There are parts of our country, chiefly in the southwest, where the humidity is so low that a person can be thirsty and not even know it. The reason for this is that your sweat evaporates so quickly that you don’t even realize you’re getting dehydrated. So whether you feel thirsty or not, you need to drink a little water as often as you can. In fact, Grand Canyon National Park even posts signs along its trails that say, “Stop! Drink water. You are thirsty, whether you realize it or not.”
In the same way, we can be thirsty for God and not even realize it. We can feel a thirst down deep in our souls, our bodies may long for God, but we may not recognize the feeling. Or if we do, we realize that our thirst for God is like living in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Where does the thirst for God come from? Why do we hunger for God’s presence?
The truth is human beings were created to be in relationship with God. That is why God created us in the first place, so that we would connect with him personally. We are hardwired for God. And when that longing for God is not satisfied, when we don’t have a good, close relationship with God, we feel it as strongly as hunger pangs or deep thirst. It is a physical response to a spiritual condition.
But sometimes human beings don’t interpret those hunger pangs and deep thirsts in the right way. We realize that we are longing for something, but we don’t really understand that what we need is God. In this world, we are presented with offers of all sorts of things besides God. Daniel Debevoise, a pastor in Orlando, states, “We live in the midst of constant promotion. Everywhere we turn we are bombarded with offers and enticements to fill every imaginable want and desire. Even if we do not need anything, it is easy to be convinced we really want something: a new car, a new computer, a glamorous career, a bigger house, a youthful appearance. However, the offers are false. They promise to satisfy but turn out to be wasted calories without any nutrition. Any way of life that turns us away from God is a way of life that leads to our starvation and death.” Sometimes the problem is that we want the wrong things. And sometimes wanting those wrong things keeps us from wanting the one thing that can truly satisfy us, and that is to be in relationship with God.
Rather than the intense kind of longing for God that is described in Isaiah 55 and Psalm 63, sometimes our craving is just too small. Lindsay P. Armstrong, a pastor in Atlanta, writes that “our appetite for God can seem paltry. While we may energetically desire a new car, professional success, or home remodeling, do we yearn for God with similar zest? While we may steadily save for retirement or vacation, do we seek God with the same regularity, intensity, and focus? Do we hunger for God so deeply that our stomachs growl? Do we love God with the kind of spontaneous enthusiasm that we might bring to one of our other loves: jazz, history, NASCAR, photography, or cooking…? Our gusto for God can be remarkably small, particularly when contrasted with the joy and delight in God that we discover in the Psalms.”
So what seems to be our problem? Is it that we don’t realize that what we most crave is God? Do we believe that our thirst and hunger might be satisfied with enough things, enough stuff, enough prestige, enough money, enough recognition? Or do we understand that we are longing for God but are afraid to admit it? Are we worried about losing control? Are we afraid of appearing weak? Whatever the reason, we can get off track and not see our greatest need as it is. We can miss the whole point of life, the entire meaning of our existence, by focusing on satisfying smaller appetites.
What we really need is repentance. Most people hear that word and assume that what is meant is some kind of extreme spiritual experience that results in confessing our horrible sins. But the word for repent is the Greek “metanoia,” which means “to change your mind.” This is more than just an intellectual change, however; it means changing the focus of your life, changing your moral direction. If you find that you are going the wrong way, then turn around! Live in a different way than you were living before.
Jesus uses the parable of the fig tree to teach this. It seems that a man had planted a fig tree, and after three years it still was not bearing any fruit. The man could see no reason for the tree to be there just taking up space, so he instructed his gardener to cut it down. But the gardener stuck up for the fig tree, and said he would give it some special attention and they should give the tree one more year to see if it might bear fruit. The landowner agreed to this plan. They were going to make sure the tree was given every chance to bear fruit before a final decision was made regarding its fate.
I want to ask you a question. Are you thirsty? Is your soul dry and dusty? Are you having hunger pangs for something you don’t know how to name? Perhaps you are being given the opportunity to grow, to learn now to bear fruit, to truly saturate yourself with being in a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Lent is a time when we are challenged to consider the reality that we may have missed the mark spiritually and we need to repent, to turn around and change directions.
In the movie, Millions, a young boy finds millions of dollars of stolen money. His family members all try to use the money to get something good for themselves. They want to really enjoy their newfound riches. But their efforts to live it up only tear them apart. The boy is the only one in the family who tries to use the money to help someone else. Near the end of the movie, the family finally realizes the futility of what they have been trying to do. They decide to give the money to a project building water wells in a poor African nation. This leads to a great celebration of joy and abundance; everyone who is thirsty, including the boy’s family, comes to the water to drink.
That’s the thing about satisfying our hunger and thirst for God. It leads us to try and meet the needs of others who may be thirsting for actual physical water. Or to feed those who are hungry for actual physical food. In Isaiah’s vision, everyone who is thirsty gets water and everyone who is hungry is invited to eat their fill. When we live into this vision, we find more joy and pleasure in God. Like the psalmist, we will find ourselves praising God with our singing lips, singing in the shadow of God’s wings. And our souls will be satisfied with the richest of foods.
