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Leaving the Sea of Galilee, the Jordan meanders on down the valley toward the southern end of the country, still fresh, still rich with life as it passes along.
But only sixty miles south the Jordan feeds into another lake, strangely opposite to the Sea of Galilee in every way. In this one, nothing lives at all. Around it there is no greenery, no growth of any kind. Even those trees that once grew close enough to be touched by the lake's influence are gaunt spectres of life, stark skeletons of trees encrusted and strangled by the salt that cakes everything.
Any observer is compelled to ask what has happened to the water in a few short miles. How could it be so rich and full of life and yet so barren when it reaches the Dead Sea? The answer is that nothing has happened to the water itself. Analysis of the Jordan just before it enters the Dead Sea would show its water to be just as good as further north.
But the Dead Sea has no outlet. Its level is maintained only through evaporation. Everything it receives it keeps for itself, and the result is a dreadful kind of death.
We too receive from God's hand rich gifts of life in the form of love, caring support, material things that make life enjoyable. But we receive them not simply for ourselves, but for the purpose that through us these gifts may be used to bless the world. We share them or they die, and something of us dies with them.
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