3 Things Ancient Aqueducts Taught Me about Heart Transformation

Sitting on the grass one afternoon while backpacking through Europe, I gazed up at the giant ruins of an ancient Roman aqueduct (pictured above). It led me to begin meditating on how aqueducts supplied the city of Rome with water back in the day. They were built at an elevation so that, with the aqueduct positioned at its highest point against the main water supply, gravity would carry the water through the clean channel, delivering it to the city. 

That's when I began to ask the Lord to make me like an aqueduct.

My prayer was three-fold: 

1. To be intimately connected with God himself (the source of all sustenance). I could never leave the source of water in an effort to bring it to anyone else in need. I would need to deliver it to others while remaining connected to Him the whole time. 

2. To be clear of “debris” (selfish motives, etc) so that the water flowing through me is pure.

3. To see an end to spiritual drought. 

In honor National Day of Prayer coming up this week, I share this poem-prayer with you to join me in using it to pray for our country and immediate communities.

What might it look like to pray through this poem every day throughout the month of May, that your heart might be further connected to and purified by the Lord so as to be an agent of transformation in your places of influence?

As always, you are welcome to share my poetry aloud in prayer meetings and group settings or refer others to this page. :) My heartbeat is that many might be equipped to pray and experience heart-level transformation.

✍🏽 Aqueduct

Esther Yoder

Father, let me be an aqueduct 

Directing your water to this land

My life a channel of Your love

An expression of Your healing hand

Just the means by which life is carried

I know that I am not the source

But may my path be cleared of debris

So as to not obstruct Your water's course

Oh may my life be found in Yours 

Intimately connected to th'eternal spring

May I bridge the gaps where death still reigns

And good news of life abundant bring 

Oh Father, heal this dying land

Let it sprout with life anew 

Rushing water, end this drought

Revive our hearts as only You can do. 

I recently commissioned a professional artist to create a design to accompany this prayer specifically and wanted to share it with you. Be sure to read through the symbolism hidden within.

Behind the art: Each stanza of this poem (pictured above) is found within the flow of an aqueduct's channel, symbolizing the simple work of gravity and the outpouring of God’s love as we are filled with it ourselves.

The background of this spread moves from light tan to blue, symbolizing the transformation of a desert wasteland into a place fertile with irrigation. It’s a big prayer, but we serve a God who makes streams in the desert and restores life!

For additional poem-prayers set to symbolic backgrounds of original art, check out my book "Sweeter."