Day Sixteen
“Thirsty for God”
“Oh God You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for you in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”
Psalm 63:1
Are we thirsty for God today? In our souls there are hundreds of things, good things, everyday things, that compete with our thirst for God. I am talking about things like food, television, recreation, spouses, children, sex, work, cell phones, surfing the internet, books, and friendships. None of these things is bad in and of itself but there is the danger that we will delight in these things and give ourselves to these things to quench the parched places in our souls, when what we really need is a fresh drink of God.
How I long for us to desire, to long for, crave, yearn, and thirst for more of God. Today we must check those things for which we are thirsty. As a deer or a dog pants for water are we panting in our hearts for more of God? More revelation of Him, more time with Him, more passionate love for Him? Do we desire to hear His voice more each day? He must be the treasure and delight of our souls.
Today we are challenged to be on a relentless pursuit of God. That is what the phrase “I shall seek You earnestly” means. I read something from pastor and theologian John Piper which has sunk deeply into my soul: “God wills to know the actual, lived-out reality of our preference for Him over all things.”[1] Do we prefer God above all things?
We prefer ball games, texting, television, sleep, food, drink, golf, video games, movies, entertainment, pets, fishing, shopping and hundreds of things more than we prefer God. How can I make this statement? Look at two indicators: where does our time go, and what are we most passionate about?
None of those things are bad; God just wants us to thirst for Him more than any and all of those things combined. Reality sets in for each of us in the fact that there are days when we do prefer God most and do thirst for Him with unquenchable souls. On the other hand there are days when we wake up and desire dozens of other things and prefer to spend our time and energies in pursuit of those things rather than deepening our desire to know God.
I know a lady whose thirst for God has caused her to drive some forty miles to attend a Bible study for years, because she prefers to spend her evenings with God more than sitting at home mindlessly in front of a television. She is a wife, a mother, and a business owner, and yet her thirst for God supersedes all else. You can tell it by listening when she talks. God oozes from her life, her speech, and her passion.
I am not suggesting that you need to do the same thing, I am suggesting that if you do not have this internal craving to know God, there is something wrong. Something in your life is competing for your affections that should be reserved for Him. Today we are on a couple of quests. First, we are on a quest to explore and discover the object of our deepest thirsting and preference. If you can say that God is your only desire, the remainder of our time this morning should be spent in relentlessly pursuing Him again today. If you have discovered that there are one or more things that have taken top billing in your preference department, you must remove those things from the top places, or some of them may need to be removed from your life altogether. God alone should be your chief pursuit, the One you hunger for the most, desire the greatest, and prefer above all things. If you do not have that kind of thirst for God, why not ask Him to create that in you? Ask Him to open the eyes of your heart and to create desire for Him above every other thing in your life. I just stopped writing for a minute to reach over to get a drink of water. I did not have to tell my body to get thirsty, it just did. Several times throughout the day and into the evening I will stop what I am doing to go search out a drink. Sometimes I sip the drink and sometimes I gulp, depending on the amount of thirst I have. Usually the amount of thirst I have is in proportion to the amount of energy I have expended.
Last Mothers’ Day I got a wild hair and decided to ride my bike fifty miles to Hurst, TX where Brenda’s mother and sisters live. It was a warm day, and the longer I pedaled the thirstier I became. I took periodic drinks but came to the shocking realization that I was going to run out of water before my trip was over. I tried to conserve what I could, but with about seven miles to go I drank the last drop and my body was crying out for more water to hydrate itself. I began to feel faint and gutted out those last miles, and when I finally did arrive, I did not care about eating, family, or television. I craved one thing and that was water. I drank as many glasses as I could.
Maybe one of the reasons we do not thirst for more of God is because we do not exert much energy in our pursuit of Him and our service for Him. These would be two good places to start. If we start expending some energy on His behalf I believe our thirst will take care of itself.
Steps to Trust and Obey:
Is there anything in your life you thirst for and prefer more than God? If so, identify it and ask the Lord what He wants you do with it.
What kind of exertion to do you put forth in your pursuit of God? In your service to God?
What are you thirsty for God to do in your heart today? Ask Him for that.
What is God speaking to you and what steps of obedience is He requiring of you?
[1] John Piper, A Hunger for God. Wheaton: Crossway Books, 1997, p. 18
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