast of burden. In the wild, horses congregate in herds and are natural grazers. In the wild, horses roam the grasslands eating and drinking as needed. When we domesticated them, it became necessary for the animal to develop dependency upon its caregiver. This dependency is what builds the relationship between horse and rider. The key to this relationship is that the horse must develop trust in its master in order for its needs to be met. The horse will receive everything it requires from his master; a relationship of trust and commitment develops so strong that a horse can acquire a desire for his master that surpasses the herding instinct. In the horse community, we call this a horse with heart.

We, too, have hearts that crave to belong to something great. We were designed for relationship. We call our master Lord; He is our God and the One who cares for us. And when we develop a relationship with our Master, we too receive the provision we so desperately need. When we finally drink from the living waters offered by our Master, we come to the understanding of what true relationship was meant to be, and our hearts become His.

Come with me for this six-week journey as we discover what it is that you thirst for. You have all heard the saying, You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. You may be asking yourself, So what is the problem with a horse that won’t drink? I am sure they are smart enough to drink when they become thirsty enough. I wish that were true, but like us, they can become very ill and even die if not properly hydrated. An idle horse needs a minimum of ten gallons of water a day, and an active horse in hot weather can suck up to twenty-four gallons. So why would a horse be so stubborn to not drink water as needed? Well, just like we don’t always do what is best for us, horses don’t either. On our ranch, we need to make sure that the horses are drinking enough water to keep them healthy, so we create a thirst for what they need. In other words, we lure the horse to water.

As we look to the Word of God for what satisfies our thirsty souls. We are going to tether ourselves to the book of John chapter four as we unfold the dynamics of the woman at the well. We will look at what it means to be empty, dehydrated, or satisfied. We will talk about the need to trust our Lord in our circumstances, just like the horse must rely on its master. So let’s saddle up for a unique journey with the woman at the well.

Read John chapter 4:1-29 (NIV):

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John—although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.

Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, Will you give me a drink? (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

The Samaritan woman said to him, You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

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. Sir, the woman said, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?

Jesus answered, Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

The woman said to him, Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.

He told her, Go, call your husband and come back.

I have no husband, she replied.

Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and